"The men who really believe in themselves are all in lunatic asylums." ― G.K. Chesterton, from Orthodoxy

The whole purpose of God in redemption is to make us holy and to restore us to the image of God. To accomplish this, He disengages us from earthly ambitions and draws us away from the cheap and unworthy prizes that worldly men set their hearts upon. The true Christian ideal is not to be happy but to be holy. --- A. W. Tozer

The promise of victory. Romans 8 contains five convictions about God's providence (verse 28), five affirmations about his purpose (29,30) and five questions about his love (31-39), which together bring us fifteen assurances about him. We urgently need them today, since nothing seems stable in our world any longer. Insecurity is written across all human experience. Christian people are not guaranteed immunity to temptation, tribulation or tragedy, but we are promised victory over them. God's pledge is not that suffering will never afflict us, but that it will never separate us from his love. --- John R.W. Stott

By David W. Virtue, DD
www.virtueonline.org
July 26, 2019

ANGLICANS, by and large are convictional Christians. Episcopalians, by and large are nominal Christians. Most Episcopalians pray, pay and obey, and write out checks without asking the hard questions about what the Church really teaches. If confronted, they say something like 'not in my house', and 'we would never allow a homosexual marriage in our parish' or 'my priest simply won't talk about sex or politics because he or she knows there just be more Republicans than Democrats sitting in their pews.' So, they say nothing.

Now if the apostle Paul had taken that approach, the two Corinthian epistles would never have been written. Paul confronts sexual issues and ethics head on and with great vigor... "a man is actually living with his father's wife!" (1 Cor. 5:1) a big no no. "Do you not know that wrongdoers will not inherit the kingdom of God? Do not be deceived! Fornicators, idolaters, adulterers, male prostitutes, sodomites, thieves, the greedy, drunkards, revilers, robbers--none of these will inherit the kingdom of God." (I Cor. 6-9-10) another list of no nos.

This is hardly in the vein of your average Episcopal priest or bishop. You can pass all the resolutions you like at General Convention and ignore Scripture, but what goes on at the local level is all that matters. I know a number of orthodox Episcopalians who stay in Episcopal parishes because they want to be buried in the parish yard or columbarium.

It only becomes an issue when a bishop with conviction, like the Bishop of Albany, Bill Love stands up and says 'not in my diocese' that the fat hits the fan. Suddenly you divide the sheep from the goats, a number of parishes revolt, the presiding bishop is summoned and the craziness begins.

Sooner or later it all comes home to roost. Silence, compromise and prevarication are losing combinations. Young people, if they are looking for a church at all, seek a pastor or a church with real conviction. That is why evangelical and Pentecostal churches are growing and why progressive churches are dying. It is why the Anglican Church in North America is growing and why the Episcopal Church is dying.

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"80% of the people who are persecuted in the world today are Christian," said Bishop Michael Nazir-Ali, former Bishop of Rochester and a world authority on religious persecution.

This astounding statistic echoed throughout the meetings last week held around the capital of the United States, Washington, D.C. The U.S. State Department held the 2nd annual Ministerial to Advance Religious Freedom around the world and Bishop Michael and Bishop Andudu from the Nuba Mountains, Sudan, were asked to participate in Ministerial side events to help shed light on the worldwide persecution of Christians.

They and other Anglicans who have participated in past GAFCON events, like Faith McDonnell of the Institute of Religion and Democracy, were in attendance to be a voice for the suffering church.

Please read more here and watch the interviews with Bishop Michael, Faith McDonnell and Bishop Andudu. https://www.gafcon.org/news/advocating-for-the-suffering-church?utm_source=GAFCON+Communications&utm_campaign=be37e6d4e9-EMAIL_CAMPAIGN_2019_07_24_03_13&utm_medium=email&utm_term=0_ae55802e3e-be37e6d4e9-90164461

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"Without true repentance this affirmation of same-sex unions as 'marriage' brings us to the end of a long goodbye for Canadian Anglicanism in its current form. It has signed its own death warrant. Faithful Anglicans now need to get off of this ship that is sinking in the midst of judgment, and reform an evangelical community of faith that can carry the rich heritage of global Anglicanism to another generation. Goodbye, ACoC." Thus writes Joe Boot of the Ezra Institute.

This past week's debacle at the Anglican Church of Canada (ACoC) Synod is living proof that orthodoxy is now dead in the ACoC. A narrowly passed resolution upholding traditional marriage was almost immediately trashed by a dozen or so bishops who referred back to an earlier resolution, A Word to the Church, which they believe gave them carte blanche to go ahead and perform these unholy "marriage" unions regardless of what Synod just voted.

In one diocese after another, bishops stepped up to the plate saying they would go ahead and allow/perform homosexual marriages and to hell with what Synod passed. This, of course, begs the question why did they have the vote at all! Canadian blogger, David of Samizdat, sums it up well when he wrote; "Mainline churches used to fear the Charismatic movement because of what they considered overly emotional displays seen during worship. Just as the liberal church has stolen much of the language of successful conservative churches -- as if success is somehow embodied in the language -- so, finally, liberals have appropriated Charismatic emotionalism. Except the emotions are throbbing waves of shock, pain, deep hurt, sobbing, anger, frustration, confusion and fear...along with enough hand-wringing, cloying, obsequious, groveling apologies to be the envy of Uriah Heep." You can read my summation here and why both TEC and the ACoC would sooner go out of business than repent. https://virtueonline.org/tec-and-acoc-would-sooner-go-out-business-repent-embracing-pansexuality

Just to complicate matters, Indigenous native Anglican groups do not want same sex marriage. In late breaking news, the Diocese of Athabasca said it will not be marrying same-sex couples. Score one for the good guys.

On the state of Biblical orthodoxy in the Anglican Church of Canada, you can read George Sinclair's fine piece here: https://virtueonline.org/state-biblical-orthodoxy-anglican-church-canada

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CONTINUING ANGLICAN NEWS. There has been a changing of the guard in the Anglican Province of America (APA). The Rt. Rev. Chandler "Chad" H. Jones was elected coadjutor of the Eastern Diocese of the Anglican Province of America at the diocese's recent synod and will succeed the Most Rev. Walter Grundorf as diocesan bishop. Grundorf is the founding presiding bishop of the APA. It is expected that Jones will succeed Grundorf at a full provincial synod next year. The APA came about in 1977 when the APA and three other Continuing bodies broke from The American Episcopal Church over her heretical teachings and unacceptable revisions of the Book of Common Prayer.

IN other news, the Diocese of the Holy Trinity (ACC) and the Diocese of the West (ACA) announced that they have agreed to work together with the goal of unifying their organizations at some level. This comes on the heels of an historic establishment of full communion between the Anglican Joint Synods Churches in 2017.

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St. Christopher Episcopal Church in League City, Texas, gave a Bible to a parishioner, David Scott, to take with him on a business trip. To this day, the congregation still has not gotten it back. That's because he left it on the moon, according to a report in ENS. The Bible was left on the lunar rover in the Hadley Plains area of the Moon by Apollo 15 Mission Commander Colonel David R. Scott, a member of St. Christopher, August 2nd, 1971. The bigger and deeper question is why Episcopalians don't read their Bibles on earth and learn what the Scriptures really have to say about sex!

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An email from the Archbishop of Canterbury's office in April 2018 confirmed that no apology had been issued to the Rev. Matthew Ineson for the lack of action to his sexual abuse claims. Ineson, a victim of sexual abuse at the hands of an Anglican priest, is campaigning for independence for church safeguarding. Ineson disputed Justin Welby's testimony at the independent inquiry into sexual abuse in the Anglican church. Trevor Devamanikkam was accused of raping Matthew Ineson of Heckmondwike in 1984. Devamanikkam took his own life on the day of his trial.

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What happens when the Bishop decides to get tough? In the light of an address by the Rev. William Taylor, Rector of St Helen's Bishopsgate in the City of London, explaining to his congregation why he is not going to leave the Church of England, here is a practical scenario that really could happen to a large city-center conservative evangelical church that chooses to stay in the denomination:

A CofE diocesan bishop receives notice from a conservative evangelical incumbent that, because she will not distance herself from the House of Bishops' 'good disagreement' and 'radical inclusion' stance on human sexuality and the transgender issue, she and his church are now in 'impaired communion'. The Bishop's spiritual oversight is not welcome; in the eyes of the Rector, the other licensed clergy on his staff team and the church council, she is just a secular CEO or area manager.

But far from taking this on the chin, the Bishop is affronted because she believes the Church has bestowed on her an authentically spiritual oversight. She resolves to play hardball with this Rector, but she is clever about it and bides her time.

When his curate's four-year licence comes to an end, she tells the Rector that he is no longer being allocated as a training incumbent. So, he won't get a first-time curate. One of his second-curacy clergy then decides to move on. The Rector gets in touch with the Bishop's office to organize a replacement, but is told that she is not going to license one. You can read the Rev. Julian Mann's full story here:
https://virtueonline.org/what-happens-when-bishop-decides-get-tough

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There is no doubt that Archbishop Justin Welby has treated the former Archbishop of Canterbury Lord George Carey very shabbily over safeguarding issues in the CofE. He was told to step down as honorary assistant bishop within the Diocese of Oxford, by Welby. Now a very British way of getting back at Welby would be for Carey to turn up to the GAFCON gabfest in Kilgali, Rwanda a month before the Lambeth Conference meets in Canterbury and declare his support for the GAFCON primates. It would certainly take the wind out of Welby's sails, but then he probably deserves it.

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Following a two-hour hearing at Calhoun County Courthouse in St. Matthews, SC, First Circuit Court Judge Edgar Dickson ordered all parties--The Episcopal Church in South Carolina (TECinSC) and The Episcopal Church (Anglican), to enter into mediation in the ongoing dispute over enforcing the South Carolina Supreme Court's 2017 decision on diocesan and parish properties.

The hearing was initially in regard to a lawsuit filed against TECinSC and The Episcopal Church by the Anglican group that has come to be known as the Betterments Act case. It was filed in November 2017 and cites the Betterments Act statute to seek compensation from TECinSC and The Episcopal Church for the cost of improvements made to the properties over the years.

During the hearing, attorneys for TECinSC and The Episcopal Church argued the grounds for dismissal of the case, per their motion filed on December 15, 2017. During the course of the arguments, Judge Dickson asked several questions on issues surrounding ownership and trusteeship of the involved properties. In response, attorneys for Bishop Mark Lawrence argued that the Supreme Court decision of August 2, 2017 does not, in their view, specifically identify the parishes that directly acceded to the Dennis Canon. That canon requires that church properties be held in trust on behalf of the diocese, to be used for the benefit of The Episcopal Church. You can read more here: https://virtueonline.org/south-carolina-circuit-court-hears-arguments-betterments-statute-and-orders-mediation

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A man who says he was sexually abused by a priest in the early 1970s is suing the Episcopal Diocese of Arizona and the Tucson parish where the abuse allegedly occurred, claiming his reports of repeated molestation were ignored at the time. It may be the first lawsuit to take advantage of a new Arizona law that extends the statute of limitations for cases of child sexual abuse. The diocese, though not disputing that the abuse took place, denies his accusations of a cover-up and says the matter was handled appropriately at the time.

According to the lawsuit, Charles Taylor was sexually abused for several years around age 12 by the Rev. Richard Babcock, a priest at Grace Church (now Grace St. Paul's Church), in the church and in Babcock's home. Taylor says he told the rector about the abuse at the time, but the rector failed to stop it, and Babcock continued to abuse him and other children. The lawsuit, filed on July 12, also claims that the diocese knew that Babcock was abusing children and covered it up by "reassigning him to other churches." The complaint consists of two counts each -- negligence and breach of fiduciary duty -- against the diocese and Grace St. Paul's. Babcock, now deceased, admitted to having abused children in a sworn affidavit before his death, according to the law firm representing Taylor. ENS Report

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The latest in sexual outrage is, not so surprisingly, transgenderism. While a tiny proportion (around 0.05 per cent) of people are genuinely 'intersex', meaning they exhibit a mixture of male and female biology owing to a disorder of sex development, transgenderism has typically been regarded as separate to this, as a psychological disorder known as gender dysphoria (and previously, gender identity disorder). Increasingly, however, activists, including many within the medical establishment, are blurring the lines between the two and claiming that transgenderism, like intersexuality, is rooted in a person's genetics and biology.

Transgenderism has typically been regarded as a psychological disorder known as gender dysphoria (and previously, gender identity disorder).

The idea that a person's sex is determined by their anatomy at birth is not true, and we've known that it's not true for decades.' So says Dr Joshua D Safer, endocrinologist at the Center for Transgender Medicine and Surgery in New York and president of the United States Professional Association of Transgender Health.

Likewise, the current US Endocrine Society Clinical Practice Guidelines from 2017 state that the term 'biological sex' is 'imprecise and should be avoided', citing the existence of intersex conditions and eliding them with transgenderism. The guidelines endorse the controversial notion that sex is 'assigned' not recognized at birth and argue that 'compelling studies' show that biology contributes to 'gender identity and its expression'.

Critics of transgender ideology often point to the fact that a person's sex is biologically determined as male or female (XX or XY chromosomes) to demonstrate that any feelings a person has to be the other sex must be mistaken, and possibly a sign of mental illness. British theologian and Anglican priest Dr. Will Jones takes this apart and you can read what he says here:
https://virtueonline.org/transgender-researchers-twist-data-prove-transgenderism-innate

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The New Wineskins for Global Mission Conference will be held on September 26-29, 2019. The tri-annual New Wineskins for Global Mission Conference, at Ridgecrest Conference Center in Black Mountain, North Carolina, continues to be the single largest gathering of Anglicans interested in international mission from throughout the whole of the Anglican Communion. You can register here: https://newwineskinsconference.org/

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All Blessings,

David