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From: Progressive Episcopalians of Pittsburgh
FOR IMMEDIATE RELEASE
Pittsburgh Diocese Threatens to Walk Apart from Episcopal Church
Pittsburgh, Pennsylvania — November 4, 2005 — The annual convention of the Diocese of Pittsburgh overwhelmingly passed a resolution threatening to walk apart from the Episcopal Church if the 2006 General Convention does not accede to conservative demands. The “Resolution on the Anglican Communion” was a last-minute hard-line substitution for a much milder resolution distributed with pre-convention materials. Most deputies first saw the resolution that was actually passed when they checked in at the convention hotel.
Appeals to the chair that the substitute resolution was out of order or poorly draw were rejected by Bishop Robert Duncan, and a voice vote to lay aside the new resolution and consider the original instead failed. Opponents called the resolution unnecessary and vague, but its supporters characterized it as an appropriate response to their frustration that the Episcopal Church has not changed direction after years of warnings from conservatives. One priest, the Rev. Dr. Dallam Ferneyhough, of St. Luke’s Church in Georgetown, Pa., alleged that the Episcopal Church is now teaching a “new faith” that is “not Christian” and has “no saving power.”
In a roll-call vote, the resolution passed, gathering more than 80% of the clergy vote and 70% of the lay vote.
Veiled Threats
The resolution asks General Convention to “make a clear statement of submission to the teaching of, and a clear statement of intent to abide by the requirements of” the Windsor Report and other Anglican Communion documents critical of the autonomous U.S. church. Should General Convention fail to accept them “unreservedly” or “to commit to a church life consonant with them,” the Episcopal Diocese of Pittsburgh, the resolution asserts, “will stand with all Anglican Churches, Dioceses and Provinces that hold and maintain the ‘Historic Faith, Doctrine, Sacrament and Discipline of the one Holy, Catholic, and Apostolic Church’ whatever the costs or actions required to do so” (emphasis added).
It was widely viewed that this language refers to leaving the Episcopal Church and joining with other churches that share an Anglican history but adhere to the same neo-Puritan, Protestant fundamentalism advocated by the Network of Anglican Communion Dioceses and Parishes, which Bishop Duncan heads. The resolution dropped language found in the original about remaining “committed to the fellowship of the Anglican Communion” in favor of asserting only that the diocese “will stand” with Anglicans sharing the same theological viewpoint. The wording seems designed to encompass Anglican groups not technically in the Anglican Communion and to hedge bets as to whether the Anglican Communion, representing about 77 million Anglicans worldwide, will even hold together in light of recent events in Nigeria, Egypt, and elsewhere.
Anger and Dismay
Supporters of the Episcopal Church, including Progressive Episcopalians of Pittsburgh (PEP), which had prepared detailed briefing papers on the original resolution, were angered by the tactics of the substitute resolution’s supporters and dismayed at the implications of the substituted text. Lay deputy Pat Eagon Stafford, of St. Paul’s Episcopal Church in Mt. Lebanon, said that she was “appalled that they [supporters of the measure] would put a new resolution out at the last minute.” The Rev. Cynthia Bronson Sweigert, rector of the Church of the Redeemer, in Squirrel Hill, expressed concern for those who do not identify with the position of the diocese. “I don’t know what this means for me or for my parish,” she said.
Lay deputy and PEP Vice President Joan R. Gundersen was informed of the substitution “as a courtesy” only hours before the start of the convention. “We were gratified that the original proposed resolution had praised unity and merely urged the bishop and other leaders to support the conservative position,” she said. “The new resolution takes a different tone entirely, demanding what the Lambeth Commission did not ask for [i.e., “submission”] and implying that the diocese might remove itself from the Episcopal Church and the Anglican Communion.”
PEP President Lionel E. Deimel, an observer at the convention, indicated that he would not have been upset had the original resolution passed. “The revised measure needlessly converted what promised to be a rather dull convention into an ugly and divisive affair.” He expressed particular dismay over the fact that Bishop Duncan personally voted in favor of the measure. “This diocese has given its bishop a blank check,” Deimel said. “Is there anything the bishop is not now authorized to do or any amount of money he is not authorized to spend to achieve the rather shadowy objectives alluded to in the resolution?”
Deimel insisted that PEP, like other members of the Via Media USA alliance, will continue to work for unity within the Episcopal Church and the Anglican Communion. “It is shameful,” he said, “when Christians seem only able to see their differences and to be incapable of celebrating their common commitment to serve their God.”
The diocesan convention concludes tomorrow at Pittsburgh’s Trinity Cathedral.
Resolution as Passed (unedited, errors in original):
Resolution on the Anglican Communion
Resolved, that this 140th Annual Convention of the Episcopal Diocese of Pittsburgh:
1)
accepts the Windsor Report (2004), and its corollary documents the
Lambeth 1.10 text (1998) and the Dromantine Communiqué (2005), as the basis on
which this Diocese, the Episcopal Church in the United States of America, and
the Anglican Communion can go forward together; and 2)
calls upon Pittsburgh’s deputies to the 76th General
Convention (June 2006) to do everything in their power to help that Convention
make a clear statement of submission to the teaching of, and a clear statement
of intent to abide by the requirements of, said Windsor Report and its
corollary documents; and 3) declares that, should the 76th General Convention determine to continue its “walk apart” from the Anglican Communion – by its failure to accept unreservedly the Windsor Report and its corollary documents or to commit to a church life consonant with them – the Episcopal Diocese of Pittsburgh will stand with all Anglican Churches, Dioceses and Provinces that hold and maintain the ‘Historic Faith, Doctrine, Sacrament and Discipline of the one Holy, Catholic, and Apostolic Church’ whatever the costs or actions required to do so
Contacts: Lionel E. Deimel, President Progressive Episcopalians of Pittsburgh Voice: (412) 343-5337 Fax: (412) 343-6816 E-mail: lionel@deimel.org
Joan R. Gundersen, Vice President Progressive Episcopalians of Pittsburgh Voice: (412) 799-0440 E-mail: jrgunder@hotmail.com
Web Sites PEP: http://progressiveepiscopalians.org Via Media USA: http://viamediausa.org Diocese of Pittsburgh: http://www.pgh.anglican.org Network of Anglican Communion Dioceses and Parishes: http://anglicancommunionnetwork.org
Progressive Episcopalians of Pittsburgh is an organization of clergy and laypeople committed to the unity and diversity of the Episcopal Church, and of the Episcopal Diocese of Pittsburgh.
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