As public relations disasters go, its publication must rank fairly highly, and, one hopes, there is now considerable embarrassment on the part of those bishops whose understanding of their vocation is, shall we say, somewhat broader and not so blindly and wildly ideologically driven, or, indeed, so lamentably and conspicuously lacking in any understanding of Anglicanism's history and complexities as that of the response's chief architect.
Once the mask of tolerance has slipped in such a very public way, it is doubly difficult to regain the only authority which really matters .....
I will include parts of a message sent to me yesterday: it is interesting and significant because it comes from someone who is not opposed to the ordination of women, either as priests or bishops:
"......It was once said to me of the then Prefect of the CDF: ‘Ratzinger at least goes both ways,’ in that along with liberal extremes he suppressed the extremes of Pope John Paul II's Marian theology which seemed to push the boundaries of tradition too far.
Selective authoritarianism is inequitable, theologically unsustainable and ultimately spiritually and intellectually bankrupt.
The [Welsh] Bench appears now to be more hard-line even than TEC, and, as you say, presents a sorry contrast to the reality in the Church of England.
They may also find themselves completely out on a limb because I understand it to be part of the Archbishop of Canterbury's agenda to (re)assert a far looser understanding of what we as Anglicans share and call 'Communion.' If the Church of England declares itself to be in communion with one or more of the ‘breakaway’ episcopal groups in the USA (which I have heard is a distinct possibility), where will the Welsh bishops then stand? They will have wilfully destroyed a family of faith, and they will find that the very people they have repudiated are able to be part of a separate Anglican province in communion with the ABC...... "
If there is genuine substance to these possible developments vis a vis the 'wider Anglicanism' (and there are widespread rumours - and more than rumours about ACNA's relationship with Canterbury - to that effect) then it is high time the Welsh Bench began to practise a genuine degree of collegiality - one which seeks to respect and include all traditions of Anglicanism in Wales - rather than the present bogus 'consensus' manipulated by that master 'liberal' puppeteer of them all ....
Unmasked indeed. TEC all over again, and the very thing that drove Episcopalians out of TEC and led to the rapidly expanding Anglican Church in North America. ACNA does not need Canterbury as much as Canterbury needs ACNA.
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