A GOOD LETTER TO THE CHURCH TIMES FROM TWO CHURCH OF ENGLAND BISHOPS

From the Church Times:

From the Rt Revd Dr John Saxbee and the Rt Revd Dr Peter Selby

Sir, — Whichever side of the argument you are on there are grounds for real concern about the way the debate about it is progressing. It cannot be good to learn, as we do, that many bishops who are against the Anglican Covenant don’t want to say for fear of seeming disloyal, that diocesan synods are “debating” the issue without hearing both sides of the argument equally presented, and that there is so much boredom and weariness about the whole issue.

This is a major proposal with potentially serious consequences for this and future generations of Anglican Christians, and for those ecumenical partners with whom we are in conversation. Nothing will be worse than for the Covenant to be yawned through at a July Synod preoccupied with debating the ordination of women as bishops, passed and then put in a drawer — only for us to discover that those who now brand it “toothless” then use it and propel the Communion into a litigious and factious future.

The Archbishop of Canterbury made it clear in his Advent letter that such is not his purpose. But the proposed Covenant cannot now escape the identity it has acquired as an instrument of exclusion. He also asks what is the alternative; we respond that the alternative to having a Covenant is not having one, and this is a time to hold fast to Anglicanism’s inherited culture of inclusion and respectful debate which is our way of dealing with difference rather than require assent to procedures and words that have already shown themselves to be divisive.

In short, if we can agree it we don’t need it and if we need it we won’t agree it. We believe that the Covenant is to be resisted. But, above all, our plea is for a debate that is candid, even-handed, and open. If it comes to the General Synod, it should do so as its seriousness deserves, as the principal business.

JOHN SAXBEE
PETER SELBY

The Archbishop of Canterbury is trying to railroad the Anglican Covenant through the Church of England General Synod quickly, before too many people in the church have a chance to study the document closely and note what harm may result for the Anglican Communion and for the Church of England if the covenant is adopted. The Anglican Communion Office sends out only pro-covenant materials, which is not right and not fair, because the members of Synod need to hear from both proponents and opponents of the document in order to vote wisely.

Thank you, Bishops Saxbee and Selby for speaking out. Isn't it time for the other bishops who doubt the wisdom of adopting the covenant to lend their voices to the debate? I like very much the answer the bishops give to Archbishop Rowan's statement that there is no alternative to the covenant:

...we respond that the alternative to having a covenant is not having one and this is the time to hold fast to Anglicanism's inherited culture of inclusion and respectful debate....

Amen and amen!

Thanks to my English friend, Neal Terry (aka themethatisme), who sent me the letter which can now be viewed on the website of the Church Times.

STORY OF THE DAY - OLD SPIRIT

The feel of his spirit was too old for most
people to understand & when he walked
by they would look up & say O, the sun
went behind a cloud, or, the moon must
be full & so he walked for a long time by
himself with no one to talk to.

From StoryPeople.

PONDERISMS - PART 2

11. How is it one careless match can start a forest fire, but it takes a whole box to start a campfire?

12. Who was the first person to look at a cow and say, 'I think I'll squeeze these dangly things and drink whatever comes out'?

13. If Jimmy cracks corn and no one cares, why is there a song about him?

14. Why does your OB-GYN leave the room when you get undressed if they are going to look up there anyway?

15. If quizzes are quizzical, what are tests?

16. If corn oil is made from corn, and vegetable oil is made from vegetables, then what is baby oil made from?

17. Do illiterate people get the full effect of Alphabet Soup?

18. Does pushing the elevator button more than once make it arrive faster?

19. Why doesn't glue stick to the inside of the bottle?

20. Do you ever wonder why you gave me your email address?

If you remember, my brother-in-law sent me twenty ponderisms, but I know some of you have short attention spans, so I divided them to post in two parts.

♫ THOSE CLERGY WIVES ARE BREAKING UP THAT OLD GANG OF MINE ♫

From Sara Ritchey at the New York Times:

On Sunday, the Vatican announced the creation of the Personal Ordinariate of the Chair of Saint Peter, a special division of the Roman Catholic Church that former Episcopal congregations and priests — including, notably, married priests — can enter together en masse.
....

Nonetheless, the Roman Catholic Church is prepared to house married priests in numbers perhaps not seen since the years before 1123, when the First Lateran Council adopted canon 21, prohibiting clerical marriage.
....

By the time of the First Lateran Council, the priest’s wife had become a symbol of wantonness and defilement. The reason was that during this period the nature of the host consecrated at Mass received greater theological scrutiny. Medieval theologians were in the process of determining that bread and wine, at the moment of consecration in the hands of an ordained priest at the altar, truly became the body and blood of Jesus Christ. The priest who handled the body and blood of Christ should therefore be uncontaminated lest he defile the sacred corpus.

Damn! You know, having grown up in the Roman Catholic Church, I knew this, but to see it spelled out again is revoltingly shocking. Remind me about the Incarnation. Did it really happen? Did Jesus really defile himself and become human like us? Did he truly hang around with contaminated women? Did Jesus allow the woman who was a known sinner wash his feet and dry them with her hair?

The medieval theologians may have been at the moment of deciding that the bread and wine became the true body and blood of Jesus, but they seemed to have forgotten the Gospel in the process.

The priest’s wife was an obvious danger. Her wanton desire, suggested the 11th-century monk Peter Damian, threatened the efficacy of consecration. He chastised priests’ wives as “furious vipers who out of ardor of impatient lust decapitate Christ, the head of clerics,” with their lovers. According to the historian Dyan Elliott, priests’ wives were perceived as raping the altar, a perpetration not only of the priest but also of the whole Christian community.

Whoa! Methinks Peter Damian needed to take a look inside himself. The psychological concept of projection was not known at the time, but Jesus surely gave warning in the Gospel, when he said that we must remove the planks from our own eyes before we judge the peccadilloes of others.

In my lifetime, I remember certain priests recoiling from me during an ordinary conversation. I could see the panic in their expressions, as they thought, "I gotta get away!" Mind you, I was not coming on to them. I promise. But back in the day, the priests were taught in seminary, some of them entering at the tender age of 13, that women were living, breathing, walking, talking occasions of sin. While some priests were clever enough to shed the harmful, nonsensical teachings once they matured, others bought it hook, line, and sinker and hung on.

Pray for the priests and their wives who become part of the RC ordinariate. Pray for all who enter there. The converts may be in for some surprises.

From Wikipedia:

Petrus Cardinal Damiani is a saint and was made a Doctor of the Roman Catholic Church by Pope Leo XII in 1828, with a feast day of February 23. His body has been moved six times, each time to a more splendid resting-place. Since 1898, Damian has rested in a chapel dedicated to the saint in the cathedral of Faenza. No formal canonization ever took place, but his cult has existed since his death at Faenza, at Fonte-Avellana, at Monte Cassino, and at Cluny. His feast has since been moved February 21.

The saint is represented in art as a cardinal bearing a knotted rope (the disciplina) in his hand; also sometimes he is depicted as a pilgrim holding a papal Bull, to signify his many legations.

Image from Wikipedia.

OYSTERS RIGHT AND LEFT AND BUBBLES

Pictured above is President Franklin Roosevelt dining at Antoine's Restaurant during a visit to New Orleans in 1937. Seated to the right of FDR is Governor Richard Leche and to his left is New Orleans Mayor Robert Maestri. After the the diners finished the appetizer course of Oysters Rockefeller, Mayor Maestri leaned over to FDR and said, "How ya like dem erstuhs, Chief?" I've always loved the story, which I remember hearing from my father when I was quite young. Though Maestri never went beyond the third grade in school, he was no dumb bunny and played the game of politics skillfully.

All of the above is a lead-in to tell you that the present crop of Louisiana oysters is to die for. I've eaten more than my share of outstandingly tasty raw oysters this year, before Grandpère has a chance to cook them. He now knows to stand guard, because the first taste of an oyster is addictive, and once I start eating, I can't stop. We've had oysters fried (perfectly!), broiled, oyster spaghetti, and oysters in tomato sauce over pasta. All the dishes were delicious, but oysters in tomato sauce was a mistake. The taste of the tomato sauce overwhelmed the taste of the oysters, and why would anyone want to do that? GP admitted that when oysters are as divine tasting as this year's crop, tomato sauce is not the way to go.

Although I've eaten oysters from several different waters, I've yet to to be served bivalves as tasty as the Louisiana variety. The two varieties that came closest in quality, though the flavors were quite different, were from Long Island Sound and the waters off the northwest coast of Scotland.

Read in NOLA.com what New Orleans chefs say about the local oysters as compared to those from elsewhere. They know because for six months after the BP oil spill, Louisiana oysters were unavailable.

Photo (minus the thought bubble) from Wikipedia. The bubble comes courtesy of MadPriest, master bubble maker.

Below is the same photo with an unrequested speech bubble inserted, because I sent wrong instructions to the master bubble maker about which gentleman with FDR should have the thought bubble, which necessitated a redo by MadPriest. The problem is that I have difficulty knowing my left hand from my right. It's true. I have to stop and think if I hear, "Turn left here," and, at times, once I've thought, it's too late to turn. Over the years, I've learned to compensate to a degree, but I still don't always get right and left right...if you know what I mean.

How could I possibly know FDR's (or the master bubble maker's) right hand from his left, when I don't even know my own?

'HOPES FADE FOR CANADIAN ANGLICAN ORDINARIATE'

From The Catholic Register in Canada:

As hopeful Anglo-Catholic parishes across Canada completed two months of catechetical study Dec. 18, dreams of a Canadian Catholic ordinariate for ex-Anglicans are fading.
"We had hoped, of course, we would have our own Canadian ordinariate, but we realize our numbers may not warrant it," Bishop Carl Reid, Anglican Catholic Church of Canada auxiliary bishop, told The Catholic Register.
....

The number of Canadian break-away Anglicans seeking a place in the Catholic Church has declined in the two years since Pope Benedict XVI issued Anglicanorum Coetibus, an apostolic constitution intended to provide for groups of Anglicans entering the Catholic Church but retaining significant elements of Anglican liturgy.
....

"A number of our people who weren't clear when they joined us of our intention to seek unity — even though it is in our foundational documents, our constitution — when unity became not only a possibility but a reality they just sort of left," said Reid. "That reduced our numbers from what they were two years ago."

So. It seems for now that the Canadian breakaways may have to make do with being part of the US ordinariate, since numbers of their people decided that they were not comfortable becoming Roman Catholic converts.

Among the issues being worked out are the final resting place of ACCC clergy. Where 67 Anglican priests in the United States have submitted dossiers seeking Catholic ordination and 35 have received a nulla osta, or initial approval, from the Congregation for the Doctrine of the Faith, none of the Canadian Anglican clergy who have applied have heard back from Rome.

When I read the initial sentence in the paragraph above, I assumed that the final resting place referred to where the clergy would be buried, and I wondered why there was such concern about the location of graves, but I was wrong. The 'final resting place' refers to the decision about the clergy's 'place' of ministry in the church of Rome while they are yet alive, which seems to be coming slowly in Canada.

The article in the Catholic Register is dated December 20, 2011, so perhaps there has been movement forward since then, but I have not found more recent news.

I wish those who departed the Anglican Church of Canada well, and I hope the people and parishes find a place where they will be at peace in their worship and practice of the faith.

The photo is of Bishop Carl Reid, Anglican Catholic Church of Canada auxiliary bishop.

Thanks to Ann V who pointed me to the article in The Catholic Register via Anglicans Ablaze.

TWO THOUGHTS FOR THE DAY

Newt Gingrich: "If I have idols," Newt told the crowd, "it's Ronald Reagan and Margaret Thatcher."

Charles Pierce: On, lads! On to the Falklands! Or, perhaps, to the Oscars. Go get 'em, Meryl!

If you're not reading Charles Pierce at The Politics Blog at Esquire, you're missing a lot, and I mean A LOT. He writes like 20 posts a day, and it's hard to keep up, but certainly worth a try.

UPDATE: Thanks to Lapin for the poster.

WHAT WE KNOW ABOUT HUMAN SEXUALITY THAT SANTORUM DOESN'T KNOW..

...and doesn't want to know.

From Psychology Today:

Santorum has argued that contraception is morally wrong because, “It’s a license to do things in a sexual realm that is counter to how things are supposed to be.” But human beings happily experience, witness, imagine, and lament a cornicopia of erotic encounters that couldn’t possibly result in conception. Leaving aside the many “perversions” happily practiced by humans the world over, the human female is available even for Vatican-approved missionary position intercourse—at least theoretically—when she’s menstruating, already pregnant, post-menopausal, or otherwise precluded from conceiving. Is this, too, an abomination? Even Santorum and his wife, who have had more children than most couples, have certainly had a lot more non-reproductive than reproductive sex over the years.

Read the entire article. Santorum's brain seems not to be able to absorb the rudimentary realities of human sexuality (and those of our cousins the chimps and bonobos!). Nothing anyone says shakes his rock-solid conviction that the talking points straight out of the Vatican are the truth, the whole truth, and nothing but the truth.

Thanks to Paul (A.) for the link. See? Paul (A.)'s contributions to Wounded Bird are not confined to jokes. He also contributes stimulating intellectual content.

STORY OF THE DAY - GETAWAY WEEKEND

escaping as quickly as they can from a
getaway weekend gone bad

From StoryPeople.

Heh, heh. It's the only thing to do.

ASBO JESUS ON HUMANS AND ELEPHANTS

From ASBO Jesus.

I must tell you that the cartoon brought tears to my eyes. The best cartoons are perhaps those that make us think, rather than make us laugh.