by Frederick B. Meekins

June 11, 2001

Often human resource decisions are seen as mundane administrative matters causing most of us to yawn. However, those involved with the selection of the rector of Christ Church --- an Episcopal congregation in Accokeek, Maryland --- are learning that these kinds of management issues can ignite broader cultural and philosophical debates, with this particular case reverberating all the way to the June 4, 2001 opinion page of the Washington Post.

The purpose of the Church in the world is to bring worship and glory to Christ by serving as an institutional forum where believers can come to learn about the application of their Biblical faith to their daily lives and where they can come together with the spiritualy curious to learn about the God of the Bible made known in Jesus Christ.

If unsuspecting worshippers were to attend the kind of church detailed by the rector of Washington, DC’s St. Columba Episcopal Church James M. Donald, they might instead get an unhealthy introduction to the god of this world and the spirit of the age as manifested by the radical tolerance disrupting much of Western society. Those in attendance would also see the hypocrisy of those making this the highest value.

Rev. Donald writes, “One of the greatest strengths of the Anglican tradition ... is that we do not define doctrine to closely.” He goes on to clarify, “...we have no central teaching magisterium that hands down interpretations or dogmas. We have no rigid or literal interpretation of scripture.”

If that is the case, then the leadership of the Washington Diocese has clearly overstepped the bounds of its authority. It has also indicated that this outpost of the Church of England has failed miserably in comprehending the English language.

In saying that the church has no rigid interpretation of Scripture or centralized teaching authority, by definition the Accokeek congregation should be free to select the “clergyperson” of their choice --- even those of aberrant theology. Thus, Rev. Edwards ought to be entitled to his convictions no matter how tight they tie the lady bishop’s clerical collar into a knot.

Rev. Donald goes on to lament, “Discipline in the church is at stake, including the matter of whether a priest who takes an ordination vow to submit to its doctrine, discipline, and worship must submit to direct instructions from his or her bishop.”

But if the Episcopal Church refuses to admit that any eternally-binding standard exists beyond some wishy-washy blather about “open-mindedness”, “relationships”, and “community”, why should anyone care about any of these things when the Bible is tossed aside like last week’s TV Guide? In such instances, these concerns then ultimately boil down to personal and pragmatic preferences, to use Rev Donald’s own terms, “adrift in the sea of cultural influences.”

This puts the Episcopal Church in a very dangerous ethical position. Possessing no solid moral foundation, the best the Episcopal hierarchy can muster to support their argument is a relativism of shifting majorities.

Rev. Donald writes, “...the present contention between Accokeek and the bishop is supported by about 40 parishioners. That is 40 out of 40,000 in the Diocese of Washington, one-tenth of one percent.”

Frankly, what of it? Moral disputes do not find resolution through the law of averages. Applying such a paradigm, Episcopal clergy would be at a loss should the majority of their congregants one day see nothing wrong in beating their kids or keeping their wives chained to the washing-machine in the basement.

As such, that is why Rev. Edwards has been deemed a threat by staying in the church even though the only thing Rev Edwards means by gumming up the works is upholding the faith once delivered unto the saints.

Perhaps the denomination’s leaders could be a little more forthcoming about the kinds of opinions they consider to express mainline Christianity. As far back as 1968, John Stormer in his classic The Death of a Nation chronicled the kind of nonsense passed off as sound preachment in some Episcopal circles as evidenced by the following quote from a chaplain at a Baltimore school in 1964: “Sex is fun... There are no rules of the game so to speak... And anyone who tells you that there are may be guilty of mistaking social and cultural custom for divine sanction or for what is sometimes called natural law.” One can only cringe at the thought of how much worse things have gotten since then.

Taken in light of this evidence, for Episcopal authorities to charge Rev. Edwards as an obscurantist endangering the cause of Christian unity is much akin to the pot calling the kettle black.

Rev Donald writes of the dispute, “...to a world that loves a good scandal, the church looks ridiculous.” The only ones looking ridiculous are a bunch of scatterbrained theologians standing around playing church who comprehend neither God’s revelation to mankind nor the logical inconsistencies contained within their own words.

Copyright 2001 by Frederick B. Meekins

(Editor's Note: Part I is found in the July 2001 Issue #16 of FREEDOM WRITER)

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