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Here’s a very good article from Episcopal Cafe on the shift in the Episcopal church in the past century that is behind our drive to include all God’s people.
By Linda L. Grenz
A reading of press reports about the 76th General Convention might suggest the only topic debated (again) was sexuality – or, more precisely, homosexuality. Sometimes this happens simply because the press does not know much about our history or theology. Unfortunately that often means our members get misinfornmation about why this topic is relevant to our church and why we are devoting attention to it.
Our focus is on inclusion and this is not new – it is something we have been working on for decades. It grew out of the liturgical renewal movement that began to have a significant impact on the church in the early 20th century. The desire to renew the church’s liturgy led scholars to re-examine the church’s worship and theology. Their research and the discovery of previously unknown texts led liturgical scholars to re-vision how we worship.
Liturgical scholars realized the earliest Christians gathered around the dining room table and it is likely that the hosts presided. As membership grew and services became more formal, the order of priests was established to assist the bishop. This led to the clericalization of the liturgy as priests became more central to worship services and laity became mere observers.
The priest became the primary actor, the one who said the liturgy and did the ministry. The people become passive recipients. Their role was to “pay,” “pray” and not “say” much more than “amen” or “and also with you!”
As liturgical scholars began to re-shape the liturgy to make it more participatory, the roles of clergy and laity also changed. This change was driven by another aspect of the liturgical renewal movement – the re-visioning of baptismal theology. In the early church, baptism was a transformative rite of passage. In baptism, one died to one’s old self and rose with Christ to a new life as a redeemed child of God. One’s baptism profoundly changed one, both now and for eternity. Read more »
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I received an email asking why the confession in church is plural, “we confess,” rather than singular, “I confess.” Here’s the original email and my response:
This has been bugging me for a while and I’ve just never managed to corner a priest on Sunday. Why is the confession in the plural form?
We confess we have sinned against You in thought, word & deed by what we have done and by what we have left undone…
Why? Shouldn’t it be ‘I confess I have sinned against You…’ What if my sin bucket is larger this week than last week? Shouldn’t I take ownership of my larger sin instead of hiding behind the WE of the congregation? What if I was really really mean to my neighbor and really didn’t love them with my whole heart but the guy sitting in the pew in front of me totally loved their neighbor and helped with their gardening?
And if it’s the Royal We then it invalidates the phrase “We are truly sorry and We humbly repent…” because you cannot be truly sorry and humble if you’re thinking of yourself as Royal.
So why the WE?
What a great question! I’ve been pondering it ever since I received it.
I have a couple of thoughts. There is a tension in our spiritual lives between our personal, individual identity and our communal identity. In ancient times, individual identity was not important. The core unit of existence was the community. The “I” only existed in the service of the “we.” You can see some of this sensibility in Asian cultures. This of course can move to an unhealthy extreme, as in the “Borg” in Star Trek (If you’re familiar with this show. The Borg was a collective of beings where there was absolutely no individual identity.)
In contrast to this, our modern western sensibility stresses the “I” often to the exclusion of the “we.” Individual rights and freedoms are emphasized to the exclusion of community responsibility. Spiritually, you can see the emphasis on the individual in religious traditions that stress the salvation of individuals. From this perspective, Christianity is about individuals getting right with God so they can go to heaven. I believe there is a big danger in this perspective. I believe we are created to be in community and the tendency we have to separate ourselves from others is sinful. The Presiding Bishop, in one of her sermons at The General Convention, said this stress on individual salvation was the heresy of Western Christianity and I would agree.
I believe we need a balance between individual identity/responsibility and communal identity/responsibility. And I think given our inborn tendency in the west to stress the individual, we need to emphasise the communal.
In the Episcopal church, there is emphasis on both. We honor individual thought and perspectives. Nobody is expected to leave their individual identity or beliefs outside. We also honor the importance of individual spiritual practice.
At the same time, we are strongly communal. Sunday morning worship is not a collective of individuals who just happen to be together in one room. Rather we see ourselves as one Body. We are mystically connected to one another, and we rely on one another. At times I’m weaker, or plagued with doubts or anxieties, and it is the strength of the person next to me in the pew that keeps me going. In the creed we say, “WE believe” rather than “I believe” for this reason. The same is true for the confession. Your sins are not your business alone. Although you may be the only one who knows what your sins might have been, they still impact the community in ways we will never understand. For me, rather than hiding my sins in the royal “we,” there is a greater exposure knowing that my sins aren’t simply about Me ‘n God but there is a way in which I let the whole community down. And the community is failing in ways known and unknown and we need, as a community, to be absolved.
Yes, individual confession is important, and ideally you would have a practice of indivual confession, either by yourself or in the presence of a priest. But when we gather for Eucharist, we are expressing the communal part of our identity.
I hope this helps. I’ve copied Canon Carey on this email. He is very good at answering such questions and he might have a different perspective that would be helpful.
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I’m starting to collect resources from other dioceses that allow same-sex blessings.
Here’s what I found from the Diocese of LA:
Policy: http://s3.amazonaws.com/dfc_attachments/public/documents/120/Sacramental_Blessing_Policy.pdf
Q&A: http://s3.amazonaws.com/dfc_attachments/public/documents/122/Sacramental_Blesssings_Q_and_A.pdf
Rite: http://s3.amazonaws.com/dfc_attachments/public/documents/119/Blessing_of_a_Lifelong_Covenant.pdf
And from Vermont:
http://www.dioceseofvermont.org/Resources/TFonBlessings/VT%20Blessings%20Report.pdf
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From my friend Tina Reynolds:
A group of about 30 homeless campers in Sacramento established SafeGround on 7/21/09 on a vacant lot near downtown Sacramento . The property owner, Attorney Mark Merin, has given permission to the campers to live on his property. The campers elected a Council of Elders, adopted the following rules and have each signed an agreement to honor them: no drugs, no alcohol, no violence. The community prepares communal meals, shares resources and looks after each other. Ages range from the twenties to senior citizens; some are physically disabled; the younger campers are actively seeking work. Many are former residents of Sacramento ’s infamous Tent City .
This morning police officers arrived and have threatened people with arrests unless they left immediately. A number of residents are prepared to stand their ground. They are fed up with being pushed from place to place by the police and have nowhere else to go.
Background: Over 1,200 homeless people in Sacramento must sleep outside every night for lack of better options. The shelters are overflowing; thousands are on the waiting lists for housing assistance. Homeless persons, social service agencies and local businesses have joined together to establish a safe, decent, legal campground in Sacramento . For more info, go towww.safegroundsac.org or www.sacloaves.org
We will be meeting again this afternoon and planning a protest. If you would like to be involved in that protest I will add you to my list.
This is totally unacceptable by our own fair city. There were over 30 police plus a CSI unit on the scene and the property was wrapped with yellow crime scene tape.
Of the 35 people that were residing at Safe Ground, none of them have a single other option for resting space – NOTHING.
Please stay informed with our emails. We may have needs of tents, sleeping bags, food and support.
