Sometimes my prophetic gifts amaze even myself. Just yesterday, as I mentioned, I was preparing to address the issue of the forces behind our current Glorious Global Schism being unquestionably Reformed Evangelical in nature, and then not twenty-four hours later Lapinbizarre alerts me to an arousing little cat-fight breaking out in the comments at Viagraville.
The thread in question began with a post by Jensen family-serf David Ould, in which he offered a mercifully condensed version of his fellow Sydney Diocesan house-elf Duck Thompson ‘s lengthy diatribe explaining why the Church of Scotland isn’t “authentically Christian” if it dares to determine its own affairs without first consulting him.
Now my dear sinners, I’ve mentioned Duck Thompson before: he heads an organisation called the Anglican Church League, who promote a version of evangelicalism not dissimilar to Wahhabist Islam, and which has been instrumental in giving +Sydney access to the money he's spent stirring up schism around the Communion. Yet now it seems the crowd at Viagraville have finally started realizing that people like Thompson, along with a lot of the others outside the US pushing for a new province, are about as Anglican as Pat Robertson.
Sure, little Dobby Ould weighs in to try and quench the fire with the standard Jensen line that there’s “nothing essentially non-Anglican” about redefining roles within the three-fold order of Deacons, Priests and Bishops, and introducing lay-presidency, but from the responses it doesn’t look like even the Viagravillains are silly enough to buy that one any more.
Let’s face it: if something looks like a Baptist, waddles like a Baptist, and quacks like a Baptist, it’s highly likely it indeed is a Baptist. And for a great many people in the Communion becoming a Baptist is not something they’re prepared to do – even if it reduces the risk of catching gay cooties.
It was a post at a certain Cajun Princess’s place that really got me thinking about all this: she linked to an essay by an unapologetic Catholic which really sums up the Contemporary Tractarian (is that an oxymoron or what?) dilemma: men like little Jack Iker and +Who-ever-it-is in Quincy can’t escape the fact that despite running away from the Presiding Bishop’s girl germs and the homos she refuses to persecute, they’re still about to hook up with a province that will recognize (and ordain) women Priests,
Even worse, with one created and funded by people directly opposed to Marian devotions, and who in many cases are opposed to Eucharistic veneration, incense, and just about everything else by which Anglo-Catholicism is defined. Remember, Duck Thompson is not just a Jensen-family chattel ranting on the other side of the world, he’s also a GAFCON theologian who claims liberalism was invented by Newman in Tract XC.
…and we haven’t even begun to speculate on how much fun it’s going to be when the Biblicists of the REC sit down to discuss liturgy with layman John-David Schofield.
I’m Father Christian and I teach the Bible.
25 comments :
Actually, Father Christian, the archdiocese of Sydney bans the ordination of women priests. Extremes meet.
This the transcription of interesting but long 2007 Australian Broadcasting Company interview with Peter Jensen - also, for the stout of heart, accessible in "live" format - may provide nuggets of information and pleasure.
Mmmmm - the interviewer really says it all, doesn't she? Thank you for this gem: it really shows how cult-leaders are never at their best when questioned by those whom they haven't brainwashed..
Well he already managed to get one ABC religion commentator kicked out, Steven Crittendon of The Religion Report was slapped hard and the program canned for calling Jensen's digging implement a bloody shovel.
Which was a shame because this atheist found it's willingness to question everything and not be a gushing fan of everyone (Encouter and The Spirit of Things I'm looking at you!) to give me a good insight into religion today warts and all.
Because the good ones really shone.
But for some reason the GAFCONeers didn't....
I have recently had a lengthy debate with Dobby Ould who objects to a comment I made on my humble little blog. He stated that, when he preaches, it is not him who speaks, but the "God of the Universe". Equating himself with God was, I thought, a bit of an over-statement. He now calls into question my unChristian behaviour and suggests I am "angry". Clearly, if one disagrees with a Viagran from Jensenland, one cannot be a true believer.
I've been wondering how long the differing theological viewpoints would be a fly in the ointment, before they started to fester. Those you call Viagravillians can only go so far by being against something. It's not good glue for the long haul.
Mr Ould is currently in agitated, authoritarian mode. I guess the "God of the Universe" hates to be crossed. Anyway, the next commentator to attempt to post "off topic", will both be deleted and banned from SF. Step right up, folks.
Don't be too hard on poor Dobby, Father David: what most house-elves like him mean by "God of the Universe" is their master, Lord Voldermort-Jensen.
Since they're only allowed to preach what he has told them, Dobby's technically quite correct; his scintillating 40 minute, 4 point masterpieces can indeed be seen as proclamations bearing the imparted authority of his deity.
The only problem is nobody else in the world thinks this (with the exception of a few nutters in Reform, that Raven fellow whose web site has a dirty name, and a few Africans who've done quite well out of missionary grants) - but they are trying hard to change that...
Yes, check out Davy Boy, threatening to ban anyone who speaks ill of his "diocese."
It's a hoot--they won't vilify those he says they should vilify so he's getting all snitty about it!
Raising a point here, since it seems that raising it on David Ould's thread will damn my soul for eternity. Thompson's "Anglican Debacle", which you link, includes the observation, re J H Newman and his "infamous" Tract XC, that "as one scholar put it, 'whether he intended to or not, he [Newman] taught us to lie'". While Google, as we know, is far from all-seeing, it yields only three citations for this quote, all of them to Mark Thompson's "Debacle". This sort of coincidence tends to set one to wondering. Anyone know the identity of Thompson's unnamed scholar?
An aside, re "Anglican Debacle" - if the Anglican Church, as per Thompson's thesis, has been corrupt since its 1559 inception, why - the wealth and status of the archdiocese of Sydney aside - would these folk want to be members of it?
You are just so precious and progressive! No wonder your church has lost a fourth of its members since 1965!
Don't hold back Lapin!
Isn't it a good thing that I never let my mouth run away with me, Susan?
So now that I've been to read the last bits of comments Lapin, I noticed two others were banned after you received the warning. Your use of logic in your last comment was almost as delicious as your recipe for brandy snaps. I'm so proud to know you!
As an erect member of Viagraville myself, I have recently been threatened with a ban by the esteemed Mr Kennedy after posting my humble opinions on "Stand Firm". I tried to comment using as much venomous bile as I could muster (as befits their site), but they still found my views unacceptable. Do you think, Father Christian, I should be ashamed that Viagraville is trying to muzzle me? Or should I be proud that I have shown insufficient hatred that I no longer qualify as a bigoted member?
Guess logic doesn't count where the God of the Universe is concerned, Susan. One of the two deletions is of AndrewA, an SF conservative regular, which seemed a bit odd. Wonder what he said. Had forgotten the brandysnap post. Thanks for reminding me. They're good stuff. Mudwrestling, however justified, is a bit undignified, so I've removed the FreddieParrot post.
So I noticed, Lapin. The only troll to be fed here is the Blessed Rev. Dr. Troll.
Fr Christian, thanks for the link. My post linking to Andrew Tether was not much noted, except by you, which is enough, surely, because yours is the only notice which matters, anyway. I thought it was well worth a read. We will see more such posts from various members of the alphabet soups as they come to realize how unlike they are to each other.
It's a Banning!!!It's a Banning!!!It's a Banning!!!It's a Banning!!!Nothing, absolutely nothing is as much fun to watch as a Calvinist banning!
And as the icing on the cake, my dear and sweetly-pathetic imitator, little Freddie Preuss, has come to join us! Please feel welcome to feed him all you wish - he won't mind if you stuff him like a foie gras goose.
Fr Christian! Get a hold of yourself. Should you be getting that excited? I know that it's a Calvinist banning, but....
Really Fred, you are such a little wiggly, here there and everywhere...don´t they have any gritty horror movies left to rent in Providence, RI? Peep holes? Secret meeting places, online places to get hookedup?
C'mon everyone, there's no need to make little Freddie feel like he's not wanted.
Since the court warned him to stay away from petting zoos, and Matron took away his silly-putty ("I'm warning you Freddie! Do that with it again and I'll confiscate it!") he's had a lot of time on his hands. Which, providing he's washed them thoroughly, with soap, are welcome to click around here anytime as long as he doesn't scare anyone.
Do Calvinists still use the dunking stool?
To belatedly put Ould's SF deletions in context, AndrewA, the SF regular whose post Ould deleted yesterday morning, posted today that "in a functional Christian church, neither Susan [Russell] [n]or Mark [Harris] would have been ordained to begin with".
Concerning AndrewA's new post, seems that ACI & buddies are demanding that the bishops of Los Angeles and Delaware investigate the conduct of Russell & Harris, alleging that they are guilty of "conduct unbecoming a member of the clergy" for their part in the recent publication of ACI emails. Read all in another piece of objective journalism from reasserter house-elf George Conger.
For myself, I'd sooner Conger sniffed around the $170,000 Don Armstrong claims to have funneled to ACI.
George Conger is a journalist in much the same way that Tokyo Rose was.
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