A Word to the Church
From the House of Bishops of the Episcopal Church
Salt Lake City
Thursday, January 13, 2005
[Episcopal News Service]
To the faithful in Christ Jesus, greetings in the season of Epiphany. We rejoice together with you that God has “caused a new light to shine in our hearts” revealing God’s glory in the face of Jesus Christ our Lord. The sufferings of our brothers and sisters in the aftermath of tsunamis in South Asia and flooding and mud slides in California and here in Utah where we are meeting, make us long all the more for this new light revealed to us in Christ. We are mindful as well of the suffering around the world caused by global poverty, HIV/AIDS, malaria, other diseases, and war. In this suffering world we are called to “serve and signify God’s mission to the world, that mission whereby God brings to men and women, to human societies and to the whole world, real signs and foretastes of that healing love which will one day put all things to rights” (Windsor Report, paragraph 3).
We decided at our September meeting in 2004 to set aside this time so we might together begin to receive the Windsor Report with humility. We have met for a day and a half in Salt Lake City. We welcome with gratitude the work of the Lambeth Commission on Communion. We realize this is a long-term effort which will most likely extend beyond our March meeting. In the meantime, we aim to practice the more intentional consultative processes called for by the Windsor Report. We also anticipate the Executive Council of our church joining in this consultation.

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“All truth passes through 3 stages: First, it is ridiculed; Second, it is violently opposed; Third, it is accepted as self-evident.” – Arthur Schopenhauer
I believe we are now in the “violently opposed” period of the universal Church’s change in belief of Truth concerning homosexual people and their inclusion in the Church and God’s purview, let alone in the full life of society.
Today is the final day of the brief but very important meeting of the Episcopal Church’s House of Bishops in Salt Lake City. The bishops are meeting to deal with the Windsor Report issued last October by the Lambeth Commission on Communion. The Anglican Communion, and elements of the Episcopal Church, are up-in-arms after the 2003 General Convention’s consenting to the ordination of the first openly-gay bishop (Gene Robinson of the Diocese of New Hampshire) and its acknowledgement that the blessing of same-sex unions is taking place within Episcopal Church congregations. For most who oppose the above actions, they also oppose the ordination of gay clergy (deacons, priests, and bishops), period.

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