Re: Lightspeed

[Louie Crew <lcrew@andromeda.rutgers.edu>]

  ----- Original Message ----- 

  Sent: Wednesday, April 13, 2005 8:03 PM
  Subject: Lightspeed


  The members on Lightspeed take the LETTER to mean we have been betrayed 
and sold down the river. I know most of the leaders of Integrity don't seem 
to read or respond to LS members but perhaps a word of explanation of the 
letter would be pastoral.  I take it to mean (and it is hard to read, mark 
and digest) that we are still sending our reps to ACC.  No change but many 
are reading it that EC caved in to Akinola. -- XXXXXXXXXX

   ---------------------------

On Executive Council we were about equally divided three ways -- not to go 
at all, to go with full vote and voice, and to go with the restraints 
finally spelled out in the statement we drafted..  Kim and I were in the 
group consistently voting to send our folks with full vote and voice.  Most 
persons of color joined us.

I found the statements for all three positions to be most articulate and 
compelling, none of them stated in ways insensitive to the jeopardy of 
lesbian and gay Christians.

The statement we drafted is the only one possible given that division.

Perhaps nothing will appease those in the Communion who are bent on 
destroying us, but we must live into our own integrity regardless of what 
others do.

It is painful to face the Right's skill at disingenuity.   Many in the 
Anglican Communion see The Episcopal Church as Dubya's allies bullying our 
way in the world.  Meanwhile, Dubya's real allies are clucking with pleasure 
over the power the Global South exercises against The Episcopal Church in 
their name.

In the face of the most arrogant potentates I have ever encountered at such 
close range personally, I find it ironic that most in the Communion view The 
Episcopal Church as arrogant.

Such is life right now in the Communion.  This too shall pass.

Executive Council's statement should win good will from any that are willing 
to reconsider their official response to The Episcopal Church.  I am pleased 
that the Archbishop of Canterbury has already thanked us for it (see 
http://www.ecusa.anglican.org/3577_61238_ENG_HTM.htm?menu=undefined).

Executive Council did not sell out lesbian and gay people.  Our colleagues 
on Executive Council are not anti-lbgt, nor were they hostile.

This was not a decision reached easily.   It will not be well received by 
the Right.   I am grateful for Susan Russell's excellent response posted to 
the world at 
http://everyvoice.net/modules.php?op=modload&name=News&file=article&sid=1944&mode=thread&order=0&thold=0

At the end of the meeting in a point of personal privilege, I thanked the 
Presiding Bishop for his gentle and firm leadership in defending the actions 
of General Convention.  "You could not possibly have known that so much 
asbestoswear would be required of the position."  Others on Council joined 
me in applauding him.

Almost any outcome possible from Executive Council would add to the pain of 
lesbians and gays.   Take note that our pain adds to the pain of our many 
supporters as well, among whom are the overwhelming majority of The 
Episcopal Church.

We have asked all alike to live into "bearing one another's burdens" and 
most have done so consistently.  It is important to acknowledge that 
solidarity.  The Right notes it.

No one has betrayed us or sold us down the river.  As the Communion is sold 
down the river by others, the person in the lifeboat next to you is very 
likely a straight ally who supports the consecration in NH.

I believe these times, hard as they are, provide better opportunities than 
we have ever had to speak news genuinely good.  while listening in 
Nottingham, our ACC members have the opportunity St. Francis proclaimed, to 
preach Good News without  words.

Best wishes.

L.