Anglican Unscripted’s Devastating Episode on ACNA
If you lose Kevin and George . . .
When I saw that the title for Anglican Unscripted 927 Tuesday was “Is ACNA Past Tense?”, I thought this might be an interesting episode. And, boy, was it.
There used to be a saying decades ago that if you’ve lost Walter Cronkite, you’ve lost the nation. (Most of you are too young to remember that Cronkite was the widely trusted anchorman for the CBS Evening News.) Well, in the Anglican world, if you’ve lost Kevin and George . . . .
Kevin Kallsen and George Conger raked Archbishop Wood and others over the coals on the handling of the Ruch trial and documents. Then they had some fun with how the selection of the new Vice-Chancellor for Safeguarding was presented. I got a mention during that segment for exposing her D. C. liberalism.
ACNA’s New Vice-Chancellor for Safeguarding
In the midst of a difficult week for the Anglican Church in North America, there is a happy announcement: we have a Vice-Chancellor for Safeguarding, Jeannie Rose Barksdale! She has quite the resume, including a Stanford degree in Political Science and Comparative Studies in Race and Ethnicity.
Then came the segment that I found most interesting (about 30 minutes in). George Conger has investigated further into the situation at Incarnation Anglican Williamsburg, which was bullied by the Bishop of the Mid-Atlantic Christopher Warner over the issue of women in Holy Orders. (If you wish to get caught up on that, the DOMA Whistleblower X account is the leading source. And here is an earlier timeline of allegations.)
The parish, thinking it was probably time to move to a more hospitable diocese, contacted the office of Archbishop Steve Wood asking for assistance. Wood never responded even though one of his roles is to facilitate such parish transfers between dioceses. Other provincial offices were also no help, mainly because Wood or his office dropped the ball.
Contrast that with how quickly Wood acted to blackball Calvin Robinson and insert himself into REC Presiding Bishop Ray Sutton’s business. Two Tier Steve?
Conger commented that the situation of a bishop bullying a parish that opposes WO reminds him of the way tyrannical liberal bishops have acted in times past in The Episcopal Church. ACNA was organized in part to prevent that “foolishness.” But here we go again. “This is what the founders of the ACNA went through twenty years ago. And now one of their bishops is doing it to their own people. . . . The mistakes of the past are being repeated again.”
It is safe to say there has never been an episode of Anglican Unscripted this devastating for ACNA. The title “Is ACNA Past Tense?” may be jumping the gun. But if you’ve lost Kevin and George . . . .
I’ll restrain myself, for now, from opining what should now be done. But ACNA, especially Archbishop Wood and the provincial offices, deserve the criticism and more. The current direction of ACNA under Wood will not do at all. I hope recent events, along with Kevin and George and many others who have seen enough, shake up ACNA bishops to take action. I hope.
Kevin and George nailed it. Bishop Chris Warner needs to be disciplined. If we have this rule—letting parishes choose their stance on women’s ordination—bishops should honor it for individual congregations. Otherwise, we need to dump the we'll all get along rule and "you do you" and stop pretending with this oxymoronic big tent mentality we currently have(where ALL views are respected--that in and of itself is non-biblical because two truths cannot both be true (shoutout to John Lennox logic anyone? ). From the outside looking in, it appears Warner is acting like dual integrities is a mere suggestion, bulldozing a parish that already had a majority following the biblical mandate for male-only priests. I’m just a layman, and you can probably guess I'm not egalitarian like Warner is.
I'm no expert on the Mid-Atlantic Diocese’s canons, but surely there’s something about a bishop upending a vestry and congregation. From a governance and unity perspective, a bishop should honor the dual integrities principle for individual congregations. The ACNA’s Constitution and Canons emphasize subsidiarity, stating that “the fundamental agency of mission in the Province is the local congregation” (ACNA Constitution, Article IV). This implies to me (and I'm not a lawyer) that congregations have significant autonomy in faith and practice, including their stance on women’s ordination. The dual integrities principle is a practical outworking of this, designed to prevent bishops from imposing one view on parishes that hold the opposite conviction. Forcing a congregation to adopt a position contrary to its theological stance—say, by mandating openness to women’s ordination leads to situations like this. To me, this means Warner must be disciplined. And yeah, I know he has the power to appoint the priest at Church of the Incarnation(and it was a woman), but it's my understanding from my reading that he has probably violated canons. (but again, I'm not a lawyer, but I can play one on TV if somebody wants to hire me) And besides, the latest reports say more than half of the congregation has left. That's a super majority who supported the complementarian position.
Instead of shepherding God’s Word, the gospel, and the church, it appears Warner shirked his duty by sowing discord and division. This debacle feels like Survivor: Anglican Edition. Behaviors like these actions with the Church of the Incarnation make the ACNA resemble a rerun of the Episcopal Church’s collapse. I thought it wouldn't happen. But here we are, starting that short road to the diabolical discord of doom and death by division. Who’s making it out alive? And I know dual integrities is a secondary issue to salvation, BUT it's not a secondary issue when it starts tearing congregations apart, and that's what it's doing here. The College of Bishops MUST and should now take action on dual integrities. It has to be addressed. This is glaring evidence of the need not to kick the can down the road anymore.
Steve Wood has an opportunity here to right this ship. We need a reasoned, responsible response to this situation. Otherwise, the ACNA will become the ecclesiastical Titanic, and no good Celine Dion song (My Heart Will Go On)sung by all of us on the bow as we go down will save us. We owe our congregations the lifeboat of honest communication, transparency, and accountability. We're trying to grow the kingdom of God, and this type of behavior isn't gonna achieve any of those goals. Non-believers will continue to non-believe because they look at the church and say, What's wrong with those people. Well, I'll tell you what's wrong. It's an unrepentant, self-serving human sin. It needs to be tempered when you get into a leadership position in a church. Admit that you're wrong when you do something contrary to your position's responsibilities and mission. Apologize. It will undoubtedly help your cause. A spirit of harmony can only survive if we remember, when bitterness and self-interest seem to prevail, that we share a common destiny. We'd better not forget that. Unity is important even if impossible in this life, and Faith, repentance, and redemption are our only hope through Jesus Christ. I think it's about forgiveness(singing Don Henley, Heart of the Matter in my head). Thank God for forgiveness.
Mark, keep praying, keep posting, and stay salty. My Bible’s locked and loaded.
I watched the episode.
Sadly this outcome was woven into the fabric of ACNA. WO was always going to be the deal breaker. The participant churches/dioceses essentially agreed to disagree on an issue that would be decided at a later date. The decision when finally made was indecisive, an attempt to keep everyone together without taking a stand. Exactly the way ACNA began, but now with Canons and structures in place that support and protect the organization not the individuals, dioceses, parishes, clergy, and parishioners. Sadly again right where many predicted this would end.
George and Kevin claim it’s not a salvation issue. However it’s a departure from Scripture, which even ACNA after their dithering multi year study acknowledged as fact. I think that is a salvation issue.
I have been in the Continuum over 40 years, following a lifetime in TEC. I have seen many things in Anglicanism in my days and I am not surprised that ACNA is where it is. In many ways they are now acting like the old TEC. In this light I don’t see any way forward for them remaining together.