posted
I heard something about a "Holy Union" of gay partners this morning on NPR.
Apparently, a certain Episcopal diocese held a gay marriage somewhere in Vermont. Since the state approved it, the church decided to also show their support?
Anyone else hear of this? Thoughts?
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posted
I believe the Episcopalian church just confirmed an openly gay bishop in the northeast. So while I wish you could provide specific links, I don't think you should be surprised.
posted
Isn't the Episcopal church essentially the Anglican church, which came about through the necessity of having a church that follows a secular rather than spiritual authority? (i.e. Henry VIII wanting a divorce)
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posted
pooka, are you implying that we shouldn't be surprised if the Episcopal Church does something you consider ungodly, since they're not a godly church in the first place?
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posted
Tom, I think you know that I'm LDS and as LDS we considered the popes of that era to be fairly corrupt. But I used "spiritual" instead of "papist" because I was was trying not to sound like a klansman.
My actual question is whether the Episcopal church is substantially the same as the Anglican church. If so, one would expect it to have the ethic (shared by LDS) of upholding the law of the land. This is part of why LDS don't want the laws to be read in a way that permits gay marriage.
LDS is not a doomsday cult, where we would just roll our eyes and dig in our heels against the tide of moral destruction washing over a society we have no part in.
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posted
"LDS is not a doomsday cult, where we would just roll our eyes and dig in our heels against the tide of moral destruction washing over a society we have no part in."
Um....Okay. I may have misunderstood, here -- but the difference between the LDS and the description above is that you believe you have some small part in society, right? Because, if I understand correctly, several prophets have basically said that a tide of moral destruction is pretty much inevitable, which is why y'all spend so much money on bottled water and canned goods.
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posted
I read an article once that was kind of alarmed at the fact that 9 members of congress are LDS. Most LDS see civic involvement as a good thing. I'm fairly lazy myself. In church we will be reminded that elections/primaries and the like are coming up. But we are not told how to vote.
Food storage is as much for personal emergencies such as unemployment as for any expectation of a world calamity. Or regional emergencies such as hurricane or earthquake. It's apparently illegal to stockpile some places (not necessarily anywhere in America) but I know that when they have the worldwide conference, they encourage the folks to obey their local laws above following that particular practice.
But in most matters, God's law is considered more important than society's laws.
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posted
Y'know, not to turn this into a homosexuality thread or anything (*grin*), but why would the LDS feel compelled to start marrying gay couples if civil law permitted it? As churches can already deny marriage to any couple at their whim, it seems odd for LDS to fear this eventuality on those specific grounds.
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posted
If I wanted to, I'm sure I could link to at least 5 threads in the last year where that has been amply discussed. But I'm pretty sure you also participated in all those discussions, and probably even more that I didn't bother to.
I checked the Episcopal site, and couldn't find where it explicity said they are from the Anglicans. Though the home page had Canadian Anglican as well as Episcopal on it. To get the church historical info, one apparently has to write to the someone. With a stamp and envelope and all that.
I did have two close friends who were Episcopal and a couple of acquaintances who were children of an Episcopal minister. But I think the information about them being like Anglicans came largely from my mother. P.S. Which means I can't be sure if it's accurate. Hence my original inquiry.
posted
I was married in an Episcopal church this year, and as far as I know they are an offshoot of the Catholic church. So is the Anglican, of course, but the Episcopal church is basically Roman Catholic lite....and I mean that in a good way.
I was raised Roman Catholic, but I was also raised to think for myself. I don't like a lot of things about the Roman Catholic faith, but a lot of the things they do seem god to me as well, so Episcopal seems to be a good faith for me. I already know the words to most of the prayers, and the service (still called Mass) is structured almost identical to RC....built in aerobics included..
Priests can (and do) marry and have families, and there are woman priests; two of my pet peeves about RC's solved right there. If I had found Episcopalian churches earlier in my life, I may have become a priest as well; but i had always wanted a family, so I never really considered it after my early teens.
It is VERY close in form to RC.....but I don't know much history about the church, so I'm not really sure when it split off. If I remember my lessons correctly, it is an offshoot of Anglican, but it split off almost right away, trying to keep the same basic forms and rituals as RC have....without the Pope, of course.
posted
......................................................What is the Episcopal Church?
The Episcopal Church is the American branch of the Anglican Communion. The Anglican Communion is an inheritor of 2000 years of catholic and apostolic tradition dating from Christ himself, rooted in the Church of England. When the Church of England spread throughout the British Empire, sister churches sprang up. These churches, while autonomous in their governance, are bound together by tradition, Scripture, and the inheritance they have received from the Church of England. They together make up the Anglican Communion, a body headed spiritually by the Archbishop of Canterbury and having some 80 million members, making it the second largest Christian body in the world. The Episcopal Church came into existence as an independent denomination after the American Revolution. Today it has between two and three million members in the United States, Mexico, and Central America, all of which are under jurisdiction of the Presiding Bishop of the Episcopal Church, Edmond Browning.
Bishops in the American Episcopal Church are elected by individual dioceses and are consecrated into the Apostolic Succession, considered to witness to an unbroken line of Church leadership beginning with the Apostles themselves. For more than two decades the American Episcopal Church has ordained women to the priesthood. In 1988 the Diocese of Massachusetts elected the first Anglican woman bishop, Barbara Harris.
Although it subscribes to the historic Creeds (the Nicene Creed and the Apostles' Creed), considers the Bible to be divinely inspired, and holds the Eucharist or Lord's Supper to be the central act of Christian worship, the Episcopal Church grants great latitude in interpretation of doctrine. It tends to stress less the confession of particular beliefs than the use of the Book of Common Prayer in public worship. This book, first published in the sixteenth century, even in its revisions, stands today as a major source of unity for Anglicans around the world.
The Church of England has always valued the life of the mind and dialogue with fields of secular study. Isaac Newton was an Anglican clergyman and theologian as were several of the founders of the Royal Society, the earliest institution organized for the promotion of science. The Episcopal Church maintains this tradition, routinely requiring its clergy to hold university as well as seminary degrees and supporting many university chaplains.
The Rev. Scott I. Paradise
.................................................
So it is, but it isn't....sort of...
It is an offshoot of the Anglican church, but it has it's own leaders and bishops, and has different beliefs as far as woman priests.....and others as well.
Compared to most Protestant churches, it is very close to the root source, RC churches. I have been to Lutheran services, Methodist ones, Baptist; none of them really seemed to be right for me. I just like my parish, and I like my priest....adn I wish I had found them sooner.
There is a HUGE split in the Episcopal Church now over the gay Bishop in VT, and some parishes are splitting off from the main branch...anyone other than me see the irony in that?
By "the irony in that" do you mean how a church that was a split from a split now struggles with a split? Of course there was a time that RC split from Orthodox, which eventually itself became split.
Okay, here's what I was looking for (from
Eerdmann's Handbook to the History of Christianity )
quote: In1534 Henry VIII proclaimed himself head of the church of England... Queen Mary...attempted to restore Catholicism and the authority of the pope in Britain... Queen Elizabeth restored and permanently established Protestantism in England during her long reign (1558-1603)...and too the title of "supreme governor" (not head) of the Church of England...
It also says here that the church under Elizabeth was "scriptural, catholic, and reasonable" whereas under James I and Charles I it "emphasized that the king received his powers directly from God and could not be called to account by his subjects (the divine right of kings).
I guess the question I still have remaining is how this relationship of the English crown was affected once the American Revolution happens. Is that loyalty now transferred to our democratic government?
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posted
Its been discussed, but never really answered. Besides, its perfectly possible to uphold the law of the land without ever performing a marriage for a gay couple -- it will never be illegal to not perform them.
Does the church perform marriages where neither person is a member of the church? Its perfectly legal for those to occur, yet the church doesn't feel compelled to perform those. Why would the church suddenly feel compelled to perform gay marriages?
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posted
I dont mean to ask this if it has been discussed previously, and I dont mean to derail the thread. But I was wondering, how do people who are Christians justify marrying gay couples? The Bible is pretty explicit about gay being immoral.
Posts: 473 | Registered: Sep 2001
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quote: The Bible is pretty explicit about gay being immoral.
*shrug* Maybe your version is, but that doesn't mean the original was. Here's a site that explains different interpretations of passages that supposedly condemn homosexuality.
posted
I thought that site was pretty interesting, although I did find myself think when they said this
quote: The National Gay Pentecostal Alliance comments: "This alone tells us that the traditionalists were wrong about the intent of this mob: If you are planning a homosexual orgy, you don't invite the wife and kids!
Sodom was smited for being immoral. There was not a single good person among them. Do you think all of these incredibly immoral people would care if their wife and kids were around? Their wives were probably screwing around with other people too. By the way, I'm not Christian so I am not defending my beliefs here. It doesnt make much difference to me what the bible says. Not Christian, but I have read the bible.
posted
Okay, 10 minutes spent searching and I'm guessing it fell off the archives. dkw has written some very interesting alternative interpretations of those biblical passages. The gist of it is that homosexuality is only mentioned as part of a list of generic sins, as some sort of Christian versus Pagan separator. But she'd be able to better explain it.
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When looking at that web site, I can see the argument about the incidents in Sodom and Gamorra. But I really felt that their arguments about leviticus were fairly weak. I also thought it was interesting in leviticus when it says that you should not wear clothing made of two different kinds of cloth. That seems a little bizarre to me. I am going to look it up and see if I am not understanding it completely.
Posts: 473 | Registered: Sep 2001
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posted
Promethius: It's called "shat-nez." Yep, a lot of interesting things can be found in the "Old" Testemant.
(Isn't it kind of hypocritical to observe only select laws from the Old Testemant? Can someone please clarify this for me?)
Posts: 3060 | Registered: Nov 2003
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posted
I heard somewhere that all of the laws do not have to be followed because some of them were covenants with God before Christ came, like circumcision. So I think once he came, certain things were fulfilled and some of the old ways were thrown out the door because they just werent necessary, because of Christs coming. I think...
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