Message from Bishop David Anderson Bishop Anderson Dear Brothers and Sisters in Christ, A strange letter has found its way across our desks, and it deserves a read and comment. It appears that when the majority of the Episcopal congregation of St. Mark's on the Mesa voted to leave the American Episcopal Church and the local Diocese of Rio Grande and form a new congregation affiliated with orthodox Anglican bodies, they chose to leave both the property and the endowment behind to avoid litigation and hard feelings. They could have taken them and the corporate name of the congregation and then endured protracted legal assault by the TEC diocese, but they decided to just leave and start over. You would think that should have been the end of it, but no. Besides taking the property and endowment, the new bishop and Diocesan Council decided that they should dun the departed members for that part of the diocesan assessment that the Episcopal remainder of St. Mark's can't afford to pay. Huhh? Yes, they decided that Christ the King Anglican Church should pay the shortfall of St. Mark's Episcopal since there aren't enough Episcopalians left to pay the high amount demanded by the diocese. Apparently it never crossed the diocese or St. Mark's minds to take it out of the endowment fund or put a mortgage on the property or give a forbearance for the full amount. The problem is that the Diocese of the Rio Grande is almost broke. When the faithful Anglicans left, they moved their tithes and offerings to their new churches, and those faithful to the Presiding Bishop of TEC don't have enough money to pay for all that they want out of a diocese. We are sorry that they are experiencing this difficulty; shortfall in financing is a common experience for families as well as churches these days, but really the gall of Bishop Vono to write such a letter! I would suggest to the bishop and Diocese of the Rio Grande that they ought to move on to more productive endeavors.

Listening to the pre-General Convention chatter that is beginning among lay and clergy deputies of TEC, it seems that shrinkage is a topic of the day or how to consolidate small dioceses together so you can get enough people to pay the bills. A once robust denomination that has turned aside from God's Word and God's Savior is stunned when God's hand of blessing no longer rests on them, and the God they have fashioned out of their own imagination just doesn't seem to be coming through for them. Maybe the TEC Diocese of Rio Grande needs to consolidate with the TEC Dioceses of Arizona or West Texas or Northwest Texas, rather than passing the hat to former Episcopalians. Statistics in the United Kingdom seem to indicate that the recent visit of the Roman Catholic pope increased the number of people who felt a spiritual component to their life, much to the dismay of the atheist Dawkins crowd. Dr. Rowan Williams of course just dithers when the sad state of the church is brought up, but one visit by the pope - and yes he does carry some controversy himself - does more in the UK than all of Dr. Williams' tenure as Archbishop of Canterbury. That says something, I think. If Dr. Williams would have let the entire Anglican Communion have an honest conversation about faith and belief, the issues of sexuality might not have become the toxic brew that they are. Instead, his versions of Ubuntu, Indaba, and Yabba-dabba-do over-empower the faithless West and under-represent the faithful majority of the Communion. Now in Ireland, sexuality as an issue threatens to tear the Church of Ireland apart according tosome leaders in that province. It looks like they either need to clean house or divide along faith lines, and we will be following this situation as it develops. Bishop Righter Within the homosexuality movement, one of their greatest champions has died. This last week, the Rt. Rev. Walter Righter, former bishop of Iowa and self-proclaimed heretic, died. If he hadn't broken the rules and ordained an openly homosexual young man, Barry Stopfel, to the diaconate, there probably would never have been a gay Bishop Gene Robinson to vex the church either. Although Bishop Righter was charged as a heretic, his trial court ruled that the Episcopal Church had "no core doctrine," ergo, he couldn't have violated it by doing what he did. Interestingly, the Rt. Rev. Fred Borsch, bishop of Los Angeles at the time, sat on the trial court. Bishop Borsch had already ordained several homosexuals himself and should have recused himself from the court or joined Walter at the defendant's table. Liberals don't do that however, and Borsch stayed on the court and helped find that TEC had no core doctrine. Actually they do, but it's all about property, money and litigation. In a curious footnote to history, in 1971, as I was being ordained a priest in the Episcopal Church in the Diocese of Washington D.C., the priest and rector of an Episcopal Church in Nashua, N.H., the Rev. Walter Righter, tried to convince me to come up and join his church staff. Clearly he didn't know me, nor did I know him, nor did either of us know the different paths that we would travel. I do thank God for causing me to decline Walter's offer. Neither of us would have been happy. May God bless and preserve you in your faithfulness to Him. +David