I'm grateful for the link and have made much of this piece of defensiveness from the recent past. This version merges three files all about the Hartford Appeal and adds in my own comments.

Blessings DavidW. Here, and a faster read, is another line in the sand for your consideration. This one was meant to be, not self-protective, but  "against the world, for the world."

Thanks Bowman,

I'm not aquainted with that, and thanks for the link. But even in the NT there were times Christians responded to a world that punished faith in Christ with persecution. After all Jesus said "Whoever is not with me is against me, and whoever does not gather with me scatters."

Lines in the sand isnt about 'how', its about what. The battle is not against flesh and blood but against spiritual powers.

Only one of ten healed leppers came back to praise God. .. but one did. Believers see God working even now. 

Hi DavidW. Are you acquainted with James Smith's Introducing Radical Orthodoxy? Here's a review. The founders of the movement are in England.

The Church of Christ which was from the beginning is, and continueth unto the end: of which Church all parts have not always been equally sincere and sound.

Richard Hooker, Of the Laws of Ecclesiastical Polity, III, 1.10 (in J. Keble, ed., The Works of Richard Hooker, Oxford, 6 ed., 1861, Vol. 1, p. 346).

For lack of diligent observing the difference, first between the Church of God mystical and visible, then between the visible sound and corrupted, sometimes more, sometimes less, the oversights are neither few nor light that have been committed.

Ibid., III, vol. 1.9 (ed. cit., p. 343).

Hi Bowman,

Thanks for another prompt response, bless you.

I used the ECUSA as an example, my subsequent post shows the same attitude at work in the CofE. Its good to keep the dialogue open, Fulcrum is invaluable, but the two sides are light and dark. Sure revisionism talks of unity, but shows they intend to oust anyone who disagrees with them. Its a sham.

There is no unity, the two sides are as believers and non-believers in the same church.

Hi DavidW. I strive not to ruminate overmuch on the vicissitudes of The Protestant Episcopal Church in the United States of America (TEC) in an English village where few have reason to think about it. However, it is sometimes the easiest way to make a point or pose a question. In this case, I want to draw a line in the air a few thousand feet off the ground.

You can get a general sense of my view of TEC in my last comment to Carl in his Writing on the Wall thread
([21883] Monday 23 July 2012, 08:35am) and an older post under Evangelical and Gay ([19731] Saturday 28 January 2012 - 02:37am). The New York Times's Ross Douthat expounds similar views here and here. To those insights, I would only add that TEC's radically decentralised polity and the physical and cultural geography of its 110+ dioceses make the idea of it as a "national church" so bafflingly abstract-- and so unfair to the other Anglican churches in the land-- that I have abandoned it entirely and urge others to do the same. In particular, it would be best if--

1. American Anglicans (all of them) and ELCA Lutherans conducted all of their truly ecclesial business on a  provincial or diocesan basis,
2. TEC and the ELCA both dissolved in favor of something like a Porvoo Communion of their constituent provinces (see map) or ELCA regions, regarded thereafter as autocephalous churches (e.g. The Church of New England, The Church of the Rocky Mountains, etc.)
3. All of these churches were bound to each other by the Anglican Communion Covenant with amendments and-- importantly-- the ecumenical agreements of the prior churches.
4. Anglicans in England and elsewhere extended the same ecclesial relations on an equal basis to American Anglicans of all jurisdictions and any Lutherans in communion with them, subject of course to the appropriate doctrinal tests.

In other words, "the fish rots from the head," and it is the vacuity of the idea of a "national church" in a nation as young, diverse, and secular as this one that has invited the silliness of TEC. An honourable experiment has failed-- in nearly all communions, not just this one-- and it is time to move on to a new polity for this country. The United States would be better served by a continental communion of strong regional churches that reflect the actual religious history of Americans and that has the hybrid vigour of roots in traditions that are both liturgical and confessional. If you have some feel for the cultural tendencies of these provinces, you can see that a few would tend to be more liberal, a few rather moderate, and a few quite conservative. But triennial arguments about an abstraction called TEC would be superseded by more meaningful and often more productive discussion. Meanwhile, the TEC-ELCA partnership is going well, and these Lutherans have several of the gifts (e.g. a passion for evangelism, a tradition of careful argument about dogmatics, a Reformation sacramental theology, a rich tradition of biblical scholarship, a "common touch") that TEC lacks. I like this approach because it builds on real though hidden strengths, rather than all too human dreams and hypotheses.

What is this?-- splitting? realigning? merging? Whatever it is, the result of it would be more integrally Christian. And sometimes that's the way we have to think about these things.

So if those who are advocating the church with its official position doesnt have integrity and doesn't deserve to be listened to...

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=IjhExkEh4Hw

One has a split doesn't one?

Bowman,

If one is not persuaded by the Biblical Testimony that splitting is correct in such circumstances, then it is either because one does not believe what the Bible says about the issue, or what the Bible says about splitting over it, or both.

What the NT describes is the believers should expel the non-believers, your post seemed to imply the believers would split, leaving the church as the non-believers.

Looking at the developments with the ECUSA that seems to be the thinking for one side. The ECUSA have not only broken the moratorium, but pretty much ousted those who wanted to stick with the majority even taking them to court. (1 Corinthians 6 again) You know for believers it is evident the ECUSA is acting out exactly what the NT is describing is false and warning against, yet they don’t even recognise it.

If the reason as described in the NT for division is not so deeply important, do you have any things at all that you think is worthy of division?

How do you see a split not taking place where the majority simply couldn’t recognise the minority revisionism?

Not going to revive discussion of That Topic, for "there is nothing new under the sun," but as you are firmly persuaded of the duty of splitting, I hope that you have begun to think constructively about how you will actually "split," and in what ways your next church will be better than the church that you have. After all, if the reason for division is so deeply important, it must be the basis for some dynamic ministry never dreamt of by those on the wrong side of things. So now that you have a line in the sand, how will things be better on your side of it?

All I really ask of splitters-- and I am often disappointed in this-- is that they be much more affirmative than some aging cell of cranky, Trotskyite, refuseniks who know precisely where the Party betrayed Marx and Lenin, but are unsure how to engage the interest of anyone who was not already convinced when Sputnik was launched. The basis of a living church is not less error-- though that is always and everywhere desirable-- but more life and light.

Another David,

I have to agree the Bible doesn’t says much directly but it is pretty specific when it does. I think it only specifically says God is love once, but would one ignore that based on frequency, or is the Bible not actually describing that throughout anyway?The condemnation of homosexual practice is also throughout the Bible, OT and NT covenants. Besdies, in holistic context the Biblical testimony says a lot about sexual immorality, it has more NT warnings about sexual immorality than instruction to  material help for the poor.

Is this an issue to split? Well yes the NT says so, not least 1 Cor 5 which says those who are wilfully sexually immoral and call themselves brothers should be expelled. We could look to Matthew 18, and the passages about false teaching. The other problem is that is homosexual practice is sin then to deny that is as the NT says a barrier to the Kingdom (ie 1 Cor 6, Rev 22, Romans 1) It is also an example of the truth not being in someone who denies they sin and it makes God out to be a liar (1 John 1)

So crucially the issue is whether homosexual practice is a sin, otherwise just how many passages of scripture is one going to ignore?

If it is then those wilfully practising and even promoting it don’t have the truth or the gospel, are not brother and sisters in Christ even though they call themselves.

But isn’t it clear? Even gay activists rip the relevant pages out of hotel Bibles, they know full well what it says and means. Many, and not just believing Christians, see the arguments against the passages that condemn homosexual practice as nothing more than lying about it. Lying is also a sin.

I doubt if there has ever been such an issue to split over than this one. It potentially can affect eternal life.

I would be interested in your response to these points Another David