I just came across this:
The Presiding Bishop of the Episcopal Church has denounced the Apostle Paul as mean-spirited and bigoted for having released a slave girl from demonic bondage as reported in Acts 16:16-34 .
Just prior to this unfortunate encounter I was travelling on the road to Damascus musing on Paul’s more providential encounter.
Call me a blind optimist if you must but, as an experiment, I would like to set the Presiding Bishop and numerous other Anglican bishops – who shall remain nameless – on this road of destiny, point them in the right direction and tell them to start walking. It could work, couldn’t it?
There is a lot more traffic these days, of course.
While I share your general opinion of Ms. Schori, on this occasion what she actually said and what this article claims she said are rather different.
The original text can be found at http://episcopaldigitalnetwork.com/ens/2013/05/13/presiding-bishop-preaches-in-curacao-diocese-of-venezuela/
No Gordon, you are in error. The article faithfully reported her remarks.
So, how exactly does she condemn people who do not share her views as enemies of the Holy Spirit? I think Gordon has a point.
What would her reaction be, if someone were to charge her with heresy?
Or doesn’t the Anglican Communion insist that its ministers, of whatever rank, believe in the Bible any more?
No, unfortunately, it doesn’t, not in North America, anyway.
Gordon, it seems you didn’t read Schori’s sermon carefully. Here’s a direct quote from the link you posted:
“We live with the continuing tension between holier impulses that encourage us to see the image of God in all human beings and the reality that some of us choose not to see that glimpse of the divine, and instead use other people as means to an end. We’re seeing something similar right now in the changing attitudes and laws about same-sex relationships, as many people come to recognize that different is not the same thing as wrong. For many people, it can be difficult to see God at work in the world around us, particularly if God is doing something unexpected.
There are some remarkable examples of that kind of blindness in the readings we heard this morning, and slavery is wrapped up in a lot of it. Paul is annoyed at the slave girl who keeps pursuing him, telling the world that he and his companions are slaves of God. She is quite right. She’s telling the same truth Paul and others claim for themselves.[1] But Paul is annoyed, perhaps for being put in his place, and he responds by depriving her of her gift of spiritual awareness. Paul can’t abide something he won’t see as beautiful or holy, so he tries to destroy it. It gets him thrown in prison. That’s pretty much where he’s put himself by his own refusal to recognize that she, too, shares in God’s nature, just as much as he does – maybe more so! The amazing thing is that during that long night in jail he remembers that he might find God there – so he and his cellmates spend the night praying and singing hymns.
[…]
[1] E.g., Romans 1:1”
Got that? Paul is “blind”, but the demon-possessed girl is “spiritually aware”, according to Schori. Note that the “destruction” of this girl’s “gift” occurred after Paul said, “In the name of Jesus Christ I command you to come out of her!” (Acts 16:18). At that moment the spirit left her. The Scripture thus clearly indicates that the spirit who occupied the slave girl is antagonistic to the name of Jesus, yet Schori appears to be more sympathetic to the slave girl’s spirit than to the action of Paul, who served faithfully in Jesus’ name. Schori states that the slave girl was an example of “God at work” and “doing something unexpected” in the world, and that this is “difficult to see”. Indeed, if not even Paul could see it! But Schori has the “spiritual awareness” to see that possession by a spirit antagonistic to Jesus is a “gift”, which Paul failed to see as “beautiful or holy”.
By the same token, Schori indicates that those who recognize “same-sex relationships”, are in the category of those who have “spiritual awareness,” whereas the rest are “blind”. It seems reasonable to infer from Schori’s argument that, if Paul was “blind”, we can’t rely on him for any guidance about same-sex relationships. While Paul wrote about 13 books of the New Testament (out of 27), and about 32% of the New Testament by volume, it seems clear that Schori considers Paul “blind” and lacking “spiritual awareness” in comparison with herself. Schori has the “spiritual awareness” to see that “same-sex relationships” are a “gift”, which Paul presumably failed to see as “beautiful or holy”.
We need to decide: who is on the side of Jesus Christ and who is on the side of the demons?
If you click on the link that Gordon has, you will also read some good reactions in the comments section below the article. Mostly not in agreement with Schori’s viewpoint.
Schori does not want for company who share her views among the Anglican/Episcopal clergy, I’d wager. I had an Anglican priest tell me St Paul didn’t know people have a “gay nature” that it’s as wrong for them to deny as it is heterosexuals to deny theirs. Besides, as Auckland’s St-Matthew-in-the-City wants us to know, Jesus himself was probably gay.
As dg424 cites above, immediately prior to Schori’s lambasting St Paul in re the slave girl — and the real reason she desires to discredit him — we read, “We’re seeing something similar right now in the changing attitudes and laws about same-sex relationships, as many people come to recognize that different is not the same thing as wrong.”
In short (perhaps I should say ‘in Schori’), all roads lead to homosexuality, even the Road to Damascus.
A good constructive suggestion perhaps!
Sin is not constructive, Robert!