The truth is we have listened ourselves to death and the result is the total marginalization of the orthodox in TEC with thousands leaving the Episcopal Church to form the Anglican Church in North America. "Listening" means you ultimately agree with revisionists.

It has been reported that the Church's "fortunes" are dropping. Only 60% of the national budget comes from dioceses; the other 40% comes from the Church's endowments and rents. There is no sign that that will turn around any time soon, if ever.

MARKHAM: Let me make the case. Let us start with the fact that the brand of The Episcopal Church has some traction in modern America. Too often we forget that the puzzle in the 1990s was why The Episcopal Church was both growing and outperforming our mainline brothers and sisters in terms of average Sunday attendance. Our combination of faithfulness and thoughtfulness was attractive; our deeply biblical liturgy and timeless language fed women and men as they coped with the ephemeral nature of our world. Then we struggled through the cultural wars and schism of the initial years of this century. So why is this General Convention the start of a renewed and growing Episcopal Church? There are three reasons.

First, everything that worked for us in the 1990s can work for us now. Although Roman Catholics and Baptists are going to continue to dominate the U.S. scene, we will play a vital role in providing a thoughtful, inclusive, gentle, biblical, liturgical, and Christ-committed witness. Millennials will find the commitment to outreach attractive; they will appreciate the chance to tap into a musical tradition of extraordinary beauty. History will look back on the early years of this century as an aberration. The 1990s was the norm; and over the next few years, the rate of decline will decrease and in the early 2020s we will see growth.

VOL: The "brand" has lost considerable cache and what was once America's premier church with presidents and politicians claiming the name is no more. Episcopalians are represented by 4% of the Senate for 1.8% of the population. In the last Congress, the number of Anglicans/Episcopalians dropped from 35 to 32.

In the 1990s, The Episcopal Church was both growing and outperforming our mainline brothers and sisters in terms of average Sunday attendance, says Markham, but no one really knows why, including this writer. All that has gone by the wayside now. GROWTH! Based on what? Millennials and Nones are not flocking into TEC or any church for that matter. The damage done by Robinson's consecration has cost the church 200,000 souls (since 2003), with every diocese in numerical and financial decline or barely holding their own. Diocesan juncturing (mergers) has started and shows no sign of abating.

The average age at ordination in the Episcopal Church is now 44 (up from the early 30s in 1970) and the average age of active Episcopal clergy is 58. Additionally, fewer clergy are in full-time stipendiary positions: 2013 statistics (the most recent reporting year) show that 33.2 percent of Episcopal Church congregations have only part time or unpaid priests, while 12.3 percent have no clergy at all. An excess of 45 percent of congregations without full-time clergy is surely a cause for concern. Barely one in two can afford to pay a full time rector. TEC's seminaries are in serious financial trouble with fewer ordinands showing up for a variety of reasons including the possibility of leaving seminary with more debt load that they can ever repay.

MARKHAM: Second, America is in the process of making some key decisions about the culture wars. In the early years of this century, we were running against the culture, which alienated some people; now The Episcopal Church is where the majority of Americans are (especially the younger demographic). Large evangelical megachurches are very aware of how they will alienate the young if they are too overtly hostile to the inclusion of gays and lesbians. Being pro-gay is good in modern America; and as we have seen with the Supreme Court decision last week, the affirmation of equality embedded in the American story from its founding finally reaches our gay and lesbian brothers and sisters. Naturally, we need to continue to value the witness of our conservative brothers and sisters; they are the ones who insist rightly that we must provide biblical justification for our positions. This is a vitally important contribution.

VOL: Sure America is making decisions about the culture wars and many of us believe that they are not good decisions at all. The attempt to change the ontology of marriage and God's express will for humankind, of rewriting the "male and female made He them" into other sexual entities might well spell the end of Western Civilization as we know it. Islam is creeping up from behind and they take no gay prisoners. The government can only reinvent marriage when we believe that men can be gods.

The Church is supposed to be a counter culture; it is supposed to stand up to and against the culture. The Apostle Paul expressly told us not to be conformed to the world but to be transformed by the renewing of our minds.

MARKHAM: Third, there is a good and healthy energy that is open to change and reorganization in The Episcopal Church. The Committee to Re-Imagine the Episcopal Church (TREC) has happened. Bishop Michael Curry is open to a new church emerging. And perhaps equally significantly is the new book by Bishop Andy Doyle. Church: A Generous Community Amplified for the Future is an agenda-setting book. The tone is perfect for this moment: It is hopeful (there is nothing inevitable about our narrative of decline) and it is constructive (here are countless great ideas for transforming the predicaments facing our congregations).

VOL: TREC like the 20/20 vision to double the church by 2020 is pure fiction. TREC will not jump start the church because TEC has no voice radically different from the New York Times, while evangelical churches of one stripe or another that do proclaim a distinctive gospel voice are growing. Glossing the culture wars with a creed and a liturgy won't impress Millennials; this does not fool them. ACNA parishes I have visited DO maintain a high liturgy, but what you hear from the pulpit is radically different from what you hear from an Episcopal pulpit. One has culture-based sermons that preach conformity to the age in which we live; the other is Biblical exegesis that looks at the world through the lens of Scripture. That is the difference, not which Prayer Book reflects authentic Anglicanism and pushing Eucharist onto unbaptized persons to boost church figures.

MARKHAM:So why is this General Convention going to be historic? It is because we offer a "product" that our age needs and wants; the immediate cultural war is coming to an end; and we now have leadership in the Church that is ready to be imaginative about our programming for the future. I am confident that in 50 years' time, the General Convention of 2015 will be the moment that historians identify as the turning moment in the fortunes of The Episcopal Church. General convention

VOL:Based on raw numbers and demographics, TEC will not be around 50 years from now, unless TEC experiences a major spiritual revival of Wesleyan proportions. It would have to repent of its abandonment of a biblical view of marriage, the sin of sodomy, proclaiming abortion, and preach a clear gospel of repentance and faith in Jesus Christ. Then and only then would Presiding Bishop Curry's call for "evangelism" and "discipleship" make any sense.

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