Lord have mercy...

JC Fisher

I gotta be honest, I'm relieved. It would have sealed-the-deal for conservatives who have felt that opinions on homosexuality are always accompanied by infidelity to Nicene Anglicanism.

"Conservative Blogger" now seems to cover everyone but the further-most left of the blogosphere.

I think I heard many of the "not usual suspects" speaking against this election - supporters otherwise of gay ordination, same-sex marriage, women clergy and even the New BCP! Even in the pages of this very website.

In other words, a fair number of "liberal bloggers" were not liberal enough to accept the idea that there is no sin dividing us from God and no need for Jesus to do something about that division and to call on a man who supports such a teaching to not be elected.

But it does seem to be the first election to be swayed by the net.

Not really sure what you are talking about Huw. Not sure you are either. The reference, as one would learn from following the link, is to arguments about Thew Forrester's interest in Buddhism. My point is prcisely your point. He wasn't taken down by the right. There was a broad range of people who had problems with his views. You are attributing to me views on this matter I do not hold.

I suppose it's not the first time the people have raised up a person who has a broader interpretation of certain ideas than the people in charge. It does, however, surprise me that some leaders of our church have no trouble at all asserting our authority and autonomy with regard to the Anglican Communion because that's how we voted, and our votes conformed to our rules, etc... yet still can't manage to celebrate, or even be a good model, when one of her own dioceses makes a decision they are more than 80% agreed upon.

Today's Interfaith lesson: Karma.

All I'll say about the Buddhist issue is that many moons ago, when I was working at the Episcopal Bookstore at the Church Center, Frank Griswold and I were having a conversation about Buddhism and Christianity, and we agreed that Buddhist spiritual practices made one a better Christian. These recent attempts to legislate peoples' prayer lives and limit the clergy so that they can only pay attention to some committee's idea of approved urgings of the spirit is ludicrous, especially if the love of God really is broader than the measure of the mind. I will continue to sit on my cushion with impunity, for the heart of the Eternal is most wonderfully kind.

Buddhism alert:
May all beings have happiness and the causes of happiness; May all beings be free from suffering and the causes of suffering; May all beings never be separated from the supreme joy that is beyond all sorrow; May all beings abide in equanimity, free from attachment and aversion.
Ana Hernandez

Friends, my hunch is that we will look back on this as a tragedy. KTF is doing theology which is both forward looking and solidly within our tradition. His reading of Irenaeus is intelligent and better yet he's actually reading Irenaeus. I trust the Spirit too much to be ultimately pessimistic, but for the moment those who want to replace common prayer with common opinion have won. Liberals and those claiming to be open- minded and alive to the moment will turn on their own in the name of "orthodoxy."

Perhaps, God willing, we will repent of this folly. If not it will haunt us for generations.

Actually, Donald, KTF was unable to convince us that he was doing his theology within the boundary of the creeds. I know--many folks don't let that stop them. But a bishop's job is to teach the faith that we have received and that means someone who not only subscribes to but teaches about human sin and our very real need for redemption through the incarnation and redemptive acts of Christ. For me and a lot of others, it was the creed issue that made us weigh in with a "no"...

Ana,

As far as I'm aware it wasn't the use of buddhist prayer practices but his revision of the Creed for baptism.

Anthony Dale Hunt

Prayers for Fr. Forrester and his family. Even those of us who think the Church did the right thing here should be grieved at what can only seem like a personal tragedy to him.

I hope that the horrible precedent set with Mark Lawrence is not followed here. Northern Michigan should start over again with a fresh slate of nominees. No more single candidate "elections."

Donald, I'd be the first to admit that we could be wrong. Anglicanism requires a sense of our own fallibility, as well as a basic trust in the reliability of the processes and institutions of the visible Church. For us, these are guided by the Spirit without ensuring their infallibility.

In this case, I think history will remember this as the point when the Episcopal Church began to show some backbone about basic Christian doctrine. For too long, we have allowed our respect for difference to mean anything goes. There are boundaries. We might be wrong about whether Fr. Forrester has crossed the line (I find his defense to be unconvincing), but we are not wrong that the Creeds and the liturgy give us some standards (based ultimately in Scripture) that one has to live up to. I would think this would hold for any baptized member of the Church. It is particularly important for bishops, who are charged with guarding the faith.

There may be much that is positive in Fr. Forrester's reading of Irenaeus. It seems to me that the idea of bishops in historic succession as guardians of the apostolic rule of faith is basic to that particular father's thought. I would hope that fidelity to the apostles' teaching would be a question in any episcopal election, just as it would be for commissions on ministry, and in catechesis and preparation for confirmation.

The danger for us has not been witch hunts. It has been an amorphous Christianity that does not adhere to the standards it sets for itself. I could see us tilting too far in the opposite direction, but there is no present danger of that.

Bill - I don't think there's any reason to expect a repeat of the situation with +Mark in South Carolina.

In +Mark's case, the consents were there but they arrived late. (Even after the process deadline was extended.) In Thew's+ case, the no votes are there to deny consent, and they arrived well within the deadline.

Redoing the election and resubmitting the name, is unlikely to change the outcome.

The larger issue is to decide if it's going to be possible for a small diocese using the total-ministry model for the episcopate to be able to find a candidate or mode of episcopate that they can afford.

Huw and Jim make a good observation that the Buddhist practices of KTF were not the reason many opposed him. However, I'd suggest that the Buddhist element was still essential to being denied consent: if it hadn't been for the attention created by the Buddhist lay ordination, people probably never would have dug as deeply into his record and discovered (or at least successfully publicized) his editing of the baptismal rite, etc.

Fair point, Jeff.

Good point, Jeff. Personally speaking, I don't see studying meditation with Buddhists as a problem--after all, I got a good introduction to meditation from Zen Buddhists and others in my college days and still appreciate the value of sitting and counting my breaths.

It is, however, a legitimate flag.

Should follow-up investigation determine that the individual uses it in combination with the appointed Offices, Eucharists, and other more clearly Trinitarian directed forms of prayer (continu[ing] in the apostles’ teaching and fellowship, in the breaking of bread, and in the
prayers)then I'd say there's nothing wrong with it at all.

Lay ordination is a step too far, and subsequent investigation did reveal that this was not the only questionable item.

Should the claim of Buddhist practices have been investigated? Yes. Does that make it a "witch-hunt"? No.

I think this whole affair highlights how misleading labels like "conservative" and "liberal" truly can be.

I also think that this shows signs of recovery of "theological backbone." And yes, we must carefully examine ourselves so that we don't fall into a feeding frenzy.

I have kept and continue to keep Fr Thew Forrester in prayer. He may indeed teach us in his own words or to deepen in our own. After all, I think of the great William Temple's own journey to orthodoxy. By the time he was consecrated bishop, I note, however, he had come to that right praise which is the expectation of the Church for bishops who are called to "guard the faith".

For myself, Fr Thew Forrester's practice of Zen meditation was not a concern in itself. Many faithful Christians, as Bp Breidenthal notes in his letter, have done so. I think of Br Merton.

The problem, to my mind, is where it would seems Zen Buddhist understanding has overtaken Christian understanding in Fr Thew Forrester's teaching such that an understanding of Sin and Christ's saving work (atonement) as in the Creeds disappeared. While we needn't subscribe to a particular theory of atonement, the notion of our being made one with God in and only in Jesus Christ in His Person and work (never separable) is at the heart of the Incarnation--and thus, at the heart of the Creeds and any Christian notion of sanctification/theosis. God makes us one with God, not some work of our own doing. God makes us one with God, not simply do we presume it as if there has been no breach (Sin) even while God has ever always cared for us in the breach. After all, we would not be if he did not.

The other problem is Fr Thew Forrester's revision of the central rites of this Church, indeed, God's service of us--Baptism and Eucharist, to fit his theological perspective, a perspective at odds with the Creeds and with our Prayer Book, which on the whole is incredibly nuanced in these matters, drawing both from West and East in the Great Church.

As Fr Bill has noted, the call of bishop is both conservative and prophetic (I would say humanizing--"will you be merciful to all, show compassion to the poor and strangers, and defend those who have no helper?" It's the rare bishop who is actually a prophet). But that humanization happens within the groundwork of the Living God proclaimed in the Creeds and present to us in the proclamaition and in our patterns of life together in encounter of this God in our central rites.

I am glad that I have waited to comment on this, because I initially found it upsetting in the extreme, and I expect that I would be even more confrontational in tone than I am likely to be here had I not waited a day.

Bill wrote:
"In this case, I think history will remember this as the point when the Episcopal Church began to show some backbone about basic Christian doctrine. For too long, we have allowed our respect for difference to mean anything goes. There are boundaries. We might be wrong about whether Fr. Forrester has crossed the line (I find his defense to be unconvincing), but we are not wrong that the Creeds and the liturgy give us some standards (based ultimately in Scripture) that one has to live up to. I would think this would hold for any baptized member of the Church."

If we are indeed to hold a bishop to this standard, and we do indeed value all of the orders of ministry the same (Bishop, Priest, Deacon and Laity), then I would suggest that we start reviving the 19th century practice of the Scandinavian churches and start holding catechism examinations right now. I would most certainly fail, as I hold very similar views to those espoused by the Rev. Thew. I would then be subject to appropriate discipline or being ostracized from the church.

Quite honestly, there are many of us "in the closet" about our "heretical" Christology, as we know what would happen if we were to "come out" and talk about it openly. I have adopted the position that most persons in my congregation would faint if I so much as mentioned much of my true opinions. There are, however, those of us who are "crossing our fingers" every time we say the Nicene Creed and trying very hard to think in "metaphorical" terms. This is THE problem with ESTABLISHED orthodoxy. It ALWAYS draws boundaries, establishing a "We the Orthodox" on the inside automatically creates "outsiders" who are "We the condemned heterodox." Whenever I try to be really honest to myself about my own perception of the "nature" of God, I find that I am too embarrassed to say anything much at all, at least in positive terms. Is there no room in TEC for an ultimately apophatic approach to these issues? Can we not admit that it is possible that any creed, even the great, holy and unimpeachable Nicene Creed (which from the way it is so reverenced might be assumed to have fallen from heaven on golden tablets rather than hashed out in great controversy), is completely inadequate to define the mystery of God?

Perhaps I should ask that my page be torn out of the parish register and burned with appropriate ceremonies as befits a heretic? Today, I am ashamed to be an Episcopalian.

It's not as if the normativity of the Creed has been concealed. It is mandatory on all Sundays and major feasts. The Catechism and the Quadrilateral are both clear about its normative status. The baptismal rite contains a promise to "continue in the apostles' teaching and fellowship." Is this not a reference to the apostolic rule of faith, and the kerygma at the heart of it? Is not the Nicene Symbol meant to be a hedge around this same faith, specifying the two great dogmas of Trinity and Incarnation?

Apophasis and Kataphasis belong together. God is indeed beyond comprehension, beyond thought, beyond every word or symbol. But God also gives Godself to be known and loved: in creation, in Jesus Christ the incarnate center of creation and history, in the neighbor. We can and do make true affirmations about God. It is possible to say things that are false about God. God is good and not evil.

The Nicene Creed, like the biblical story, identifies a particular subject, i.e. the Triune God. Like any human person, God is a mystery. There is apophasis even when it comes to speaking about God's image. The Creed rules out certain false ways of speaking about God, e.g. the Son is less than the Father, but it does not and cannot exhaust God's mystery.

Bill kindly writes:
"It's not as if the normativity of the Creed has been concealed....Is not the Nicene Symbol meant to be a hedge around this same faith, specifying the two great dogmas of Trinity and Incarnation?"

I agree that the poetry of the creeds is beautiful on paper and in verse and in song, and that the creeds can paint an inspiring "picture" that can lead us into relationship with and contemplation of the divine. What I cannot bring myself to believe in any longer is the literality of any of it. The problem of Theodicy is just too acute, too painful to be reconciled with any of these "great dogmas." As a neurologist, I see a great deal of disease, pain and suffering. To quote the question to Jesus from the Gospels, "Whose sin was it?" that caused these things to be? (If we insist on using the language of "sin." ) And if it was not sin, then why does the "good," all-powerful creator and father inflict such misery on his supposedly beloved children? Dogmatic Western Christianity has never had a satisfactory answer to this question, but it is the central question of human existence and sentience. It is quite simply a brute fact that, throughout the history of humanity, the vast majority of persons have been born in poverty, lived in poverty, ignorance, suffering and disease and died in misery. Unless they are getting their "reward" for good behavior in the "next world," then this fact strikes a note of falsehood in a literally-understood interpretation of the Creeds and symbols of our faith. I would say not that "God is good and not evil" but rather "God is not good and not evil" or better that "God is not not good and not not evil" adding as many negations as possible until the intellect gives up in the paradox.

And if we understand the language of the creeds as metaphorical and mystical rather than literal and subject to logical scrutiny, then should we really be using them as a test or "hedge" to fence in the orthodox ground? In the end, I would submit that manner of life is a far better criterion for judging if someone is "worthy" of the office of Bishop. The parable of Jesus about the judgment did not ask "Did you affirm the Nicene and Apostles Creeds as normative?" but did you feed the hungry, minister to the sick, visit those in prison, etc. Would it not be better to know the "true Christian" by his/her "fruits" rather than subscription to a certain dogmatic formulation?

In the end, I think, when all doctrines and dogmas and creeds cease and we behold "not as in a mirror dimly" but "face to face," all of these arguments (mine especially included) will seem a bit ridiculous.

Thank you, Bill, for taking the time to care and to respond. I hope that you will hold me in your prayers, and I will certainly hold you in mine.

Dr. Shy, Bill, Derek and all,

I do hope this event will be something more, other and better than our church's embarking on an inquisition or litmus-test scrutiny of every episcopal election from now on. The one sign of hope I see just now is that we're arguing (some of us including Kevin Thew Forrester) about how to read and use Irenaeus, an early and significant Christian theologian, trained in the Eastern Church and Greek tradition, serving in the West, teaching in a church that had suffered bitter persecution and martyrdoms, and asking the question of what we teach and how we proclaim and practice Gospel to a world that longs for Good News.

Coincidentally perhaps, the very fine, very accessible article in the June 2 Christian Century, "How does Jesus Save? An Alternative view of Atonement" by William C. Placher sorts through alternative readings of atonement (how is God reconciling us and the world to God's self?) and lands on Irenaeus as a place divergent interpretations and teachings may find common ground. I haven't been able to find an electronic copy of the article that I can link to here, but it's well worth getting a print copy, meanwhile here's a decent overview of it -
http://readingpastor.blogspot.com/2009/05/how-does-jesus-save.html

Bill, thank you for this description of Archbishop Temple:

'I think of the great William Temple's own journey to orthodoxy. By the time he was consecrated bishop, I note, however, he had come to that right praise which is the expectation of the Church for bishops who are called to "guard the faith."'

I stumble, only slightly, at Archbishop Temple's treatment of Bishop Hall and Li Tim Oi. I think, in hindsight at least, that his leadership at that point was off the mark. But, that's a digression at the moment, or mostly so. What I appreciate and want to point out for those who didn't catch it is that "Right praise" translates the Greek word 'orthodoxy' more compellingly and in a much more Anglican spirit than what Plato scornfully calls "Right opinion" or what the later church would land on as "right doctrine."

Dr. Shy, your concerns about orthodoxy and heresy resonate intriguingly in Irenaeus' work. He just might be more welcoming of your experience than the title of his main work, 'Against Heresies, Refutation of the Gnostics Falsely So-Called' would suggest.' His Second Century perspective framing the terms 'orthodoxy' and 'heresy' thoroughly emphasizes and legitimizes, as your note does, the common experience of people in church.

The 'false gnostics' Irenaeus researched, studied and quoted at length (an interesting and maybe unique project when he undertook it) offered esoteric "knowledge" and special highly spiritualized interpretations of what they claimed was a higher truth that only a few could receive, understand and know.

Irenaeus advocates for the power of the church's ordinary storytelling, public teaching that makes some kind of sense to a crowd without fancy theological training. Irenaeus insisted that the whole of human history and experience was God's work and that in it all we saw God leading us all to maturity, union, and becoming more and more like God.

The 'false gnostics' proclaimed a spiritual principle in Jesus and an escape from mundane, ordinary life, sickness, decay and death.

For the self-designated 'gnostics,' the 'ones who knew' or were 'in the know,' Jesus wasn't a man in flesh in whom we meet God, but a spiritual principle.

Irenaeus taught that God's presence with us in Christ in the whole of our embodied, messy, conflicted human experience was God's purpose from the beginning, that God was breathing God's Spirit in the breath of every living being and that God's purpose in creation was to fill all things, all beings, life in its confusing, messy specificity with God's self so we could meet and see God everywhere, beginning in the whole life of Christ. Irenaeus boldly taught that Incarnation, coming in flesh, dwelling with us, was God's purpose from the beginning.

I think most Episcopalians who mutter the creed and strain to find metaphors to make sense of it are close to one significant intention of Irenaeus; they're rejecting an esoteric, rarefied world of false gnosticism (a cult of special knowledge for the few). When people stumble over the creed and think, 'maybe this isn't supposed to make sense to people like me,' or 'I feel like I'm on firmer ground when we're just telling the stories with all their ambiguities and contradictions,' they speak from the ordinariness, the plain humanity that Irenaeus was defending. And for him the power of the creed - at that point a baptismal formula something more like the Apostles' Creed - was the directness and humanity of the story it told.

Irenaeus believes the ordinary telling of the ordinary story is holy (including the Old Testament which many 'gnostic' teachers rejected and including a lot of ordinary human experience of the contradictions of living as limited embodied selves). Irenaeus teaches that the plain public teaching moves ordinary people to a falling in love with God. He doesn't reject 'gnosis,' and I'd argue doesn't reject it because his Old Testament trained ear remembers that 'knowledge' is also personal, intimate, passionate, transforming, face to face ('We shall know as we are known') and even so embodied that it makes sense that the Old Testament uses the same language for the knowledge of God and sexual relations between partners.

This painful debate around Kevin Thew Forrester's election has got me thinking about how much 'orthodoxy' and 'knowledge' in the early centuries was a defense of ordinary people's plain understanding that God's work included the whole of our lives, a defense against what was esoteric, refined, spiritualized, and potentially elitist. When a parishioner came to KTF and asked if his child's baptism had to include reference to Satan and personified evil, KTF made a pastoral response. It's a respone that's in keeping with a knowledge of various baptismal formulas (including our own BCP tradition's brier description of emergency baptism). What makes a baptism, a baptism. Classically, historically, it's the use of water and the invocation of the Trinitarian formula.

Interestingly KTF didn't re-write the baptismal formula, so, he didn't replace baptism 'in the Name of the Father, Son and Holy Spirit' with baptism 'in the name of the Creator, Redeemer, and Sanctifier' or some other less than fully Trinitarian gloss. I see the work he did with a pastoral situation as appropriate and the form he wrote as solidly within our Christian tradition and understanding of baptism. Does it ask a question or challenge the expression of the 1979 BCP? Yes. Is the BCP an adequate test of orthodoxy or a boundary we must not cross? I don't think so. Faithfulness to the tradition and in a missionary moment is more complex than that. Messy? Yes.

Irenaeus' teaching of orthodoxy and knowledge (Christian gnosis) isn't about protecting a boundary but about breaking one open. He's defending the religion that freed and blessed the lives of Roman slaves against a religion that comforted an elite with their sense that they knew better than any one else.

So, back to Bill's translating 'orthodoxy' as right praise - Anglicanism at its best trusts that telling the story together, praying together, giving thanks to God and breaking bread together is holier and truer than our religious opinions.

There's a lot on our Anglican horizon at the moment that would like to change that. Archbishops, maybe Canterbury, "conservative" pundits, and now some pastoral liberals are asking whether 'in times like these' we can get by without making a clearer definition of faith, without checking to make sure we all mean the same thing when we say certain words. As I hear it (and fear it) that sounds like the beginning of the 'false gnosticism' Irenaeus warns us against. We've got more than 450 years or managing, more or less, to hold together by praying together, by continuing to tell the same story and read the same scriptures, and by respecting the good faith of those whose questions aren't ours. That bit of Anglican genius, sloppiness, disorder, creativity, blessing and love looks to me like what Irenaeus is defending as orthodoxy and knowledge of God.

I feel badly for Fr. Thew Forrester and for the Diocese of Northern Michigan, though I respect the church's process that may lead to him not becoming a bishop.

As a member of the Standing Committee in East Tennessee, I voted to consent to his election, as did the majority of our committee. I was not so much concerned with his theology initially, as with the fact he was the only candidate. However, the canons do not specify that there must be multiple candidates, and after considering the unique context of ministry in Northern Michigan, I was persuaded to support him.

I think that Thew Forrester's biggest problem is that he has departed somewhat from the linguistic and conceptual world of the Christian tradition, and this has led him to be construed as someone whose theology, and particularly Christology, lies outside the range of what is "acceptable."

In truth, his theology resembles that of many of the ancient fathers and mothers of the church. They, however, put forth their understanding of things using the language which we now know as traditional. But the idea that salvation is union with God (a union which preserves our identity) and that Christ opens the way to find this unity is hardly a heretical notion.

It is unfortunate that the Buddhist meditation practice has become an issue. In truth, the Christian tradition has preserved meditation techniques that are very similar to Buddhist techniques, though most Christians are unaware of them. In recent years, various contemplative movements in the church have sought to recover them, and bring them back out into the mainstream of Christian life.

It seems that Fr. Thew Forrester's consecration is unlikely to happen. Let us pray for him and his family, and for the Diocese of Northern Michigan, who will surely be bewildered, frustrated and injured by this outcome.

Peace,
Matthew Dutton-Gillett
Rector
St. Elizabeth' Church,
Knoxville, TN

May God have mercy on we who call ourselves His "church" and forgive us for what we do in His name. I stand right beside Dr. Shy and Rector Dutton-Gillet in prayer. I am so weary of hearing how we must attempt to recreate a lost past in order to remain "faithful" to Christ.

There is no direct connection to the early Church and there never was -- merely recollections and passed-down stories that are generations removed which have been lost in history and all we have are copies of copies of copies which we have built our house of sand upon.

Yet we feel confident and secure in dramatically altering the lives of fellow children of God in our role as judges and jury in so many ways every single day and, it seems, many, if not most, feel not the slightest fear and trembling in taking this power upon themselves.

I will not condemn Rev. Thew-Forrester nor would the Christ I know, love, and follow in my everyday life.

Bless the diocese of Northern Michigan, oh Lord, for mistaking their own prayerful consideration and work as a legitimate working of your Spirit. They knew not what they did according to the "majority" and orthodoxy, in its empty frailty against reality, is saved yet again from the world in which we all dwell. Amen.

Priscilla

Priscilla,

Some of us have found a remarkable freedom, honesty, and responsiveness to the moment in ancient Christian writers. Reading Irenaeus and the Syriac theologians as Thew Forrester does is exhilarating. Things we've 'always known' collapse and new possibilities emerge. Things that were settled ideas start to emerge as living encounter.

No, it doesn't work to simply quote and copy the ancient writers or try to reproduce their thought in our setting, but part of what Kevin Thew Forrester is doing is clearly rooted in a reassessment of today based on a re-reading of an ancient yesterday.

This strange power of an open reading working to gain familiarity with the past to renew the present is onelogic to the etymology of 'radical,' in radix (and radishes!)- roots. What is most fresh and alive has strong, healthy roots.

More often than note, I hear the word 'tradition' invoked in short-sighted, unrooted ways. Our tradition isn't 1928 or 1866 or 1662 or 1559 or 1552 any other decisive moment. It's a conflicted, confusing, inspiring story of us a time ago encountering an unfamiliar moment and still us, still in the presence of God, still the body of Christ. The bigger the sweep of our reading the better, and the most ancient sources may be most powerful because they're most unexpeccted.

Jesus faced off against the "tradition of the pharisees" (their late first century b.c. attempts to codify the law) in part from what we have to hear as a re-reading of centuries earlier (and more radical and freeing) work of the writing prophets like Isaiah, Amos, and Hosea.

The thing I admire about Kevin Thew Forrester's work is his determination to ground an openness to NOW and mission in an open re-reading of our tradition. That's what I'm afraid our church is recoiling from and if that is what we're doing, that's what I see will really cost us.

The Spirit is looking to find who will be faithful, who can listen to the holy life of the community in the past and the yearning of people in the present. If we say 'not us' - - and despite the sincere voices of friends here who think we did the right thing with KTF, I think that's what we're saying - - the Spirit WILL find whatever people and community is ready. God's yearning is to draw humanity together and into communion.

love,
donald

Having followed this story closely for months, and having read Bishop Elect Forrester's theological position paper "Approaching the Heart of Faith", I believe the church has lost the opportunity to have a subtle, bold, and faithful theologian in the house of bishops.
I thank God that we have him in the church, and trust that this decision will not affect his relentless pursuit of the living Christ, nor diminish his bold preaching of the heart of our faith and the ultimate gift from our God: Resurrection from sin, fear, and death.

The danger for us has not been witch hunts. It has been an amorphous Christianity that does not adhere to the standards it sets for itself.

Sez who, Bill? Those whose minds---like deadly, defective parachutes---fail to open? We will NEVER, as a Church, be NARROW enough for them.

FWIW, I say the Nicene Creed, as Louie Crew says, "without crossing my fingers" (except that I refuse to call the Holy Spirit "He"!)...

...but that doesn't mean that I don't think Christianity has become weaker EVERY time we took a vote on Truth, and then gave the minority-party the boot! The Church would be stronger, True-er, if it found a way to INCLUDE every so-called "heretic" in the closer-to-the-Mind-of-Christ CONSENSUS.

And so w/ KTF. He might be a heretic, or he might understand God better than you do, Bill (Needless to say, I'm sure either/both of you understand God better than I do!)

I accept the need for a democratic, elective process in TEC: God only knows, I've defended it enough in the confirmation of +Gene Robinson or the election of the PB, etc, etc.

...but we should never confuse a majority-vote with Truth, or raise orthodoxy above orthopraxis. Right behavior, I'm convinced, would be to have a way to continue the conversation about KTH, instead of this headline, "Kevin Thew Forrester's election reportedly fails".

This is just kicking the minority to the curb (the people of Northern Michigan, FAR more than KTH personally) yet again. I repeat: Lord have mercy!

JC Fisher

Clark--Subtle theologian? Maybe. I admire Eckhart's theology, to which Fr. Forrester appeals. I don't think that Eckhart would make a good bishop. (Or that Fr. Forrester's Christology is nearly as faithful to the distinction between children by adoption and the Son by nature. It is only insofar as we are in God that we are children and images in the same sense as Christ.) The statement he issued in his defense does portray his thought in the most positive light possible. What I don't see is any distancing of himself from things that he repeatedly said that are quite problematic.

What about the sensus fidelium? Does that not count for something when choosing a successor to the apostles? The Church does not seem to recognize that Fr. Forrester is teaching its faith.

JCF--"Kicking the minority to the curb"? I don't see how this could be anything nearly that violent. It would be a profound disappointment to some in Northern Michigan and certainly to Fr. Forrester.

I've never advocated the view that some espouse, namely that we must respect the wishes of the local diocese. That was a bad argument when it came to Bishop Robinson's consecration. There are real impediments, doctrinal and otherwise, that can and should prevent a bishop or standing committee from consenting to an election. Apparently the majority of standing committees and probably a majority of bishops, including some very liberal dioceses, feel that Fr. Forrester is not teaching the faith of the Church.

The headline does report the news that has been received. I think it is to the credit of those commenting that we have sought to continue the conversation. I am certainly praying for Northern Michigan as they process some difficult news.

I think we do have more of a connection with the early church than some suggest. We have, actually, a great deal of the writings of the ancient fathers (sadly, not so much from the mothers).

Fr. Forrester is doing is what each and every generation of Christians must do. That is, using the intellectual inheritance and experience of our time to proclaim the Christ Event in a way that brings people to God. It is necessary if the church is to remain relevant and credible in every generation.

But, sometimes those at the frontier of this effort get burned in the attempt. Origen is a good reminder of that. It saddens me that Fr. Forrester is one of those, along with his diocese, that is ending up in the fire.

Matthew Dutton-Gillett

Fr. Schell,

With regard to my use of "right praise" for orthodoxy, I would never pit praise against doctrine. In the early proper prefaces of the East, for example, was used "all the angels offer their undending theologies". Later this became doxologies--their glories. Doctrine is about Who it is we are in relationship and Who it is we can trust. Certainly, because doctrine is in human language, it is only ever "sufficient," but nonetheless, communicates in a human way who it is that God is and is for us. The two great doctrines of the Church, Incarnation and Trinity, mean to communicate this God. Again, "sufficiently," that Anglican watchword that balances apophatic and kataphatic.

Thinking of Rahner, certainly God is infinite, beyond ever reducing to words, and yet God in Godself and character will not be at odds with who God has revealed Godself in the flesh in Jesus. As St Damascene makes so splendidly clear, in the flesh of Jesus Christ we see God.

I understand your frustration, Priscilla, but I would not agree entirely with what you have said. Specifically, we actually have a large amount of material from the ancient fathers of the church (much less, I'm afraid, from the ancient mothers). And it is certainly possible to describe a lineage which extends from their time to ours.

I would agree, however, that we cannot recreate the Christianity of the past, nor should we try. To my mind, the special genius of the ancient Christian teachers was that their wisdom and theology was rooted in their experience of God in prayer, and that they attempted to use the intellectual and cultural inheritance of their time to articulate the truth of Christ in a way that would bring people of their world into an experiential and saving enounter with the living Christ.

Every generation of Christians is obliged to do this, and some generations have done it better than others. If our proclamation is to remain relevant and credible, we must articulate our faith in a way that reaches the people of our time, and brings them into relationship with God in Christ. In our time, that includes recognizing the multi-religious world which we inhabit, in which people of different faiths live side by side.

The difficulty of this work is that it is not always easy to discern when one has crossed a line that seems to place you "out of bounds" in terms of the discernment of the Christian community to which you belong. I think immediately of Origen, one of the most creative thinkers and theologians of the ancient world. His insights influenced a large number of ancient Christian teachers, but in the end, Origen did go a bit too far in the judgment of his contemporaries, and sadly, was ultimately declared a heretic. Nevertheless, many continued to use and draw on his ideas, without invoking him by name.

Fr. Forrester is continuing in this tradition, and sadly, it seems that he has gone too far for many, and like Origen, he and his diocese have been burned by it (though, I hope, we will not go so far as to declare him a heretic). Nevertheless, the work that he is doing is and will remain an important contribution to the on-going effort of the Christian community to proclaim the truth of Christ in a way that can bring people of our time into relation with the living Christ.

One thing that does concern me about all of this is that perhaps it is one of the first fruits that has resulted from the beating we have been taking from elements in the Anglican Communion. There was a time when participation in the services of the Book of Common Prayer was the only "test" for orthodoxy that was really ever applied in The Episcopal Church. And Fr. Forrester's liturgical experiments notwithstanding, I have not seen anything which suggests he declines to participate in the services of the BCP. Perhaps some are moving toward a different "test of orthodoxy", one which is not quite consistent with our previous tradition as Episcopalians.

One wonders what we would learn if current bishops were asked to tell us (honestly) about all of their theological views.

Let us pray!

Peace,
Matthew Dutton-Gillett

Matthew, thank you very kindly for your thoughtful reply. The problem for me remains, however, exactly within those materials from the "church fathers" that I approach so carefully and grow so weary of hearing about.

These men, however fine and upstanding and pioneering, were humans as we are, grappling with understanding the meaning of God and Christ in the context of their times and lives in a far distant past.

What has happened over the centuries to their writings is that they have been elevated to a level that equates them with God's own words rather than the opinions of fallible humans. I do not apologize for my "post-modern" reading of ancient texts -- it is the only reading that makes sense to me at all.

Is there wisdom and experience that we can draw on from these ancient writings? Absolutely! But to use their words centuries later, out of the context of their times and limited understandings seems to be to be a very dangerous game that, more often than not, harms far too many whose experiences and beliefs differ.

Just translating a document from the original language to modern English changes its meaning in important ways, let alone dealing with the assumptions of the native speaker grounded in his own time of writing.

I do not advocate "anything goes" but rather "all are welcome", which is not the same as "all have equal say".

I will continue to argue against what I see as a burgeoning orthodoxy litmus test emerging in TEC that is probably grounded in the fear of rapid change and modernization of the church in the world.

It has led (in the past and currently) to a clinging to, if not outright idolatrous worship of, the "faith once delivered" divorced from the living faith in the here and now.

My God and my Jesus are still very much alive, still speaking new words to us which the "fathers" and apostles weren't ready to hear, and they are still involved in the world and they are dishonored by those who would view them only with centuries-old eyes or through centuries-old lenses, in my not-so-humble opinion. They have nothing to fear from the heterodox -- they are God.

Namaste

Bill, Eckhart is an interesting example to bring up. If we were back in Chicago it would be a great topic for a bull session at the Div School Coffee Shop.
However, I don't think this whole debacle has anything to with Forrester's theology, which can be given an orthodox interpretation if one wants to be charitable. I doubt most standing committees or bishops gave "Approaching the Heart of Faith' much of a second glance before making their decisions. Not nearly as close a reading as the folks at Stand Firm, who, interestingly enough, also drew the theological line in the sand over the issue of 'adoption' versus 'nature'-- another red herring in my opinion.

Rather, to my eyes this is the church playing, yet again, the power politics of orthodoxy--a politics of fear, fear pure and simple. Just as it is doing in keeping the subcommittee of the house of bishops secret for fear of being 'lobbied.' As you and I agree, no theologian worth her salt would be 'afraid' of hearing views that disagree with her own, temperate or otherwise. We know the history of polemic in the church, and do not shrink back, I trust, from heated controversial wrestling over the heart of our faith.
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In the Forrester case, what I see is fear of appearing less than robustly orthodox to our Anglican brothers and sisters as we try to convince them that one can be theologically orthodox and supportive of full inclusion of our glbt brothers and sisters. So I agree with you over your earlier concern about the last paragraph of Breidenthal's letter, which seemed to be casting an anxious glance toward Canterbury over how the Forrester election would play. That's politics, not theology, and its a politics of fear, when what we need is a relentless, resurrection centered bold love casting out the shadows of fear and doubt over our faithfulness in embracing full inclusion. We need to read Stringfellow again to rid ourselves of this demon, I think. How remarkable that he supported Bishop Pike and yet both Karl Barth and Rowan Williams (whose orthodox creds are not in doubt, I trust!) count him as one of our church's greatest theologians. But alas, he too probably would have made a lousy bishop, given his disgust for clericalism and seminary style theological hairsplitting over lost causes.

I for one have lost interest in appearing orthodox in the eyes of those who, as you so eloquently put it in an earlier thread, "are still holding on to heteronormativity [...] doing so for other than theological reasons.' Yes, they are holding to it out of fear. And so the charge of herersy or heterodoxy in our church today, has become fear politics as I see it. In a nutshell, I view Forrester as its latest casualty. But I do not worry for him--his faith is rooted not in politics of orthodoxy, but the living Christ of the resurrection, a fact that shines through in his writing. Perfect love casts out fear. That's the center of his theology, and that's not a bad place for a bishop to start.

Tobias Haller on one of the relevant issues:
http://jintoku.blogspot.com/2009/06/tinkers-curse.html

Clark,

I do continue to have concerns about that part of Bishop Breidenthal's otherwise outstanding letter.

The concerns about Fr. Forrester's Christology are real, and Bishop Breidenthal is right on about them. I also have concerns about Fr. Forrester's alterations to the baptismal liturgy, which I believe to be related to the Christological heresies. His defense is simply not convincing to me in light of the large body of consistently heretical preaching and liturgical practice that he has never distanced himself from. I would welcome a conversation with friends like, e.g., you and Donald Schell, about why it is convincing to you.

Stringfellow's point that the charges against Bishop Pike were motivated by his stance on questions of race is perhaps true. What I would have liked to have seen at the time (I wasn't alive yet and neither were you, right?) would be an emerging coalition of orthodox from across the ideological spectrum who would say that Pike's Trinitarian and other heresies were unacceptable and so was the racism of some of his opponents. It is remarkable that a wide variety of liberal and moderate Anglo-Catholics have joined with evangelicals and traditionalist Catholics to say, "No, this isn't the Church's faith." I don't think that all of them are playing to Canterbury. I'm certainly not. We have concerns about the apostolic faith.

If the Episcopal Church is going to survive and thrive, it is going to have to be more true to its doctrinal heritage. In the absence of cultural Christianity, this is absolutely essential. I'm not at all sure that the Anglican Communion will help us do that. We need to do this for ourselves if we are to become a viable post-Christendom tradition of faith and practice. I am equally convinced that only an Episcopal Church that comes to a coherent position that moves to and beyond full inclusion of all the baptized will be viable. Our great competitive advantage is being a liturgical, catholic, reformed Church with less sexist and heterosexist baggage. Both with regard to the creeds and with regard to inclusion, we need to be far less tolerant of those who will not adhere to the norms we have set for ourselves. Welcoming all does not mean and never has meant that we have no boundaries.

Bill,
You've used the word heretical to describe Forrester's theology. I can certainly understand, that being your opinion, why you think it good that he not be a bishop in our church. Bishops should not be heretics in your view. You've also shared that you think Pike's theology was heretical and should not have been tolerated.
Spong must surely fit your definition of heretical. (If not, please tell me why, for I will be utterly mystified by your criteria if not!) If so, do you think he should have been deposed as a bishop? He was and is, as we all know, unrepentant in his theological views, even after their heretical nature has been pointed out to him ad nauseum. Since a heretic in purple would seem a hell of a lot worse than a mere priest(as Forrester currently is) or lay heretic, surely you must have thought he should have been deposed. If not, why not?

Can we please, for a moment, not conflate heteronormativity and concerns about Fr Thew Forrester's theology? That isn't just. Conflating these two things suggests that any criticism of his theology is also related to heterosexism or is itself heterosexist. This sort of thing is done by those who would criticize Bp Spong's theology as well. I'm critical of Bp Spong's theology and consider a bishop who repudiates our core doctrines to be problematic in the extreme. Why in the world bother being a bishop at all of something one completely rejects? But to teach that rejection, often with a fundamentalist mindset of one's own? No way.

To my mind, conflating theological criticism and -isms at every turn tell's me gay people cannot be serious and orthodox theologians because to do so requires being heterosexist. I would suggest that in fact it lumps gay people and is itself a form of heterosexism. How does this lumping then explain the criticisms of myself or Fr Haller? It is precisely the radicalness of Incarnation and Trinity that gives me room to argue for a place in the Church and to challenge heterosexism in the Church.

Certainly, politics may be brought in here, but I don't think that's all that's going on. Some of us do not hear an adequate expression of the faith once delivered. Christ's "begottenness" has been sloppily mixed up with our "adoption," for example. The result on the practical level is a tendency to suggest we can get to our own enlightenment. To me, this sounds like having imported Buddhist understandings without proper Christian refinement.

I am troubled by Fr Thre Forrester's Christology, which seems to want to get to union with God without always being clear that union is only through, with, and in Jesus Christ. Union with God is in Christ as Schmemann would insist over and over in For the Life of the World. Which says that the work of salvation is done for us, not something we must do. It also suggests that Sin is something to take seriously. At least on of Fr Thew Forrester's sermons suggests quite otherwise, bypassing Sin and suggesting union already was. Someone as astute as Maurice or Ramsey would suggest that as this is so at all it is because the Eternal Word was already at work and present in the world before the Incarnation.

I am also troubled by alterations to the central rites of our faith, Baptism and Eucharist, to fit a theology that is at odds with the Creeds and our own conformity to the Prayer Book.

I am also troubled that Fr Thew Forrester's theology seems to be of a kind of dabble of this and that without adequate clarity about who Jesus Christ is and is for us and our salvation while we were yet sinners. We cannot ignore either salvation or sinners in this regard. But this sort of dabble is something I run into more and more, often without any grounding in Anglican divines at all. More, this dabbling can easily lead to misreadings of say St Nyssa if the whole of a theology is not engaged.

I also am not as troubled by that part of Bp Breidenthal's letter. It is a reassurance that we do share theologically. It gives some space for folks to work through moral theology/ethics without sensing we've abandoned the faith once delivered. I think that's important when lgbt persons are often accused of being apostate for merely existing and living.

It also gives room to challenge Canterbury by taking a strong theological core related to how we are to be together, including with lgbt Christians.

Christopher, I fear I am being misunderstood, and I want to try to clarify my position. I certainly am not suggesting that those who criticize Forrester do so out of heteronormativity. I know full well that you, Tobias, and Bill do not, by a long shot. Nor am I suggesting that being progressive on the issue of sexuality requires sharing Spong's or Pike's views. I do not and would probably be considered quite traditional in my theology (I agree almost entirely with Tobias, by the way, on hewing to the BCP, which is my practice as a parish priest in almost all cases). Nor am I saying that we cannot disagree with or have problems with Forrester's theology, Christology, etc. But I suspect that if we began to ask the kind of questions we are asking of him to many of our current bishops, we would have problems with them too, and yet I don't hear anyone (other than the Stand Firm folks) suggestig that that is grounds for them not being good bishops. Good theological debate is crucial, and our seminaries, in my view, bear a lot of the responsibility for having bishops, priests and laity who are not able to articulate their theology as well as we would like. But as Rowan Williams pointed out in his Book Anglican Identities, heresy does not mean being an inadequate theologian. I am saying that one can, if one is so inclined, read Forrester charitably as falling within the boundaries of orthodoxy, Surely he is more orthodox than either Spong or Pike, and many of us would say that theological disagreements notwithstanding, we are grateful they were bishops, and in some absolutely crucial ways, especially for glbt folks, they were wonderful bishops. We can work on their theology, but not jump to the power politics of heresy trials either in reality or on the blogs.

Finally,I come back to Stringfellow precisely because I think his theology, robust, biblical, liturgically quite traditional, with a radical social justice orientation, is our best bet for finding what many of us want in the church. And I would suggest that he would be appauled at what we have done in this case, just as he was appauled at what was being done to Bishop Pike.

One last thought before I go nighty night (actually, I'm going to sing some blues!). I wrote above that I have lost interest in appearing orthodox to those clinging to heteronormativity because, as Bill rightly puts it, they so cling with anything but theological reasons. In truth, I have no reason to doubt my own orthodox credentials. (though i know others might!) I am steeped in and love the Christian tradition and have no desire to kick it to the curb in favor of the latest trend.

What I was referring to is folks like Ephraim Radner, with whom I have had rather intense theological discussions on occasion. Because I rejoice in the witness and faith of gay and lesbian Episcopalians in our church, (orthodox and not so orthodox), I think I will never be, no matter how many orthodox theological positions I may happen to hold, other than heretical in Radner's eyes. (I pushed him on this once, and though he never answered me directly, he would never admit that I could be orthodox theologically as long as I supported same sex unions.) The reason, I believe, is because, as Bill has said, heteronormativity is not a theological position, or if it is, it is a theology of fear and shame. That theology I consider utterly, utterly heretical, as does, I am convinced, every great orthodox theologian we care to name. (Which is not to say they didn't all have their bad days when fear ruled their hearts--just look at the late Augustine, especially his views on hell in City of God!)

So, I do not worry about being viewed as less than orthodox by folks like Radner, who our Archbishop of Canterbury has at times held up as one of our country's finest 'orthodox' anglican theologians. Nor would I worry, if, (don't I wish!!) Williams ever read my drivel and thought it heretical and deficient in all kinds of ways. I have a dissertation chapter outlined, by the way, critiquing his reading of Brothers Karamazov, precisely on this issue we are discussing. Crazy, I know, to go against one of the greatest Dostoevsky scholars of our time, but the theme of the dissertation is exuberant, foolish boldness before God--parrhesia in the Greek--and, by extension, God's highest representatives. Doesn't look orthodox to argue with God, the almighty and their theology--but my argument is that it may well be one of the highest expressions of true faith precisely so to do.

I have no desire for witch hunts, Clark. I do want some gentle but firm acts of self-definition on the part of our leadership. We are a diverse little community but we do need to define ourselves or we will not persist over time.

We don't need to comb through the records of the present bishops. We do need to be more careful about whom we confirm. In some cases, we may need to exercise more discipline when a bishop (or priest or deacon) is engaged in heretical teaching. The best interventions will be earlier on, by Commissions on Ministry and seminary faculties. This will probably be misheard as a desire for very narrow litmus tests, but what I am arguing for is broad, generous orthodoxy. We need a sense of theological openness and legitimate pluralism without having no standards at all.

If I were a member of the HOB (highly unlikely) and there were a presentment against Spong, I would vote to depose him. I'm not sure I would lead the charge, but I might even sign the presentment.

My only reservation is that I think that this kind of move is, in part, playing into his hands and rewarding his attention seeking behavior.

On the other hand, if someone known to have Spongian views came up for a confirmation vote and I were on a Standing Committee or a member of the HOB, I would absolutely refuse to confirm.

I would think the standard of core doctrine established in the Righter trial would lead us to a similar conclusion.

In Bishop Spong's case, that is. We were absolutely correct to throw out the charges against Bishop Righter.

Thanks for sharing your view, Bill. I disagree, and would find myself on Stringfellow's side here. I think he was right to defend Pike, and I would defend Spong in a heresy trial in spite of the many many theological differences I have with him.

though as I say, and would be prepared to defend, Forrester's theology is a far cry from Spongs. It is actually, in my view, deeply rooted in the tradition and the whole 'he is not really a Christian but buddhist' thing, which by some is parsed as saying he has no doctrine of sin, is patently false. He has a robust doctrine, at least if we look closely at "Approaching the Heart of Faith." No herery there, in my view.

Perhaps it is my ignorance (since I am neither a learned theologian nor in holy orders) but this thread troubles me deep in my soul.

I see little of value in these weighty arguments about putting up yet more boundaries and stop signs to block those who would enter or rise in the ranks of TEC and making sure only the "right kind" of Christian can be a member, a deacon, a priest, or a bishop.

It is one thing to require someone to take oaths to uphold the faith and canons and quite another to develop an orthodox theology litmus test (no matter how you frame it) that must be adhered to by threat of excommunication. You've already kicked me out, BTW, in your above post, LOL.

Rome does that better, by the way.

Toeing the orthodox line is an external conformity that feels safe in the light of change and uncertainty. Your theology and commissions will never have the ability to put the heart and soul of a human being on trial for orthodoxy, however, so it will be largely cosmetic and there will be eternal subversion as has always been the case.

I put my full and firm faith in the fact that God is God and God doesn't need human created roadblocks and laws to protect God's integrity in worship or belief. The Spirit blows where it will and if it blows those of us who see a new creation being made by God outside of TEC perhaps then TEC can become more pure and assured of surviving in a safe, orthodox integrity and the Thew-Forresters, Spongs, Foxes, and Priscillas will leave you alone.

I wish you well in your pursuit of a minimal Episcopal orthodoxy. These techniques of separating the undesirables from the elect have been perfected over the last 2000 or so years by several thousand "denominations" already so the road is clear and the course it set.

Namaste

Priscilla,
As long as there are folks with your wisdom and bold spirit in the church, I have hope for us. Thank you for your witness here, with which I agree 100 %.
Oh, and I would say from what I've read here, you're quite a good theologian. Stringfellow had not a lick of seminary training nor was he ordained, yet is one of our church's finest theologians bar none.
Blessings to you.

We have concerns about the apostolic faith. If the Episcopal Church is going to survive and thrive, it is going to have to be more true to its doctrinal heritage.

Re the latter, on what basis do you say that, Bill? Marketing research?

But mainly, I want to talk about the former: your "concerns."

From those whose emphasis is upon orthodoxy, I hear an almost pervasive FEAR: "we have (had) orthodoxy, but could LOSE IT! (Oh no!)"

The conception of "orthodox-scarcity" or "orthodox-depletion" (and pessimism about its soon-coming loss) seems to me entirely alien to the thrust of the Gospel: "perfect love casts out fear."

If the decision-making majority (and those lobbying them, such as yourself---and no fault on that activity) are intending to Tough-Love KTH/Northern Michigan, I'm sensing a lot more of the "tough" (in exerting decision-OVER, power-OVER), than I am sensing "love."

As TEC's theologians write more and more reams of God-talk from their heights re "Christological insufficiency" blah-blah-blah, it's sounding more and more like Paul's "clanging gong."

Down in the pews, I'm a simple WWJD Episcopalian: where is the Love, here?

JC Fisher

It is a delight for me to be on the right hand side of an argument for a change. I don't see how anybody can possibly be troubled by a Christian Church's attempts to come to some shared agreement about who Jesus was and what he was up to. I don't have any real opinion on Kevin Thew Forrester, other than that I think the way his election went down will have ramifications for future candidates that we don't quite grasp yet, but, like Bill, I believe that it is imperative that the Church expect its leaders to be clear about its core doctrine. I probably fall on the minimalist side of the spectrum in what I consider core, but I think the need for a core is inescapable.

Priscilla,

I don't intend to go any father than the "mere Christianity" contained in the Quadrilateral. This is nothing new. It is still the official stance of the Episcopal Church and of the Anglican Communion.

It is quite incorrect to assert that the Episcopal Church has ever been anything different. What we have done is to neglect the standards that already exist and the effect of that neglect has not been salutary.

As a result, we have congregations failing to profess the Creed on Sunday and priests standing up in the pulpit on Easter Sunday saying "Maybe it was the gardener." (I witnessed that one first hand.)

I'm pretty sure it was the gardener.
For the Jesuit theologian Peter Schineller's perspective on this, see his essay Jesus the Gardener:

www.loyolajesuit.org/peter_schineller/resources/ JESUS%20THE%20GARDENER.doc

Peter, by the way, a U of Chicago trained theologian and seminary professor at Jesuit School of Theology for many years, and then has taught for many years in Nigeria. He has a very cool website with a ton of really good articles, all accessible and free!

Clark,

Is it that you are suggesting that all of the anxiety about lgbt Christians is being recentered on Fr Thew Forrester? That's possible. But I would suggect that it is also possible that there is an increasing concern for some sense of basics in teaching and liturgy, and that his sermons, liturgies, and apologies are representative of what I and others perceive as an increasing tendency to suggest there are no basics or boundaries of theological thought or liturgical requirement in our Church. It strikes as a form a Hoadlyism or Latitudinarianism that suggests anything goes and to disagree is to be intolerant and be about heresy trials. I would say the same in terms of morals/ethics. Archbishop Williams is correct that inclusion doesn't mean anything goes in terms of same-sexuality. I would just add to his challenge that it doesn't mean the various forms of ecclesial violence toward lgbt persons go either. Conversion is a whole Church matter.

I appreciate William Stringfellow very much, and yet, he is not the only measure of theological thought in our Church or tradition. There are others in our tradition that I also find compelling. Michael Ramsey, for one. And I think while much more generous than Gore--whom Ramsey notes wound have torpedoed Temple's ordination, Ramsey would take a dim view to a theology that is squishy on Christ's uniqueness, atonement broadly understood rather than narrowly pinned to one theory, and rolling-one's-own for central rites in our Prayer Book tradition. Another whom I love is Maurice, and I would suspect he'd take a dim view as well.

I've read and reread and read again Fr Thew Forrester's sermons, liturgies, and apologies. I continue to find them troubling on the Person and work of Christ. The want to grab bits and pieces from the Fathers and Rahner without some semblance of coherence only adds to the concern when I cannot be clear that he understands that Jesus is uniquely perfectly God and perfectly human and that our salvation, our union is IN Christ and cannot be so outside of Christ. And I can take very generously a Rahnerian (and Nazianzen) approach to the matter condemning none while nonetheless upholding that salvation is in Christ. What I cannot do as a professing Christian is downplay the unique mediation of Christ in his Person and work. Again, some of the sermons suggest a unity without clarity of this "in Christ" mystical reality, which is a reality vital to Anglican thinking since at least Cranmer, as J.I. Packer once noted. And worse, the tinkering both in the Baptismal liturgy and Eucharistic Prayer blur distinction sbetween our being sons and daughters by grace and Christ's being Son by nature, as well as suggest that our divinization/theosis/sanctification is our work rather than God's work in us. Again, I read some unrefined Buddhist thought not fully conformed to Christian basics.

His use of Dr Winkler's work is highly selective, and as I've noted elsewhere, use of 2nd Century East Syrian liturgies for Anglicans must go through 4th Century Creedal realities in our tradition at the least. And we can do so without impugning our 2nd Century ancestors in the faith. There are reasons the Jordan imagery falls out of favor for Baptism, and one of them has to do with Arian and adoptionist tendencies.

I do expect those who are consecrated to the episcopate to be hold to our core doctrine, generously and I would add minimally laid out in the Quadrilateral.

I also expect those who would be bishops to uphold our Prayer Book practices, especially in central rites.

I'm not out to start heresy trials. I think that's jumping to the furthest option. The difference between Bp Pike or Bp Spong and Fr Thew Forrester is that his theological peculiarities were available before consecration. There is not heresy trial in examining that theology, which was put forward rather publicly and voluminously, and suggesting it won't do to teach this as someone called to "guard the faith." What I would suggest is that all candidates for the episcopate should be able to express within our quite rich latitude the faith as summed in core of Incarnation and Trinity. And I expect them to uphold the Prayer Book as regula in the diocese. I think asking about these matters is the responsibility of the Committees that put them forward. When the Committees don't do their work in asking, it falls to those who elect them, and if not, then to the wider Church lay and ordained.

As for going after Bp Spong (Bp Pike was dead before I was born), I would note two things. Bp Spong has brought many back through the doors, who then getting something richer and deeper, reject Bp Spong's theology. But I would also note that others read his work and having done so reject tout force our basics without further engagement, which is terribly unfortunate when coupled with our current trend toward less catechetical engagement on the parish level. Again, for a bishop I expect an ability to engage doubts and at the same time uphold the faith. I expect the Church in its bishops to uphold the faith. If we do not, we never would have a William Temple. The provacateur-type that Bp Spong represents may be helpful in a popular theological milieu and at the same time not be a good candidate for bishop. As a bishop, I would suggest given the bombastic nature with which he went about, that I'm actually surprised he was never brought up on trial.

I wouldn't make a good bishop myself, but I expect those who are chosen to do what they are set aside to do as found in the BCP.

I'm also not a systematician, so my theology tends to be rooted more in a liturgical mode. I don't expect all bishops to be systematicians either. I do expect an ability to express the central/core relationships (i.e., doctrines) of our trust (i.e., our faith) with some degree of clarity.

As Bp Sykes notes, "challegeability" is part of Anglican tradition--I would say our humility, sufficiency, and particular approach to Truth (orthodoxy), indeed, is necessary to the conversational approach we take to Truth. To challenge Archbishops does not place one outside orthodoxy. To downgrade Jesus Christ does.

pax,
Christopher

WARNING: THEOLOGIAN AT WORK; READING ALL THESE WORDS MAY CAUSE EXASPERATION, DEFLATE YOUR
SPIRIT, CURVE YOUR SPINE AND AWAKEN A SPIRIT OF WRATH. YOU'VE BEEN WARNED!

Christopher, you’ve clearly earned with a lot of hard work your theological stance, and I respect it. Let me make a bold theological claim that will take a lot more space to unpack than a blog post will allow. This is going to like something more suited to a theological journal, but what the heck, as this point probably only one or two persons is even following this thread any more and why not indulge ourselves a bit? Besides, much of it is responding to others up above, so this does seem in some way the right context.

Here’s the claim: Today, more than ever, the language of heresy and orthodoxy is not theological in nature, but rather pure power politics at worst, a rhetorical intensifier at best (I used in this latter way up above). That is why I am not interested in either defending my orthodoxy nor in using charges of heresy to either depose current bishops or reject validly ordained priests whose theology we really don't like (i.e. think is heretical) from the episcopate. I am a theologian, after all, and not a bishop. Praise be.

The fact is, charges of heresy and/or orthodoxy, which we theological types are tempted to pull out to seal the deal in an argument, have nothing but rhetorical effect. Heresy is defined by the church, not by the theologian, no matter how brilliant, subtle, and well armed with his theological arguments and historical examples he/she may be. As Eckhart found out, or rather his followers found out since he was dead when the final heresy pronouncment came out in 1329. But he knew what was coming, I suspect. His female counterpart and a major influence on him, Marguerite Porete, simply refused to even speak to the bishops and theologians trying her—a stubborn silence that came at the cost of our life. Now that’s bold! The church has not yet declared Forrester's theology heretical, which it could do by means of a heresy trial.. If Forrester, or Spong, or Pike, was declared by the church a heretic, then and only then would such rhetorical language have force, and that force would be political. That is, they would be put outside the boundaries of the church’s polis in one way or another.

But I would insist that such force is merely ecclesial, that is, political. The theological faithfulness of a heretic is not settled by a heresy trial which results in a conviction. If you want an historical example, look, for example, at the history of the reception in the church of the writings of Marguerite Porete, the first Christian mystic burned at the stake for a mystical heresy, the heresy of the free spirit, which iswell documented in Robert Lerner’s book of the same name. She was tortured and burned in Paris in 1310, even though a number of bishops had defended her orthodoxy at the time. Bernard McGinn, along with Lerner, has written a number of good pieces on Porete’s book’s reception in the Christian tradition. After her torture and death in Paris, her work, written in French, went underground, but, you won’t be surprised, was soon translated into other languages and printed under various pseudonyms to protect its readers. (Ruysbroeck incorporated much of the Beguines work in his own theology, but was never suspected of heresy himself, in part because he was politically astute enough to attack the beguines at the same time he was pilfering their ideas).
Porete’s work, heretical though it was, lived on for many years but eventually dropped out of sight until, in the 20th century, it was rediscovered. Some downside Benedictines in England loved it, translated it into English, and it received an imprimatur and nihil obstat from the Church before its author was discovered and that mistake was, I believe, quickly rectified. To this day, thoroughly ‘orthodox’ theologians argue over whether the church was right or wrong to judge her a heretic, never seeming to realize the irony that that is not, alas, a question they as theologians are capable of answering, at least not theologically. The church made her a heretic, and to be sure, heretic she was when she went, with great calm and faith in her God, to the flames. She was, by the way, utterly unlearned in her theology, as all women mystics were in those days.

Well, I trust my point is obvious about the difficulty in using the language of heresy in a theological context, which is why I have resisted it or at least ironized it in this discussion. But you might wonder what this has to do with today. Well, I would say that the problem today is whether the Anglican Communion has the power to enforce its rhetorical use of the language of heresy in relation to our Episcopal Church. I view the infamous Section 4 of the Proposed Covenant, of which Ephraim Radner is one of the drafters, as addressing, however obliquely, that question. (It is oblique, I would think, because to use the language of heresy these days doesn’t play very well, as Bill has seen up above by Priscilla’s comments. I trust she is not alone in feeling this way. It sounds so medieval!) But the end effect of that section, as Ephraim has I think admitted, would be to allow the Anglican Communion to in effect politically remove our church from full communion with Canterbury and the AC—in effect, if not in language, to declare TEC heretical. This, I think, will happen or at least could happen, depending on the decisions of Canterbury, with or without the covenant. We shall see, perhaps. I am not optimistic given my reading of Rowan Williams theology, nor given his sympathy for much of Ephraim Radner’s theological views.

In any case, the only way TEC can avoid being declared or positioned as heretical in toto is to ‘refrain for a season’ (seemingly the season is road repair in Buffalo!) from doing what would, in Radner’s thinking, be an unrepentant, brazen, heretical flouting of the orthodox view of the global Anglican Communion, full inclusion, authorized rites of blessing. And my fear is that our fear of being declared, either in word and/or in deed, heretical, is gripping too many of our bishops, and perhaps a number of others, into trying to rid ourselves of this charge one way or another. One way to resist it is theologically, as Bill, Tobias, you, and a number of others are doing, admirably in my mind, insofar as you are resisting theological trendiness and returning us to the rich resources in our tradition, which I too deeply love. We can, rightly I think, hold to a robust Trinitarian faith and hold to full inclusion. (In fact, as I know others have suggested, I believe the one will lead, inexorably, to the other). But I am arguing that, because Bill is right that the heteronormative position like Ephraim Radner’s is not ultimately theological, (or is rooted in a theology of fear, shame, and support of the closet), that this strategy will fail to convince Ephraim, even though he is a remarkably brilliant, historically grounded, robustly Trinitarian thinker in so much of his work. On this matter, he sees heresy, (or so I suspect given my dialogues with him) and if the global communion agrees with him, the AC could use its political power to enact this rhetorical, (N.B. not theological) charge.

Now I for one do not think we should shrink back from this possibility. I am in full support of full inclusion NOW, rites of blessing NOW (or as ‘now’ as general convention can ever be!). I am willing to be part of a church that is declared heretical (hell, all I’ve got to do is read Stand Firm to enjoy that pleasure!) and I think we should be willing to bear the real, political consequences of being a heretic in the eyes of the Anglican Communion. There are worse things than being a heretic in my view. That’s why I have no great desire to keep them out of the church leadership. That may be our entire church soon enough! We willl all going to be heretics soon enough! (welcome to the club the spirit of Origen, Eckhart and Porete tease!)

Now this is a slightly different argument from the one about Bishop Elect Forrester, I realize. But at one level, yes, I am arguing that I see signs that the decision to deny consent to him is largely politically motivated, and ties in to the desire to defend ourselves from the charge that we are not orthodox enough (a charge which is, as you, Bill, Tobias and many others, especially the young people in the church with whom I work bear ample witness, just plain silly) I think we can survive bad theology, even ‘heretical’ theology in our church, though I too wish it otherwise. I suspect even Newark has a number of generously orthodox folks in its midst, and that Spong’s effect is not as pernicious as some think. I have faith in the ability of most of our laity to see through bunk when they hear it. The fact that we haven’t rejected a Bishop-elect in seventy years, and this one without any moral impediment, which is the usual reason, I think, is what gives me great pause. And this one is very well regarded in his own diocese. I imagine some in that diocese are even ‘orthodox’ by our lights as well. Pity we haven’t seemed to hear from them.

What really troubles me with the Forrester situation is that I see a rather serious theologian working in his position paper, Approaching the Heart of Faith. The kind of serious reflection we want in a bishop. Now he is clearly mining the mystical and ascetical traditions of the church. Perhaps he is even reading and being influenced by some Buddhist works (so did Merton and many others-- it is not yet heresy, I think, to find ‘foreign’ influences in Christian theologians. If so, Aquinas is going to have some explaining to do!) Bill suggested that he thought Meister Eckhart would not have made a good theologian. Perhaps not. There are a lot of other aspects to being a good bishop than one’s theological musings. He was , however perhaps the most brilliant theologian, outside Aquinas, in the Middle ages. (I realize we could debate this. But when Rowan Williams, Hans urs von Balthasar, and Bernard McGinn hold him up as such, I for one defer!). His theology was considered by many bishops and theologians of the day, as McGinn reminds us in his essay of the same title, “Evil-Sounding, Rash, and Suspect of Heresy.” He preached in the vernacular to theologically illiterate or semi-literate audiences, and his sermons were bold and stretched language to the breaking point. Many times he went, even in his own words, a bit too far trying to break language open to the palpable reality of the living Christ, about whom he had no doubt. The goal, however, was to bring people to Christ, to give them Jesus, and by the very definition of heresy when it is being defined theologically, he did not have the ‘intent’ to reject the church’s teaching. I am quite confident that Kevin Thew Forrester also does not have that intent. He is clearly striving to bring his heart to Christ and that of others to Christ. As a vehicle, he is imperfect, as we all are. But he is, I think, quite clear that it is Christ who saves, not Forrester’s or anyone else’s theology.
You and others may think he sounds heretical, rash, Buddhist, etc. But I will speak for myself, and Bill and I can argue if over a latte some time at our Div School reunion, and say that if a Meister Eckhart, who also sounded quite heretical, rash, and Buddhist to many fine theological minds, came before the standing committee as bishop elect, I would probably not be able to vote for him right away only because I would have passed out at meeting one of the greatest and most influential theological voices of our time. And then I would vote yes, yes, and yet again yes.

I know what you will say. I have met Meister Eckhart, Clark, and Forrester, good sir, is no Meister Eckhart. I agree. Not only would that be outrageous to compare any theologian in the church today to the intellectual brilliance, theological creativity, and fervent every day piety of Eckhart (Eckhart, by the way, preached that Martha was privileged over Mary because she put humble service before theology concerns; she had two gifts, the via activa and comtemplativa, not just one as with Mary—I agree with him!) No, Forrester is not Eckhart, not Gregory of Nyssa, not Pike, nor Spong. He is Kevin Forrester, priest in good standing in our church, a man with no moral impediment as far as we know, a man committed to full inclusion and to serving the church he loves, a reader of theology (far more than a lot of bishops, I humbly submit!) who does find a great deal of sustenance in the mystical, apophatic, tradition, where the exploratory, critical mode of theology is often done. I am referring of course, to the now fairly well known typology of theological modes outlined by Rowan Williams in his On Christian Theology. This mode, as Williams brilliantly outlines it, can indeed take us into the wilderness, where familiar theological and creedal markers are absent. Williams suggests that this mode, where language is often exploratory, sometimes critical of our traditional ways, at time nearly unrecognizable as Christian (he names my first theology teacher, Mark C. Taylor as an example of this latter style—I will attest, he’s right about that!) is a risky one, and may lead us astray. It may, for many, as Eckhart’s thinking did, look heretical only to be found later on to have been indispensable for later, more linguistically ‘orthodox’ theologians (think of Balthasar’s reliance on Origen, Eckhart and Pseudo-Dionysius for example). Forrester seems to find himself in this exploratory mode frequently, but I do not think we need to shrink back in fear from it. It is, as Williams notes, a crucial mode for our theological tradition to break open from routinized and even stultifying ways of thinking.

Now Williams goes on to warn that we should beware of thinking of any ‘whole theology’ as falling under only one category, and I would say this is true of Forrester. There is a celebratory mode present, and a communicative style which a patient reader would find. But it is also true, I think, that the church needs to recognize, that in its theologians and in its bishops, different gifts have been given by God. There have been mystics who have made very good bishops (Gregory of Nyssa obviously comes to mind), there have been systematic and historically minded thinkers, social justice oriented bishops, etc. When we are not looking over our shoulder at whether or not we are going to be labeled heretical, I suspect that we can, as we have for so many years in our church, be charitable when we have a bishop whose theology is muddled, confused, stridently conservative or stridently liberal. We have been given by God a multitude of riches, and all in broken vessels. My question of Bishop Elect Forrester, as of myself, is—does he want Jesus Christ in the center of his life? Does he love the Episcopal Church and its traditions and want to serve it with all his heart, mind and soul. Does he see that the role of a bishop will require prophetic boldness (standing up an before the pragmatic and the prudent who say, ‘let’s wait another season before moving ahead with where we know Jesus Christ is leading us’ and fervently rebuking them for their unfaithfulness to the spirit’s charge); That with this he will need the humility to admit if he has been wrong (including in his or her own teaching from pulpit, pen, and conversation)? Does he desire to re-write and implement normatively substantive portions of the prayer book unilaterally and insist that others in his diocese follow his direction in so doing? Can he respond to occasional breaches of prayer book rubrics and other canonical deviations with patience and pastoral sensitivity, recognizing that the letter of the law may on occasion need be overridden by the boundary breaking demands of gospel faithfulness. Does he know himself loved irrevocably by God and desire to share Jesus Christ with all his heart, soul and mind?

If he could answer yes to these questions, Christopher, I would not find it in my heart to pursue the technical theological questions we as academics find of interest. I would trust in my heart that he would be open to listen, accept correction, even from theologians and laity who might know more than he about some fine points, and that we would have a bishop of whom we could be justly thankful to God. My sense is that Kevin Forrester would be just such a bishop. OCICBW (Of course, I could be wrong) Thanks be to God!

Yours in Christ,
Clark

P.S. I am thinking of attaching a caveat, something like the following, to all of my future (and past!) blog posts.

This post is incomplete, written on the fly, full of holes, and is not, I repeat, is not a definitive articulation of my theology. Should any standing committee, bishop, heresy hunter or otherwise disgruntled parisioner actually come across these words, please do not quote them without acknowledging this caveat. I reserve the right to change my mind, clarify my errors, and be brought into greater wisdom and understanding by the many, many people who were, are, and will have been far smarter and more faithful to Christ than me. I write these words, knowing their weakness and flaws, only with the trust that the God I love, trust, and seek to follow may chose to make of even this flawed vessel a witness to divine and life-giving love. If anyone is edified, all praise to God for the miracle of the divine Word’s humble willingness to inbreath the wavering and weak flesh of these thoughts.

I for one am glad that the internet has made this kind of conversation possible.

I think it is more or less obvious that the Episcopal Church is in a state of transition and that we don't know what the future will hold. I continue to see this particular act of corporate discernment as part of a movement toward health and a stronger witness to the Gospel in our context. Others disagree.

I am still convinced that, whether or not the Church has drawn the line in the right place in this particular case, that the line does need to be drawn. It is a very old line, defined by the creeds and the liturgical traditon (and ultimately the Scriptures). Old doesn't necessarily mean true, but this Church has found this way of drawing the line to be serviceable since the English Reformation and the apology of Jewell. I would suggest that this way of drawing the line has been constitutive of Anglicanism as such, realizing that Anglicanism is a historical construct and what it means is up for grabs. Amid the parties on the ground, I am advocating for generous orthodoxy, realizing that some find the idea of orthodoxy to be anathema (self-referential problem there), while others find my particular orthodoxy to be less than generous. I do think that the Quadrilateral suggests that this is not my orthodoxy, but our orthodoxy. If Anglicanism is to have a future, it must be loyal to the creeds of the undivided Church. What does it mean to confess that Jesus Christ became incarnate, was crucified, and rose again, for us and for our salvation? Does Fr. Forrester offer an adequate interpretation of this mystery? That is the question before his brothers and sisters in Christ. They have apparently answered "no."

A tradition needs some standards to sustain itself over time. These standards have been developed to keep us close to Christ as revealed in Holy Scripture. They are acts of Spirit-guided ecclesial self-definition which we ignore at our peril. Like Jim, I think that the core is rather minimal, but it is real.

I would also point out the diversity of the standing committees and bishops, who in spite of intense lobbying on the part of the Northern Michigan standing committee and the bishop elect himself were not convinced that Fr. Forrester is teaching the Church's faith. The sensus fidelium is at least prima facie evidence that there were grounds for concern. However fallible that might be, we don't have anything else to go by when it comes to judging whether this particular bishop elect has crossed the line.

Clark,

Is exercise of authority and power always wrong? I would say only if there is no challengeability. We have quite a lot of dispersed authority and power at the moment, and that means challegeability is aplenty. Indeed, to the point that in TEC, I would say that some would suggest we have no standards or norms at all. But TEC says we do: the Quadrilateral.

For now, I will say that Ephraim Radner is not the person for whom I'm most concerned to continue to be in thoughtful theological articulation within a generous orthodox framework outlined in the Quadrilateral. By his standards I'm likely a sinner and heretic and you're right there is nothing I could do to convince him otherwise. I don't think Bp Breidenthal has him in mind either, but more many middle-of-the-road bishops, including those in parts of Africa, like Botswana. As Bp Breidenthal says, they see in our baptismal rite a quite recognizable, Anglican, and christologically sound praising (I'll point out that in the past, Archbishop Williams praised our baptismal rite for its connections between Christ, Church, and Commonwealth), and that praising is at odds with the approach taken by Fr Thew Forrester. For example, this troubling bit sounds quite at odds with broadly Anglican liturgy:

" Do you seek to awaken to the eternal presence of God, who is your very
heart and soul"

That might make for nice mystical language, though it is blurry for my taste, but it makes for bad public liturgy and leaves an impression when coupled with his sermons, that we are just like Jesus, awakening to our own divinity by nature.

As Bp Marshall, a liturgist in his own right, notes, he uses Rite III language in a way that blurs christological distinctions.

I also do not think TEC is alone in danger of being kicked out of the AC, and that it is a failure to articulate a recognizably generous orthodoxy rather than same-sex unions that would be the straw that breaks the matter. After all, the ACoC is an ally (and also in trouble itself) in the latter, but would have real issue with a fuzzy christology that seems to undermine our rather generous range of christological thought.

I would also say that kicking us out over same-sex unions is quite distinct from kicking us out for rejection of the Creeds. The former might be better characterized as a reformation moment (on our part), the latter as slide into heterodoxy. After all, we can have reapproachment with the RCC even though we view one another in error, because we share a core. The AC could kick us out, but if we have a core, there is room for reapproachment down the road.

Christopher, you make good points, though I think one can certainly find an orthodox way to read "Do you seek to awaken to the eternal presence of God, who is your very
heart and soul". This will be too quick, but here goes:

Paul himself says, in Gal. 2:20, that it is not himself, but Christ who lives in him, presumably in his heart and soul. That presence is eternal, as the prologue to the gospel puts it: 'All things came into being through him, and without him not one thing came into being. What has come into being in him was life, and the life was the light of all people. The light shines in the darkness, and the darkness did not overcome it.' Sin covers over the light, hides it under a bushel, but the image of God, the light in which we live and move and have our being, is however marred, never removed--that would be a manichaen dualism to think that there is ever utter darkness in any of God's creation. The ascetical task of the Christian is to remove the impediments, the sins, which are quite real, so that we may have our faces restored to unity with christ, that they may shine in the light of teh glory of Jesus Christ. This is the task of our liturgical, spiritual and theological lives, why we pray the offices daily (as some of us still do!), meet in spiritual direction, subject ourselves to one another in spite of our differences, etc.

Finally, you are far more optimistic about the Archbishop of CAnterbury's support of same sex blessings and gays in teh church than am I. He has said some disturbing things of late, suggesting he is not wholly committed to his earlier "The Body's Grace" and if Radner has any insight into the Archbishop's thinking (I believe they have known each other for a number of years, Williams having been a visiting professor at Yale, I think even when Radner was there getting his doctorate), he has moved away from that earlier support in favor of a more conservative ecclesiology.
I agree, rapprochement is always possible, which is why I for one think we ought to move boldly ahead with same sex blessings, ordination of remarkably faithful bay priests as bishops (no one could argue that many of them would not only not be 'bad' bishops, but positively wonderful ones, as Bishop Robinson has been!), and let teh chips fall where they may. As I say, there are worse things than being a heretic, which as I argued above, in not a theological cateogory in this case (it doesn't touch our faithfulness, that is) but is rather a political category, and given the current global situation in the church, the power does not seem to lie with us. But God's power is made perfect in our weakness (and Christs', who lost his battle with the church too!), so I have no fear on that front.
Blessings to you, Christopher. I am so excited to see a fellow traveler in theological engagement in the church.

Clark,

It's not that this phrase cannot be read in an orthodox manner, it's that it's ambiguity makes its inappropriate for public liturgical use, especially when coupled with a change to a central rite of our Prayer Book.

Why is it that Ephraim Radner and Rowan Williams keep being put forward as the only conversation partners? They're not. And I don't think we should let them be either in our own writing, nor in how they would frame things narrowly in a Reformed theological/Roman Catholic ecclesiological reformation of Anglicanism. I don't have optimism in either of them, so much as I reject that they are the only part of the conversation--there are others and we are smart to appeal to their moderate sensibilities and Anglican conservatism (ecclesiologically both Radner and Williams are not conservative in an Anglican sense).

Certainly they are not the only conversation partners. But they are two of the most important theologians working today, especially as it relates to the current ecclesial situation we find ourselves in, no?
I mean, it was Williams who put Radner on the Covenant design team, which has an absolutey critical role to play in terms of whether TEC is 'disciplined' for its 'heresy'. Now I for one find Radner's writing on ecclesiology in his Bad Bishops essay to be remarkable in many ways; his insights, many of which I share, can, I would argue, cut both ways and be used to challenge the current ecclesiological power structure within the highest levels of the AC. That is, as I hinted in my commment in the most recent post on this issue, I think we can take Radner's ecclesiology captive to Christ, and that that would be a very very effective way to engage those who would argue that we are not orthodox enough. If we could use Radner himself to argue for a bold position of full inclusion, let's see them argue with that! Well, that's a project for another day. I've been working on it, and am prepared to present it, if the occasion ever arises.
Now I sense that you have a much firmer grasp on historic Anglican ecclesiology than do I--I am not that conversant in Gore, Ramsey, Maurice, though I would like to be. Why do you think that neither radner nor williams are not conversative in an anglican sense? I used that word, conservative, with some trepidation, and I would be grateful to you if you could offer your thoughts here.

Oh, and Christopher, I won't argue with you about the liturgical quality of various prayer book liturgies and experimental ones. You're the liturgical scholar, not me by a long shot! I have never really liked Eucharistic Prayer C, for example, but since I can get an orthodox reading out if it, and it is our common prayer, I am inclined to let it slide a bit. As I am with some of the newer SLC experimental liturgies. Liturgy by committee, which is how we get our BCP, is always a mixed blessing, as someone has mentioned above about theology by committee. That's why I think it important for individuals to try their hand at it from time to time, to let the church see, hold and discern whether a new liturgy might be a possible starting place for BCP revision. It's an offering, as I read it, not a mandate. And I have known more than one very good bishop who has himself/herself made changes to the liturgy in this way--often, does not the liturgical tradition follow innovations that are done locally? That is my hope for how a new, inclusive marriage rite will be written. Individuals are writing them, using them, and when the church finally has the courage to move forward, we will have a number of examples, presumably written by some very fine liturgists, with which to work.
That is what Forrester argues in his "Approaching the Heart of Faith", and why I would simply want him to affirm that he is not going to make any of his own liturgical experiments mandatory {read: 'authorized rites'} in the diocese. If the bishop gave him permission to do this on an occasional basis, I am okay with that, as long as it doesn't become normative. Again, as long as we can get an 'orthodox' reading out if it, I don't get too fussed up. Though certainly here as elsewhere, prayer book revision has and will perhaps always raise the question of to what extent are we modifying core elements of our faith--e.g. the Filioque and other innovations, which we also saw in the 1979 BCP and the strong reaction against it among some who were quite convinced it was heretical on the face of it.

Perhaps I'm missing something. There has been a lot of talk about orthodoxy in these comments. Let's not forget that, back in 2006 in response to the question "Is belief in Jesus the only way to get to heaven?", then Bishop Schori replied "We who practice the Christian tradition understand him as our vehicle to the divine. But for us to assume that God could not act in other ways is, I think, to put God in an awfully small box." We've been down this road before. Why are statements like these still controversial?

Priscila, thanks for articulating so well the following idea:

"Is there wisdom and experience that we can draw on from these ancient writings? Absolutely! But to use their words centuries later, out of the context of their times and limited understandings seems to be to be a very dangerous game that, more often than not, harms far too many whose experiences and beliefs differ."

It seems to me that what has passed as "orthodoxy" in this debate is largely the parroting of safe formulas out of their cultural, social, and historical context, much like fundamentalists do with Scripture. (eg., nature vs. "adoption" --who thinks in terms of "nature" any more) But I digress.

What I find truly scandalous is not that Kevin has been manhandled like this, but that his manhandlers (I bet they are mostly men) are so theologically illiterate. This is the truly serious scandal for our Church, not a meditating priest who adapts (probably with his bishop´s blessing!) the Baptismal rite to fit a specific pastoral situation.

The real evidence of our spinelessnes is that liberal, informed, right -praising and thinking (one needs both) leaders in our church did not laugh this attempt from the IRD out of the room.

And if I may ask, where are the professional (Ph.D. holding) theologians, -- particularly seminary faculty members in Systematic Theology and Liturgical Studies when we need them? Louis Weil seems to have been the only courageous voice among them. Why has this debate been allowed to drift into whatever anyone´s opinion is, without accountability to research and scholarship?

Finally, shame on those church leaders who did not consent out of political expedience, in an attempt to pacify the right by proving that we can be "tough." THEY have broken their vows to defend the faith of the Church, giving away our birthright as Anglicans for a mess of political lentils.

As Leo Frade recently said, "the Inquisition is over!" Apparently not in TEC as we edge ever closer to Rome.