“The Golden Mouth Chrysostom”
A great preacher of the Church
John Chrysostom
Peter Menkin, Obl Cam OSB

Church of Our Saviour (Episcopal)
Mill Valley, CA USA
January 27, 2010
Wednesday morning Eucharist
Lesser Feasts and Fasts, 1994

Jeremiah 1: 4-10
Luke 21: 12-15
Psalm 49: 1-8

In the name of God, Father, Son, and Holy Spirit.

The priestly office was defined in John Chrysostom’s “classic manual” as one of awesome demands. The priest, he wrote in his treatise, “Six Books on the Priesthood,” must be “dignified, but not haughty; awe-inspiring, but kind; affable in his authority; impartial, but courteous; humble, but not servile; strong but gentle…” Ordained a priest in a time when one needed to be at least 30 years old, John Chrysostom was a great saint of the Eastern Church.

In the year 407 he was Archbishop of Constantinople. He was born about 354 in Antioch, Syria and studied under the pagan Libanius who said of him on his deathbed, that John would have been his successor "if the Christians had not taken him from us.” Libanius was a great teacher of his time, and John a great student of Libanius’.

Chrysostom is English for the Greek expression, “Golden Mouth.” As a preacher, John is noted as one of history’s great ones.

One encyclopedia text says of him:

Over the course of twelve years, he gained popularity because of the eloquence of his public speaking, especially his insightful expositions of Bible passages and moral teaching. The most valuable of his works from this period are his Homilies on various books of the Bible. He emphasized charitable giving and was concerned with the spiritual and temporal needs of the poor. He also spoke out against abuse of wealth and personal property. He said:

Do you wish to honour the body of Christ? Do not ignore him when he is naked. Do not pay him homage in the temple clad in silk, only then to neglect him outside where he is cold and ill-clad. He who said: "This is my body" is the same who said: "You saw me hungry and you gave me no food", and "Whatever you did to the least of my brothers you did also to me"... What good is it if the Eucharistic table is overloaded with golden chalices when your brother is dying of hunger? Start by satisfying his hunger and then with what is left you may adorn the altar as well.

His Homilies were straightforwardly given. He was not given to allegory. As an Archbishop he founded hospitals for the poor in Constantinople and said in this famous quote:

"In the matter of piety, poverty serves us better than wealth, and work better than idleness, especially since wealth becomes an obstacle even for those who do not devote themselves to it. Yet, when we must put aside our wrath, quench our envy, soften our anger, offer our prayers, and show a disposition which is reasonable, mild, kindly, and loving, how could poverty stand in our way? For we accomplish these things not by spending money but by making the correct choice. Almsgiving above all else requires money, but even this shines with a brighter luster when the alms are given from our poverty. The widow who paid in the two mites was poorer than any human, but she outdid them all."

As a Homilist, the Archbishop believed the classic advantages of the homily were as the form of promised preaching used from the very beginning of Christianity. Simple and easily understood, the homily gives better opportunity for interweaving sacred scripture. So it is said. The early Mass is the best time for the homily, called the appropriate time, and it affords a less formal sermon than that of the principal Mass.

Not of a speculative mind, yet a fine theologian, John Chrysostom spoke the higher form of homily known as the fourth kind. The fourth kind is that which first paraphrases and explains the entire Gospel, and then makes an application of it.

Our reading from Jeremiah tells of the great orator the prophet Jeremiah was, and we attribute similarly to John Chrysostom:

Then the Lord put out his hand and touched my mouth; and the Lord said to me,
“Now I have put my words in your mouth…

And in our Gospel it reads:

For I will give you words and a wisdom that none of your opponents will be able to withstand or contradict.

This homilist likes this quote from John Chrysostom’s homily “In Praise of Saint Paul:”


The most important thing of all to Paul, however, was that he knew himself to be loved by Christ. Enjoying this love, he considered himself happier than anyone else; were he without it, it would be no satisfaction to be the friend of principalities and powers. He preferred to be loved and be the least of all, or even to be among the damned, than be without that love and be among the great and honored.

John Chrysostom could almost be speaking of himself. And note, how straightforward the preacher John Chrysostom is in his remarks on Saint Paul.

Eloquent, yes. Here he gives the homily preached in Constantinople before he went into exile:

The waves have risen and the surging sea is dangerous, but we do not fear drowning for we stand upon the rock. Let the sea surge! It cannot destroy the rock. Let the waves rise! They cannot sink the boat of Jesus. Tell me, what are we to fear? Is it death? But “for me life is Christ, and death is gain.” So tell me, is it exile? “The earth is the Lord’s and all that it contains.” Is it the confiscation of property? “We brought nothing into the world and it is certain we can take nothing out of it.” I have nothing but contempt for the threats of this world; its treasures I ridicule. I am not afraid of poverty. I do not crave after wealth, I am not afraid of death, and I do not seek to live except to be of help to you. So I simply mention my present circumstances and call on you, my dear people, to remain steadfast in your love.

Eloquent, yes. Straightforward, yes.

Let us remember that John Chrysostom set about reforming the church and exposing corruption among the clergy and in the Imperial Administration. “Mules bear fortunes and Christ dies of hunger at your gate,” he is reputed to have cried out. His dying words were, when dying of exhaustion and starvation in September 407, “Glory be to God for everything.”


So we pray with John Chrysostom, and this Homily is a form of prayerful statement for it is “Glory be to God for everything.”

As our prayer book offers, let us end with “A Prayer of Saint Chrysostom:”

Almighty God, you have given us grace at this time with one accord to make our common supplication to you; and you have promised through your well-beloved Son that when two or three are gathered together in his Name you will be in the midst of them: Fulfill now, O Lord, our desires and petitions as may be best for us; granting us in this world knowledge of your truth, and in the age to come life everlasting. Amen.


Audio of Homily as given at Church (live recording) is here:

Speak to my Heart
By Peter Menkin
January 25, 2010
(written in the wee hours of the morning)

I have waited on the Lord,
In the stillness of my mind.
In the music of a hymn,
In a conversation with a friend.

It is in the loveliness of a flower,
And the color of the light of day
Lost in a prayer from the prayer book,
I have waited on the Lord.

My friend, it is the pleasure of life,
The knowledge in simplicity of knowing
One another, and even the times that come looming
To the psyche of trials and fears in a tunnel
Where confinement of spirit and mind

Make the soul weep and wonder
That there is comfort in knowing you
Lord. Speak to my heart.

Commentary and report on Carter, God, and ‘The Global Scourge against Women’
by Peter Menkin

In the last month of 2009, former President Jimmy Carter spoke before The Parliament of World Religions as part of The Elder Project. He again has spoken out against discrimination against women, as he sees it, as a once Southern Baptist, a Christian, and as former President of the United States. This is in character for President Carter, known for good Christian works, winner of a Nobel Prize, and who continues in his concern for the American Nation and the world. He is a national figure, world figure, and Christian figure.


In his Farewell Address to the American people, 1988, he said, “As I return home to the South where I was born and raised, I am looking forward to the opportunity to reflect and further to assess -- I hope with accuracy -- the circumstances of our times.”

He has previously spoken for women’s rights, but not so much as a Christian and man of God. One political-secular moment in 1977 was in a speech on Women’s Equality Day. He said about the history of their struggle, “Standing behind me is a woman, Ms. Hallinan, who in 1917 stood outside the gates of the White House when Woodrow Wilson was President, simply holding a sign in her hand that was photographed, saying, ‘How long will it be before women can have freedom?’" He speaks for women’s rights even today, again.

The Sunday School teacher President Carter starts part of his argument with a Bible quote:

The Holy Bible tells us that "There is neither Jew nor Greek, there is neither bond nor free, there is neither male nor female: for ye are all one in Christ Jesus." (Galatians 3:28)

Every generic religious text encourages believers to respect essential human dignity, yet some selected scriptures are interpreted to justify the derogation or inferiority of women and girls, our fellow human beings.

Then he goes to the secular with a jarring set of particulars. Here they are:

Globally, at least one in three women and girls is beaten or sexually abused in her lifetime. (U.N. Commission on the Status of Women, February, 2000)


Our Carter Center has been deeply involved in the Republic of Congo. In war zones where order has broken down, horrific and sometimes lethal rape has become a tactic of warfare practiced by all sides.

In a study in 2000, the U.N. estimated that at least 60 million girls who should be alive are "missing" from various populations, mostly in Asia, as a result of sex-selective abortions, infanticide or neglect.

According to UNICEF, an estimated one million children, mostly girls, enter the sex trade each year and the U.N. estimates that 4 million women and girls are trafficked annually.
In some Islamic nations, women are restricted in their movements, punished for permitting the exposure of an arm or ankle, deprived of education, prohibited from driving a car or competing with men for a job. If a woman is raped, she is often most severely punished as the guilty party in the crime.

The same discriminatory thinking lies behind the continuing gender gap in pay and explains why so few women hold political office, even in most Western democracies.

Noting also that in his 65 years of Bible teaching he’s learned some important facts of the history of religion, and as a result of his reflection and serious concern for women’s rights even chose to leave his Church (Southern Baptist). His remark about the equality of humans in Jesus as found in the Bible is the significant religious turning point of scripture manifesting his change of heart towards his own Church, and how he sees women treated by religion in general. This is that Bible argument he cites: “…all one in Christ Jesus.”

Though herself not so much a religious figure or thinker, even a person noted as a Christian, the feminist Jan Nedeau writing in Change.org (Women’s Rights) comments from a personal and also writer’s perspective:

I was raised Catholic. And, on occasion, I still go to church because it is a place where I can connect with my spirituality. I was lucky that I learned about religion in a very tolerant place - in San Francisco - where I really connected with religion through the spiritual exercises of St. Ignatius... I participated in a very progressive church - one that welcomed all people and didn't preach the marginalization of women or homosexuals. Clearly, this is the exception to the rule.

Knowing the blatant discrimination toward women by religious institutions elsewhere always bothered me and I too have questioned from time to time whether I should separate from the Catholic Church based on the experience that Carter describes. It cannot be denied that there are many faiths that use religion as a "justification of discrimination against women and girls on grounds of religion or tradition, as if it were prescribed by a Higher Authority" and he is right - it is truly unacceptable.

A critic of male dominance regarding the Bible, President Carter wrote in 2009 for The British newspaper “The Observer:”

So my decision to sever my ties with the Southern Baptist Convention, after six decades, was painful and difficult. It was, however, an unavoidable decision when the convention's leaders, quoting a few carefully selected Bible verses and claiming that Eve was created second to Adam and was responsible for original sin, ordained that women must be "subservient" to their husbands and prohibited from serving as deacons, pastors or chaplains in the military service. This was in conflict with my belief - confirmed in the holy scriptures - that we are all equal in the eyes of God.

This writer supposes that in his speech at The Carter Center as one of The Elders in the organization by the same name, that his campaign for women’s equality which spread to his religious and spiritual beliefs finds an hypocrisy and unfairness by men towards women throughout the history of the Bible. More, he asks that there be a new respect for women founded on the old models of reverence found in the Bible. See his reference to Mary below after his observations on the Old Testament. This writer thinks this is his Biblical statement on “gender equality,” or what is commonly referred to as sexual relationships—relationships between the sexes.

Most Bible scholars acknowledge that the Holy Scriptures were written when male dominance prevailed in every aspect of life. Men could have multiple sex partners (King Solomon had 300 wives and 700 concubines), but adulterous behavior by a woman could be punished by stoning to death - then, in the time of Christ and, in some societies, 2009 years later.

I realize that devout Christians can find adequate scripture to justify either side in this debate, but there is one incontrovertible fact concerning the relationship between Jesus Christ and women: he never condoned sexual discrimination or the implied subservience of women. The exaltation and later reverence for Mary, as Jesus' mother, is an even more vivid indication of the special status of women in Christian theology.

Before going further, here is who The Elders are known as: The Elders are an independent group of eminent global leaders, brought together by Nelson Mandela, who offer their influence and experience to support peace building, help address major causes of human suffering and promote the shared interests of humanity.

As he has said to The Elders, The multiple evils of human suffering, women’s suffering, and the shared interest of humanity is for Jimmy Carter found in his relationship with God. He says, and he is a religious leader himself:

The truth is that male religious leaders have had – and still have – an option to interpret holy teachings either to exalt or subjugate women. They have, for their own selfish ends, overwhelmingly chosen the latter.

Does former President Jimmy Carter speak for Jesus Christ? One writer whose work appears on Beliefnet and in “On Faith” in “The Washington Post,” says of Jimmy Carter and his changing religious heart and theology of the Bible and women. Rabbi Brad Hirschfield—on “Beliefnet:”

By making statements equating his own understanding of religion with the will of "Jesus Christ, the Apostle Paul, Moses and the prophets, Muhammad, and founders of other great religions", Jimmy Carter continues his well-established tradition of making outrageous statements to justify legitimate concerns. The sad part is that his approach reflects precisely the kind of spiritual arrogance which nurtures the ability of any group to oppress others in the name of that which they believe.

No differently than the very people he most opposes, Carter arrogantly assumes that he can isolate those portions of a tradition which reflect the "proper" understanding of its teachings. He cherry picks his way through not only the faith he follows, but presumes to do so for others as well. I guess he just knows best.

Of course that attitude of knowing best is the basis of all oppression committed by people in the name of religion.

Though the remarks by Jimmy Carter spoken at The Carter Center may not be those remarks exactly as referred to by the Rabbi, the thrust is there. About the choice of Biblical interpretation by Southern Baptists and other religious Christian denominations, he names Biblical figures by their names as teachers who support his view:

Their continuing choice provides the foundation or justification for much of the pervasive persecution and abuse of women throughout the world. This is in clear violation not just of the Universal Declaration of Human Rights but also the teachings of Jesus Christ, the Apostle Paul, Moses and the prophets, Muhammad, and founders of other great religions - all of whom have called for proper and equitable treatment of all the children of God. It is time we had the courage to challenge these views and set a new course that demands equal rights for women and men, girls and boys.

At their most repugnant, the belief that women are inferior human beings in the eyes of God gives excuses to the brutal husband who beats his wife, the soldier who rapes a woman, the employer who has a lower pay scale for women employees, or parents who decide to abort a female embryo. It also costs many millions of girls and women control over their own bodies and lives, and continues to deny them fair and equal access to education, health care, employment, and influence within their own communities.

Rabbi Hirschfield says about this statement by Jimmy Carter, as concept, in “On Faith” found in “The Washington Post:”

This debate, if it is to have any real impact, must be shifted from one in which we argue about who understands God best, to one about the sacredness of choice, the independence of the spirit and modesty to admit that none of us has the only true understanding of God's will. This needs to be about the creation of spiritual options so that as many people as possible can find a place within whatever faith they choose, not about taking away the options of others to practice in ways we make not like.

Many pundits and columnists agree with the former President and state their own case and make their own statement when commenting on his. Nicholas Kristof in “The New York Times” writes of recent:

It is not that warlords in Congo cite Scripture to justify their mass rapes (although the last warlord I met there called himself a pastor and wore a button reading “rebels for Christ”). It’s not that brides are burned in India as part of a Hindu ritual. And there’s no verse in the Koran that instructs Afghan thugs to throw acid in the faces of girls who dare to go to school.

Yet these kinds of abuses — along with more banal injustices, like slapping a girlfriend or paying women less for their work — arise out of a social context in which women are, often, second-class citizens. That’s a context that religions have helped shape, and not pushed hard to change.

There is some of the debate and statement; yet Jimmy Carter gets his due and none can really take it away. After all, it is based on a man’s religious sensibility and interpretation, a man who is a world famous and honored Christian, a Christian leader and admirable Christian at that. His speech before The Carter Center wasn’t the first on the theme of discrimination by religion towards women. It won’t be his last.





Jimmy Carter: Religion is one of the 'basic causes' of violations of women's rights

Methodists tell us about the Ethics of saying 'I'm Sorry'--the apology both public and private...

by Peter Menkin

In a report on ethics of apology, United Methodist News Service (UMNS) Linda Green examines sincerity and authenticity, two ingredients lacking in our American sense of public apology. Public apology consists of thin, self-serving, and manipulative purposes according to three noted Methodist ethicists.

“I fear that apologies have become techniques for diminishing the consequences of behaviors that are destructive and damaging,” said Bishop Kenneth Carder, professor of the practice of Christian ministry at United Methodist-related Duke Divinity School.

Methodist writer Linda Green notes:

Recent apologies in the news came from Yankees superstar Alex Rodriguez, who apologized for using steroids; Olympic gold-medalist swimmer Michael Phelps, who apologized for smoking marijuana; The New York Post, which apologized for but defended a cartoon with racist images; and former U.S. Senator Tom Daschle, who apologized for not paying taxes that he owed.

“When apologies are deeply rooted in confession, contrition, a recognition of the damage that one has done and one’s implication in the hurt of others-- in the context of genuine repentance and confession with a goal of restoration of integrity, restoration of relationships and restitution for damage done, then apologies have depth,” Carder declared.

Clearly, Methodists do not find apology of the kind prevalent today by public official’s confessional in any manner, offering remorse or contrition, and essentially a means of manipulating opinion or engaging in media spin. People in the United States and especially public figures have either forgotten, given up, or willingly ignored what is known as repentance in their apology. They make no statement of making restitution or of change in their ways, Methodist ethicists proclaim.

“The apologies we hear today are mea culpa,” said the Rev. Katie Cannon. “Repentance means being willing to make restitution or reparation and a sacrifice has to be offered and some good faith act needs to follow so that it is not cheap or an action that has no substance behind it.” Cannon is professor of Christian social ethics at Union Theological Seminary-Presbyterian School of Christian Education, Richmond, Va.

Writer green says in her UMNS article:

The rash of recent apologies has resulted in cynicism and skepticism, leaving the public to wonder if they are apologizing for their conduct or because they were caught.

This practice of false apology does little to provide the true “I’m sorry.” Our World Wide Web is trying to help solve this problem…but…there is a proliferation of failure to apologize with honor and honesty that holds true. Re the web, Cannon agreed. “Some basic human social skills are gone,” she said, noting that today’s high-tech culture has lost the ability to learn from human interaction. “We need these sites for education of the high-tech generation or for those who live their whole lives on the computer.” The web is not helping us enough how to learn to apologize, according to Cannon.

“…[W]e have not made it a habit to say I’m sorry and we have not cultivated within ourselves the capacity, the grace or readiness to say I’m sorry.” The Rev. J. Philip Wogaman is a Christian ethicist and pastor of St. Luke United Methodist Church, Omaha, Neb.

Linda Green reports:

Web sites that teach the science of apology show that society has lost some measure of civility, according to the Rev. Rosetta Ross, dean of academic affairs at Howard University in Washington. Today’s culture has invested a lot in saying biting and hurtful things to people and such sites indicate a loss of appreciation for being kind, compassionate and sensitive, she said.

Theodore Dalrymple calls the False Apology Syndrome ones that relate to historical sins and the crimes of ancestors.

“A false apology is usually accompanied by bogus or insincere guilt, which is often confused with appropriate shame,” said Dalrymple, a physician and author of “Our Culture, What’s Left of It: The Mandarins and the Masses.”

“False Apology Syndrome is a therefore rich but poisonous mixture of self-importance, libertinism, condescension, bad faith, loose thinking, and indifference to the effects it has on those who are apologized to.”

Commentary and report on election of Lesbian Bishop in Episcopal Church USA

by Peter Menkin

Los Angeles, California Episcopalians have elected a Lesbian as Bishop Suffragen who may be installed after approval by the larger Episcopal Church, USA. The Archbishop of Canterbury, Rowan Williams, spiritual leader of the 77 million member Anglican Communion has expressed dismay over the election, and in understated words says he and Anglicans in general are waiting to see if The Rev. Mary Glasspool, who was elected a suffragan (assistant) bishop by the Diocese of Los Angeles on Saturday (Dec. 5)--and who, Glasspool, 55, has been with her partner since 1988, according to a biography she provided to the diocese, will be officially installed.


That probable eventuality will further the rift in the worldwide Anglican Communion, of which Episcopalians are a part, and mark the further separation and departure of the American wing of that Communion in its serious move away from what is called both Biblical authority, and mutual covenant by agreement between the Churches of the Communion. Many surmise, an internal result of the “liberalization” of American Anglicanism by the Episcopal Church, USA, will continue the mainstream Church’s loss of members.

Various religious and secular news services have noted the decline and controversy over the last few years, and recently Religion News Service ran a copyrighted article outlining the decline in denomination numbers as it presently stands and continues by trend. They do not link a cause and effect between the acceptance and election of Gay and Lesbian clergy to the office of Bishop in this particular article cited. But this decline is considered in common usage a strong consideration for the declining numbers of Episcopalians.

Religion News Service says:

Domestic membership in the Episcopal Church dropped by 3 percent in 2008, continuing a decline in which the denomination has lost almost 200,000 American members since 2004, according to Episcopal researchers.

The Episcopal Church now counts slightly more than 2 million members in about 7,000 U.S. parishes. Church leaders say they are pleased, however, that the denomination is growing in its non-domestic dioceses, particularly in Haiti and Latin America, where the church counted about 168,000 members in 470 parishes last year.
Still, the church is "swimming against some difficult cultural tides," Matilda Kistler, who heads a state-of-the-church committee in the denomination's House of Deputies, said in a statement.

"We find ourselves facing a society that is gravitating toward secularism," Kistler said. "We also believe that the church-going segment of the public is aging significantly, though the committee will be seeking more definitive data to ascertain if that is so."

Kistler acknowledged that "internal conflicts within the Episcopal Church have also distracted from the message of hope our clergy and lay leaders seek to share."

The Diocese of California (San Francisco Bay Area) led by The Rt. Reverend Marc Andrus supports the inclusion of Gay and Lesbian clergy in the Church and in the same line vocally supports with strong opinion and deeds election of Gay and Lesbian Bishop candidates. Bishop Marc Andrus is not a homosexual.


In addition to the restrained but oppositional statement of the Archbishop of Canterbury to the election of the Lesbian Mary Glasspool in Los Angeles, an Anglican organization has recently criticized and been seriously concerned, even alarmed, by this recent development that may cause impaired Communion or other negative relations within the Anglican Communion with the Episcopal Church USA. The Episcopal Church’s Presiding Bishop The Rt. Reverend Katherine Jefferts Schori has indicated she favors and will help to bring the Lesbian clergy woman to final installation, in the name of God and Church. This is an unusual and historic act of change and some think diminished faith as Christian Church by the Americans, though the American wing of the Anglican Communion believes they are in the forefront of “ordained” good in their support of an election of homosexuals who are sexually active, and even in what they find as favored and “blessed” active homosexual permanent relationships. Both New and Old Testament Biblical readings have been discounted by the American Church. One argument in favor of The Reverend Mary Glasspool is she has served well in every capacity, and except for her Lesbianism, and active sexual relations as a homosexual, is fully qualified to be a Suffragen Bishop. The question becomes, does her Lesbian sexual practice bar her from being a Bishop.

Many Episcopalians in San Francisco’s Bay Area, and good people, think her sexual proclivities are not a bar, and it is an act of social justice to elect her a Bishop in the Episcopal Church.

As Religion News Service reports in its instance of early Anglican Church reaction to the election:

An international Anglican commission on Tuesday (Dec. 8) urged Episcopalians to exercise "gracious restraint" by not confirming the election of a lesbian as a bishop in Los Angeles.

…In the coming months, more than 100 bishops and standing committees from Episcopal dioceses across the country will vote on whether to give "consents," or confirmation, to Glasspool's election. If she receives confirmation, Glasspool will become the second openly gay bishop elected by the Episcopal Church.

On Tuesday, a 21-member international Anglican committee recently established to promote unity in the communion said they discussed Glasspool's election during their meeting in England Dec. 1-8 and "expressed the fervent hope that `gracious restraint' would be exercised by the Episcopal Church in this instance." The Inter-Anglican Standing Commission on Unity, Faith and Order includes one American, the Rev. Katherine Grieb of Virginia Theological Seminary.

Neither Williams nor the commission has the power to stop Glasspool's confirmation, however.

The election of the first openly gay bishop, New Hampshire's V. Gene Robinson, in 2003 has caused widespread dissent in the Anglican Communion, which includes the Episcopal Church as its U.S. branch. To quell the uproar, Anglican bishops, including the spiritual leader of the communion, Archbishop of Canterbury Rowan Williams, have asked for a "period of gracious restraint" on consecrating any more gay bishops.

Daniel Burke of Religion News Service has been active in following this story and George Conger of Religious Intelligence, a London based website owned by The Church of England Newspaper has been following this story and the larger stories connected with the controversial issue.

It is interesting to note that The Reverend Mary Glasspool is strongly committed to fulfilling the role of Bishop and being consecrated and installed as same. Daniel Burke writes in another of his copyrighted reports for Religion News Service of her stand in the matter, and reports on her words regarding her desires to fulfill the pride and historic role for a homosexual to be made a Bishop in the Episcopal Church, USA:

Since becoming the first lesbian to be elected a bishop in the Episcopal Church on Saturday (Dec. 5), the Rev. Mary Glasspool has been hailed as a gay rights pioneer and maligned as the straw that will finally break the back of the Anglican Communion.

Glasspool "wavered two or three times" before agreeing to be nominated as an assistant bishop in Los Angeles, she said in an interview Wednesday. But friends and spiritual counselors reminded her to follow her own preaching.

"Look, you believe in the Holy spirit," she said they told her.
"You've always said the Holy Spirit is in charge. Your job is to follow where it leads."

…The spiritual leader of the Anglican Communion, Archbishop of Canterbury Rowan Williams, has all but told Episcopalians not to vote to confirm Glasspool's election. The Episcopal Church is the U.S. branch of the communion, but could lose its place over Glasspool, Williams warned.

"He clearly was saying something like that," Glasspool said. "And again, I've done what I could do to allow myself to be available to God's call, and the people of Los Angeles have spoken and voiced their trust in me and my potential leadership."
Before Glasspool can be consecrated a bishop, a majority of the more than 100 Episcopal bishops and dioceses must confirm her election within the next several months. Robinson predicted Thursday that process will be "a little more difficult" than when he was confirmed by delegates to the church's triennial General Convention in Minneapolis.

Part of the statement by The Reverend Mary Glasspool prior to her election indicates her strong argument that sexuality is tied to and part of her faith journey, that homosexuality as part of her coming of age worked well and is justified as part of God’s gift to her, and a strength in her candidacy for Bishop and life in ministry as ordained Clergy in the Episcopal Church, USA. The beginning of her statement that asks, “Provide a description of your walk with God in Christ that brought you to this moment of discerning a call to the episcopate in our diocese…” reads:

And who knows whether you have not come to the kingdom for such a time as this? (Esther 4:14b, RSV)

I was born in February 1954, on a rainy Tuesday (Tuesday’s child is full of grace) in Staten Island Hospital, New York, where my father was Rector of St. Simon’s Episcopal Church and Vicar of All Saints’. Both my parents grew up in the Episcopal Church, and each modeled a profound faith in God that was given to me as gift while I grew up. We moved to Goshen, N.Y., in April of 1954 where my father was Rector of St. James’ Church for the next 35 years until his death in 1989. As with most children, I suspect, God was more transcendent than immanent, more other than palpable in community to me.

It was during my college years (1972-1976) that I began to discern a vocation to ordained ministry and concomitantly to discover my sexuality. Both these areas were sources of intense struggle for me, as I wrestled with such questions as; Did God hate me (since I was a homosexual)? or Did God love me? Did I hate (or love) myself? Was it really possible, not to mention appropriate, for women to be priests? My father’s answer to this last question was a resounding NO, and true to his own colors he never publicly supported women’s ordination, although I became something of an exception to the rule.

God was still transcendent and other to me as I entered Episcopal Divinity School in the Fall of 1976, just as the General Convention in Minneapolis was wrestling to recognize the reality of women called to be priests, the new Prayer Book, and what to do with the Philadelphia 11 and the Washington 5 as we termed them at EDS. My role models at that time represented two different ways of doing things in response to God’s call: Carter Heyward and Carol Anderson. Carter, for me, represented the courage to break through barriers – not without cost – in order to become fully the person God is calling you to become. Carol represented the sacrificial love of the Church that manifested itself in restraint, and also came at great cost. Both of these courageous women have continued to model for me the integrity of responding to God’s call with your whole person, being exactly who you are.

It is clear from this part of her statement that she believes her homosexuality and appearance, nay now election as a Bishop in Los Angeles, is part of God’s plan. The question is, other than what at this stage the stance appears to be with the 2 million members of the Episcopal Church USA, will the rest of the Anglican Communion, which in total numbers about 77 million, agree.