Truth should be more important than unity

Interesting take on the Episcopal Church from across the pond (the UK) in Truth should be more important than unity.

Quote!

In many ways, the United States is a study in contrasts. It is full of clashing colours and jangling messages. Socially and politically, it is very divided. The "neocons" have clear views on everything from Iraq to abortion, and the "progressives" have the opposite - but also equally clear - opinions on such matters. We would expect, then, to find these divisions reflected in broadly-based organisations such as the Churches and we would not be wrong. All of the so-called "mainline" Churches have this fault-line running through them.

Why, then, should I have been shocked on entering the Greater Columbus Convention Centre in Ohio, where the General Convention of the Episcopal Church (the Anglican Church in the USA) was being held? Should I not have expected tension, difference and debate? There was, first of all, culture shock. It felt to me like a trendy exhibition put together by some ultra-politically-correct organisation, with all the favourite causes of the fashionable prominent. There was, however, a more profound reason for feeling uncomfortable: it became plain quite quickly that this was not a conflict merely of styles, attitudes or even opinions but of two quite different views of religion.

One tendency that was informing the culture of the convention, in a major way, was to do with the diffuse religiosity of the present-day West. Such religiosity, in my view, has much in common with New Age ideas, vague as these often are, such as nature mysticism, or a sense of oneness with the world around, and pantheism, the belief that everything is divine: God is identified with Mother Nature and also with our own souls. Jesus then becomes just a special example of a god-self. Such a world-view is likely to be optimistic, inclusive and non-judgmental. It regards the world and the people in it as more or less as God intended them to be. Such people should be accepted as they are and, if they wish to be, fully included in the life of the Church without further question.

... and ...

People need not just acceptance and inclusion but conversion and transformation. The work of the Spirit is not formless, vague and without direction, as some "progressives" would have us believe. It is, rather, that of witnessing to Christ, making plain the words and works of Jesus to us and glorifying both Christ and the Father who sent him. The Spirit is continually forming us so that we attain to the fullness of life in Christ.