The following sermon, on Ephesians 4:25-5:2, was preached on 9 August 2009 (Year B, 10 Pentecost, Proper 14, RCL) at St. Paul’s Parish, K St., Washington, D.C. by N.J.A. Humphrey.

For five Sundays in a row now, we’ve been hearing snippets from the epistle to the Ephesians. We will hear seven weeks’ worth of the “greatest hits” from Ephesians in all, and today’s verses are central to Paul’s message.

Before getting into this morning’s reading, however, let me begin by summarizing what the letter is all about. Ephesians is concerned with the issue of the inclusion of Gentile converts into a largely Jewish Christian Church, about what accommodations Jewish Christians are called to make on the one hand, and what amendments of life Gentile converts are called to make on the other hand. In other words, it’s about a big ol’ conflict, the resolution…

I managed to be out of the country for most of the time General Convention met and for that period of reflection which came after the bishops and deputies returned to the reality of their respective homes and jobs. Of course even at a safe distance, in Yorkshire, Scotland and then County Durham, I heard and read of the decisions our leaders made for us. Mercifully not one of my relatives, well except for my older son, and he in passing, had the slightest interest in what TEC was up to in California. I was thus not drawn into the emotions surrounding TEC’s convoluted decisions to go it’s own way, wrapped in the mantle of exceptionalism and prophecy.

Towards the end of my stay in Durham, I did meet it’s Bishop a few times, unaware during our brief conversations that he exhibits megalomania ( as English Liberals…

Fulcrum Newsletter, August 2009

Copublished, with permission, with Comment is free belief, The Guardian online, 5 August 2009

Desmond Tutu has often talked of the crucial support of the Anglican Communion when he was under pressure from the Apartheid regime. Robert Runcie, the Archbishop of Canterbury at the time, commented that it signaled to the regime, 'Touch Tutu, and you touch the whole Anglican Communion.' Tutu was not isolated.

David Gitari experienced similar world-wide solidarity following an assassination attempt on his life. During the night of 22 April 1989, thugs attacked his house in the foothills of Mount Kenya. He managed to climb to the roof and raise the alarm. Neighbours came running. The thugs ran away. Gitari had taken a courageous stand on issues of local, national and international justice.

At the nearby college in Kabare,…