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Churches read bishop's letter en masse St. James' pastor declines to follow orders from the L. A. Bishop Diocese citing its new freedom from the Episcopal denomination.   Jeff Benson Daily Pilot   August 23/2004   NEWPORT BEACH - The Los Angeles Diocese lashed back against St. James Church this week in a pastoral letter condemning St. James' secession from the Episcopal Church to join the Diocese of Luwero in the Anglican province of Uganda.   The Rt. Rev. J. Jon Bruno, who issued the statement, ordered all Los Angeles Diocese churches to read the letter at their Sunday services.   "I have chosen to take the extraordinary step of writing to you in a pastoral letter because of the extreme nature of the decision these congregations and clergy have made and the implications it has on our life together, not only for the Episcopal Church in the U.S.A., but for the worldwide Anglican Communion," he wrote.   The letter was laced with sentiments of betrayal and disappointment, as Bruno specified several failed attempts to talk with St. James' leaders after what he called a "breach of trust and authority" and his belief that leaders had "abandoned the communion."   "No bishop outside the diocese has the jurisdiction to oversee ministry within that geographical diocese," Bruno wrote. "The fact that a bishop from another autonomous church within the Anglican Communion has chosen to exercise oversight in this diocese flies in the face of our ethos as Anglicans and of the Catholic unity of the church. It is a clear statement that the Diocese of Luwero and its bishop and the province of Uganda and its primate have broken with the established historic authority of the Anglican Communion."   St. James Rev. Praveen Bunyan didn't read the letter in any of the church's Sunday Masses because the church no longer considers itself Episcopal and can now act independently of the order, he said.   "He's not my bishop, why would I read it?" Bunyan said. "I've got better things to do."   Instead, he told his congregation he'd make himself available to address their questions and concerns both after the Mass and in a 7 p.m. members-only meeting tonight. The congregation had voted overwhelmingly in favor of secession last week.   "I cannot speak for [Bruno]," Bunyan said. "He mentioned breaking a covenant. Two parties make a covenant. Our basic foundations are one, that Jesus Christ is lord and savior, and that is the teaching of the church. And two, the Old and New Testament Scriptures are the authority for us. On those two counts, the Episcopal Church is drifting away."   Sunday Mass began as usual, but after parishioners gave one another their peace offerings, Bunyan addressed them with his thoughts on the secession. He told people at three services that they should refrain from gossip, triangulation and any condemnation or judgmental words because he wanted to continue the church's pillars of love and respect for all people. The supportive and attentive 11 a.m. congregation acknowledged him with cheers and applause.   Churchgoer Christie Russell of Brea said the Sunday Mass wasn't much different from others she'd attended at St. James.   "It was glorious," Russell said. "We always have great teaching, and there wasn't anything different except for the fact that now we're under the bishop of Luwero. I always come here looking forward to worship."   Bunyan said he felt the church needed to act quickly because he felt the Episcopal Church was becoming so ambiguous that it was on the verge of becoming "the world's largest Universalist Church."   For guidance, he said he'd turned last month to Ugandan Archbishop Henry Luke Orombi, a friend he'd seen enthroned on Jan. 25 to Uganda's highest religious position.   "The parish had been asking me for a long time, 'Why are we still affiliated with the Episcopal Church?'" he said. "I told them we wanted to be under a bishop because it's a tradition that we'd received for centuries. But those core values had deteriorated, and we waited for an opening we could find and a bishop who would receive us under authority. Archbishop Orombi and I had been associated for a long time, and we're theologically in the same place."   JEFF BENSON is the news assistant

BISHOP BRUNO'S BETE NOIR   News Analysis   By David W. Virtue   Jon Bruno, the Bishop of Los Angeles got a dose of in-your-face orthodoxy this week, the kind of thing orthodox priests have been taking for years from revisionist bishops, and he didn't like it one little bit.   The ex-LA cop, former professional football player and General Convention bouncer for his previous boss, said four clergy from two congregations - St. James' Church in Newport Beach and All Saints Church in Long Beach - appeared unexpectedly, without an appointment, at the Cathedral Center on Tuesday morning, August 17, and delivered written notice that they were leaving him, the diocese and the Episcopal Church. They also left a voice-mail message for the bishop.   That's the bishop's spin. A reader close to the scene said the rectors of the parishes did indeed go to Diocesan Center on Tuesday morning, and were unable to contact any of the four bishops of this diocese. They did indeed "leave voice messages", which, in this technical-gadget age, was the best that they could do, as no bishops were available (or perhaps willing) to meet them. Driving to the diocese - a distance of some 50 miles - is no small feat when you bear in mind Los Angeles traffic. They made the effort. According to the source, Bruno made himself unavailable.   What the four clergy said was that they had had enough of The Episcopal Church's theological and moral innovations and bade the bishop, the diocese and the Episcopal Church farewell, and said they were coming under the Diocese of Luweero in the Anglican Province of Uganda and were therefore accountable now to the Primate of the Province of Uganda. A third parish, St. David's in North Hollywood also upped and left the diocese and the Episcopal Church two days later.   On hearing the news the bishop went ballistic. The ecclesiastical outrage ran for more than a 1,000 words, with the bishop invoking the weight of his office, the canons and constitutions, the primacy of Frank Griswold and his office, even and including dashing off a letter to the Archbishop of Uganda and the Archbishop of Canterbury no less, asking for the latter's intervention!   Bruno promptly called an emergency meeting of the Diocesan Standing Committee, and inhibited the four clergy, (later adding two more) which included a woman deacon, for abandoning the communion of the Episcopal Church, that is, the faith, which they have not, and served them notice that unless they change their minds (which they won't) he will move to take their parishes and properties from them (which may not be as easy as he thinks). The Fifth District Court of Appeal opinion recently found in favor of a Fresno Methodist parish church that had seceded from the United Methodist Church (California-Nevada Conference). While the UMC will appeal to the California State Supreme Court the court of appeal decision does not bode well for Bruno, et. al. Furthermore PA Bishop Charles Bennison has been unable to unseat two rectors in his diocese who have come under the Province of Central Africa and who have kept their properties.   Both California churches are in the process of re-writing their respective corporate charters to excise trust language that might be construed as favoring the ECUSA.   Now these two parishes are no small bit players in the unfolding drama of ECUSA's slow but steady demise. They are two of the richest, most powerful parishes on the West Coast of the U.S. The former rector of St. James is the Rev. David C. Anderson who now heads the American Anglican Council, and he is an implacable foe of Frank Griswold. The illustrious Ahmanson family attends this church, and they have enough money to send Bruno and Griswold on a one way ticket to the moon and keep them there.   Now you know why Bruno had a cow over their departures; he will lose hundreds of thousands of dollars that would have gone to his coffers to feed his revisionist agenda and the church's sodomist Moloch. Of course they are not the first parishes to leave the ECUSA and they certainly won't be the last.   Reading through his letter of ecclesiastical outrage, one gets the usual carrot and stick approach to fleeing clergy that one is all too familiar with in these instances. If you come back all will be well, we still love you, please come home and the temporary inhibitions will be lifted against you. If you don't, we will not be waging reconciliation and graceful conversation is over and we will toss you into ecclesiastical outer darkness, and use the canons to wrest your properties from you. Long experience has taught this writer that the latter always prevails.   The fact that the three parishes have come under the ecclesiastical authority of a Ugandan Bishop and ultimately under that of Henry Luke Orombi, Archbishop of Uganda, only gores Bruno's ox even more. He sent a stiff letter to Rowan Williams whining mightily.   Frank Griswold weighed in with a letter to Archbishop Orombi expressing his concern about "boundary violations" with Orombi replying that these priests and their parishes are now part of the Anglican Province of Uganda and under his authority. "They are part of the Diocese of Luweero under Bishop Evens M. Kisekka who has appointed retired U.S. Bishop Ben Benitez of Texas to give immediate oversight to these parishes," said the articulate Archbishop.   In an audio taped statement, Benitez said he felt that perhaps his entire ministry up to this point was the Lord preparing him for this moment!" Neither Griswold nor Bruno made any mention of Benitez in their responses to the fleeing parishes. Do we smell a presentment in the wind? Recently five retired orthodox bishops refused to meet with Griswold's Council of Advice and its President because they smelled a kangaroo court action.   Griswold talked about Bruno's "ministry of reconciliation" in the diocese, but Griswold can't reconcile squat in the ECUSA. He couldn't reconcile Bishop Charles Bennison and Fr. David Moyer, despite promises that he would intervene on Fr. Moyer's behalf and deal with Bennison. It never happened. Furthermore you cannot reconcile the irreconcilable. Light and dark, truth and falsity about sexuality issues are clear in Scripture, so "reconciliation" for Bruno means never having any moral absolutes and keeping your fingers crossed that everybody will stay in line.   Of course Dr. Williams can't really do anything about it either, except make noises about the need for greater understanding and tolerance between those of differing points of view and then defer the whole thing back to Griswold who hopes that all parties will go to his now famous "deeper place" to find reconciliation; perhaps even consult Sufi the Rumi on same plain or other.   Bruno also wrote a letter of protest to Bishop Evans Mukasa Kisekka of Luwero, with a copy to Archbishop Henry Luke Orombi, the primate of the Province of Uganda expressing his ecclesiastical displeasure. The African bishops replied in the vein of a certain American General surrounded by a German Army corps in the forest of Bastogne, "Nuts". The parishes now belong to us.   At the end of the day Bruno has one of two courses of action; let the rectors and the parishes go in peace to love and serve the Lord, and there is no evidence to suggest he will, or hire a battery of lawyers, and sue them for their parishes and endowments. In the end the whole mess will wind up in the courts, where it was bound to end up anyway.   Now Bruno's letter tells us more about what he believes than he would like to have had revealed, especially to this writer. His anger and outrage got the better of him and he let slip his true feelings and beliefs.   Bruno blasted statements issued by the two congregations, declaring "these clergy have also framed their leaving in terms I find unfair and false" by saying that the Episcopal Church is "not orthodox biblically or theologically."   The Episcopal Church is orthodox? Who does Bruno think he is fooling? Perhaps the bishop can explain why some 82 bishops could not affirm Resolution B001 upholding certain basic doctrines of the faith at last summer's General Convention, and then the majority of those same bishops voted for the blessing of same-sex unions and then to consecrate a divorced homoerotic bishop. These actions are orthodox!   Bruno: "No bishop outside the diocese has the jurisdiction to oversee ministry within that geographical diocese. The fact that a bishop from another autonomous church within the Anglican Communion has chosen to exercise oversight in this diocese flies in the face of our ethos as Anglicans and of the catholic unity of the Church. It is a clear statement that the Diocese of Luwero and its Bishop and the Province of Uganda and its Primate have broken with the established historic authority of the Anglican Communion."   Nonsense. Two priests in the Diocese of Pennsylvania have come under the authority of the Province of Central Africa and Bishop Charles Bennison can't do a thing about it, despite all his huffing and puffing, threats of lawsuits and more. There are also priests and parishes in the Dioceses of Atlanta and Oklahoma that have come under the ecclesiastical authority of the Archbishop of the Southern Cone. The truth is these three parishes and their priests in the Diocese of Los Angeles are in very good company. And you can be sure that company will, in time, only grow.   But it is the following two lines that gave Bruno away. He writes: "Yet I will not let the Holy Scriptures be compromised by those who seek to make their literalist and simplistic interpretation the only legitimate one."   Ah, there you have it. Herein lies the heart of the whole matter. Sex, specifically homosex is near and dear to the heart of every revisionist bishop, and God forbid that Bruno should offend or fail to pander to his coterie of gay and lesbian priests, because that would be a sin. The Rev. Susan Russell, an out and out diocesan lesbian leader and priest whined about why these priests should exclude themselves from her table. Really. The answer is simple; her sexual behavior can bring forth neither biological nor spiritual life and the orthodox priests know it.   So Bruno accuses these six priests of being fundamentalist about sex - in whose company could be added, St. Paul, St. Augustine, Athanasius, Luther, Calvin, Wesley, C. S. Lewis, Pope John Paul II, Billy Graham and a whole host of saints throughout the ages. But according to Bruno the Episcopal Church's orthodox believers - its true believers - are "literalist and simplistic about sex" - he should have also added homophobic as well because that is clearly what he meant. The inclusive bishop just lost his inclusive virginity.   And one has only to look at Bruno's own voting record. It speaks volumes. He has voted for every single sexual innovation in the ECUSA. He voted for the blessing of same-gender unions to be added to the Book of Occasional Services; he voted to recognize sex outside of marriage in Resolution D039; he signed a statement supporting Washington Bishop Jane Dixon whose million dollar pogrom to rid herself of one pesky Anglo Catholic priest is eerily reminiscent of what he is now doing, and he topped it off by voting to consecrate Gene Robinson, a divorced homoeroticist for Bishop of New Hampshire. So why should six orthodox clergy in his diocese follow him to hell, he can go there all by himself.   These six inhibited clergy serving the three Southern California parishes will no longer jeopardize their own souls and those of their parishioners by staying with the Episcopal Church and one can hardly blame them.   Bishop Bruno loves to strut around wearing a large gold cross over his equally large stomach, but he has never learned the truth that wearing that cross and carrying that cross are two entirely different matters, and the latter demands sacrifice (and truth-telling about sexual behavior) for which Christ himself died, a fact that seems to have entirely escaped the bishop. The way to Hell is paved with inclusive intentions, and these clergy have drawn their final line in the sand and will not follow him. They have relearned that age old truth that the gate is small and the way is narrow and few find it. They at least found it, before it was too late.   NOTE: If you are not receiving this from VIRTUOSITY, the Anglican Communion's largest biblically orthodox Episcopal/Anglican Online News Service, then you may subscribe for FREE by going to: www.virtuosityonline.org . Virtuosity's website has been accessed by more than one million readers in 45 countries on six continents. This story is copyrighted but may be freely forwarded electronically with reference to VIRTUOSITY and the author. No changes are permitted in the text.   END

Bishop aims to woo worshippers back with sweet talk   By Jonathan Petre, Religion Correspondent THE TELEGRAPH   8/27/2004   A bishop who warned that the Church of England was facing extinction is to launch a campaign to lure 50-somethings back to the pews with bars of chocolate and their favourite hymns.   The Bishop of Manchester, the Rt Rev Nigel McCulloch, is attempting to swell attendance figures at harvest festival services next month by distributing thousands of credit card-style invitations and "goody" bags of free gifts, including chocolate.   The initiative, which is being sponsored by a Christian businessman, is largely aimed at over-50s who have drifted away from worship rather than the under-20s, the age group Church leaders normally seem most anxious to attract.   The "Back to Church Sunday" scheme has been inspired by glitzy PR launches and marketing campaigns that give away gift bags to promote their products.   Half the diocese's 300 parishes have already signed up for the scheme and ordered material that includes colour posters depicting a crowd of people around a puzzle-shaped hole containing the slogan "Missing You".   Over the next few weeks regular churchgoers will hand out the specially designed invitations to friends, neighbours and relatives and the event will be heavily promoted across the diocese.   For the service on Sept 26, clergy will be encouraged to use a specially prepared traditional liturgy on the theme of thanksgiving and to use harvest festival hymns that resonate with older people, such as We Plough the Fields and Scatter.   They will also be urged to do something "completely different" during the service, such as showing a comedy video.   New worshippers will be handed a bag at the end of the service containing a glossy booklet about the Church, a special issue of the diocesan newsletter Crux and a bar of "fair trade" chocolate donated by the Co-Op supermarket chain.   In the newsletter, Bishop McCulloch will tell them: "We share a great Father. We're brothers and sisters in Christ. We're all on a journey together. I wonder, have you ever thought of coming back to join us?"   The Bishop caused a stir in March when he said that the Church of England could disappear "within a generation or two" without an immediate change of direction.   Commenting on projections that suggested that, at the current rate of decline, total Church membership across Britain will have fallen to below six million by next year, the bishop said: "We will, unless there is a turn in the tide, be a Church which gradually disappears from this land."   The Church's usual emphasis has been on attracting young people because of concerns that congregations are ageing but Manchester diocesan officials have identified the over-50s as fertile territory because many of them have memories of churchgoing not shared by younger generations.   The diocese cited new research that found that of the 20 million people aged 50 or over in Britain, half were estimated to have had an experience of the Christian worship through Sunday school or in later life.   The scheme is being monitored by academics at Wolverhampton University, and the organisers hope that if it proves successful it could be introduced nationally.   Canon Roger Hill, the rector of St Ann's church, Manchester, said he was very enthusiastic about the scheme. "We come across dozens of people who say they have slipped out of the habit of going to church and want to come back. We have found that personal invitations are a very effective way to achieve this. The bar of chocolate just brings an extra element of pleasure."   END

The Diocese of Los Angeles The Cathedral Center of St. Paul 840 Echo Park Avenue Los Angeles, CA 90026-4209   August 22, 2004   To the members of All Saints Episcopal Church in Long Beach,   My beloved Brothers and Sisters in Christ, please know how disheartened I am by the decision of your Rector, Wardens and Vestry to leave the Episcopal Church. However, I am pleased to let you know that the mission of the Church goes on in your communities, and we will be arranging for your pastoral care through other clergy in your area. I am asking all faithful Episcopalians to contact the diocesan offices at a special phone number or email address, listed below, to gather names and facilitate communication to reconstitue the ministry of the continuing Episcopal Church in your Parish and arrange for the election of a new vestry.   The Anglican understanding of church governance is based on unity with a bishop in a geographic diocese. I know you will seek to remain faithful to the doctrine, discipline and worship of the Episcopal Church in union with your bishop.   The consecrated buildings of your Parish are not the sole possession of the congregation. They belong to the whole Episcopal Church and the Diocese of Los Angeles, where together we serve Christ in this place. Soon we hope to return these properties to those faithful Episcopalians in your community who will continue our common mission as a Diocese and a Church.   The ministry of the Episcopal Church in your communities will continue. I have attached a pastoral letter that is to be read to all congregations in this Diocese today, August 22, 2004. I want to be sure you get a chance to read it. My, thoughts, concern and especially my prayers are with you all. Please pray for me.   Please call: 213.482.2040 extension 283 or E-Mail: pastoralletter@LADiocese.org   Yours in Christ,   +J Jon Bruno

Pastoral Letter from the Rt. Rev. J. Jon Bruno, Bishop of Los Angeles   This letter shall be read at every service in all churches of this diocese and made available to all members of our congregations this Sunday, August 22, 2004.   August 17, 2004   To my beloved brothers and sisters in Christ throughout the Diocese of Los Angeles:   Greetings in the name of our Lord Jesus. You may already have heard that two congregations in this Diocese, St. James' Episcopal Church in Newport Beach and All Saints' Episcopal Church in Long Beach, have informed me of the decisions made by their rectors, wardens and vestries to leave the Episcopal Church and to join the Diocese of Luwero in the Anglican Province of Uganda, and that clergy of these churches were now under the bishop of that diocese. The rectors of these congregations appeared unexpectedly, and without an appointment, at the Cathedral Center on Tuesday morning, August 17, and delivered written notice of their actions. They also left a voice-mail message for me and seem to have believed that this served as sufficient communication with me.   The Reverends Praveen Bunyan, William Thompson and Richard Menees, priests, and the Rev. Kathleen Adams, deacon, all of whom are clergy of the Episcopal Church in the United States of America and canonically resident in this Diocese, have therefore abandoned the communion of this Church.   I temporarily inhibited these clergy immediately and requested that the two rectors of the congregations meet with me to rescind their decision. They refused this invitation. Subsequently, I called for an emergency meeting of the Standing Committee and, in accordance with the canons of this church, the Standing Committee has informed me in writing that there is sufficient evidence that these clergy have abandoned the communion and I have responded by inhibiting them from the exercise of the ordained ministry. Should they wish to return to the communion of this Church during this period, a process of restoration will take place. Should they not change their minds, they will be deposed. My sincere hope for these clergy and vestries is that they will reconsider their decision and return to full communion with me, the Episcopal Church and indeed with the Anglican Communion.   All of my actions have been in consultation with the office of the Presiding Bishop, the Standing Committee and our diocesan chancellors.   I have also written a letter of protest to the Bishop of the Diocese of Luwero with a copy to the Primate of the Province of Uganda. I have also asked the Presiding Bishop and the Archbishop of Canterbury to intervene in this breach of trust and authority.   I have chosen to take the extraordinary step of writing to you in a pastoral letter because of the extreme nature of the decision these congregations and clergy have made and the implications it has on our life together, not only for the Episcopal Church in the USA, but for the worldwide Anglican Communion.   Our Constitution and Canons help to bring order to our common life in the Episcopal Church. Recall that much of our current crisis arose after the General Convention of the Church last summer. The decision to assent to the election of Gene Robinson as Bishop of New Hampshire was made, in large part, because that diocese duly elected a bishop in accordance with the canons of this Church. Both the House of Bishops and House of Deputies attested to the authority of that diocese to elect its own bishop, that it had been done appropriately and that their decision was based on the quality of Bishop Robinson's life and experience. As a Church, we seek, whenever possible, to allow autonomy in decision-making to individual dioceses. Each Bishop in every diocese has authority over the life and work of that diocese, its congregations and clergy. The Bishop's ministry is based in our belief that in any given place, there is one Bishop, who continues the work of the holy apostles and is the chief priest, pastor and teacher in that diocese.   Priests exercise their ministry on behalf of their Bishop and only under the Bishop's authority. No bishop outside the diocese has the jurisdiction to oversee ministry within that geographical diocese. The fact that a bishop from another autonomous church within the Anglican Communion has chosen to exercise oversight in this diocese flies in the face of our ethos as Anglicans and of the catholic unity of the Church. It is a clear statement that the Diocese of Luwero and its Bishop and the Province of Uganda and its Primate have broken with the established historic authority of the Anglican Communion.   This is all the more troubling because for some time now an international commission of the Anglican Communion, established by the Archbishop of Canterbury, has been hard at work attempting to respond pastorally to some of the concerns of more conservative members of the Communion who are troubled by the decisions of our last General Convention and by the blessing of same-sex unions taking place in the Church in Canada. The final report of this commission is due out in approximately one month. How disappointing that our congregations would make such a decision at such an inopportune time. Moreover, I have attempted to honor the congregations and clergy who have dissented from the decisions of General Convention and even offered them the oversight of a bishop of our Church whose opinions on these issues are more in keeping with theirs. The rectors of these congregations did not avail themselves of this opportunity and even up to two weeks ago affirmed their love and loyalty to me as their Bishop. How distressing their recent decision has been to me.   It is both my pastoral and fiduciary responsibility as your Bishop, in concert with the Standing Committee, to protect and preserve the properties of these congregations as part of the Diocese of Los Angeles. The consecrated buildings of each of our congregations rightfully belong to the Episcopal Church in this Diocese and in the USA. I also have a pastoral responsibility to all those of Christ's flock entrusted to my care and am developing plans for the pastoral care of those members of our Church in these congregations who seek to maintain their loyalty to this Church.   Perhaps more than any other time I have felt that I am not alone through this troubling time, not only because similar events have been taking place in other parts of our Church, but principally because I have been contacted by our Presiding Bishop's office and by many other bishops in our Church bringing words of encouragement and support, along with the other bishops in our diocese with whom I have been in contact. Yet even more than these, the messages of your prayers and love from around the Diocese have heartened me. I cannot thank you enough.   Finally, apart from the issue of sexuality, these clergy have also framed their leaving in terms I find unfair and false. They have stated that this Church is not orthodox biblically or theologically. How wrong they are. I want you to know as your Bishop that I continue to uphold the vows I made on the day of my consecration "to guard the faith, unity and discipline of the Church." I believe today as I did when I was first ordained that the Scriptures contain all things necessary to salvation. Yet I will not let the Holy Scriptures be compromised by those who seek to make their literalist and simplistic interpretation the only legitimate one. Further, I uphold the orthodox faith given to us by the apostles in all the essentials laid down in the historic creeds of the Church. In these necessary things there must be unity of faith, but in other things there may be diversity within this roomy house we call the Anglican Communion. Please join with me at this time as you are gathered at the Lord's Table in praying for these congregations, our Diocese, and for the whole Church. Let us pray:   O God of unchangeable power and eternal light: Look favorably on your whole Church, that wonderful and sacred mystery; by the effectual working of your providence, carry out in tranquility the plan of salvation; let the whole world see and know that things which were cast down are being raised up, and things which had grown old are being made new, and that all things are being brought to their perfection by him through whom all things were made, your Son Jesus Christ our Lord; who lives and reigns with you in the unity of the Holy Spirit, one God, for ever and ever. Amen.   END

ACN CONVOCATION DEANS COMMENT ON TWO CALIFORNIA CHURCHES' DISASSOCIATION FROM THE EPISCOPAL CHURCH   By John Guernsey & Cynthia P. Brust   As Convocation Deans for the Anglican Communion Network (ACN), we are strongly supportive of St. James' and All Saints' Anglican Churches who have disassociated from the Episcopal Church USA (ECUSA). While the ACN operates under the Constitution of ECUSA, our goal is to unify faithful Anglicans in the US, and we offer non-ECUSA congregations "partner status".   These are faithful, orthodox parishes that have consistently upheld the authority of Scripture and have attempted to foster Biblical reconciliation with their diocese and bishop. Their decision to withdraw from ECUSA is further evidence of the doctrinal crisis fracturing the Episcopal Church.   In coming under the jurisdictional oversight of the Diocese of Luwero, Anglican Province of Uganda, St. James' and All Saints' have found safe harbor.   We deeply regret the aggressive response of Bishop Bruno and his attempted inhibition from priestly duties as well as his threat to depose clergy no longer under his authority. During this season of realignment, we call upon each individual and congregation to seek the Lord Jesus Christ and to obediently follow His direction.   Like St. James' and All Saints', some churches will choose to disassociate from ECUSA while others will remain. We exhort faithful Anglicans to support one another whether in or out of ECUSA, recognizing that we are one family as members of the worldwide Anglican Communion.   We offer our prayerful support to the clergy and parishioners of St. James' and All Saints' Anglican Churches and look forward to continued ministry with our colleague, the Rev. William Thompson, rector of All Saint', Long Beach and Dean of the Western Convocation.   The Rev. John Guernsey, Mid-Atlantic Convocation The Rev. James McCaslin, Southeast Convocation The Ron McCrary, Mid-Continental Convocation The Rev. William Thompson, Western Convocation The Rev. William Murdoch, New England Convocation The Rev. David Moyer, Forward in Faith North America Convocation

GREG GARRISON News staff writer   8/2/2004   The Rev. William Wilson, a priest who was on the staff of St. Luke's Episcopal Church in Mountain Brook for four years, has left the Episcopal Diocese of Alabama.   Wilson had objected to the Episcopal Church's approval of an openly gay bishop last year, Bishop V. Gene Robinson of New Hampshire.   "It's the end of the sacredness of sexuality," Wilson said. "I do not think the Christian vision of sexuality includes sex outside marriage."   In protest, Wilson applied for acceptance as a priest in the Anglican Diocese of Bolivia and was granted that recognition.   "It was a way to resolve conscience," Wilson said.   Wilson said he had hoped he would be allowed to function as a visiting Anglican priest in Alabama Episcopal churches, but that request has been denied by Episcopal Bishop Henry N. Parsley. "I wanted to be treated like a priest from another diocese," Wilson said.   Instead, Parsley removed Wilson's faculties, so that he cannot lead worship services as a priest in churches of the Episcopal Diocese of Alabama, Wilson said. Wilson had been an Episcopal priest in the Diocese of Alabama since 1990, he said.   Efforts to reach Parsley for comment were unsuccessful.   Wilson, 67, said he has begun his own small congregation, called Church of the Most Blessed Name, which will meet for the first time on Sept. 12 at 5 p.m. in the Chapel at Glenwood on Sicard Hollow Road.   He has also recently written a book, "Four Essentials: Classical Disciplines of Christian Spirituality," in which he expounds on monastic traditions, based upon his 25 years of experience as a cloistered Trappist monk who once lived in a hut as a hermit under a rule of silence.   "It's a translation of the monastic tradition to the Christian life of the world," he said of the book.   In 1981, Wilson went to the Andes mountains in Bolivia and founded the Amistad Mission, which now operates a hospital, retreat house, school and orphanage for the poor in Cochabamba. He left the Catholic priesthood to be married in 1989 and became a priest in the Episcopal Church, which allows married priests. Wilson and his wife, Susan, a surgeon, have two children.   Wilson was priest associate for spiritual formation and associate rector for four years at St. Luke's, where he left the staff Dec. 31. "I love Episcopalians," he said. "They were church and family to me."   END ______________________________

By Ron Boyd-MacMillan   In 2002 it was my privilege to spend a weekend with 10 top house-church leaders in China. What I heard changed my life.   But it was what I smelled that made the first impression. These men had not washed in months. They preach often for eight hours a day, sleep on a floor, and travel the next day to do it all again. They carry one suit of clothes, which they rarely have time to launder, and the reek of unwashed bodies and bad socks roared up my nose like a cavalry charge. After a couple of days, though, you stop noticing.   These 10 were amazing. I knew the brother who had begun the ministry in 1987. He saw 200 converted in the first year. When I visited him in 1991, there were 30,000 in the movement; now, he estimates there are 750,000 members!   You would think that with this kind of growth these leaders would be leaping and dancing. When they told me about the growth, I shouted, "Hallelujah." They smiled, then promptly burst into tears. "What am I missing?" I asked.   "You are missing the reason we are gathered here this weekend: to ask God why he brings people to himself far faster than we can disciple them."   If this sounds ungrateful, consider their challenges. Last year over 10,000 of their membership left to join a vicious cult called "Lightning from the East." As one leader explained, "We can only ask new converts to disciple new converts, and it results in so much bad teaching that we are beginning to fear that the gains of the revival could be undone."   Another said, "This revival looks statistically incredible, but it is spiritually vulnerable. Millions of Chinese Christians are just one unanswered prayer away from moving on to another religion."   As many know, the largest and longest revival in the history of Christendom took place in China in the past 30 years. The church has grown from a couple of million in the late 1970s to upwards of 60 million today.   And yet the Chinese church has precious few resources to disciple the millions of new converts. This is partly because they are a persecuted community, where it is hazardous for independent house-church movements to maintain links with Western churches, and partly because the growth is so overwhelming.   The 10 were studying the history of revival. I had brought them a syllabus from my old professor, and as we went through all the revivals two points became clear.   First, revivals don't last very long. They are temporary phenomena. "We may not enjoy this growth very much longer," said one of the group, "because the revival killer is coming: consumerism." In the words of Li Tien En, a famous Shanghai pastor, "Consumerism makes you think you don't have to suffer to follow Jesus. It makes you think you can have lots of things, and Christ as well. In reality, you just end up with lots of things, and most of the time you don't even realize Christ has gone." China is experiencing rampant capitalism. Everyone wants to get rich quick, and many are.   Second, revivals do not necessarily have a long-term impact. Some revivals disappear without a trace. Think of the Welsh revival of 1904. What has Wales got to show for that but empty churches today? These men were all concerned and asked us for our help: "This is the Chinese church's most urgent need--for the Western church to enable us to turn new believers into mature believers, so that this revival will change Chinese society."   Said one of the leaders, "Westerners seem to see China's Christians either as an entirely persecuted church - which it isn't, or as an entirely free church - which it isn't either. Torture happens, but not to most of us. Make a hue and cry about torture by all means, but don't be distracted from realizing what the Chinese church really is and needs - we are a revival church, and we need your assistance with the blessing and burdens that revival brings."   He added, "Remember, it's your revival too. You prayed for it as much as we did, and we will come to you with the blessing as China opens up more in the future."   (Ron Boyd-MacMillan works for Open Doors International [ www.od.org ], a ministry that offers an in-depth leadership and Bible-training program to over 5,000 Chinese teachers a year. They also deliver desperately needed Bibles and Christian literature extensively throughout China. This article was featured in the Jan/Feb 2004 issue of PRISM Magazine, which looked at both the persecuted church in China and the new religious freedom flourishing there.)

Commentary   By Uwe Siemon-Netto UPI Religious Affairs Editor   PARIS, Aug. 17 (UPI) -- As one analyzes the pope's weekend pilgrimage to Lourdes, U.S. baseball great Yogi Berra curiously comes to mind. Here was the ailing John Paul II whispering urgently in Polish during a sermon given in French: "Help me; I must finish." Here, Belgian cardinal Godfried Daneels hinted to a newspaper at the possibility of the 84-year old pontiff's impending death.   But then no sooner was the pope back in Rome than he offered his good services to end the carnage in Najaf in Iraq, where rebellious Shiite cleric Moqtada Sadr had appealed to the head of the Catholic church to intervene.   Clearly, Berra's adage applies just as well to the ecclesial realm as its does to his sport: "It ain't over till it's over."   For the last few years, every one of the pope's foreign journeys triggered expressions of fret over his weakened health. Cardinal Daneels, considered by many as a possible candidate for St. Peter's throne, has articulated such concerns before. Now one of 11 princes of the church in John Paul's entourage during last weekend's pilgrimage, Daneels told the Brussels daily, Het Laatste Nieuws (Latest News), "It was his goodbye to Lourdes and maybe also to his life."   Indeed, it would amount to a miracle if the pope were alive or in good enough health to travel to Lourdes in 2008 for the 150th anniversary of the Virgin Mary's first apparition to Saint Bernardette Soubirous near that village in the Pyrenees. Nevertheless, he already is planning his next trip to another Marian shrine: On Sept. 5 he will visit Loretto in Italy.   What 300,000 other pilgrims witnessed during John Paul's stay in Lourdes was the normal evolution of the Parkinson's syndrome of which he himself had informed the world in 1996. This disease is well advanced, but according to Vatican insiders it has in no way affected his intellectual acumen and feistiness.   This might well have been his farewell to France, but as during his first visit there almost a quarter-century ago, he reminded this nation, the "Church's first daughter," of her baptismal vows. What has she done with it? Why is she wavering in such essential matters as bioethics, abortion, or the Christian roots of her civilization?   One hopes that French President Jacques Chirac, once retired, will have the grandeur to reveal to future generations what it felt like when this shaking old Pole gave it to him straight during a 20-minute tete-a-tete on the tarmac of Tarbes airport near Lourdes.   It was France -- governed by conservatives -- that prevented any mention of God and Christianity in the draft of the new European constitution. And it is France to which John Paul appealed: "Defend your liberty." It was first and foremost the French whom he reminded that the ideals of their 1789 revolution -- liberte, egalite, fraternite (freedom, equality and brotherhood) -- have Christian roots.   It is easy to mistake the pope's frailty for weakness. Crippled, he rubbed shoulders with thousands of fellow cripples looking hauntingly like Hieronymus Bosch figures. But at the world's largest site of pilgrimage -- a site dedicated to the Virgin Mary, the quintessence of the "new woman" (Christianly understood) -- he once again proved his ability to transmit a powerful message.   This message won't please everybody, especially not self-centered post-moderns, but it nonetheless conveys an anthropology common to Judaism and Christianity alike: "Today's society needs the essential values that can be seen only with 'the eyes of the heart.' It is up to you women to be witnesses to that which cannot be seen."   It doesn't matter if the mouth conveying such words emits spittle. What matters is that the world is once again reminded that the most important eyes are the ones of the heart. And as long as that can still happen, Yogi Berra's words apply: "It ain't over."   END

By David W. Virtue   Two large, wealthy, orthodox parishes in the Diocese of Los Angeles; St. James Church Newport Beach and All Saints' Church, Long Beach, have announced that they will leave the diocese and the Episcopal Church USA and come under the jurisdiction of the Anglican Province of Uganda.   According to a joint press release issued by both churches they will remain members of the worldwide Anglican Communion.   Both St. James and All Saints' want to remain loyal to the historic teachings of the Christian Faith, observed by the mainstream of the Anglican Communion but their members believe the Episcopal Church USA has chosen a path that no longer reflects this steadfast faith, said the release.   All Saints' Church, a biblically orthodox church since 1926, affirms its membership in the Anglican Communion and has formally come under the jurisdictional oversight of the Anglican Province of Uganda in the Diocese of Luweero, thus retaining its membership in the worldwide Anglican Communion.   "Holy Scripture remains a constant in our lives," said Senior Warden David Thornburg. "It holds authority over us and inspiration for us. As we watch the Episcopal Church USA move away from this authority, we remain convinced of its truth. Therefore, our prayerful decision is to continue in that scriptural authority with the vast majority of our fellow Anglicans around the world."   The decision to leave the ECUSA after 80 years was unanimous with the members of All Saints' steadfastly wishing to remain loyal in their commitment to the Holy Scripture, the historic teachings of Christianity and the Anglican Communion. They believe the Episcopal Church USA has chosen a path that no longer reflects their membership's steadfast faith.   "This has not been an easy decision for us," said the Rev. Thompson, rector of All Saints' Church for 29 years. "We have struggled with this for a number of years. It is with great regret we have realized that if we are going to be able to focus our attention on the call that our Lord has placed upon us, we must move beyond this distraction so that we can focus all of our energies on being faithful to God.   "The vestry and members of All Saints' realize we now must move beyond this issue, so that we can concentrate on our core mission: To know Christ and to make Him known to others," concluded Rev. Thompson.   All Saints' will continue to hold worship services in the same location where it was incorporated in 1926 and carry on with its usual programs and activities. All Saints' is a self-supported, growing church with more than 450 members.   St. James Church in Newport Beach, a biblically orthodox church since 1949, also left the diocese and the Episcopal Church and affiliated with the Uganda Province affirming its right to stay in the Anglican Communion.   Members of St. James have remained steadfast and loyal in their commitment to the Holy Scripture, the historic teachings of Christianity and the Anglican Communion for 55 years. They believe the Episcopal Church USA has chosen a path that no longer reflects the membership's steadfast faith.   "St. James is a biblically orthodox church that accepts Jesus Christ as the One and Only Lord and Savior, and acknowledges the authority of the Holy Scripture as the Word of God," said Senior Warden Jim Dale. "Our devotion is to God, not a particular institution. When an institution no longer represents our understanding of God's Word and His Will, we must have the courage and faith to stand by our convictions."   The members and vestry of St. James made their decision with the support of The Rev. Praveen Bunyan, reflecting the desire of the church to stand firm on its religious convictions.   "We at St. James have prayed and struggled with this decision for many years," said Rev. Bunyan, the rector of St. James Church. "It is after much deliberation that we came to this conclusion, but it is our only recourse if we are to stay true to the historic faith and teachings of the church.   "St. James worked very hard for many years to reconcile our differences with the Episcopal Church USA and the Diocese of Los Angeles, both in our own hearts and through extensive dialogue. However, that effort has brought no comfort to ease our pain.   "The members of St. James wish to move beyond this issue, so we can concentrate on our core mission: To glorify God, uphold the Holy Scripture, raise our children to love and serve Jesus Christ and share the Gospel with the world," concluded Rev. Bunyan.   St. James will continue to hold worship services in the same location where it was incorporated in 1949 and carry on with its usual programs and activities. St. James is a self-supported, growing church with more than 1,200 members.   The worldwide Anglican Communion has churches in 164 countries with about 77 million members. The Episcopal Church USA represents 2.5 million members both here and abroad, which is only three percent of the Anglican Communion.   The Anglican Province of Uganda represents eight million Anglicans, more than three times the membership in the entire Episcopal Church USA. St. James has a close and longstanding relationship with the Province of Uganda and the Diocese of Luweero, where many of its missionaries have served.   Reached at The Diocese of Los Angeles, Janet Kawamoto, Media Director said bishop Jon Bruno had not seen the letters from the two parishes and had "no comment" to make at this time.   END _______________________________________________

By KARIN LAUB, Associated Press Writer   KIBBUTZ TZUBA, Israel - Archaeologists said Monday they have found a cave where they believe John the Baptist anointed many of his disciples - a huge cistern with 28 steps leading to an underground pool of water.   During an exclusive tour of the cave by The Associated Press, archaeologists presented wall carvings they said tell the story of the fiery New Testament preacher, as well as a stone they believe was used for ceremonial foot washing.   They also pulled about 250,000 pottery shards from the cave, the apparent remnants of small water jugs used in baptismal ritual.   "John the Baptist, who was just a figure from the Gospels, now comes to life," said British archaeologist Shimon Gibson, who supervised the dig outside Jerusalem.   However, others said there was no proof that John the Baptist ever set foot in the cave, about 2 1/2 miles from Ein Kerem, the preacher's hometown and now part of Jerusalem.   "Unfortunately, we didn't find any inscriptions," said James Tabor, a religious studies professor at the University of North Carolina at Charlotte.   Tabor and his students have participated in the excavations.   Both Tabor and Gibson said it was very likely that the wall carvings, including one showing a man with a staff and wearing animal skin, told the story of John the Baptist. The carvings stem from the Byzantine period and apparently were made by monks in the fourth or fifth century.   Gibson said he believed the monks commemorated John at a site linked to him by local tradition.   Gibson said the carvings, the foot washing stone and other finds, taken together with the proximity of John's hometown, constituted strong circumstantial evidence that the cave was used by John.   John, a contemporary of Jesus who also preached a message of redemption, is one of the most important figures in Christianity. The discovery, if confirmed, would be among the most significant breakthroughs for biblical scholars in memory.   The cave is on the property of Kibbutz Tzuba, an Israeli communal farm just outside Jerusalem. A member of the kibbutz, Reuven Kalifon, knew of the cave's existence - the community's nectarine orchards run right up to the mouth of the cave - but it was filled with soil almost to the ceiling.   In 1999, Kalifon asked Gibson to inspect the cave more closely.   The archaeologist, who has excavated in the Holy Land for three decades, crawled through the small opening and began removing boulders near the wall of the cave. When he pushed aside one of the stones, he saw a head carved into the wall - the top of the figure he believes depicts John.   Gibson, who heads the Jerusalem Archaeological Field Unit, a private research group, organized an excavation. During the five-year project, he wrote a book, entitled "The Cave of John the Baptist," to be published later this week.   Gibson said the cave - 24 yards long, around four yards wide and four yards deep - was carved in the Iron Age, somewhere between 800 and 500 B.C., by the Israelites who apparently used it as an immersion pool.   "It apparently was adopted by John the Baptist, who wanted a place where he could bring people to undergo their rituals, pertaining to his ideas of baptism," Gibson said.   Believers would have walked down 28 stone steps. To their right, they would have discarded their clothes in a niche carved into the wall.   At the bottom of the steps, they would have placed the right foot onto a stone with an imprint of a foot. A small depression to the right of the imprint would have contained oil, to be poured over the foot for cleansing, Gibson said.   END

EMMANUEL KOLINI: AFRICAN LEADER OPPOSES U.S. GAY BISHOP   By John Blake Atlanta Journal-Constitution Staff   The following is a question and answer with the African Primate   August 14, 2004   Archbishop Emmanuel Kolini of Rwanda saw his homeland torn apart by genocide. Now he's watching his church rupture over what he calls another form of evil --- the consecration of an openly gay bishop.   Most people in the United States have not heard of Kolini. That may change this fall. Kolini is a central player in the Anglican Communion's struggle with the global aftershocks from the Episcopal Church USA's consecration of Bishop V. Gene Robinson.   This fall, a special commission formed because of the controversy will release its report on keeping the Anglican Communion together despite deep theological division. Rowan Williams, the archbishop of Canterbury, rejected requests last fall to discipline the U.S. church but created the commission to address objections to Robinson's consecration.   Williams heads the denomination, a 68 million-member global alliance of churches, including the Episcopal Church USA.   Kolini will have plenty to say in that report. He has helped direct an international alliance against Robinson that could lead to the end of the Anglican Communion. He says at least 11 Anglican primates in Africa (a primate is one of 38 Anglican provincial leaders worldwide) will break off relations with the U.S. church if the commission does nothing.   "Their argument is that it's interpretation of the Bible," Kolini said of Episcopal leaders. "We think it's culture. It's not biblical. You can't impose your culture onto other people."   Robinson's defenders cite Anglican tradition of autonomy, but Kolini has numbers on his side --- the denomination is growing rapidly in Africa and Latin America but declining in the United States.   Kolini, who will speak at the Church of the Messiah in Canton on Sunday, is in the United States for a meeting of the Episcopal World Mission. While in Atlanta, he answered questions about the crisis.   Q: Episcopal leaders say they're not trying to impose their culture on other Anglican provinces because other provinces like Rwanda can set their own policy on gay or lesbian bishops.   A: Yes, but there are some essentials you can't go around. To be Christian, there are some fundamentals, some basics to our faith. The question is "is homosexuality a sin or not?" If the Scripture calls it a sin, then it's a sin.   Q: How can you cite Scripture to exclude a group of people when people citing Scriptures have used them to justify the enslavement and murder of your ancestors?   A: We don't exclude people. I have friends who are gay and lesbians. And they have asked me, why do you hate us? And I said, "If I hate you, I can't claim to be a Christian. I don't agree with you." That's where I stand.   There are hundreds, maybe thousands of homosexuals in the churches: priests, bishops. We kept quiet. We asked each province to deal with the problem... The word of God is powerful enough to transform us. I wasn't born into a Christian family. I was born in an African, traditional religion family until I went to school, and one day the Lord transformed my life. We feel like the word can transform our habits, our way of living.   Q: What effect has Robinson's consecration had on your province in Rwanda?   A: It's become a debate in the bars and in the villages between believers and nonbelievers. We have looked ridiculous. Some of our people have said we can't belong to that kind of church. It took time to explain what we mean by communion and the autonomy of each province. Some of our members are leaving the church.   Q: What actions do you want Archbishop Williams to take against the Episcopal Church?   A: His role is to investigate the thinking of many people and what should the primates come up with to help the Episcopal Church. There are two alternatives. It's up to them to pick one, not two. Since 1998, we have called the Episcopal Church to repentance. If they don't, we said there will be broken communion.   Q: What happens if the commission formed by Williams recommends no action against the U.S. church? What will you do?   A: When we met in Nairobi as the African primates, we made it clear that we will declare broken communion. I stand by that. We have spent so much time in church politics, but our mission is to reach out to those who don't know Christ. We'll probably need time apart like Paul and Barnabas did when they were arguing because of Mark. Let them go their way and we go our own way.   Q: Why is the church growing so rapidly in places like Rwanda and not in the United States?   A: Human beings look for God when they're in trouble. When people are well-off, they may think they don't need God. They have all they need. Materialism has become kind of an idolatry.   What has amazed me is in Rwanda people should be angry because [the Christian church] was directly involved [in genocide]. So they should be saying that the God of Christians is not a good God. Genocide took place. It's not the case. When I go to prepare for the service between 6 and 7 in the morning, thousands, young and old, are walking to Mass. I ask myself, why are all these people going to Mass, knowing that people were killed in these church buildings? Naturally, they know that their only safe refuge is God. It doesn't matter if the priests handed them over. They're not there for the priests. They're there for God.   END