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Former TEC Bishop Rips Episcopal Presiding Bishop: "Mrs. Jefforts Schori, tear down this wall of litigation."
By David W. Virtue
www.virtueonline.org
August 3, 2009
The former Bishop Suffragan of the Episcopal Diocese of Albany, The Rt. Rev. David Bena blasted the Episcopal Church's Presiding Bishop Katharine Jefferts Schori accusing her of teaching bad religion and calling on her to tear down the wall of litigation.
In a fiery sermon at the ordination of three military chaplains at a recent Convocation on Anglicans in North America, (CANA) Council in Herndon, VA Bena, who is now a suffragan bishop with the diocese of the Anglican Province of Nigeria, tore into Jefferts Schori saying that for a Christian leader to stand and say, with the whole nation listening in, that personal salvation is a heresy insults our Heavenly Father, who wishes each one of us to have a personal, saving relationship with his Son.
"Perhaps this leader has not read, marked, heeded and inwardly digested Romans 10:9, "because if you confess with your lips that Jesus is Lord and believe in your heart that God raised him from the dead, you will be saved." and a thousand other passages from the scriptures covering the same subject are there, just lookin' at ya."
Bena said Episcopalians are listening to religious leaders who teach bad religion, and don't tell them the truth. "I'm happy to say that many people to whom this unfortunate statement was made a few weeks ago recognize it to be false teaching, teaching which is not true. Many have heard this type teaching so often that they are leaving denominations which teach such unchristian things. The veil has been removed from their eyes and they want freedom and truth in their church. They are leaving these denominations for churches which teach the gospel truth. And that's where we have some trouble today."
Bena then blasted the Episcopal Presiding Bishop over property litigation. "Mrs. Jefforts Schori, tear down this wall."
"Congregations who want to leave are often prevented from leaving because they fear they will lose their property. Even though they built and maintained their property and the deeds are in the name of the congregation, they are in danger of having their properties taken from them if that denomination can convince the court that said denomination is a hierarchical church and that a controversial church canon which somehow got in the canons in 1979 gives the denomination the right to own all buildings.
"This is a sin against us, brothers and sisters. This litigation to take these buildings from their owners, which is being visited across our country, is like the communist wall during the cold war. The communists did not want anyone to leave so they built a wall to prevent escape. What they wound up with by building this fearsome wall was a group of resentful people who mostly gave up hope for freedom and found escape in their minds through addictive behaviors. And that's what is happening in much of that denomination today. The veil is over their faces. This wall of litigation is killing the people of that denomination. It is crippling them of any spiritual growth. The wall of litigation must come down.
"Lift the litigation. Let all Episcopalians freely decide which Anglicanism they wish to follow in America. And have the decency to allow them to take with them the buildings they erected and maintained, and on whose deeds are their names. Let my people go."
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