So when St. Paul says in I Corinthians that "fornicators, adulterers and homosexuals will not inherit the kingdom" we should suspend the law of non contradiction, and trust and hope (and presumably pray) that he is wrong, or that his words can be parsed to make them mean other than what they obviously mean, because Bishop Ohl says so. And then, because we have agreed to disagree we should all approach the Lord's Table as the divine leveler and take Holy Communion together. That is not going to happen any longer.

Ohl then said he attended the September meeting of bishops at Camp Allen in Texas, but said he wished the invitation had been made to all bishops of the Episcopal Church. He said he went because he thinks Anglicans must continue to talk with each other, rather than do what "those at both ends of the theological/political spectrum" want to do, which is "close off conversation and expel from the Episcopal Church or the Anglican Communion all who are not of the one mind that they dictate."

He then reminded the convention that the introduction of the Windsor Report was meant to enable conversation. "It is not scripture, nor does it have the force of Canon Law," he said.

Finally, he said he still intended to stay connected even to those with whom he vehemently disagreed. "I am a loyal member of the Episcopal Church and will continue to be loyal as long as I require oxygen." He may require it even as the TEC goes on life support.

Los Angeles Bishop J. Jon Bruno said much the same thing in Washington, DC this past week while addressing a new group of moderate and progressive Episcopalians calling themselves The Episcopal Majority, urging them to "wage reconciliation" a phrase first made famous by Frank Griswold. Bruno said; "We need to wage reconciliation, to constantly work for dialogue and conversation, reaching out and touching others who are different than us. If you don't sit around a table and talk...you get nowhere," adding - even while remarking that opponents have not been listening to each other in dialogues up to now.

Ian Douglas, priest and General Convention deputy from the Diocese of Massachusetts, argues that we need to work "to foster constructive conversation about how the Episcopal Church can live into the fullest level of Communion possible." The EDS professor of Missions should write novels for a living.

Frank Griswold, when he was PB, posed that the Windsor Report itself was not conclusive of anything but rather that the report was intended as the beginning point for a conversation that would take place in Columbus under the aegis of the Holy Spirit. That, we now know, failed. Resolution B033 bombed for just about everyone...at a cost of $9 million dollars which could have gone to advance the much played up Millennium Development Goals.

The notion of conversation was a much ballyhooed theme of Griswold during his reign and he used it to manipulate circumstances by insisting on harnessing bishops into small groups where Duncan and Robinson would be forced to face each other, in an effort to dilute anger and hope, believing that, in the process, Duncan could be made to feel Robinson's pain, listen to his journey, and engage in conversation. Duncan would then feel overwhelming compassion for his "brother" and conclude that he, not Robinson, had it wrong, repent of his ways and become "inclusive" - another much ballyhooed word foisted on us by liberals.

Of course Bishop Duncan had no intention of retreating as indeed neither did Robinson who could be found, on occasion, screaming against patriarchy in the church (a shot aimed at conservatives) while arguing that he wants them still to stay in the church, while at the same time creating an unbridgeable gulf between the two men.

It should also be noted that Duncan treats his liberal parishes with far more generosity than Robinson treats his conservative ones. The same can also be said for Dallas Bishop Jim Stanton who generously allowed Christ Church Plano to leave the diocese and the TEC, while J. Jon Bruno of Los Angeles is litigating multiple times against five parishes in order to take them back into his liberal fold. One is the triumph of truth and compassion over canon law and nastiness, the other is the triumph of canon law and constitutions over truth and gospel freedom.

How can such drastically different points of view coexist in the same church?

"They can't," said Springfield Bishop Peter Beckwith. "We are not in communion with Newark. It's two different faiths."

Not so, says Newark Bishop John Croneberger. "I really believe that the church offers a very big tent, under which a lot of different acts take place."

But what the liberals will not concede, and what conservatives have come to realize, is that we no longer have two expressions of the one faith, but two religions trying to coexist in the same Procrustean bed.

No less a person than the Bishop of Rochester, England, Michael Nazir-Ali observed this when he was at our General Convention in Columbus, Ohio. What he said was that divisions between liberals and conservatives were so profound that a compromise was no longer possible. "Anglicans are used to fudging things sometimes, but I think this is a matter of such seriousness that fudge won't do," said the bishop. "Sometimes you have to recognize that there are two irreconcilable positions and you have to choose between them."

Now if you are inclined to brush this bishop off as a fundamentalist, think again. He has more earned degrees than any other bishop in England and came within a hairs breadth of being the next ABC to follow George Carey, but bad press lost him the top job. He has one of the keenest minds and intellects in Europe. He can out-think all the liberal bishops in the TEC put together.

Ohl wondered aloud how Jesus would treat outsiders in the current conflicts in the Episcopal Church and the Anglican Communion. The answer is very simple Bishop Ohl. He would show compassion, love and forgiveness, as he did the woman who washed his feet with ointment and her tears. And then he would say your sins which are many are forgiven you. He would repeat what he did for the lame man passed through the roof of a house, heal him and then tell him his sins were forgiven...But Bishop Ohl won't do that. He wants what all liberals want, inclusion without repentance, come as you are, stay as you are, no transformation necessary.

Ohl then bewails the fact that the "ravages of fracture" has produced no fewer than 53 different (Anglican) denominational groups. He's right about that. But the truth is they all agree on the authority of Scripture, the atonement, women's ordination and sodomy. That there are 53 groups is a shame and blemish on the Body of Christ and unnecessary. Sadly that has more to do with pride and purple shirts, than it has to do with 'sound doctrine'.

And for the record, Jesus reserved his biggest guns for the religious leaders of his day calling them a 'generation of vipers' and 'whited sepulchers' because they led people astray, in much the same way liberal and revisionists bishops in the TEC are doing today.

Ohl said he wondered "how can we proclaim God's grace and mercy to a broken, hurting, world starving for some Good News?" Well Bishop Ohl, it is your coterie of liberal bishops that are failing to proclaim that sort of "Good News". Yours and their 'gospel' is one of inclusion not transformation. Therein lies the problem.

As Bishop Nazir-Ali noted your liberal and revisionist pals have a different religion and because of it you have no message to proclaim to a sin sick world. Until you reclaim that gospel and not the gospel of millennium development goals being pushed by Mrs. Schori then the Episcopal Church will continue to slide into the abyss. All the numbers point in that direction.

The Rev. Canon Mark Harris, author of "The Challenge of Change: The Anglican Communion in the Post-Modern Era" opined, that the point isn't that we agree about everything; the point is that we're willing to use the kind of democratic machinery we've got to deal with our disagreements as opposed to... leaving or saying we're going to change it."

Mr. Harris doesn't get it. It is not about "democratic machinery" it is about the faith once delivered to the saints, and until the liberals and revisionists understand that, what they are pushing is "another gospel" and as a result the Episcopal Church will go on hemorrhaging till there is nothing left. And when it has all gone they will have only themselves to blame.

END