O Canada!

Tenth Biennial Convention of the Evangelical Lutheran Church in Canada meets July 21–24, 2005, Winnipeg Manitoba. They have business to do!

"The world of other religions is part of our mission field. Conversion is not the only reason for telling the story of God. Jesus Christ and his relationship with God is a gospel that will make its way into the awareness of other believers in the same way that their gifts will awaken greater understanding of the Christian revelation."

Read more here.

We DO NOT want to pick on ELCIC. We are vastly uninformed on what goes on there compared to deep experience in ELCA ethos and politics. What I would like to say is, if you guys are in communion with The Anglican Church in Canada, seems like that would take about a week just deciding what to do about that before your fall meeting. Just go to titusonenine and put in the name of their leader Michael Ingham (the king of the antinomian spawn of Spong)and start reading the interesting articles. Here's one.

“In Nottingham, England, last week, the Anglican Consultative Council, one of four global” instruments of unity,” kicked out the Anglican Church of Canada and Episcopal Church U.S.A., rejecting their rationale for blessing same-sex relations….

Meanwhile, two developments may hasten the day the Anglican Church of Canada breaks intoprogressive and traditional factions.

In June, the conservative Anglican Essentials coalition formalized its existence as
Anglican Essentials Canada. The 800 AEC delegates also formed two subsidiaries, the
Essentials Federation and the Essentials Network (legally the Anglican Network in
Canada).

The Essentials Federation, for traditionalists still at home in the ACC, will try to
reverse the momentum behind gay marriage before its 2007 General Convention.

The Network or ANiC is for traditionalists who believe they are now marginalized in thechurch and suppressed for their orthodoxy.

“The Network is the establishment of the necessary ecclesiastical structure, should theAnglican Church of Canada choose to walk apart,” says Rev. Paul Orritt of St. Peter’s Anglican in Okotoks, an AEC director.

“We’re not a competitive church. We’re building lifeboats, Anglican lifeboats ” – with towlines to the bishops of Global South.

Only 10 to 15 per cent of Anglican congregations are already represented at Essentials. But when liberal New Westminster began same-sex blessings, and eight of its 80 parishes split, they took about one-third of its members and revenue….”


About Michael Ingham:

"The following is an address delivered by Bishop Ingham, a married straight man, and an Anglican Bishop. This address was delivered in Canada, describing how and why he changed his position to accept gay relationships. In his introduction he mentions the debate between two leading Anglicans, the Revd John Stott (leader of the low church evangelical tradition from UK) and the Right Revd John Spong (liberal bishop and gay supporter from the USA). John Stott has been called by some people as the 'pope' of the Anglican evangelical low church tradition and of course Bishop Spong has been regarded by others as atheist who does a rather good job as a bishop (Bishop Spong is a non-theist christian, those who are skeptical of the supernatural God - sort of a Buddhist version of Christianity).

In this address, Bishop Ingham traces the history of Christianity's negative attitude towards sex that make women second class, and gay people lower than women. He goes on to discuss how sexism and homophobia are closely related. He proposes a church that extends marriage to her gay members and he believes that when gay union is no longer an issue, ordination of practising gay people will be a non-issue as well (just like we extend marriage to the clergy). He agrees that celibacy is a high calling but is against imposing celibacy on people just because they are gay. For that matter, it is a double standard to allow married clergy but not clergy in gay partnership.

He also says that if we suppress the erotic, it comes back as pornographic. If we idealise love without sex and we get sex without love."

Here's the sermon:

For God So Loved the World...

Address by the Right Revd Michael Ingham,
Bishop of New Westminster
27 September, 1996,
St. Leonard's Church, Toronto, Canada


Three years ago, in July 1993, we held a debate in Vancouver between John Stott and Bishop Spong. It was held in the Cathedral on a hot summer's night and about 1400 people came. We turned 300 away at the door.

It was an amazing evening. Both men spoke passionately and persuasively. They spoke with an evident measure of respect for each other. But what they described were two fundamentally different understandings of human sexuality, human freedom, the interpretation of Scripture, and indeed the Gospel itself, and they were applauded by two quite different sections of the audience.

Two things became clear that night: first, what a marvellous thing the Anglican Church is that we can hold together such diverse and opposite viewpoints within both our members and our leaders. Many of us remain in good relationship with each other despite disagreement on these fundamental issues. And second, what a huge gulf divides our church in its understanding of human sexuality."

SCRATCH... (sound of record player arem dragged across record [you rememebr them, right?] wait, stop, major cognitive dissonance moment. John Stott and Shelby Spong? Together, like as equal in voice?

YOu read the rest of this sermon. Note that this was 10 years ago. He has gotten much loopier since then. I read one of his messages that said the Bible is not to be trusted becasue it says Jesus ascended to heaven and as scientists know that if he ascended at the speed of light he wouldn't even be near the edge of the Milky Way by now ... God save us.

Here's the sermon in question, and I do mean question.