When atrocities such as that which Bishop Andrew Smith of the diocese of Connecticut has committed against Fr. Mark Hansen and the parish of St. John's, Bristol, are tacitly tolerated by the HOB, respect for bishops is further eroded. Respect is not gained by employing despicable bully tactics in the name of a merciful Savior.

Nor is it enhanced by using a convoluted interpretation of canon laws that I dare say would even make Henry VIII blush with acute embarrassment. I pray that a spiritual awakening occurs to inspire these Bishops to behave as the chief pastors that they are supposed to be rather than as CEOs of corporations accountable to no one.

As an entity the HOB doesn't have the moral authority to speak to any issue that the average member of the church, or the rest of the world, cares to listen to. They usually speak only on those subjects near and dear to the narrow interest groups that got them elected to their positions of responsibility that so many systematically shirk. They warn of unilateralism but shamelessly employ it as a battering ram for a "gospel" that we don't recognize.

They make pronouncements against the U.S. government but they can't govern themselves. They warn us against war in foreign lands and to be more tolerant of other religions but they wage an unholy war against the faithful who disagree with their actions in the parishes of their various dioceses.

They speak of evangelism but are paralyzed to reach out to those inside the church that don't understand their reckless race to embrace special interest policies and are incapable of taking any stand against the zeitgeist.

They yearn for church growth but can't seem to resist showing the door to those trying to be faithful to the Gospel and the Creeds. We are now in a doppelganger world where truth and falsehood are turned around and decent faithful clergy and laity are now identified in the revisionist's view as the Anti-Christ!

We were warned of this very situation in the Gospels. Of course the very mention of believing scripture makes one a target to be labeled "superstitious" in this world of smoke and mirrors. It's now seems that we have gotten to the point where when revisionists read the claims of sovereignty by the Almighty; the reaction is "who does this guy think he is...God?"

What does the Episcopal Church stand for anyway? I'm not sure I know anymore. I do know one thing; the majority of the House of Bishops doesn't have a clue and don't seem to care. They just want the money to continue to flow into their diocesan treasuries uninterrupted, but to promote what? They seem to be formulating some form of New Age Anglo-Unitarianism. Its "catholicism lite", if you will, all of the taste but none of the requirements of discipleship.

I am growing very weary of hearing the most activist revisionist bishops and their minions accuse those that decry the installation of V. Gene Robinson as bishop of New Hampshire as being homophobic and intolerant. This has to do with bishops and General Convention condoning behavior that God warns us is not what he planned for us.

Accepting the argument of orientation as being something that one cannot help, it does not excuse the church blessing it anymore than the church should condone and bless lying. False witness is endemic to humankind and we can't help it, not even bishops, Presiding or otherwise. Even the most scrupulous of us has told at least one lie in our lives.

Do we want the church to say it's alright, or rather, that it's not good for us and strive not to do it again? Christ came to save us but from what? Revisionists act as if this whole sin problem is just some sort of one big misunderstanding perpetuated through the centuries to maintain "control".

Using this twisted reasoning their motivation is the same, just a different technique. Maybe we were really supposed to set up a Big Club where the bishops have the power to blackball anyone that doesn't have a loose enough interpretation of the expectations of membership. The more seriously we take the Club's precepts the more unfit we are deemed to belong to it. This is sheer insanity!

As an Anglican, I am proud of our heritage of being allowed to openly question basic tenets of the Catholic faith in order to test that faith. Somewhere along the way however we have gone from encouraging questioning to satisfy our troubled finite human understanding of our loving, compassionate God to the blatant encouragement of disbelief.

For the life of me, I can't understand, for example, why someone like John Spong wouldn't want to renounce his orders masquerading as a bishop representing a Supreme Being that he admits he doesn't really believe in. Maybe it's the money. Maybe it's that he could dress up and have a parade lead him to a reserved seat. I do not know what has motivated him but surely it's not the hope of our transfiguration from certain death to life eternal.

A life where I "superstitiously" believe I will see my dear father and all the other faithful that have gone before me that knew the voice of the Christ and obeyed him as imperfect as they were. All I do know is that I don't want to take a bishop like him as the prototypical ECUSA bishop that he appears to be to those outside of the Episcopal Church.

One thing is clear: he has apparently successfully instituted his Twelve Theses as the "secret handshake" for most to enter the House of Bishops.

May God have mercy on our souls!

--Ben Joyner is a communicant and lay reader of St. John's Episcopal Church in Hampton, VA in the diocese of Southern Virginia. He is a Quality Inspector at Northrop Grumman Newport News.