Yo! It's Lookin' Ugly Out There

God willing, let there be some Upcoming Vacancies...
Nunley confirmed that the Episcopal Church's elected leadership may, if necessary, declare a diocese vacant, and that in such a case the Presiding Bishop would call for the election of a new diocesan bishop, among other actions.

Ruth Gledhill quotes an unnamed, recent poster to the HoB/HoD Listserv. I reproduce it at length, because I think the point here is so important, interspersing my comments within brackets:
Any number of folks have suggested recently that we frame some sort of amicable divorce to let the disgruntled go peaceably and nicely That would be a terrible strategic error. First, we have no reason to believe that the harm and humiliation that groups like the ACN, etc have sought to perpetrate upon TEC would end.
[Excellent point! Recall the Chapman Memo and David Anderson's recent comments: they want to destroy the Episcopal Church and seize "the franchise" for themselves, eliminating the rest of us from it. Our enabling the destruction of our church is NOT a virtue, but a pathology.]

In fact, if we let them leave with all their resources we have simply given them a platform to carry on their promised war against TEC. Remember, please, that they are collecting parish directories in order to allow their lay arm to continue to agitate among TEC's membership.
[Remember that Duncan, Iker, Howe etc are not genuine theological conservatives; like bizarro mirror images of the sixities radicals they probably loathe, they are agents of destruction, tearing down institutions for better career placement. These bishops stand in the line of Machiavelli, not the line of the apostles.]

"So step one is to promise them a long legal battle for every scrap of property and every dime in every bank account. We need to make it clear they will spend the next ten years litigating.
"The standard is that if there is one person in a parish or one person in a Diocese who wish to remain in TEC they become the legitimate stewards of everything that is now TEC's
[Yes; this is a no-brainer. This is the only acceptable moral standard for proceeding--and this comes from me, stranded in the Desert of Central Florida; the wolves are at my door.]

"Second, let's remember that these folks have no constituency from which to draw for growth. Catholics will always pick Rome over Rome wannabes and in the evangelical-fundamentalist world the folks withdrawing from TEC are guppies among sharks.
"Their fantasy life says that they will grow and grow and just show us all, but the reality is that apart from the Truros and Planos, they have lived sheltered lives as bible thumpers. Which means, again, that they can only hope to grow from trying to sew more discord in TEC.
[Another excellent point; these schismatics are by nature vampiric. When they find Roman Catholics and Orthodox, Pentacostals and Baptists, Nazerenes and Assembly of God-ites do what they are trying to do better than they can (think of CNN's pathetic efforts to imitate FOX News) , the schismatics will return to flaying ECUSA alive and feasting on the parishoners they are able to cut off and devour.]

"Third, I certainly hope that in San Joachin, South Carolina, Pittsburgh and Fort Worth people are preparing Diocesan Conventions to replace those who are leaving. Whomever has the authority should declare those Sees vacant and support local folks as they re-organize. This same organizing should begin now in every other Diocese that has withdrawn it's accession to the Canons and Constitution.
[As you see from my post below I agree with this; I believe it takes only two priests and ten laypersons to get the ball rolling--including one priest and six laypersons from Central Florida. Do I have any takers???]


Fourth, we are already an international church, spanning turf from Taiwan to France. We should offer alternative primatial oversight to any parish or Diocese anywhere in the world who would rather beassociated with TEC than the curial-fundamentalist WWAC emerging under ++Rowan's mismanagement.
[Again, we should already be doing this.]


Before he assigns us second class status, let's demonstrate the power of a participatory democratic church. We should be prepared to welcome as Sister and Brother Provinces those like Scotland, Ireland, Wales, South Africa, Brazil, etc who will notsupport the emerging shape of the WWAC."Hopefully the Executive Council and the PB's office will take leadership in these matters, but if not, then instead of continuing to worry over the true impact of B033, we could instead become proactivein this full court press against the theo-terrorists of the ACN-IRD-AAC-NAG-ACI grouping."
[People, if there are any of you out there reading this--it is not God's will that we imitate the Weimar Republic and succomb to this band of thugs. Yes, "thugs"--GO READ the Central Florida pronouncement and smell the rot of theonomic reconstructionsim; it would be positively loony, even rushdoony, if it weren't outright Evil. The spirit of Nigeria is here, here in Central Florida. I implore you, Bishops, Presiding Bishop(s), Priests, Ministers of Christ do something now to send the wolves from the fold.]