Excellent summary and analysis, Jim. I agree very much.

++Cantaur spelled out clearly yesterday, and the Covenant Consultation Paper at ANglican Communion hq makes plain, that only nearer the end of a Communion wide discernment process involving many bodies, does the nomenclature of constitutive and associative begin.

Yet here we have several diocese rejecting this process and proclaiming themselves constitutive, central bodies of the AC, and asking ++Cantaur to suborn this, by appealing to him to recognize them as constitutive.

He may in all clarity and firmness ask them: How, by undermining the process I laid out to arrive at constitutive and associative, can you claim to be constitutive?

I suspect he knows the answer before asking.

I would direct the schismatics to the following lines from ++Cantaur's paper:

" It isn't a question of throwing people into outer darkness, but of recognising that actions have consequences - and that actions believed in good faith to be 'prophetic' in their radicalism are likely to have costly consequences."

I would love to see you outline grounds for presentment against +Duncan or any of the other ACN bishops.

And can you please explain how you can use the term "languish" in reference to the 12 odd parishes of the Diocese of Pittsburg which claim want alternative oversight.
Have they applied for DEPO? Are you claiming that +Duncan is being a mean ogre and denying them alternative oversight?

I have seen no reports where +Duncan and his minions have come in under cover of darkness to change locks, seize bank accounts and pry into confidential computer records as happened with Bishop Andrew Smith in Connecticut. Can you provide a link to any news article which confirms such actions by Bishop Duncan? Has he inhibited any priests for "abandonment of communion" as in Connecticutt and in the Diocese of Florida? Your prejudice against the Network Moderator is showing. And typically, you threaten presentments against these men. On what grounds? Being true to "the faith once delivered?"

I thought your previous post was a bit tame for you. But obviously you are recovering your normal paranoia and antipathy towards Bishop Duncan and the rest of the ACN bishops.

Allen Lewis

Just because you're paranoid, does not mean they are not out to get you. Hope you enjoy Nigerian Christianity.

Perhaps the Network dioceses got wind of the threat of deposition before it was announced by Ms Nunley:

http://www.episcopalchurch.org/3577_76450_ENG_HTM.htm

In those circumstances it is entirely understandable that they should wish for the protection of the ABC.

BTW when did it become a deposition offense to request help from the Panel of Reference?

Camma,

The ENS statement comes in response to the votes in the three dioceses. You are suggesting it proceeds them. I think your cause and effect chain is backwards.

Allen Lewis' notwithdstanding, I am not advocating much less "threatening" presentments. I am stating that grounds for presentments exist. In Bishop Duncan's case, one offense would be inviting the primates of other provinces to visit your diocese to ordain clergy to work in Episcopal dioceses over which you exercise no authority.

I meant to link to an article in which the bishop, in my reading, seems to yearn to be presented. I will put that link in now.

Loco Owl, you might find your views more supported on another website. Maybe one run by Westboro Baptist Church.

Yesterday when the news was hitting the fan, I meant to post on "what you were missing" but you figured it out. Very interesting.

I noticed in the ENS piece Griswold said some less than kind things about fellow bishop Duncan's intentions. Seems like everybody but me bought that bestseller "How to Read People's Minds" book at Wal Mart! Dang. It sure could come in handy sometimes.

Gotta run, I want to go buy the X-Ray Spectacles before they sell out.

Jin Naughton,

I do not think that Bishop Duncan has invited primates from other provinces to ordain within his diocese, but as a diocesan bishop he would surely be at liberty to invite any bishop in good standing to ordain on his behalf, within his own diocese, or within their diocese?

And surely the ABC is in good standing within the whole of ECUSA?

Camma, actually he did do this. It was in November of last year. A Bolivian bishop did the ordinations. Sent a priest to the Diocese of Maryland and a deacon to our diocese. I've added that link I mentioned earlier, and it discusses this event.

That the Nigerian church has elected an American Bishop to head the Nigerian Church in America should tell you who is pulling the strings on this puppet, not the Nigerians, but the IRD and conservative American Christians inside and OUTSIDE the Episcopal Church.

That they are trying to undermine Archbishop Williams’ efforts at a covenant is not a surprise. They seek to undermine and destabilize the Episcopal Church, not “agree to disagree”. They don’t want covenant, they want TEC destroyed so they can pick up the pieces and mold it into a church more to their liking. I don't disagree with anyone's right to worship as they desire, but do it by finding a church that fits your beliefs, not by tearing down an existing church so you can rebuild it in your image.

Thanks for that very "inclusive" and "loving" welcome, DanielR.

Your actions would seem to deny just how welcoming TEC is!

Allen Lewis

Thank you for the link to what you consider a ground for presentment against +Duncan. I note, however, that the article does not specify what he might have done to warrant such an action. As I read it, +Duncan merely read a note from someone who threatened him with a "Good Friday," whatever that means.

However, you stated "There are ample grounds for presentments against
any number of prominent conservatives, ..."

Do you have sources to back up that assertion?

Who decides how much distance is "too much?" As I read the several announcements by the various dioceses, none of
them is "leaving" the Episcopal Church. They do, however, call on the
Archbishop of Canterbury for alternative primatial oversight.

Also, I see you have not addressed my question regarding the parishes in the Dio. of Pittsburgh which are supposedly "languishing." I would be willing to bet that,if those "languishing" parishes applied for DEPO, Bishop Duncan would be more
than happy to accomnodate them. This in contrast to Bishop Smith of
Connecticut who inhibits any priest who applies for DEPO.

Is there perhaps some bias in evidence against Bishop Duncan?

Allen Lewis

Allen, I know a number of people in Pittsburgh. The word languish conveys my sense of the feelings that they have conveyed to me.

As I am in hopes that we end up with no presentments against anyone, I don't think it does my cause much good to being publicly pointing out who I think is presentable, so to speak.

Jim Naughton, perhaps you can help me? If the ordination you mention was carried out by a Bolivian bishop, who was sending new clergy to minister in places which had withdrawn from ECUSA, how could Bob Duncan be accused of ordaining clergy intended to interfere in other diocese of ECUSA?

Camma, neither the Diocese of Maryland, nor our diocese here in DC had withdrawn from the Episcopal Church. Steve Levin of the Pittsburgh Post-Gazette and Julia Duin of the Washington Times have both written pretty extensively on the event at which this occurred. Can I suggest having a look at thier coverage?

Has anyone reflected on whether to request alternative primatial oversight is to leave the Episcopal Church? After all, in the Episcopal Church primacy is vested in the Presiding Bishop only on behalf of the General Convention. To request alternative primatial oversight is to request oversight from someone outside the jurisdiction of the General Convention, and thus the primacy of the Episcopal Church.

This is not the same as DEPO, in that DEPO continued under the General Convention - the petitioning congregation remains in the diocese, and the delegated bishop functions only under the jurisdiction of the diocesan bishop, with regard to that congregation. Now, we can argue whether language of "abandoment of communion" applies, but it would seem "abandonment of cure" would apply, since the cures in question are themselves under the jurisdiction of General Convention.

As to leaving a province of the Episcopal Church (as in Pittsburgh leaving Province III), that is addressed in Canons. However, establishing any new province, whether territorial or extra-territorial, requires a change in canons by General Convention. It could not possibly happen before 2009 (and I don't think it likely then).

Hmm.

Several dioceses have requested "alternative primatial oversight."

If I don't like who's in Lambeth Palace, may I request "alternative palatial oversight"?

"I was assuming at the time that the parties to our potential separation would act in good faith. This isn’t what good faith looks like."

Why? Because they have askled for separation? Because they are not waiting until 815 proposes something first? Does anyone think 815 was planning to propose anything? After the failure of DEPO, why would anyone think that? Just because someone asks for something you don't like, it does not follow that that is not in good faith. That makes good faith like the southern definition of good manners: good manners are what I do that I like and bad manners are what you do that I don't like. Or is it that this was a contingency planned beforehand? I do not believe contengency planning is acting in bad faith, whether by these Diocese or by ECUSA, which I am sure has also done lots of planning. Particularly since absolutely everyone on the left and right expected something like this to happen after, as also widely anticipated, GC rejected the WR.

And how is threating presentments good faith? I know, Nunley and others are not "threatening" presentments, they are just, like, informing people that they could happen, like an accident, sort of.

The main point remains that Williams has asked us to work out a separation without coercion. I hope and pray that course will be chosen.