It is hard to know what world Frank Griswold "inhabits" to use a favorite word of his, or if he had suddenly stumbled onto a live televangelist healing show while flipping channels, and when invited to place his hands on the TV screen for healing had been zapped by something resembling the Holy Ghost.

Denial according to Daniel Webster's definition is a disowning or disavowal of reality. Denial is not letting yourself know what reality is; it is lying to yourself.

Frank Griswold, along with his revisionist Episcopal bishops are blocking out reality and they are living in major league denial; they are lying to themselves.

As the isolation of ECUSA grows from the Anglican Communion and strains grow fiercer from within, Griswold and the revisionists do the only thing they know how; they circle the wagons and exercise a draconian power over all they still own.

Witness what we are seeing in the Dioceses of Connecticut, Pennsylvania, Florida and Los Angeles to name but a few. Fearful that orthodox priests and their parishes might flee they come down on them using the canons in an illegal manner to steal what they think is theirs, bullying vestries into submission, instilling fear into other priests who might entertain any ideas about seeking alternative episcopal oversight and employ a range of lawyers to fight back.

A case in point is Bishop Andrew Smith of Connecticut who made an early morning commando raid on St. John's in Bristol, tore into the offices, grabbed the computers, froze the accounts, dismissed or cowered the vestry and put in place a two-day a week woman priest with two years pastoral experience over against a priest with 20 years under his belt. Now, several weeks later, and there is still a 7-days a week, 24-hour a day private guard outside the church.

Does the bishop think that squads of aging parishioners plan a midnight raid to take their parish back? It is fear, paranoia and the exercise of unbridled power that he uses to keep people in line, with tens of thousands of hard-earned diocesan dollars. One senses that John Howard, Bishop of Florida is also about to exercise the same draconian power to come down on seven faithful parish priests.

Frank Griswold says he sees "webs of relationships". On that point he is right. One "web" is the Network with its dozen orthodox bishops lead by Bishop Bob Duncan, another "web" are revisionist bishops like Bennison, Harris, Shaw, Robinson, Righter, Charles, Hollingsworth et al who have absolutely nothing in common with the first "web". These two webs are like circling planets with no theological connection.

There are other "webs" as well. There is CAPA and CAPAC webs which have nothing in common with the vast majority of the ECUSA HOB "web".

There is Archbishop Peter Akinola's massive web of 18 million Anglicans in Nigeria with a smaller web (CONA) forming in the US - a web that angers Frank Griswold.

Griswold says there is the "public rhetoric" presumably Internet, though he didn't say so, and there is "actual reality."

That rhetoric has said the ECUSA and the Canadians are suspended from the communion till they repent, and more recently Archbishop Akinola said the Church of England should be suspended over accepting civil partnerships. Is that a cracking sound one hears or an "actual reality" cracking sound?

Griswold: "I think it's a question of mutual respect, time, and reliance upon the Holy Spirit, who can do amazing things in overcoming divisions."

So where is the "overcoming" happening? Is it happening between Akinola and Griswold? I don't think so. Is it happening between V. Gene Robinson and Bob Duncan? I don't think so. The truth is the lines are being hardened not softened and at the end of GC2006 there might be nothing more for the orthodox to "overcome".

Said Griswold; "I see my ministry as one of connecting pieces, reminding people of a variety of points of view, that they don't have a corner on God's truth. God's truth has many dimensions."

If that's the case perhaps the Presiding Bishop might "connect the pieces" for orthodox parishes under siege by revisionist bishops. Then again if there are a "variety of points of view" pray tell me why do we have a Panel of Reference in England set up by the Archbishop of Canterbury about to hear cases of beleaguered parishes and whole dioceses around the Anglican Communion complaining about power hungry bishops trying to take over their churches and depose their priests!

"The Anglican tradition has always ... been a tradition in which widely divergent points of view have been held together not by one point of view capitulating to another but by common prayer, focusing beyond opinions on the person of Christ," said Griswold.

Really. The three legged stool is so wobbly with Scripture being neutered, reason abandoned and tradition mocked, we now have the spectacle of clown Eucharists, open communion, sodomite bishops and more, with the orthodox being forced to "capitulate" at one convention after another till they have nothing left to fight for. They might just as well put out the white flag of surrender, admit the game is over and "capitulate" to the enemy.

The steady drive by homosexuals to push their agenda for more than 40 years has been nearly totally successful, and they have managed to push conscience driven issues like women's ordination, a new so-called Prayer Book and latterly pansexuality onto the church, forcing hundreds of priests to leave and thousands of laity to look for new churches. And Griswold calls this healing!

This near total capitulation "to another" in this case to Integrity and pansexual behavior has caused an unbridgeable rift that, unless the law of non contradiction is lifted, doesn't have a prayer of healing.

On his understanding of the Christian Faith itself, Griswold is nothing if not self-absorbed in his evaluation. Here is what he said in answer as why somebody should choose Christianity over a hundred other religions?

Griswold: "Having been shaped and formed by the Christian religion, and seeing the person of Jesus as fundamental to my sense of self and the world around me, I would want to make that deep sense of the joy and life that I receive from Christ available more broadly."

So Christianity is true for Griswold because Jesus fulfills his "sense of self". Richard Gere could say the same thing about Buddha, so could Robert Schuller whose self-esteem 'gospel' marvelously misses the point about sin and salvation and death to the self. Who would want to interrupt the love fest with oneself, after all? Griswold's take on the Christian Faith is truly one of the most narcissistic, self-absorbing statements of all time. No mention of the cross, the resurrection, sin, salvation, the second coming, objective justification, eternal life...only a "sense of self." Carl Gustav Jung might approve of that notion, St. Paul certainly would not.

Jesus says that to be born anew we must die to ourselves, and the lives of the saints and Church Fathers over two millennia is living proof of that.

When asked what he would want people in Kentucky to know about the Episcopal Church, Griswold replied, "The Episcopal Church is a questioning community. ... It's confident that Christ is at its center, and that gives it the courage to look at things that are difficult. It also is a church which has lived with open-ended questions. It doesn't need to reduce things to absolutes. We can deal with shades of gray; we can deal with paradox and ambiguity without feeling that we are being unfaithful."

It's hard to know where to begin to unpack this statement. "A questioning community" reminds us of those words of Paul to Timothy "ever seeking but never coming to a knowledge of the truth." How true, how true. Then Griswold talks about "difficult" issues and "open-ended questions" all code words for pansexual behavior. "We don't need to reduce things to absolutes", says Griswold. Heaven forbid. To have absolutes might be exclusionary and that would be "fundamentalist" and not "inclusive", another favorite ECUSA buzzword. Heaven and Hell are absolute places, but for ECUSA's presiding bishop the latter no longer exists, so why should one even have an absolute belief system!

God is not restricted to the church, says Griswold. And at the Last Judgment God will not be restricted as to who He will include at the Marriage Supper of the Lamb, and it might just not include Frank Tracy Griswold.

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