Greg Joyce
THE CANADIAN PRESS
Saturday Feb 16th, 2008
VANCOUVER - Several more British Columbia Anglican congregations will vote in the coming days on whether to abandon the local bishop and diocese and align themselves with more conservative Anglicans in South America, despite the church's Canadian leader warning that they'll lose their church, property and funding if they leave.
The root of the split is the contentious issue of the blessing ofsame-sex unions.
"It started out as a tear in the fabric, then it became a rupture andnow it is a schism and a new reformation," says Lesley Bentley, spokeswoman for St. John's Shaughnessy, the largest Anglican congregation in Canada and one that voted last week to leave.
Two other British Columbia churches had already voted to join the more conservative South American diocese.
"The vote was on the blessing of same-sex unions but the reason we walked out on that was never about the blessings in particular."
Federal legislation allowing same-sex unions largely silenced what was once a raucous debate in Canada. But many churches continue to struggle with the question of religious recognition of homosexual unions.
It has been a major topic of debate for the Anglican Church of Canada and its 30 dioceses at least since 2002 when Bishop Michael Ingham and the Diocese of New Westminster approved it.
Archbishop Fred Hiltz, the head of the Anglican Church of Canada, released a letter earlier this week after the St. John's vote reminding defectors that they'll have no building to occupy if they choose to join another diocese.
In our Anglican tradition, individuals who choose to leave the Church over contentious issues cannot take property and other assets with them," Hiltz wrote.
But Bentley, whose congregation plans to fight any eviction, says the St. John's vote is a result of issues that extend beyond the blessing of same-sex unions, which she likens to the tip of the iceberg, the 10 percent of the iceberg that protrudes above water.
There is now in the Anglican Church of Canada "a real divide between twoways of viewing the scripture, where the orthodox would argue you use the Bible as a lens and you look at society and judge society through the lens of the Bible."
"The liberals would say you use contemporary society as the lens and you look at the Bible through the lens of society."
St. John's voted to come under the episcopal authority of Bishop DonaldHarvey and the diocese of the Province of the Southern Cone in SouthAmerica.
An article published this week in the Anglican Planet noted that last April the "primates (bishops) of the global Anglican Communion had recommended a pastoral council to oversee distressed Anglicans andEpiscopalians in North America."
The article quotes Bentley as saying the primates had called for the Diocese of New Westminster and the Anglican Church of Canada "to repent"' by Sept. 30.
When they didn't, the Southern Cone made the offer of "temporary emergency oversight" in November - the offer voted on last week by St. John's Shaughnessy.
Three other Vancouver-area Anglican churches are holding similar votes this month.
Two other churches in B.C. - in Hope and Richmond - are already affiliated with the Southern Cone.
"We waited out every process we were asked to wait out," Bentley told The Canadian Press. "Over the last two years we continued parish life to try to solve problem."
While those churches are looking to affiliate with the conservative Anglican Church in South America, other B.C. churches joined theAnglican jurisdiction in Africa (Rwanda) five years ago.
Those churches belong to the Anglican Coalition and total 12 congregations with "four or five more in the pipeline," says Rev. Ed Hird, who has been battling Ingham and the same-sex issue from the outset.
Most of the dissident churches are in B.C. but there are at least three in Ontario also about to take votes that could lead to them aligning with jurisidictions in Africa or South America, he says.
Hird agrees the Anglican Church in Canada seems in disarray.
"I think that's quite accurate (while) the Anglican Church in most of the world is healthy and growing in Africa," he says.
"Nobody would have anticipated this a number of years ago becauseCanadians are institutionally loyal."
The Anglican Church he grew up with "has left us. We no longer recognize it. It's become closer to the theology and practice of the UnitedChurch."
Like Bentley, Hird says focusing strictly on the same-sex issue ismisleading.
"The church welcomes homosexuals "but if we have to compromise biblical teaching that becomes difficult for us."
"We welcome everybody - drug addiction, prostitution, pe ople fromprison. But we don't feel we have permission to bless things that areforbidden in Scripture."
With Ingham out of the country, Rev. Peter Elliott speaks for theDiocese of New Westminster and takes the stance that the church is strong and vibrant and can weather this issue.
Of the 30 dioceses in Canada, he says four have voted in favour of asking their bishop to provide a rite for the blessing of couples whohave been civilly married.
They are New Westminster, Niagara, Ottawa and Montreal.
The other 26 "are having conversations" on the issue.
Elliott also notes that the General Synod of the Anglican Church has already decided that the issue of the blessing of same-sex unions "was not in conflict with the core doctrine of the Anglican Church of Canada,in other words, a secondary issue."
For Elliott, it boils down to a minority within the Canadian church who take a view that "homosexual people are disordered. That's really the essence of their argument. They believe the issues around homosexuality to be first order, gospel issues as they call them.
"The vast majority of Anglicans across the country disagree. We celebrate a church that is diverse, where there is healthy debate."
Archdeacon Paul Feheley of Toronto, the principal secretary to the primate of the Anglican Church of Canada, says the Diocese of New Westminster is ahead of even the Anglican Church in Canada.
"It got more confused when federal legislation came through allowing same-sex marriages," says Feheley.
That legislation allows for those who are licensed to marry gay or lesbian couples.
So civil law allows Feheley to marry a gay couple but church law does not.
"In the Anglican Church we are allowed to bless heterosexual couples who are civilly married. To this point we have not on a national level approved blessings of same-sex marriages or relationships."
"But the New Westminster Diocese did make that decision and has moved ahead with it so there are seven or eight parishes that do bless same-sex couples."Like Elliott, Feheley says opinions on the issue vary from diocese to diocese. "We have some dioceses that are very conservative and don't believe we should be blessing same-sex unions. There are other dioceses where probably a majority of people do believe we should be blessing same-sex unions and marriages. And there are dioceses where opinions differ."
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