Death Before Touching Evangelicals
Unbelievable — but then, all too believable. From the NYT:
Plans to turn the Cathedral of St. John the Divine into a vast coronavirus field hospital were abruptly shelved on Thursday, with public health officials saying that a leveling off in virus-related hospitalizations in New York City had made them reassess the need for the project.
But behind the scenes, Episcopal leaders said they were upset by the role played in the project by Samaritan’s Purse, an evangelical humanitarian organization whose approach to L.G.B.T. issues runs counter to that of the Episcopal Diocese of New York, which is based out of the cathedral.
Samaritan’s Purse is led by the Rev. Franklin Graham, who has been criticized for anti-Muslim and anti-L.G.B.T.Q. rhetoric and whose organization is based on a statement of faith that includes a belief that “marriage is exclusively the union of one genetic male and one genetic female.”
The Episcopal Church did not realize that Samaritan’s Purse would be involved in the project when it offered the use of the cathedral to Mount Sinai Health System last month, and the slowing rate of hospitalizations might have created an opportunity for all parties to step back from a fraught situation, officials said.
The project was intended to turn the church, which describes itself as the largest cathedral in the world, into a 200-bed medical facility. If the need for hospital space increases, those plans may be reactivated, but Dean Clifton Daniel III, the cathedral’s leader, said he thought Samaritan’s Purse would not be back.
The “oops, it’s not needed” is clearly a face-saving story for the cathedral leadership. These liberal Episcopalians would rather not treat terribly sick people than defile their cathedral by welcoming conservative Evangelicals there to aid with the nursing.
What appalling, appalling people, these latte-liberal Episcopalians. They are willing to force sick people to wait for a place to rest than to defile their cathedral with the presence of Franklin Graham. I get that they really do not like conservative Evangelicalism. But can’t they put that aside temporarily for the sake of treating the very sick? Conservative Evangelicals aren’t particularly fond of liberal Episcopalians either, but that’s not the most important thing at this moment, is it?
Consider: in 1993, that same cathedral hosted a “Gaia Mass” in which its priests and congregation chanted praises to Egyptian gods. Terry Mattingly, who was then an Episcopalian, and who was present for this ceremony, recalled:
But, for me, the most symbolic moment of the service came at the offertory. Before the bread and wine were brought to the altar, the musicians offered a rhythmic chant that soared into the cathedral vault:
OBA ye Oba yo Yemanja
Oba ye Oba yo O Yemanja
Oby ye Oba yo O O Ausar
Oba ye Oba yo O Ra Ausar
Praises to Obatala, ruler of the Heavens
Praises to Obatala, ruler of the Heavens
Praises to Yemenja, ruler of the waters of life
Praises to Yemenja, ruler of the waters of life
Praises to Ausar, ruler of Amenta, the realm of the ancestors
Praises to Ra and Ausar, rulers of the light and the resurrected soul.
— From the printed worship booklet for “Liturgy and Sermon, Earth Mass — Missa Gaia,” distributed on Oct. 3, 1993, the Cathedral of St. John the Divine.
Then the congregation joined in and everyone sang “Let all mortal flesh keep silence.”
Yemanja and Obatala are Yoruba gods who are also worshiped in voodoo. Ausar and Ra are ancient Egyptian deities.
The Cathedral of St. John the Divine is a place where pagan gods have been praised in worship, but which will withhold participation in medical care if it has to welcome conservative Evangelical Christians under its eaves. Think about that. I don’t know what they are, but these Divine people are not Christians. There is no grace in them.
UPDATE: An Episcopal priest e-mails:
After college I went to seminary and am now an ordained Episcopal priest. Though I would lean more ‘conservative’ theologically (I read a lot of Barth, von Balthasar and the Patristics), my politics are fairly progressive (especially in regards to economic policy, labor policy, etc. I guess I would be a ‘New Deal Democrat’ if anything. For that reason, I generally find both parties distasteful — the GOP because of its ongoing war on legitimate governance and care for the poor, and the Democratic Party for its sham ‘care’ for the poor and consistent selling out to the military industrial complex and Wall Street.That said, I get your frustration and exasperation with the Episcopal Church. I think a lot of young clergy (or, recently ordained clergy) are frustrated with the faux liberalism of baby boomers and the absurd things they’ve brought into the church (e.g. the Beyonce ‘mass’ you discussed a few years back and the Egyptian god service you mentioned in the last few days). Episcopal clergy do all sorts of bizarre things (as do clergy of any other tradition), and our faults tend toward the embarrassing boomer tropes of radical relativism and ‘feel good’ religion. Philip Rieff may have been right about his generation, but I have reason to doubt that the Triumph of the Therapeutic is as widespread today amongst younger clergy. Many of us can clearly see the excesses and absurdities of our elders on some of these things, and many are actively working to oppose them and re-focus the church on Christ and His Kingdom.I wanted to write to you because of your article today about St. John the Divine and the plan to have a field hospital there that has fallen through. I think you might find the Episcopal News Service brief helpful, as it directly contradicts some of the assumptions in your reaction (https://www.episcopalnewsservice.org/2020/ 04/09/shifting-needs-cancel- plan-to-build-field-hospital- in-st-john-the-divine/). According to the sub-dean, St. John the Divine did not decide not to have the field hospital: “We did not tell Samaritan’s Purse that they were not welcome here.” Additionally, it might be important to include in your original article that Samaritan’s Purse has required those who work there to sign statements of belief that include anti-LGBTQ interpretations of Scripture. Though, of course, you would be sympathetic to such beliefs, this seems like an important caveat to the policies of Samaritan’s Purse relief efforts: ‘you can volunteer here to save lives with us, if you believe x, y, z.’ Not exactly the innocent, conservative Evangelicals you portray — intentionally using the desperation and hysteria of a disaster situation in order to force beliefs on volunteers whose work (tending to the sick and providing medical support) has no ostensible connection to their beliefs about gay marriage, etc. seems relevant to any unbiased telling of the story, whether or not we are sympathetic with such beliefs about LGBT issues. It seems Samaritan’s Purse is guilty of risking the lives of the needy and sick in service of their political agenda, not the other way around. That said, if you think there’s legitimate medical relevance to one’s stance on LGBT issues in relation to treatment for an upper respiratory infection, I’d be curious to hear it.I know you have an allergic reaction to all things ‘pandering to SJWs,’ but I’d like to request greater care when it comes to your general disgust of all things the Episcopal Church. You quote and discuss Terence Malick and Auden (both Episcopalians and Auden a gay man) with great appreciation and admiration, and then turn around and rip on Episcopalians for their stances on social issues. It’s disheartening, especially for someone like me who is: a) appreciative of your writing despite disagreements on certain topics, b) an Episcopal priest, c) relatively progressive politically, and d) theologically conservative.I was especially concerned about what seems to be your penchant for confirmation bias in the specific matter of Samaritan’s Purse and St. John the Divine. Though I would not have been surprised if things had gone the way you described, minimal digging into the matter make clear that that’s not accurate. DemocracyNow! also reports about objects that Samaritan’s Purse had to the Cathedral displaying a rainbow flag on its own property (https://www.democracynow.org/2020/4/10/ headlines/nyc_cathedral_wont_ partner_with_christian_ fundamentalist_field_hospital_ group_over_lgbtq_rights). Whether or not you agree with the rainbow flag as a statement (and I’ve read you closely enough not to wonder which side you’d probably land on), the presumption of Samaritan’s Purse to think that it can determine how a hosting-location must decorate its space also seems to undermine your assumption of innocence on their part. In any case, I enjoy your writing, even when I disagree with you. I would appreciate some nuance, especially when it comes to more ‘liberal’ Christian groups such as the Episcopal Church. Whether or not we ever see eye to eye, it would at least make your writing more palatable to liberal Christians who are open to persuasion. Very few, like myself, read people on both sides of the aisle. When you highlight the organizational affiliation of those that drive you nuts, and when you fail to highlight or ignore the organizational affiliation of those you love (Auden, Malick, etc.), the bias reads as much less even-handed.
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