Anglican bishop faces difficult church issues

http://www.honoluluadvertiser.com/apps/pbcs.dll/article?AID=/20070310/NEWS01/703100332/1190/NEWS

[Honolulu Advertiser] 10 Mar 2007--"It isn't really everywhere, it's a small piece of the denomination that's in such an uproar, a tiny piece," said Jefferts Schori, who has expressed support for gay clergy and blessing same-sex unions. "... They're developing allies in other parts of the communion who think they're in the same place theologically and politically."

Take note of how Jefferts Schori consistantly minimizes the extent of opposition in the denomination to The Episcopal Church's current direction in her public statements. This is part of her effort to control and manipulate public perceptions of what is happening in the denomination. Remember that the person who is speaking has herself denied the New Testament doctrine of salvation by faith in Christ alone and embraces a view of other religious faiths that the Thirty-Nine Articles, a historic Anglican formulary that is a normative authority for many Anglican provinces, declare anathema, or accursed (see Article 18). Also take note of how she is seeking to shift responsibility and therefore blame for the growing division between The Episcopal Church and the more Biblically-orthodox Anglican provinces onto those opposed to the denomination's movement away from the teaching of the Bible, the Anglican formularies, and the apostolic faith, instead of admitting being one of the radical leaders of The Episcopal Church upon whose shoulders the responsibility and blame squarely rest.

Kendal Harmon posted the following on his blog titusonenine:

I don’t know why the Presiding Bishop keeps trying this “it’s only a tiny piece” line. In the Episcopal Church Foundations survey they found:

Leaders contacted by the Episcopal Church Foundation often depicted their dioceses and congregations as defined by a “20-20-60″ breakdown: 20 percent endorsed the convention’s actions, 20 percent were against them, and 60 percent came down “somewhere else.” As one prominent lay leader expressed it, “I’m not drawn to either extreme and I don’t know where to turn.”

Also, the Episcopal Church’s own statistician found
that 48 percent of Episcopal congregations experienced moderate to very severe conflict over the 2003 vote to permit Robinson’s consecration.

The point is the situation on the ground in the Episcopal Church is quite complex and variegated and there are a lot of unknowns (I know of no good stastical recent survey of average Episcopalians’ perspectives on these matters), but that the problem remains considerable and it does not help when the national leadership keeps trying to downplay what is really occurring. The dictionary defines tiny as “very small; minute; wee” and it is simply not true to say that concern and opposition to some national church decisions is tiny–KSH.