‘Two-Track’ Church Suggested by Archbishop of Canterbury
PARIS — The Most Rev. Rowan Williams, the archbishop of Canterbury, said profound differences among the world’s 77 million Anglicans over gay clergy and same-sex unions could divide their church into a “two-track model” yielding “two styles of being Anglican.”
The formula could avert a formal breach between liberals and conservatives but bring new strains in the relationship between the global Anglican Communion and American Episcopalians who resolved this month to open the door to ordaining openly gay bishops and to start the process of developing rites for same-sex marriages.
Archbishop Williams insisted that the issue should not be debated “in apocalyptic terms of schism and excommunication but plainly as what they are — two styles of being Anglican.”
In a lengthy message published Monday on his Web site, the archbishop offered a detailed and nuanced response to events at the Episcopal convention in Anaheim, Calif., this month when gay-rights advocates in the United States chalked up major victories over conservatives on sexual issues. The Episcopal Church is the official branch of the Anglican Communion in the United States.
The developments were seen by liberals and conservatives as likely turning points in the history of the divided Episcopal Church, reflecting the profound rifts over sexual issues within Anglicanism — the world’s third largest network of Christian churches after the Roman Catholic and Orthodox Churches. The differences have crystallized around the Episcopal Church’s consent in 2003 to the consecration of the church’s first openly gay bishop, V. Gene Robinson of New Hampshire.
The Episcopalians had agreed to a moratorium on the election of gay bishops, but it was lifted at the convention in Anaheim.
The archbishop of Canterbury is the spiritual head of the Anglican Communion, which is composed of 38 provinces worldwide. The Episcopal Church claims about 2.3 million members.
In his message, Archbishop Williams repeated his view that “a blessing for a same-sex union cannot have the authority” of the full Anglican Communion, any more than a blessing for a heterosexual couple living outside marriage would have.
That, in turn, means that as long as the broader church “as a whole does not bless same-sex unions, a person living in such a union cannot without serious incongruity have a representative function in a Church whose public teaching is at odds with their lifestyle.”
The issues have confronted the archbishop with deep divisions not simply between liberals and conservatives in the United States but also across the broader church with its many followers in Africa, Britain and elsewhere. Four conservative dioceses in the United States and many individual Episcopal churches have broken away from the national denomination to forge alliances with conservative Anglican groups such as the Anglican Church of Nigeria.
Archbishop Williams said: “There is at least the possibility of a twofold ecclesial reality in view in the middle distance: that is, a ‘covenanted’ Anglican global body, fully sharing certain aspects of a vision of how the Church should be and behave, able to take part as a body in ecumenical and interfaith dialogue; and, related to this body, but in less formal ways with fewer formal expectations, there may be associated local churches in various kinds of mutual partnership and solidarity with one another and with ‘covenanted’ provinces.”
The archbishop has promoted the idea of covenant — described by some analysts as a kind of good-behavior guide for churches — to overcome the rift.
“This has been called a ‘two-tier’ model, or, more disparagingly, a first- and second-class structure,” the archbishop’s message said. “But perhaps we are faced with the possibility rather of a ‘two-track’ model, two ways of witnessing to the Anglican heritage, one of which had decided that local autonomy had to be the prevailing value and so had in good faith declined a covenantal structure.”
The message continued: “It helps to be clear about these possible futures, however much we think them less than ideal, and to speak about them not in apocalyptic terms of schism and excommunication but plainly as what they are — two styles of being Anglican, whose mutual relation will certainly need working out but which would not exclude cooperation in mission and service of the kind now shared in the Communion.”
See Anglican Sees ‘Two-Track’ Church @ New York Times
- Archbishop warns ordination of gay clergy could lead to two-tier … guardian.co.uk
- Anglican Head Warns Of Two-Tier Church After Gay Vote On Top Magazine Archbishop of Canterbury responds to General Convention actions on … Austin American-Statesman
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After the break-up, what about the lake house?
IT was a perfect party — vodka lemonade on a dock overlooking a lake, dozens of close friends, a cool misty night in the country a couple of hours north of New York.
Inside, the house spoke of a passionate interest in style, and of a committed relationship. Silhouettes of the couple who owned the house hung on a wall in the master bedroom; the couple’s nickname — Benford — was spelled out in large letters leaning against a wall in the kitchen.
But the couple, Benjamin Dixon, 31, and Bradford Shellhammer, 33, who had planned the evening as a commitment ceremony, had broken up three months earlier. Still, with airplane tickets purchased by some of the guests, a catering deposit paid and a house they haven’t been able to sell, they figured it made sense to go ahead and have a party anyway.
Their tale of lost love has a familiar arc — love sparks, then blooms; lives intertwine; moments are lost and misunderstandings creep in; eventually the two begin to live as strangers — and an epilogue that has become increasingly familiar as well, as unwanted houses become prisons rather than cocoons.
Rather than being a glossy testament to their taste and their partnership, their house in Stanfordville, in Dutchess County, is now a dead weight that entangles them and makes it impossible to move on. Having bought it and an apartment in Manhattan at the height of the real estate boom (and having made an agreement with a third partner in their lake house property not to sell it until December 2009), they are left with joint custody of two large mortgages. They are also left with two carefully decorated homes filled with one-of-a-kind accessories found on eBay and quirky furnishings by high-end designers like the Dutch collective Droog that are reminders of what came before and, Mr. Dixon said, “big reminders of what was supposed to be.”
See After the break-up, what about the lake house?
New York Times
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McEntee: Discrimination is still with us
o Salt Lake City is stepping out, urging a new anti-discrimination law that actually includes sexual orientation and gender identity in the traditional list of those affected by housing and employment discrimination. Take that, all you legislators who have squashed any such thinking on the state level, arguing disingenuously that “choosing to be gay” is not grounds for civil rights protection. Mayor Ralph Becker, a Democratic representative for 11 years, knows all about that ruse. And one of the most fascinating things is how the city’s Human Rights Commission got there: Its members sat down and talked to people in five “dialogues on discrimination” late last year. No lectures, no surveys. Just conversations about classism/poverty, people with disabilities, racism, faith and sexual orientation. Kilo Zamora, whose nonprofit Inclusion Center trained the commissioners, says the opener was, “How’s the city doing, and do you think there’s discrimination here?” As people talked, it became evident that race, gender, class, income and religious biases “we thought we had buried in the ’60s were much alive in our communities,” he says. People were shocked. “Are you sure?” they would ask. “I never knew racism was still alive!”
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Private meeting with Archbishop of Canterbury Rowan Williams at convention will address sexuality, ministry
By Mary Frances Schjonberg, July 01, 2009
[Episcopal News Service] Eight members of the Episcopal Church’s House of Deputies are scheduled meet privately with Archbishop of Canterbury Rowan Williams at General Convention in a session that is intended in part to address lesbian, gay, bisexual and transgender (LGBT) issues in the church.
General Convention meets July 8-17 in Anaheim, California, and Williams will be present July 7-9.
The session is not an official convention meeting and thus there has been no announcement of the plans. However, when contacted by Episcopal News Service, the Rev. Canon Michael Barlowe of the Diocese of California confirmed the details.
Barlowe said that he and the other deputies understood the meeting was to be brief and private, but that it was not a secret.
“It’s not a summit or constituted in an official way,” he said. “We don’t expect to issue a communiqué or anything like that.”
Instead, Barlowe said, he hopes the meeting will be a chance for dialogue and a chance for Williams to hear about the ministries of eight Episcopalians whose “significant fundamental characteristic” is “our deep love for the Episcopal Church within the Anglican Communion.” The eight deputies’ lives reflect the broad range of ministry of all Episcopalians, he said.
Barlowe set the meeting in the context of the communion-wide Listening Process, which is intended to hear all sides of the issues concerning human sexuality and the church.
Williams, Barlowe suggested, has not had a chance to hear about the broad range of ministry and leadership in which LGBT Episcopalians are involved.
There’s a larger hope attached to the meeting, according to Barlowe.
“Anytime committed Christians come together, something remarkable happens,” he said. “What comes to the fore is the commitment to be better bearers of the good news of Christ.”
The chance to have such a meeting, he said, is typical of the way leadership in the Episcopal Church seeks ways to move the mission and ministry of the church forward by trying to form partnerships with “other passionate ministers such as Archbishop Rowan.”
Barlowe, who has been a candidate in episcopal elections in the dioceses of California and Newark, said that he first raised the possibility of a meeting with the archbishop when the California deputation was discussing Anglican Communion issues. His colleagues encouraged him to pursue the idea and Barlowe says he sought the support of other LGBT deputies.
When he contacted Presiding Bishop Katharine Jefferts Schori or House of Deputies President Bonnie Anderson to ask for time with the archbishop, the request came with the backing of many of those deputies, he said.
Jefferts Schori and Anderson, along with their staffs, “graciously” agreed to ask Williams to meet with some deputies and Williams “graciously” agreed, Barlowe said.
Jefferts Schori’s and Anderson’s willingness to help bring about the meeting “is totally consistent with their leadership” of the church and their goal of fostering “serious and respectful conversation,” he added.
The presiding officers did not appoint the deputies, Barlowe said. Instead, he was asked to put the group together. He said he consulted with others and sought deputies who reflected the range of geographic, age, and ministerial diversity of those people who supported the request for the meeting.
In addition to Barlowe, the deputies are:
- Louie Crew, Diocese of Newark;
- the Rev. Canon Lisa Gray, Diocese of Michigan;
- the Rev. Tobias Haller BSG, Diocese of New York;
- Joanne O’Donnell, Diocese of Los Angeles;
- the Rev. Altagracia Perez, Diocese of Los Angeles;
- Rebecca Snow, Diocese of Alaska; and
- Michael Spencer, Diocese of Eastern Michigan.
The Rev. Eric H. F. Law, known for his work in multicultural leadership training, has been helping the deputies prepare for their meeting, according to Barlowe, and Law may attend the session with Williams.
Because they do not all know each other, Barlowe said, the group has been presenting to each other their “ministry biographies.” He called that experience “emotionally powerful.”
“Once again, I’ve been overwhelmed by just how committed the ministers of this church are,” he said, adding that hearing the deputies’ stories “made me incredibly thankful yet again for being part of the Episcopal Church.”
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Gay seniors embrace a newfound openness
Marvin Levin was speaking to his psychiatrist in November 2003. The conversation halted briefly as Levin looked away, collecting a thought that had waited decades to surface.
“You know what?” he said, looking up at his doctor. “I’m gay.”
At age 61, married more than 30 years, this was an unlikely admission.
“It was the first time I’d ever put words to that,” Levin said. “It was like an epiphany. And then I looked back on my life and said, ‘You dummy, of course you are.’ ” Levin, now 67, grew up in Chicago, part of a conventional Jewish family. He found himself interested in the gay lifestyle — still highly taboo at the time — but resolved that he was “straight but curious.”
Conforming to the social mores of the time, he married in his mid-20s. “I can’t really say I was madly in love. This was a woman I knew and we had the same sets of values and beliefs. It seemed a good fit.”
Together they had two sons, were active in their synagogue, entertained regularly and worked through the ups and downs of marriage.
“I was Mr. Straight,” Levin said. “There were certain things in life that you do, and I would just go ahead and do them. I was fascinated by this other world. The gay world had this attraction. But I just never did anything with it. It was just there.”
In the 1970s, Levin began suffering from depression. He went into counseling and got on medication but could never identify the source of his unhappiness. Until that day in 2003, in his psychiatrist’s chair.
“My wife at first was shocked,” he said. “But she was also glad I’d finally figured out why at times I was non-functional. She’s a wonderful woman and was very supportive of me through all of this.”
See Gay seniors embrace a newfound openness
Chicago Tribune
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Gay marriage advocates to reach out to churches Ventura County Star
Ventura County advocates for gay marriage plan to visit churches and synagogues as part of their effort to put the issue back on the California ballot in 2010.
“We don’t want to get into screaming and yelling matches, we just want to tell our stories,” said Lisa Hughes, a member of Equality Ventura County’s faith outreach subcommittee.
Equality Ventura County met Thursday night at the Ventura County Rainbow Alliance offices in Ventura to discuss its next step, now that the California Supreme Court has upheld the voter-approved Proposition 8 prohibiting gay marriage.
EVC is a task force that was organized to defeat Proposition 8. Its mission now is to return the issue of gay marriage to the voters.
Hughes, 49, has a 16-year-old daughter who is gay. She believes her story will touch others in various houses of worship.
Hughes said they are not going to “preach to the choir” by speaking to church groups who already support gay marriage. They also will not be targeting fundamentalist churches.
The subcommittee’s plan is to visit area mainstream churches and host panel discussions on what it’s like to be gay, or to be the relative or parent of a gay individual.
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All in God’s Family: Creating Allies for Our LGBT Families Launched
WASHINGTON, May 11 – Leading organizations today released a curriculum designed to help faith communities support and embrace lesbian, gay, bisexual and transgender (LGBT) people and their families. The National Gay and Lesbian Task Force’s Institute for Welcoming Resources, COLAGE and Family Equality Council announced that this multimedia curriculum will go a long way in providing the necessary tools to make faith communities affirming of LGBT people and their families.
“While many churches have done very well welcoming individual lesbian, gay, bisexual and transgender members into their midst, many have not done so well with LGBT families,” says the Rev. Rebecca Voelkel, Institute for Welcoming Resources and faith work director of the National Gay and Lesbian Task Force. “But LGBT families deserve the same love and honor as all of God’s beloved families. This curriculum helps congregations extend God’s extravagant welcome to all of God’s families – especially LGBT families.”
All in God’s Family includes concrete tools to educate faith leaders, including a step-by-step guide to supporting LGBT families of faith and tools for facilitating group learning, community dialogue, Bible study and community action planning to highlight LGBT families in our communities. Additionally, the curriculum includes Families Like Mine, a book about adults with LGBT parents written by Abigail Garner, whose father is gay; the youth-produced documentary In My Shoes: Stories of Youth with LGBT Parents; and a CD containing the phototext exhibit “That’s So Gay: Portraits of Youth with LGBT Parents.”
“I know many LGBT parents who struggle with faith,” says Jennifer Chrisler, executive director of Family Equality Council. “It can be difficult to find a congregation that feels welcoming and supportive. Though they want raise their children in a community that shares their values and beliefs, LGBT parents also want their children to be embraced. That’s why we partnered to put together All in God’s Family: Creating Allies for our LGBT Families. We know there are thousands of congregations out there that want to embrace our families. We want to give them the tools to do so more fully.”
“For youth and adults with LGBTQ parents, finding a faith community where your family is respected and reflected can be a challenge,” says Meredith Fenton, COLAGE program director. “COLAGE is pleased to be a partner on All in God’s Family: Creating Allies for our LGBT Families and invites your faith community to use these tools to move beyond acceptance to full inclusion and celebration of LGBTQ families.”
All in God’s Family: Creating Allies for Our LGBT Families can be acquired for a suggested donation of $50.00. As a special promotion, the first 50 congregations to request the curriculum will receive it for free. All in God’s Family: Creating Allies for Our LGBT Families can be acquired at www.WelcomingResources.org.
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‘Fat Gay Jew’ – surprises with unexpected freshness
While its title sounds like an epithet, if not a racial slur, Fat Gay Jew, Charter Theater’s trio of interrelated one-act plays, contains ample laugh-out-loud moments.
Area-based actor/playwright Mario Baldessari has collected a provocative list of ugly names for those who are fat, gay or Jewish. But he’s also written three reasonably believable scenarios that highlight some of the most uncomfortable aspects of being either fat, gay or Jewish.
This compact 90-minute evening takes place at Arlington’s intimate Theatre on the Run stage Thursdays through Sundays until May 23.
Is it a play with a message? Yes, and that’s clearly stated in the prologue/preface when actor Jim Helein allows there’s lots of “touchy stuff that most good people don’t usually say.”
Director Keith Bridges uses a bare-bones set — a table and four chairs — and has mined his performers’ individual quirks. Laconic Helein has no choice but to play the fat guy, his size and girth evident. He’s the one we meet first as he moves the furniture complaining that just because he’s fat doesn’t mean he’s strong.
Baldessari plays the gay guy with exaggerated feyness and Renee Calarco, the self-described token Jew in the theater company, plays a suburban wife, a single woman whose best friends are gay men and a convert to Judaism who believes that her Jewish connections make her a better Jew. See ‘Fat Gay Jew’ – surprises with unexpected freshness
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Healthy Gay Relationships: Ken Howard Gives Tips for Relationship Success at Annual Gay Men’s Forum
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West Hollywood, CA — The Gay Men’s Forum is a free, day-long event will focus on the theme: “Where We’ve Been. Where We Are. Where We’re Heading” and will include contemporary experiences of gay men, panel discussions featuring a range of perspectives from the gay community, special performances and interactive workshops.
Ken Howard, LCSW will be participating in the discussion: “Love & Its Opposite: A Discussion on the Differences Between Healthy & Unhealthy Relations” with fellow colleagues including, Tyrone Carter, Ian Stulberg, LCSW and Andrew Susskind, LCSW; the Q&A will be moderated by Christian Antonio Calle of the LA Gay & Lesbian Center.
Howard has extensive experience in counseling the gay male community (and lesbian and straight couples) on how to achieve healthy and satisfying relationships. Throughout the years he has worked with a variety of couples who have sought his guidance on topics including “how to have an open relationship without hurt feelings”, “being serodiscordant (one HIV-positive, one HIV-negative), managing stress, and older-younger relationships. He teaches communication skills using the Imago Couples Dialogue, pioneered by Harville Hendrix. His long-list of testimonials from happy couples provides countless examples of those who have turned his philosophy and guidance into real-life skills and solutions, often preventing breakups.
The forum is being held in collaboration with the City of West Hollywood’s Lesbian and Gay Advisory Board, community organizations and the City’s Social Services Division.
The GAY MEN’S FORUM: Dialogue and Workshops will be held at Fiesta Hall at Plummer Park on Saturday, May 2, 2009 from 9 a.m. to 5 p.m. located at 7377 Santa Monica Boulevard, West Hollywood. The event is free.
To RSVP, please call (323) 848-6381. For more information, please contact Corey Roskin, Hernan Molina or Larissa Fooks at (323) 848-6460. For the deaf and hard of hearing, please call (323) 848-6496.
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Dallas pastor to join team lobbying Congress for gay rights
The Rev. Jo Hudson of Dallas’ Cathedral of Hope will be part of a high-profile team of pastors visiting Congress to lobby for gay rights. Details below:
This is a critical time for the LGBT movement. Today, the U.S. House is marking-up the federal hate crimes bill, an important step before the bill moves to a vote. Federal legislation is necessary to ensure all citizens are safe from hate violence. Only 11 states and the District of Columbia have hate crimes laws that cover both sexual orientation and gender identity. Twenty states have hate crimes laws that cover sexual orientation but not gender identity.
The Clergy Call for Justice and Equality is organized by the HRC Foundation’s Religion & Faith Program, lead by Harry Knox, who was recently appointed by President Barack Obama to the Council on Faith-Based and Neighborhood Partnerships. To check out this year’s program visit: www.HRC.org/ClergyCall.
Confirmed speakers: Read their bios: http://www.hrc.org/issues/religion/12294.htm
The Rt. Rev. V. Gene Robinson, NH
Bishop Yvette Flunder, San Francisco, CA
Rev. John H. Thomas , Cleveland, OH
Rev. Dr. Anthony Campolo, St. Davids, PA
Father Richard Estrada, Los Angeles, CA
Rev. Dr. Jo Hudson, Dallas, TX
Rabbi Steven Jacobs, Los Angeles, CA
Rev. Dr. Cynthia Love, Abilene, TX
Rev. Manish Mishra, St. Petersburg, FL
Rev. Drew Phoenix, Anchorage, AK
Bishop Tonyia Rawls, Charlotte, NC
Joe Solmonese, Washington, DC
Rev. Dr. Traci C. West, Madison, NJ
Updates in the movement of faith and LGBT equality:
The unanimous ruling of the seven-member Iowa Supreme Court, written by Mark Cady, a Republican appointee, explained that a state’s legalization of same-sex marriage has no effect on marriage as practiced by religions. “The only difference,” the judge wrote, is that “civil marriage will now take on a new meaning that reflects a more complete understanding of equal protection of the law.
The McCain-Palin 2008 campaign strategist, Steve Schmidt, urged his party last week to join him in endorsing same-sex marriage.
Jon Huntsman Jr., the governor of Utah, who in February endorsed civil unions for gay couples, a position seemingly indistinguishable from Obama’s. Huntsman is a Mormon presiding over what Gallup ranks as the reddest state in the country.
Rev. Rick Warren, the hugely popular megachurch leader who endorsed Proposition 8, California’s same-sex marriage ban, dropped in on Larry King to declare that he had “never” been and “never will be” an “anti-gay-marriage activist.” But, it apparently didn’t thrill his base and he cancelled on ABC’s George Stephanolopous, minutes before taking to the air on the nationally televised “This Week.” Warren’s sudden reverse remains controversial in the LGBT community: http://www.pamshouseblend.com/diary/10284/rick-warren-lies-about-his-homobigotry-on-larry-king-live
Faith leaders are building momentum and making clear that they support full equality for LGBT people under the law. America’s clergy are transforming our nation one congregation at a time and making it easier for Members of Congress to stand for equality. The theme for Clergy Call 2009, “Moving from Acceptance to Advocacy,” reflects the vision of a faith-based movement for LGBT equality built from the ground up: in local churches, synagogues, mosques.
See Dallas pastor to join team lobbying Congress for gay rights
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