The Most Rev Katharine Jefferts SchoriPeace and blessings to you in the spirit of the holy season, Archbishop Daniel Deng Bul.
Presiding Bishop of the Episcopal Church
United States of America
Thursday 15th December 2011
Dear Bishop Katharine,
Advent greetings to you in the name of Our Lord and Saviour Jesus Christ.
It is with a heavy heart that I write you informing you of our decision as a House of Bishops to withdraw your invitation to the Episcopal Church of the Sudan (ECS). We acknowledge your personal efforts to spearhead prayer and support campaigns on behalf of the ECS and remain very grateful for this attention you and your church have paid to Sudan and South Sudan. However, it remains difficult for us to invite you when elements of your church continue to flagrantly disregard biblical teaching on human sexuality.
Find attached a statement further explaining our position as a province.
(Signed)
--(The Most Rev.) Dr. Daniel Deng Bul Yak, Archbishop Primate and Metropolitan of the Province of the Episcopal Church of the Sudan and Bishop of the Diocese of Juba
Most dioceses in the Episcopal Church will very likely continue their relationships with dioceses and parishes in Sudan. By doing so, they will witness to the Gospel of Jesus Christ.
Initial responses from dioceses in the Episcopal Church may be found at The Lead.
H/T to Simon Sarmiento at Thinking Anglicans.
Abba Theodore said, "Do not judge the fornicator, for you yourself would then transgress the law just as much. For he who said, 'Do not fornicate" also said, 'Do not judge.'" -- The sayings of the Desert Fathers, Theodore of Eleutheropolis 3
ReplyDeleteI hope Deng Bul Yak realizes how much his way of picking motes out of others eyes is injurious to his own well being?
Tobias, the archbishop's flagrant disregard of biblical teaching on judging others is sobering, indeed, and perhaps cause for concern.
ReplyDeleteSo sad.
ReplyDelete[I still wonder, "Why Now?" My hermeneutic of suspicion says there's something INTERNAL (in Sudan) which prompted this.]
Archbishop Bul seems to always appears with a great sense of grandstanding and drama...I remember his anti-LGBT Anglican blasts after his late arrival at the last Lambeth Conference against Bishop Gene Robinson...months later he sweeps through Washington and the U.S. to plee for ¨help¨ for his persecuted flock...something is very spirtitually twisted here, in my opinion, as he slanders the demonized the despised the marginalized at TEC (once again)...I think another sad bout with Gafconnitis has set in.
ReplyDeleteLen, it's the same old, same old tiresome slander. As though there were not more important problems in his country than who has sex with whom.
ReplyDeleteJCF, I have no idea why now.
ReplyDeleteHe's an archbishop.
ReplyDeleteYou don't get to be one by worrying about what Jesus said.
Mark, I suppose you and I must lay aside our ambitions, then. ;-)
ReplyDeleteNo, no. I want to be a warlord! I'm way too straightforward and compassionate to be an archbishop.
ReplyDeleteYou can be the warlord then, Mark, and I'll just be me.
ReplyDelete