The official language requires same-sex marriage ceremonies to be held within all dioceses regardless of the will or conscience of the local bishop -- a "compromise" policy requires an objecting bishop to invite bishops from other dioceses to "provide pastoral support" to same-sex couples seeking to be civilly married in an Episcopal Church ceremony. Bishop Love objects to this. He won't invite another bishop. He won't cave.

"By God's grace and the guidance and empowerment of the Holy Spirit, I have tried throughout my 12 years as Bishop of Albany, to be faithful and obedient to the Great Commandment, to God's Holy Word, and to my ordination vows and the responsibilities entrusted to me..."

Love has fought tenaciously over the years in the HOB for the faith, taking his stand for orthodoxy in the growing face of apostasy, his voice and opinions were repeatedly shot down in the clamor for more pansexual acceptance. Over time, as the voices of faithful bishops departed, his voice got lonelier and lonelier.

I used to watch him at one convention after another stand and raise his voice, telling his fellow bishops that they could not go against God's Word without consequences. They politely listened and then rolled right over him, culminating finally in the consecration of a perverse practicing homosexual to the episcopacy in the person of Gene Robinson.

I was always amazed at how Bill Love took it. He was gracious to a fault. He never raised his voice; in the truest sense he was a fool for Christ's sake, but he never said they were fools, even though they were. I was convinced on more than one occasion that one day he would have a nervous breakdown or a heart attack, he is such a gentle soul, but it never happened. He valiantly stood up for what he believed and was dutifully ignored and then steam rolled over. I can't imagine he had many friends in the HOB.

And now it has come to this.

December 2 will go down as a day of infamy in the history of The Episcopal Church when B012 will be enacted, and it will be then that the last orthodox bishop in TEC will learn if he faces an ecclesiastical firing squad for daring to say that a resolution proposing rites for homosexual marriage is good and right in the eyes of God, when in fact it is not.

In his letter to the diocese, Love called what the bishops passed as "satanic" and said their decision would, in time, kill off the church. I have been saying this for years; now a TEC bishop has finally said it. (Recently, outgoing Georgia Bishop Scott Benhase echoed the same words).

"The Episcopal Church's embrace of the LGBT movement... and Western Society have been hijacked by the 'Gay Rights Agenda' which is very well organized, very strategic, very well financed, and very powerful," said Love. Powerful words indeed.

Hours after he made his stand, The Church's Presiding Bishop Michael Curry issued a statement that pretty well guarantees Love will be taken before an ecclesiastical court, found guilty, inhibited, deposed and tossed out of the church. Either way, he will get the same punishment as the besotted and jailed, no longer Bishop Heather Cook, but for totally opposite reasons. Alternatively, he may be offered an early retirement package to get lost.

It is deeply ironic that Curry, who has no bishopric and whose only authority is running general conventions, will file these charges with Todd Ousley, bishop for Office of Pastoral Development, whose job it will be to quickly conform to Curry's desire and bring Title IV charges against Love. The outcome of which, is assured.

Personally, I hope Bill Love fights it. The press will have a field day, of course, accusing him of being homophobic and a hater, none of which is true, but what do you expect from the Colonie, NY based liberal Times Union; the truth? They will call up the small handful of pro homosexual priests in the diocese, look for an aggrieved homosexual couple who feel they have been marginalized one more time, wring their hands in faux despair, cry in front of TV cameras and fire salvos at the godly bishop, whose only "crime" is his stand for the truth about marriage which stretches back more than 2000 years.

God has not changed his mind about how the two sexes he created should live and behave. The Episcopal Church believes it can change God's mind for him. They are wrong. The cowardly Communion Partner bishops will pull a Pilate, washing their hands, and turning their backs as another bishop gives approval which they won't personally perform for a same sex marriage in their own dioceses. Bauerschmidt (Tennessee), Brewer (Central Florida), Samuel Johnson Howard (Florida), Daniel Martins (Springfield), Michael Smith (North Dakota) and George Sumner (Dallas), will one day answer to God for their betrayal and cowardice.

Bishop Love will, in time, be vindicated. He may live long enough to see the Episcopal Church wither and die. In the end he will get the last laugh. For the moment, he must go through his own personal Calvary, but we all know how that ended for the One, and who today reigns victorious. That day, too, will come for Bishop William Love, the ninth bishop of Albany. It is only a matter of time.

END