Spong is a heretic. Plain and simple. Not only does he have false views about everything from the Trinity to sexuality but he also sounds suspiciously pantheistic. Disgusting. How this man can possibly claim to be Christian while having such heretical views, I’d love to know.
He is, I believe, an Episcopal Bishop. That means he has credentials, papers on the wall of his study which certify that he is a good Christian.
That’s all it takes. Paperwork. In matters of politics, even alleged paperwork is enough, when the financial backing is sufficient.
Once upon a time, shortly before my independence from the Church, I had an appointment with a local Bishop, to facilitate the marriage of a friend (he’d made me “best man”) to a non-Catholic woman. While cooling my heels in his anteroom, I checked out the wall decorations. Aside the door one would open to actually go see the Bishop, there was a nice full color photograph of the somewhat chunky prelate himself, decked out in red silk robes and underlying finery, wearing a hat taller than Don Imus’, and not looking particularly friendly. (As it turned out, he was not.)
On the obscure side of the door was an artist’s rendition of some skinny, bearded guy wearing a towel around his privates, who appeared to wearing a ring of sharp weeds around his head, He was parked fairly permanently on a big wooden cross, to which he appeared to have been nailed. Like the Bishop, this poor guy did not look very happy— but his was a different quality of unhappiness, one to which I could relate.
Since than, I’ve been more selective about the authority figures I choose to respect. Sometimes, weeds and a towel say more than finery or papers. Dogs have papers. Subservient citizens have papers. Bishop Spong is offering you an opportunity to listen up to what is happening in the arcane world of belief.
