The S

unday R

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up November 1, 2009 All Saints

Phoenix Happenings … p. 2 Do I Really Have to Love Them … p. 3 by Timothy Leffler Around the Church and the World p. 5 This Sunday Holy Eucharist: 8:00 AM / 9:15 AM / 11:00 AM Bible Study: 9:30 AM / 10:30 AM (Conf. Room) Brunch: Switch Bakery @ Central & Virginia. 12:45 PM

Pho

enix Hap

pening

s Integrity@Trinity’s Movie Night Presents:

Fall Double Features

Saturday, November 21 – 6 PM – Atwood Hall Featuring:

The Charlie Brown Thanksgiving Special and

Chocolat

Check Out Our Newly Redesigned Website http://www.integrityarizona.org

Stud

ying G

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’s Wo

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Do I Have to Love Them by Timothy Leffler

Which commandment is the most important of all? (Mark 12:28b) This is the question being put to Jesus as we begin today’s Gospel reading. If we go back earlier in the chapter we find that Jesus is being questioned, rather intensely, by some Pharisees, Herodians and Scribes. Their questions were devised to trap Jesus, but he was able to thwart their plans and create some great teaching moments. Jesus answered, “the most important is, ‘Hear O Israel: The Lord our God, the Lord is one. And you shall love the Lord your God with all your heart and with all your soul and with all your mind and with all your strength.’ The second is this: ‘You shall love your neighbor as yourself.’ There is no other commandment greater than these.” (Mark 12:29-31)

Many of Jesus’ answers were drawn from the Old Testament. In some cases to show the fulfillment of prophecy and in other cases, such as this, to speak the truth thru words with which the people were familiar. Loving God is found in Deuteronomy 6:4-5 and loving your neighbor as yourself is found in Leviticus 19:18b. Who would be our neighbor?

Leviticus 19:34 says You shall treat the stranger who sojourns with you as the native among you, and you shall love him as yourself, for you were strangers In the land of Egypt: I am the Lord your God. Stated in one, simple word…EVERYONE! There are those in our lives that are easy to love, our friends, family, the barista that serves us our first coffee of the day, and people who are like us. Others are not as easy to love, our co-workers, noisy neighbors, the waiter who gets our order wrong and is then rude to us, and people who are not like us. The list of those who would be a challenge to love can be, unfortunately, a long one. Sometimes, the hardest to love is sitting two pews away.

Some wonderful things happened this summer at the General Convention of The Episcopal Church. These wonderful things have caused LGBTQ Episcopalians and others in the Anglican Communion to rejoice and have a great feeling of hope for the future. We have prayed and worked hard to see that full acceptance be granted to all baptized Episcopalians, whether you are called to be a parish member, a Deacon, a Priest or even a Bishop. A change of policy does not guarantee a change of hearts. Other Episcopalians do not share our joy and hopeful view in the future of our church. History bears this out.

How long did it take us to accept people of color as our equals, let alone hold positions of lay authority and finally become clergy? Let us also not forget the issue of the ordination of women. Some of these fellow Christians will suffer in silence, never saying a word to us or about us. Others have, and will continue to be vocal in their displeasure with these tides of change. Some are leaving our folds and aligning themselves with like-minded Anglicans, or maybe even Roman Catholics. Others will say right where they are and try to turn back these tides of change. Where would we be today if, rather than stay put and affect change, we as LGBTQ Christians had left TEC and joined the MCC? So what are we to do with these people who would prefer we not have a place at the table? Fight them? Shun them? Annoy them? Ignore them? No. We are called to love them as we love ourselves, even if they refuse to love us back. Will it be easy? Probably not. It is, however, what we are to do as Christians. Beloved, let us love one another, for love is from God, and whoever loves has been born of God and knows God. Anyone who does not love does not know God, because God is love. In this the love of God was made manifest among us, that God sent his only son into the world, so that we might live through him. In this is love, not that we have loved God but that he loved us and sent his son to be the propitiation for our sins. Beloved, if God so loved us, we also ought to love one another. No one has ever seen God; if we love one another, God abides in us and his love is perfected in us. By this we know that we abide in him and he in us, because he has given us of his Spirit. And we have seen and testify that the Father has sent his Son to be the Savior of the world. Whoever confesses that Jesus is the Son of God, God abides in him, and he in God. So we have come to know and to believe the love that God has for us. God is love, and whoever abides in love abides in God, and God abides in him. By this is love perfected with us so that we may have confidence for the day of judgment, because as he is so also are we in this world. There is no fear in love, but perfect love casts out fear. For fear has to do with punishment, and whoever fears has not been perfected in love. We love because he first loved us. If anyone says, “I love God,” and hates his brother, he is a liar; for he who does not love his brother whom he has seen cannot love God whom he has not seen. And this commandment we have heard from him: whoever loves God must also love his brother. (I John 4:7-21)

And finally, the obligatory Hymn quote you have come to expect from me. “God is love, and where true love is God himself is there.”

Hymn 576 & 577 The Hymnal 1982

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The BCP as Anglican Covenant a blogpost from Dean Kniselyʼs Entangled States – http://www.entangledstates.org

People have always asked Episcopalians to describe what sort of Episcopalians they are. That's because there's a very diverse lot of us under the Episcopal Church's umbrella. Gosh, there's a very diverse group of us under my own Cathedral congregation's umbrella. There are High Church Anglicans, Ultramontane Anglicans, Calvinists, Low Church, Charismatic, Broad Church, Deists, Theists and cultural Anglicans. To name just a few.

Lately thanks to the writing of folks like Christopher Evans and Derek Olsen, I think I've come to understand my own place on the spectrum as being a "Common Prayer Anglican". Our genius within Anglicanism is our decision to find our unity in prayer, not in a binding Confession or in a Teaching Magisterium. And we find that unity by agreeing to pray the words of Book of Common Prayer with each other.

The wise folks over at Anglican Online have taken this idea a step further than I have in my own thinking, and I like where they're headed. They suggest that rather than the proposed Covenant for the Anglican Communion, we circle back and look at what we already do have, The Book of Common Prayer: "At first glance, it's easy to dismiss this concept of BCP-as-covenant as a conceit: really, some will say exasperatedly, the 1662 BCP was book of liturgy, not a covenant. But within a empire that crossed continents and oceans, where postal mail took months and news could be delayed by years, it was theological framework of the 1662 BCP that shaped the understanding of English Christianity. The two great sacraments of Baptism and the Holy Eucharist — as well as the lesser sacraments — were defined within an Anglican understanding. Their definition was sufficient for most to read, mark, and inwardly digest. The catechism was the school book for millions of children — and what is the catechism other than a theological FAQ? The rubrics, if not

quite canon law, were observed diligently for the most part and provided additional theological guidance. Lex orandi, lex credendi was perhaps truer during the hegemony of the 1662 BCP than it can ever be again. We might now argue that the use of Elizabethan English in, say, the Sudan was absurd; part of a misguided, wrong-headed attempt to 'civilise' the world and produce Victorian gentlemen and ladies rather than promote the spread of Christianity. But English Christianity was spread by Victorian (or Elizabethan, Jacobean, Carolinian, or Regency) gentlemen, by word and sometimes weapon. And the vector* was the 1662 Book of Common Prayer. All these little oases of English Christianity — Elizabethan thees and thous in the Mongolian desert, 'The Day Thou Gavest' heartily sung in Delhi, clergy dressing for dinner in Zanzibar — eventually joined together in strangely named dioceses such as Mashonaland and Ruwenzori and became the building blocks of the Anglican Communion. But the ties that bind were pages of the 1662 BCP bound in morocco, cloth, or paper. They held the communion together before any covenant was a glimmer in any disaffected bishop's eye." The full article can be read at” http://anglicansonline.org/ Obviously such an idea isn't a panacea, and it glosses over the real differences between the prayer books in use in different Provinces. The Book of Common Prayer in Sudan is very very different than the one in use in New Zealand. But at least this idea takes us back to our foundational roots and the fundamental defining characteristic of our polity. I like this idea very much. Good on 'em.

Vatican announcement raises many questions By William Franklin, October 23, 2009 [Episcopal News Service] As a member of the Anglican Centre in Rome, which represents the Archbishop of Canterbury to the Vatican, and as an Episcopalian who is a professor at one of the pope's universities in Rome, I have been asked many questions about the Vatican's announcement on Oct. 20 about the setting up of "Personal Ordinariates" for former Anglicans wishing to enter into full communion now with the Roman Catholic Church. Here are some answers to questions that many in the Episcopal Church are asking. 1. What exactly happened? On Oct. 20, there were two simultaneous press conferences in Rome and in London announcing that Pope Benedict XVI has approved an Apostolic Constitution that will set up a new canonical structure within the Roman Catholic Church that will allow for Personal Ordinariates which will make it possible for groups of Anglicans to enter into full communion with the Roman Catholic Church, preserving within the Ordinariates distinctive aspects of the Anglican liturgical and spiritual tradition.

In Rome, Cardinal William Levada, president of the Congregation for the Doctrine of the Faith (which prepared the constitution, which Pope Benedict has approved) and Archbishop J. Augustine Di Noia, of the Congregation for Divine Worship, announced that the constitution would be forthcoming.

In London, Archbishop Vincent Nichols, the Roman Catholic Archbishop of Westminster, and Archbishop of Canterbury Rowan Williams announced the constitution with their view that it brings to an end "a period of uncertainty for such groups who have nurtured hopes of new ways of embracing unity with the Catholic Church." 2. What is new about the Personal Ordinariates? The Apostolic Constitution clearly authorizes something "new" in the Roman Catholic Church and it provides "a new way" to enter into the full communion of the Roman Catholic Church. For many centuries individual Anglicans have converted to the Roman Catholic Church. There have been, however, a few previous cases in the past in which groups of Anglicans have entered the Roman

Catholic Church and have been allowed to preserve some corporate structures of Anglicanism. Examples of this have been the Anglican diocese of Amritsar in India, and some individual parishes from the Episcopal Church in the United States which maintained an Anglican identity when entering the Roman Catholic Church under a "pastoral provision" adopted by the Congregation for the Doctrine of the Faith and approved by Pope John Paul II in 1982.

When this development took place in 1982, the ecumenical officer of the Episcopal Church, the Rev. William Norgren, wrote: "In pluralistic America we are accustomed to Christians moving from church to church. It is quite a different matter for one church to organize parishes and institute liturgy taken from another church -- all to satisfy the individual wishes of a very few people who have moved. Comments in my hearing from individual Episcopalians, including some bishops, about parishes and proposed Anglican rites have been uniformly negative. This is simply a fact."

What is new in 2009 is that this provision will be universal in its application. It provides for groups of parishes that will be formed into "Personal Ordinariates" which may be presided over by former Anglican priests, or unmarried bishops, and it provides for distinctive forms of priestly formation for former Anglicans which incorporates aspects of the Anglican tradition. 3. What is the origin of the constitution? According to the Congregation for the Doctrine of the Faith, the constitution emerged as a single model for the worldwide church in response to requests coming to the Holy See from various Anglican groups over the last years seeking to enter into full communion with the Roman See. Cardinal Levada has said: "We have been trying to meet the requests for full communion that have come to us from Anglicans in different parts of the world in recent years in a uniform and equitable way. With this proposal the church wants to respond to the legitimate aspirations of these Anglican groups for full and visible unity with the bishop of Rome, successor of St. Peter." 4. Were we at the Anglican Centre in Rome surprised by this announcement? For more than a year, we at the Anglican Centre in Rome have heard rumors of groups of former Anglicans meeting in Rome with representatives of the Congregation for the Doctrine of the Faith. But

we were neither informed nor consulted about these conversations, nor was the staff of the Pontifical Council for Promoting Christian Unity, the ecumenical office of the Holy See, who are our closest dialogue partners in Rome. The Pontifical Council did not draft the constitution, nor did it participate in the press conference announcing the constitution. The Archbishop of Canterbury has said that he was informed of the announcement "at a very late stage," and the archbishop's Representative to the Holy See, the Very Rev. David Richardson, has said that he was "taken aback by the Vatican's decision." 5. What are the ecumenical implications of the "Personal Ordinariates"? We at the Anglican Centre in Rome expect and hope that the ecumenical conversations with the Roman Catholic Church will continue. We look forward to a response from the Pontifical Council for Promoting Christian Unity on the proposed Apostolic Constitution. This will help us to understand how the ecumenical dialogue can continue in a context which has obviously been made different now. As Dean Richardson has said, "It doesn't seem to me to help the ecumenical dialogue, but perhaps it will galvanize the dialogue." 6. What are some unanswered questions? There are four unanswered questions that need to be addressed before we can evaluate the ecumenical future: a. What does the Pontifical Council for Promoting Christian Unity have to say about the Apostolic Constitution? b. What does the text of the Apostolic Constitution actually say (the document has been announced but we have not seen it), and particularly on the following points, what are the details? What

specifics of the Anglican patrimony will be allowed? Will it be more than "spiritual" and "liturgical"? Will it be "ecclesiological" and "theological"? What will seminary formation for former Anglicans entail? How will the "Personal Ordinariates" relate to the authority of the local Roman Catholic bishop? c. What are the names of the groups of former Anglicans who seek reunion with the Roman See? Names of various groups have been put forward and denied in Rome, so it remains unclear to us what former Anglicans we are talking about. Knowing the identity of those who seek to move will help in our evaluation of the significance of this development. d. And finally, what will be the response to this development in the many provinces of the Anglican Communion where there is a national Anglican-Roman Catholic dialogue? 7. What will our continuing relationships be like? With this announcement the shape of things to come for Anglican-Roman Catholic relations is at this time unclear. But in a letter of October 20, Archbishop Rowan Williams has said: "It remains to be seen what use will be made of this provision, since it is now up to those who have made requests to the Holy See to respond to the Apostolic Constitution; but, in the light of recent discussions with senior officials in the Vatican, I can say that this new possibility is in no sense at all intended to undermine existing relations between our two communions or to be an act of proselytism or aggression." I believe we need to "wait and see" how this plays out in the several dimensions of these significant questions Christians are asking about the ecumenical future.

Integrity@Trinity is the congregational circle of Integrity at Trinity Cathedral. Our mission is to foster the integration of all people, especially gay, lesbian, bisexual, transgender and questioning (GLBTQ) people into the full life of the Trinity Cathedral parish. We do this by being witnesses of the Gospel of Jesus Christ by listening to the needs and concerns of our community, being witnesses for justice and inclusion and by serving our church and wider community.

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