STORM2K

By Darren Barbee, Star-Telegram Staff Writer

The Fort Worth Episcopal Diocese has joined an alliance of 13 dioceses opposed to the ordination of an openly gay bishop, a move some priests and theologians see as a step toward a split in the denomination.

Other priests said the group, the Network of Anglican Communion Dioceses and Parishes, will work toward reconciliation and is not breaking with the U.S. Episcopal Church.

The network's strategy is to win recognition from the worldwide Anglican Communion and to oversee conservative congregations in liberal dioceses, according to a letter written by Fort Worth Bishop Jack Iker posted on the diocese Web site.

I thought Church was about religion, not sexual preference

Unfortunately, some people feel the two aren't compatible.

Besides, aren't priests, bishops, cardinals, etc. supposed to be celibate? So sex either way should be considered a break of their vows.

Not Episcopal priests, I think onlyl Catholic and a few other groups feel they should be celibate.

Oops, that's right. Episcopal priests don't enter into the same sacrament as Catholic priests. Catholics who enter into the Holy Orders are supposed to "commit to the Church with an undivided heart."

Being a Christian of the Protestant Episcopal Communion, it pains me to see ever more fragmentation whitin the Body of Christ's Church...something Our Lord and the Apostolic Fathers never intended, and laying Pharisaic "certainties" before the faithful as the denominations grow more angry, insular and contentious with each other.

As Rudyard Kipling put it so very well,

"For each was partly in the right,
And all were in the wrong!"

So, as we attend our separate chuches this Christmas season, reflect on this as we all celebrate the birth of Him Who made the lame walk, the blind see, and sacrificed Himself for all of us...that we may be cleansed by His sacrifice, only to batter each other over (again) Pharisee-like inequities, if not inconsequentailities?