Even More Thoughts on General Convention'06

A number of years ago, Mark Dyer was my parish priest as well as a
professor at my seminary. Among the many things he said which have
stuck with me, this one seems pertinent. "We should never use the
Bible as a weapon against each other."

I am a nobody in the Episcopal Church. Not a deacon, priest, bishop,
deputy, chairperson of any committee, serve on no diocesan or national
councils etc. I sit in my pew. I hope, like Abba Lot, "as far as I
can I say my little office, i fast a little, I pray and meditate. I
live in peace and as far as I can, I purify my thoughts." As Abba Lot
asked, I ask also " What else can I do?" I would like my next step
to follow Abba Joseph's suggestion. "Abba Joseph stood up and
stretched his hands toward heaven. His fingers became like 10 lamps
of fire and he said to Lot "If you will, you can become all flame."

What I would like the House of Bishops to know, and the Deputies and
anyone who came to GC06 from anywhere in the world and offered their 2
cents is that there are a great many nobodies such as I in TEC who
just want to be about the business of loving God with every thing we
have and are and loving as neighbors as ourselves. We nobodies want
and need you to lead and guide us in that and we will return the
favor. Bashing each other over the head with the Bible, or making
claims to a purity that **NONE** of us will ever have this side of
heaven and all the name calling from hither and yon all over the place
contributes nothing to what we want and need from you. In fact, it
gives us the opposite.

I am not singling out one "side" or the other (and ill it makes me
feel to think members of my family are taking sides against each
other, how dysfunctional is that?) but addressing all of you.
I offer you this:

"A brother at Scetis committed a fault. A council was called to which
Abba Moses was invited but he refused to go to it. The the priest
sent someone to say to him, "Come, for everyone is waiting for you."
So he got up and went. He took a leaking jug filled with water and
carried it with him. The others came out to meet him and said to him,
"What is this, Father?" The old man said to them, "My sins run out
behind me, and I do not see them, and today I am coming to judge the
errors of another." When they heard that they said no more to the
brothers but forgave him."