No subject

to kill it with sunshine

Posted by: Diogenes - Today 11:14 AM ET USA 

Jim Naughton is the Canon for Communications and
Advancement of the Episcopal Diocese of Washington,
and, in his role as spokesman, a frequent commentator
on the problems vexing the Anglican Communion. 

Naughton used to be a Catholic, and a member of Holy
Trinity Parish in Georgetown, about whose conflicts he
wrote a fairly-presented, lucid, and convincing
account called Catholics in Crisis (1996). 

Naughton was a player in the controversies about which
wrote, and did not hide his progressivist convictions
-- convictions which, when he was a Catholic, made him
a vocal opponent of centralized authority and a
champion of parochial independence. A 1997 message
thread discussing Holy Trinity's battles with
then-Archbishop James Hickey includes this posting by
Naughton: 

The archdiocese has been looking for a pretext under
which to punish the parish for cooperating with me in
my research for Catholics in Crisis, and it seems as
though the moment may finally have come. Last night,
William Lori, auxiliary bishop of the archdiocese of
Washington, Bernard Gerhardt, chancellor of the
archdiocese, and another diocesan priest conducted the
first of a series of interviews with committee
chairpersons and parish staff. They are investigating
alleged "liturgical abuses" at the parish. The
"visitation" was supposedly occasioned by an incident
that occurred during the Octave of Christian Unity
when an Episcopal priest and a Presbyterian (I think)
minister, both women, preached at a liturgy at Trinity
and were later invited (it isn't clear by whom) to
distribute communion.

chop

I think all of this is a lengthy pretext for firing a
few Trinity staff people whom conservatives in the
archdiocese have been gunning for some time (one of
whom, the liturgy director, was a central figure in my
book), but I suppose it could lead to Cardinal Hickey
ousting the entire Jesuit staff.

Note that the Catholic Naughton was almost a
congregationalist in his insouciance about
communicatio in sacris and his phobia against
archdiocesan control. Later he became an Episcopalian,
got a job on the staff of the Episcopal Diocese, and,
with the instruments of authority in the hands of
fellow Lefties, the secessionist poacher had turned
curialist gamekeeper. Check out the Anglican
Naughton's response in a 2005 interview, when asked
what he liked best about his job: 

I suppose it's that the variety is great. Last month,
for instance, there was a bill in the Virginia state
senate that could cause a lot of trouble for the
Episcopal Church because it would have unilaterally
changed the governing structure of our Church in a way
that favored parishes eager to break away [emphasis
mine]. So I worked with a few others folks to try to
bring this legislation to people's attention -- to
kill it with sunshine.

Lest I be misunderstood, I don't mean to imply that
Naughton has been inconsistent or insincere. On the
contrary, he shows the highly consistent political
discipline of a convinced Leftist, for whom subsidiary
issues (like ecclesiology, or even church affiliation)
are governed not by principle but by their utility in
bringing about the desired changes. 

Yesterday you had a conservative archbishop to contend
with, and the cry was for autonomy; today you have a
liberal on the throne, and you deplore the "separatist
agenda" of your antagonists. Once you've convinced
yourself that you have seen The Future -- as every
progressivist has -- the prime moral imperative is to
do what is necessary to make that vision a reality. 




ART KELLY, ATM-S
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