VirtueOnline broke the story of these two priests practicing after a report in the independent Christian magazine Christianity Today saying the Episcopal Church had officially accepted Wiccan worshipping practices. The story made the front page in the Philadelphia INQUIRER on Friday Nov. 5. VirtueOnline got an honorable mention.

I have today sent this letter to my Bishop. My wife [The Rev. Glyn Lorraine Ruppe-Melnyk] has sent a similar letter:

Dear Bishop,

Recently it has been brought to light by several agencies and individuals that I have been involved in work with Druid organizations in the United States and England, exploring the relationships between Christian and pre-Christian Druid spirituality and theology.

These individuals and agencies have presented you with pages of documentation of my activities from the internet. You and I have discussed this material, and you have pointed out to me that it is the opinion of the church that my involvement, writings, and activities go beyond the bounds expected of a Christian and a Christian priest.

I affirm to you with all my heart it was never my intention to engage in such error, but only to help others who had lost connection to the Church to find a way to reconnect. I also thought that there was much in our early British heritage that could help those of us in the Church to broaden our understanding of Anglican tradition.

I was wrong. I repent of and recant without qualification anything and everything I may have said or done which is found to be in conflict with the Baptismal Covenant, and the historical Creeds of the Church.

With God as my witness, I reaffirm my belief in the historical creeds of the Church, and the Baptismal Covenant, and reaffirm to you my faith, as expressed in that covenant. I am resigning my membership in the Order of Bards, Ovates, and Druids, as a sign of my repentance.

I have been a follower of Jesus Christ since my Baptism in 1947, and a faithful Deacon and Priest of the Church, with the exception of the error admitted above, since 1981. It is my desire to continue as such, and I ask for the mercy of the Church, and of our Lord Jesus Christ. Sincerely, The Rev. W. William Melnyk I now take pains to publicly affirm this statement, and to thank the contributors to the various Anglican weblogs for bringing this to my attention and helping me to see the truth.

Pennsylvania Bishop Charles Bennison yesterday responded to their letters saying saying that the the wardens of their congregations and vestries expressed its overwhelming support for their rectors and after assurances that they affirm the teaching of the Church as set forth in Holy Scripture, the Creeds, and the Baptismal Covenant they promised
him they are doing everything possible to repair any damage that has been caused to their own congregations or to the wider church.

While I am continuing to ascertain and establish the facts of the two
separate cases, at the present time I am issuing both priests a Pastoral
Direction and Solemn Warning pertaining to their future conduct in regard to what has occurred.

"I ask you, their sisters and brothers in our diocesan clericus, to pray for them, for their physical and emotional health, for their strength to persevere graciously amidst the pressures they are under, for the people they serve, for our diocese, and for me."

Interpretation: Bennison will do nothing.

END