Comments? Thoughts?
This subject, IMHO, would make a very good thesis for a sociologist or a religious historian. I often wondered why universities like Harvard and Yale, whose founding documents state boldly that the purpose of the founders was to establish and teach the truth of God written in the Holy Scriptures … became exactly the opposite and in fact oppose the Bible that the founders loved.
It has happened again. Before our eyes, in this generation, we have seen the emasculation of a former bastion of Christianity. What was the seed? Who allowed it to be watered and to grow to the point that it squelched the truth at every opportunity… and finally morphed into an entirely unrecognizable institution.
I would appreciate it if the Catholic friends and neighbors that visit here would refrain from Protestant bashing
… or starting a conversation about how Protestants will be Protestants … Thnx in advance. This social trend affects all of our families.
I attended a vibrant beautiful old ivy covered greystone Episcopal Church, St Stephens, Sewickley PA in the mid 80’s. I remember the Pastor at the time, Rev John Guest, in his winsome Liver-puddelian accent stating that if the US Episcopal Communion decided to ordain gays and lesbians that he would leave the church. Well it finally happened … and he took most of the congregation with him to establish a new place of worship.
The Episcopal Communion on the African Continent has completely separated itself from the US Episcopal Church for the above reasons, among others.
I recently read this short statement describing the decline and fall of the US Episcopal Church.
"When I first became an Episcopalian years ago, a friend facetiously told me that I had
joined the best church that money could buy.”
In fact, another wag observed that the Episcopal Church is the Cadillac
of American Christianity’’ and the ‘‘Chevis Regal of
Protestantism.’’
These attempts at humor, based on social and intellectual snobbery, have grown a bit
stale in the ensuing years, as the stately and venerable American version of the
Church of England has experienced wide-spread decline in numbers, theological
conviction, and social and political influence.
The church that once was called “the Republican Party at prayer” has
now become little more than a coalition of special interests and would probably
be more accurately termed the “Democratic Convention in 1988 at prayer.”
With bishops who declare the Bible to be little more than the prejudices of a group
of misogynist, homophobic
males, the Apostle Paul to have been nothing but a frustrated homosexual, and
the Resurrection of Jesus Christ to be nothing but the rattling of old bones, it
is little wonder that the Episcopal Church in the United States has lost over a
million members since 1970. As if these “profound theological insights” were
not enough, the American branch of Anglicanism now has liturgies for the marriage
of two persons of the same gender and refuses to expect clergy to live morally
pure lives.
This sad state of affairs has prompted some Episcopalians to seek a safe harbor outside
the Anglican Communion in which to live out their faith. Not surprisingly, some
have elected to leave the denomination for other more conservative, Protestant
groups. Still others have ‘‘swam the Tiber’’ for membership in the Roman
Catholic Church. A few others have formed “independent Episcopal”
congregations, and yet more have formed new ‘‘Anglican Churches’’ that
are in communion with neither Canterbury or the Episcopal Church in the U.S.A.
Sadly, some have simply dropped their practice of the faith altogether.
Continued:
antiochian.org/Orthodox_Church_Who_What_Where_Why/Why_In_The_World_Would_An_Episcopalian_Become_Orthodox.htm
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