It’s a miracle! Wrapping up their meeting in Tanzania, Anglican officials of the 77 million-strong church have agreed to allow America’s Episcopal Churches to welcome gays into the international communion.
The seven-page report, penned by Archbishop of Canterbury, Rowan Williams, allows American churches to include gays, but has barred them from installing any more gay bishop a la Gene Robinson. In addition, the conclusive paper derided Nigeria’s Archbishop Peter Akinola for sticking his nose in America’s business and snatching away a number of Churches. Of the decision, Pro-gay British Bishop Colin Coward said:
We are very pleased and delighted… The archbishops have come up with a surprisingly realistic assessment of the reality of life in the communion for gay and lesbian people.
Conservatives, meanwhile, were none-too-pleased. American theologian Dr. Kendall Harmon griped, “It’s a really poor report. It is shocking that a report like this could have been written at this stage. It’s way too soft.” Boo-hoo.
(PS: The white horse and first line are a vague pop culture reference. Anyone know what it is? Here’s a hint, the writer/director’s initials are MB and they never made a sequel – may be a tough one for the youngsters, but you old queens have to know this movie. We’ll reveal the answer later.)
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[Update: Some astute readers pointed out that the meeting doesn’t wrap up until Monday. We were wrong. But, there’s still a compromise of sorts and conservatives are still pissed.]
Scott
I’m with you on the issues, but this entry has several inaccuracies. The major one is that the meeting is being wrapped up. Not until Monday! And “agreed to allow America’s Episcopal Churches to welcome gays into the international communion” isn’t really what the subgroup’s report was about. Might want to study the news reports.
It’s posts like this that have gotten me into the habit of taking queer journalism with a grain of salt regarding facts. And this aura of looseness with facts doesn’t help anyone or any cause.
Patrick Townson
Scott says:
It’s posts like this that have gotten me into the habit of taking queer journalism with a grain of salt regarding facts. And this aura of looseness with facts doesn’t help anyone or any cause.
==========================
Indeed, Scott. Where, oh where, are the unbiased sources of news coverage where GLBT people are concerned? Where are our relatively unbiased sources of news such as that provided by Human Rights Campaign and The Advocate News? I aggragate GLBT news and headlines (please see http://gaynews.n3.net )
and am constantly amazed by the wide variations in reporting on issues like Anglicans vrs. Episcopal.
And you are quite correct; the meeting will go on through Monday before it is dismissed and results are
announced, if they ever are.
PAT
John
I actually think most gay news is hopelessly pessimistic, even when there’s no real reason to be.
Too often, I’ve seen misleading headlines like “California Denies Equal Marriage Rights” (in the local rag) when the bulk of the story was about domestic partnerships being made into the equivalent of civil unions…and had nothing to do with marriage.
Talk about snatching defeat out of the jaws of victory. In most of the world, being granted access to civil unions is not reported as “bad” news. American gays are also terribly foolish to think that Europe is some sort of blissful gay paradise.
In fact, civil unions are the norm overseas rather than full-on marriage. And those laws were only enacted after enduring years of tough lobbying and homophobic attacks. Yet, reading gay newspapers, you’d think America was the worse place on earth when it comes to homosexuality. It’s just not true.