3 JUNE 2020, NOTES

Welcome, again, blog reader, as we try to take stock of the swirling world around us in this moment of crisis on crisis. There is much to consider today.

PANDEMIC

The sweep of COVID-19 continues unabated. According to the statistics in Worldometer, the disease continues to spread and kill people at about the same rate. In the last week, the rate of infection in the world was 13% whereas it had been 14% the week before. The rising rate of deaths in the world was 9% whereas it had been 8% the week before. The numbers for the United States show a slight easing. In the past week, there was a rise of 9% in new cases while the week before was 10%. As for deaths in the U.S., the rate of increase was 7%, a slight decline from the 8% of the week before. At least 108,062 Americans have died of the plague, all within the last four months. The present death rate is app. 1,000 a day. At this rate, there will be over 200,000 Americans dead of COVID-19 by the First of September. After that, we can expect a big surge in new cases and deaths as fall sets in.

The spread of the disease is uneven in America. The southeastern states are now a "hot spot" in the country. In South Carolina, there were 1,999 new cases in the past week for a total of 12,415. This is a 19% increase, up from the 15 % of the previous week. There were 55 deaths of the disease in the last week for a total of 501. This is a 12% rise, the same as the earlier week. Alabama continues its alarming pattern of spread and mortality. In AL, there were 3,121 new cases last week for a staggering total of 18,771. This is a 20% rise, down slightly from the 23% of the previous week. There were 73 deaths in AL in the last week for a total of 653. This is a 13% rise, well up from the 2% of the earlier week. All in all, SC and AL are suffering shocking surges in the spread and mortality of COVID-19 with no relief in sight. Meanwhile, almost every locality now has re-opened its public places. One can only imagine what this, and the current massive demonstrations, will do to spread this highly contagious disease.

RE-OPENING CHURCHES

The Anglican Diocese of South Carolina resumed in-person worship services three Sundays ago. For the first two Sundays, I could find only two churches of the 50 or so in the diocese that resumed inside services, Old St. Andrew's and St. Luke's of Hilton Head. Both had only sparse congregations. On last Sunday, I counted 6 people in the pews at the 8 a.m. service of OSA and 11 in the pews at the 11 a.m. time. There had been 14 on each of the two previous Sundays. At St. Luke's, I counted about 50 in the congregation last Sunday. There had been about 30 the first Sunday and 37 the second. It seems that people are reluctant to return to one church but are gradually returning to the other. On last Sunday, I found a third church that held public service, St. John's of Johns Island. It was outside and the camera did not show the congregation. So, after three Sundays, the vast majority of the local churches in ADSC remain closed.

The Episcopal diocese of SC is allowing churches to resume public services next Sunday but discouraging inside services. It will be interesting to see how these local churches handle resumption of corporate worship. There are really three choices: continue online only, outside service, inside service. The priorities in EDSC are in that order.

PRESIDENT TRUMP'S PHOTO OP

On last Monday, police forcibly removed peaceful demonstrators, exercising their constitutional rights, from the area around St. John's Episcopal Church, at the edge of Lafayette Park, the public space on the north side of the White House. This was to clear the space for a presidential photo op. St. John's, a masterpiece of Benjamin Latrobe, has been "the presidents' church" since it was built in 1816. The president and his closest advisors then walked from the White House to the church. Trump stood outside of the boarded up windows of the parish house, under the Episcopal Church flag. He held up a Bible and stood for photos. He was then joined by some officials for another photo op. All of this was done without prior knowledge of Episcopal Church officials.

The bishop of Washington, Mariann Budde, usually a calm person, was beside herself with "outrage" that the president would use her church, and the Bible, as props for what she described as words and policies "antithetical" to the Christian religion. Likewise, the Roman Catholic archbishop of Washington was offended that a Catholic shrine would be used as for another photo op, on Tuesday. Numerous bishops and other religious leaders across America have spoken out against Trump's misuse of religion as well as his heavy-handed tactics against peaceful demonstrators. For instance, the bishops of New England issued a strong rebuke. Find it here. I am awaiting a statement from the EDSC and from Episcopal bishops of the south. What they say carries a lot of weight in the midst of our present social crisis. No one knows racism better than we southerners.

MONUMENTAL CHANGES

Symbols are important in any society. As societies change and evolve so do their public symbols. We southerners are witnessing monumental change, at least in the most visible symbols of our racist past. Nothing exemplifies this better than the fall of the great Confederate obelisk in the middle of downtown Birmingham. 

A few days ago, demonstrations began in downtown Birmingham, as they did in virtually every American big city. The heart of the downtown is built around a large square named Linn Park. The center piece of the park was a 52 foot tall granite obelisk erected in 1905 as a memorial to the Confederacy. The city of Birmingham, about 70% African American, has been trying for years to get rid of the hated reminder of slavery. A few years ago, the AL state legislature and governor made a law forbidding the removal of any public monument more than 40 years old (virtually every one of the ubiquitous Confederate monuments in the south is more than 40 years old). So, the city government of Birmingham built a plywood wall around their towering obelisk. Still, that was not enough for many local residents. On last Saturday and Sunday, crowds proceeded to attack the obelisk in an attempt to destroy it. It did not work. Then, the city government resolved to remove the entire monument, in violation of the state law. They were informed this would be illegal and would carry a fine of $25,000. A GoFundMe fund raised the money. On Monday and Tuesday, crews dismantled and removed the Confederate monument that had presided over the city for more than a century. Find a TV report of this here . Let us southerners hope and pray this "monumental" change will help us put our racist past behind us and get on with building a more just and egalitarian society. It is high time. Perhaps this will be the good that will come of the turmoil boiling all around us.

As an old, lifelong student of history, I sense we Americans are at a crossroads in our nation's life. I see two great competing forces pulling us in opposite directions. The situation has heightened immensely in the last couple of weeks in the backdrop of the enormous social stresses of the pandemic and racism. On the one hand, we have the pull to move to a more democratic society, one that gives equal opportunity to all people regardless of differences. This would be a continuation of the great American democratic revolution of the post-Second World War age. On the other hand, we have the pull to move to a more authoritarian society, one in which the propertied minority would exercise power and retain control by force. This would lead us into a fascist state possible only by military control over the majority. In short, I see us moving to a more democratic society or to a fascist state. In my view, the reelection of President Trump would be a giant step to the latter. Thus, we are at the most consequential moment in American history at least since the end of the Second World War, seventy-five years ago.

All of this is a lot to process. It is a lot to take in. Sometimes I feel overwhelmed, or as Bishop Budde said, I cannot believe what my eyes are seeing. Is this really happening? Whatever next? 

We are obviously at an important point in history. There is no doubt about that. What comes out of this will profoundly affect the future of all of us. It is easy to get bewildered, apprehensive, and even frightened about it. As people of faith, we must keep the big picture. There is an order in the universe. Regardless of what is going on around us, we are called to love God and our neighbor, what the presiding bishop calls the way of love. This is our calling, and this will see us through. It has gotten humanity through thick and thin for two thousand years. It will see us through our lifetimes too.

Remember, we are here for the living of this hour. Peace.  

"I AM OUTRAGED"

The bishop of Washington, the Rt. Rev. Mariann Budde said yesterday, "I am outraged." Faithful people everywhere ought to be outraged too. I am. What happened yesterday was outrageous on so many levels I would not know where to begin. Besides, Budde has spoken for all of us more eloquently than anyone could. So, I will just provide the videos of Budde telling us why people, and particularly Episcopalians, should denounce what happened yesterday.

Find Anderson Cooper's interview of Budde on CNN here . Find a short interview of Budde on NBC News here (starts at 3:16).

IT IS TIME TO PULL THE FIRE ALARM

It is time to break the glass and pull the fire alarm. Our country is on fire literally and figuratively. This is an emergency and the future of America is at stake. There is no other realistic way to view what is happening. We are in the presence of a perfect storm of natural and man-made crises that, combined, have the likelihood of changing America profoundly, either for the worse or the better. 

First, let us look at what is happening. Suddenly, two disasters befell us. Just last January, a little more than four months ago, a new virus appeared in the United States. Since then, that virus has infected nearly two millions Americans and killed over one hundred thousand of us. This is the worst public health crisis in the country since the great influenza pandemic of 1918. There is no cure, not even a treatment, for COVID-19. Until a vaccine appears we are at the mercy of this miniscule organism. For the foreseeable future, the coronavirus will dominate and disrupt our lives. Over forty million Americans have lost their jobs. People are going hungry. The economy is reeling. On top of all of this, the poor and disadvantaged among us are suffering the ravages of the virus disproportionately.

Then, just last week, a white police officer knelt on the neck of a black man until the man was dead. Caught on video, it was an apparent act of unjustifiable homicide. Black protests against the historic police and judicial systematic unequal treatment of African Americans exploded across the country in a wave of violent demonstrations in virtually every big city in the U.S. Shocking physical attacks, burnings, lootings, and vandalism have become ubiquitous in America in the past few days. As of this moment, there seems to be no letting up in the strongest wave of civic unrest since 1968. The country seems to be on the edge of chaos. The root factor in all of this is racism.

Thus, we have a double crisis of the coronavirus and mass violence, a combination potentially lethal to the cohesion of our civic society. The country that we have known is in trouble. The problem now is---How should we respond to this double crisis of sickness/death and racism? We are being put to the test, and how we answer the test will determine the future of our country.

Part of our problem is a lack of national unity. From the Second World War to 1990 there was an external threat, the USSR, that forced a cohesion on the country. This papered over the internal divisions that had always been a part of America, an increasingly diverse society of national backgrounds, races, and religions. At the same time, under this umbrella of unity, America was carrying out a great democratic revolution extending rights of equality and inclusion to long neglected elements as African Americans, women, the disabled, and homosexuals. However, there were elements that saw this democratic revolution as a threat to their own real or perceived power, namely the white man who had largely won the Seond World War and had enjoyed the benefits of this thereafter. 

After the Cold War ended in 1990, the United States increasingly fractured along racial, economic, and cultural lines putting to test the democratic reforms of the 1950s-60s. Blacks, who had won political rights after the overthrow of Jim Crow, found that social, cultural and economic equality did not follow. In ways, the continuing racial inequalities were even more painful because of the failure of political reform to bring true equality. Blacks still felt as beleaguered second-class citizens in their own country. The most visible aspect of this was the power that the police had over the lives of urban minorities. The relationship between African Americans and the police remained the flash point in the interface between racism and the power structure.

To make matters worse, too often politicians exploited the fault lines in America for their own benefit. President Trump ran on, and was elected on, a motto that was a dog whistle of racism. Since 2016, social divisions have worsened in America and not just against blacks. Jews have come under increasing attacks. White supremacists are experiencing a resurgence. The divisions that were always there became more and more apparent and dangerous.

What to do?

There are two big issues and they have to be treated differently. The coronaviruas is a natural crisis that can only be treated in a natural way, to find a chemical concoction to stop the spread of the disease. This is a matter of science, for the scientists. However, they must have massive public support to do this. Until a vaccine arrives, the only good approach to the virus is social distancing. We can conquer the virus. Can we conquer racism?

Our bigger problem is racism. This is America's original sin, the one that we have never accepted, let alone tried to treat. The coronavirus will be relatively easy to beat. Racism will not. 

It is possible for a great nation state to recognize the sins of the past, address them, atone for them, and reform itself for a better future. Our example is Germany. After the Second World War, the common cry in Germany was "we were only following orders." In other words, German society refused to accept responsibility for the monumental horrors of Nazism. Then they got busy rebuilding their devastated country into a great economic machine. All the while, the question of guilt lingered over the German people. Finally, in 2015, on the seventieth anniversary of the end of the War, Germany as a nation publicly came to terms with its past. Chancellor Merkel and her entire cabinet went to the Reichstag and conducted a national service of repentance. In the name of the German people, they accepted guilt for Nazism, for the war and the catastrophic crimes against humanity the Nazis perpetrated. They begged the world for forgiveness as they promised to build a greater and more egalitarian society. (Meanwhile, Germany has been giving Israel billions of dollars.) So, it is possible for a nation to repent of its sins and correct the wrongdoing of the past. If Germany could do it for Nazism, America can do it for racism. 

The question is how we do it. One idea floating around is reparations, that is, that African Americans today should be paid for the slave labor of their antebellum ancestors. In principle this is a good idea, but the practicalities are hugely problematical. How are we to determine which blacks are descendants of slaves? Some African Americans are and some are not. Then too, what is the lifetime work a slave worth? 

So, here are my ideas, for whatever they are worth:

Set up a special national commission devoted to the issue of racism. I would put Val Demings in charge. No one is better qualified to combine the African American experience and the police. I would make the commission as diverse as America. I would ask it to do three things, oversee a study of racism in America, arrange a national time of repentence for the sin of racism, and present specific recommendations for the healing of racism in America. This will not end racism but it will set national standards of how we move to a more equitable and just society.

The first part would be setting up a study of racism in America. I would invite a broad range of experts to contribute their experiences and recommendations: people such as historians, sociologists, psychologists, economists, police chiefs, public prosecutors, public defenders, judges, and community activists. I would set up a several day session when these experts would present their papers on live television.

The second part would be a ceremony of public repentance. I would have a service at the Washington National Cathedral led by the presiding bishop and attended by all the political powers of Washington. In the service, the liturgy would recognize and repent of the sin of racism, as well as call for atonement. This would set the moral and ethical stage for the next part, the political reforms to correct the sins of the past.

The third part would be a state-of-the-union type gathering in the House of Representatives chamber in which specific reforms would be spelled out and presented to the people. By this time, there should be sufficient public pressure on the president, Senate, and House to join in enacting these reforms. 

I know, this is idealistic and will probably never happen, but that does not mean it should not happen. Something has to happen. Something is happening. Something is going to happen. Let's channel that happening in a constructive way to bring the country together and build a better future for our children and grandchildren. 

Two hundred years ago, Thomas Jefferson called slavery the fire bell in the night. He was right. All these years later, the fire of racism is still raging, still threatening to consume our country which is, after all, a fragile experiment. The Founding Fathers believed they could set up something that had never happened in the history of the world, a republic of diverse people governing themselves under lofty principles of human rights. 

So, I say it is time to pull the fire alarm. Let's put out the fire that has been smoldering for four hundred years and will consume us all unless we do something about it. Let's save the greatest democratic republic in the history of the world. If any nation-state in human history has ever been worth saving, I say it is ours. How about you? What do you say?  

A GARDEN WALK

WITH RON CALDWELL,

MAY 30, 2020

Instead of the usual still photos of my garden, I am posting a video of my garden I made today at about 10:30 a.m. This is my first attempt at posting a video from my phone, so let's hope the quality of my garden videos will improve in time. There is not much blooming in my garden right now as we are between flowering seasons, spring and summer. However, one may get a good idea of the overall effect of this garden that I designed, planted, and have maintained myself for seventeen years. I hope you enjoy this little stroll around my garden which takes up a building lot next to my house.

The video is found here.

EPISCOPAL DIOCESE OF SC DISCOURAGES RE-OPENING OF CHURCHES

On yesterday, May 28, 2010, the Standing Committee of the Episcopal Diocese of South Carolina issued a statement basically discouraging local churches from resuming worship services in the church buildings. Find the statement at episcopalchurchsc.org/news-blog . Find it here .

In the first place, the note recommends online services "as the primary means of worship." In the second place, it implies a local church should develop "a plan" to take all the precautions appropriate and then may proceed to indoor worship. In the third place, it recommends that all services and other gatherings should be held outdoors. The message I see in this memo is to discourage local congregations from returning to worship in the church buildings for the foreseeable future. It encourages Internet services instead of in-person ones. However, it allows congregations to resume services but leans on them to hold them outside of the church buildings. At least this is my interpretation of yesterday's message. My take-away from this is that Episcopal churches in lower SC should not resume in-person worship but if they do, they should hold services outside.

The Anglican and Episcopal dioceses have issued guidelines for the re-opening of churches. Find the Anglican one here . Find the Episcopal one here . One observation I have about these two papers is that they point out the differences between the two approaches that led up to the schism of 2012. As anyone who has read my history of the schism knows, there was a difference between the two "sides" on vertical versus horizontal religion. Vertical is oriented to a posture of one person-one God (personal salvation). Horizontal is oriented to a person's relationships to the world as directed by one's faith in God (the social gospel). In the first, God is an authority figure who controls all. In the second, God is a transcendent force working in our transactional relationships with others. The Episcopal Church developed as a horizontal-oriented religion after the 1950's but there was a counter backlash led by vertically-oriented forces. The vertical forces created the five schisms in the Episcopal Church between 2007 and 2012. The Anglican diocese of SC is the result of the schism in SC. It is a vertical-oriented religion. 

We can still see that dichotomy in the two approaches to the re-opening of churches in SC. The ADSC has an authoritarian plan with "Requirements" that are absolute and "Recommendations" that are strong suggestions but not necessarily requirements. This was handed down by the authority of the bishop. It even includes a letter the local church should send out to its communicants. The EDSC has an almost entirely independent plan where local congregations essentially decide on their own how to resume services. The only "requirement" on the Episcopal side is that communion be in bread only. So, here we have the driving issue of the schism in a nutshell: vertical and horizontal.

Another observation I have is that people are very reluctant to return to their church buildings. As we have seen, the Anglican diocese allowed the reopening of churches two Sundays ago. Of the 50 or so local churches in the ADSC, I found only 2 that reopened and both of those had very sparse congregations, I would guess between 10 and 20 percent of their usual attendance. It seemed to me the services were awkward and unsatisfactory for the attendees. The congregations appeared to be more like a studio audience at the taping of a TV show than participants in a religious service.

We are in a difficult position as we want to do everything we can to stop the spread of the coronavirus and also to resume the congregational dimension of our religion. The leaders of both Anglican and Episcopal diocese are right to insist on a go-slow approach. The church will survive. It will live on in spite of the virus. What may not survive this crisis is that vulnerable person who is endangered by the easy spread of this highly contagious and deadly germ. 

A NATIONAL DAY OF MOURNING

It is Thursday, May 28, 2020. This is a national day of mourning for the 100,000 Americans who have died of COVID-19, all within the last three months. All of us should take a moment today and say a prayer for these people and their families and friends, indeed for all of us. We are in the presence of a national disaster. This is the worst natural catastrophe to hit our country in a century and it is far from over. In fact, it is just beginning. There is more to come, much more. Hundreds of thousands of Americans are likely to die of this terrible plague before it is over. God help us.

As we reflect somberly today, I recommend this video made by a doctor on the front lines of the war against the unseen enemy. 

The address of this video is:  youtube.com/watch?v=IdeHSkDCm58

As hard as it is, we must not forget we are here for the living of this hour. As we grieve, we must go on. We must do our best. Peace.

27 MAY 2020, NOTES

It is Wednesday, May 27, 2020. Welcome, blog reader as we continue on together in the long, dark night of the coronavirus plague.

COVID-19 is now the fastest spreading deadly disease in American history. One hundred thousand Americans have died of it, all within three months. At the present rate of death, app. 1,000/day, there will be 200,000 Americans dead of the virus by Labor Day. Then, all indications are for a second wave, a resurgence in the autumn. In the great flu pandemic of 1918, there was a first wave in the spring, a lull in the summer, then a much greater and deadlier wave in the last few months of the year. We may expect the same for Covid-19 this year. We should get prepared for the worst.

The bad news is that the virus is spreading as wildfire throughout the world and now beginning to accelerate in Third World countries, as Brazil. According to Worldometer, there are at least 5,707,637 cases in the world, with 703,501 in just the last week, a 14% rise. As for deaths in the world: 352,746, with 27,507 in the last week, an 8% rise.

The United States is by far the hardest hit country in the world. With just 4% of the world's population, it has 30% of the world's cases and 29% of the deaths. The U.S. is now listing 1,725,808 cases and 100,625 deaths. In just the last week, there were 154,790 new cases and 7,083 deaths. From the data, we can see the virus is continuing to spread and kill people in the U.S., but at a declining rate. The government's handing of the pandemic is a national humiliation. For goodness sake, the greatest country in the history of the world is going into a civil war over whether to wear face masks! Pathetic. 

In the southeastern U.S., the numbers and the rates are rising. Both Alabama and South Carolina are now among the leading 'hot spots" in the country. In the last week, SC saw 1,360 new cases for a total of 10,416. It also saw 47 new deaths for a total of 446. AL is even worse. In the last week, it counted a whopping 2,949 new cases for a total of 15,650 and 14 new deaths for a total of 580. The accelerating rate of spread in SC and AL is cause for alarm.

Meanwhile, public places as churches are beginning to re-open. The Centers for Disease Control finally issued a guideline for the re-opening of churches. Find it here . It is so vague and general as to be of little help. Essentially, it says to follow the local guidelines for re-opening. Unfortunately, the CDC has fallen to political influence and has receded into the background of the fight against the virus. Churches are on their own, at least under local regulations. President Trump has demanded the complete re-opening of churches across the country as he campaigns for reelection and reaches out to his bedrock evangelical Christian base. 

Even so, churches have been slow to re-open and parishioners have been reluctant to return to the ones that have opened their doors. On May 17, I found only two churches in the Anglican diocese that re-opened. Old Saint Andrews had about 14 attendees while St. Luke's of Hilton Head had about 30. On last Sunday, the 24th, I counted 14 at St. Andrew's and 37 at St. Luke's. Obviously, parishioners are hesitant to return to their buildings. If any of the other 50 or so local churches of ADSC re-opened to in-person worship, I am not aware of them. The Episcopal diocese remains closed at least until June 1. Both the ADSC and the EDSC have issued guidelines for the re-opening of churches that generally follow the CDC guide that was leaked in April but killed by the White House for being too stringent.

Now, turning to the subject of the litigation, there is some thought floating around that the Texas Supreme Court ruling of May 22 will help the schismatic contingent in South Carolina. Not so. The Texas decision has nothing at all to do with South Carolina. The Texas ruling was that even though the Episcopal Church is hierarchical, the breakaway group had the legal right to leave the Church and the Dennis Canon had no validity in the state because a trust could be legally revoked if it did not explicitly state that it could not be revoked. I suspect there is a good chance the Episcopal Church diocese will petition the U.S. Supreme Court for cert of this absurdly illogical opinion. So far, SCOTUS has retreated from taking Episcopal church cases. However, we now have a federal court ruling declaring TEC to be an hierarchical institution with all the rights that may entail. The scene now is not the same as the one two years ago when SCOTUS denied ADSC's petition for cert as it tried to appeal the SCSC decision of Aug. 2, 2017.

The litigation in SC is still on two tracks. In the federal courts, we are now awaiting the EDSC brief to the U.S. Court of Appeals, in Richmond. Then, we will get an ADSC rebuttal. All of this is expected to occur by July. Then, the Court will decide whether to hold a hearing. With or without a hearing, the justices will decide whether to uphold or overturn Judge Richard Gergel's decision of last September in which he found all in favor of the Episcopal Church diocese. In my view, odds are very strong the appeals court will uphold Gergel's masterful opinion.

It is the other track that is giving trouble. On August 2, 2017, the South Carolina Supreme Court ruled that 1-7 local parishes are independent, 2-29 local parishes are property of the Episcopal Church, and 3-Camp St. Christopher is property of the Episcopal Church diocese. The SCSC denied a rehearing. SCOTUS denied cert. On Nov. 19, 2017, the SCSC issued a Remittitur to the circuit court to implement the decision. There is where it remains. For two and a half years, Judge Edgar Dickson has had this on his desk. In all this time, he has carried out exactly one point, the first of the three orders in the SCSC decision (independence to the 7). He had done absolutely nothing to implement the other two orders of the decision. Why he has been sitting on his hands is anyone's guess. He is not talking. The Church diocese tried twice to get the state supreme court to prod Dickson on, to no avail. So, we wait interminably as the judge marks time. We know he has to retire by Dec. 31, 2022. It is not inconceivable we will mark time along with him for the next two and a half years. Where is the justice in all of this?

Remember, friends, we are here for the living of this hour regardless of how frightening and unfair it may be. Goodness and truth will not be vanquished. We will get through this, and we will do it together. Peace.

THE CONTRADICTORY
TEXAS SUPREME COURT DECISION

On May 22, 2020, the Supreme Court of Texas handed down a decision in the Episcopal Church case. Eight justices agreed while one did not participate. Find the decision here .

First, one should recognize the nature of the Texas Supreme Court. It is made up of nine justices. Each one is elected by popular vote in a state-wide election for a six-year term. For years now, conservative Republicans have held every seat on the court. The Court's new decision is a thin, thirty page, bundle of contradictions. It supports the breakaway side that is adamantly opposed to equal rights and inclusion of women and open homosexuals in the life of the church.

This is not the first appearance of the TSC in the church case. The original lower court ruled in favor of the Episcopal Church side. Then, the TSC intervened and ordered the lower judge to reverse his decision. He did and practically called for an appeal. The Episcopal Church side did appeal to the Second Appeals Court of Texas which, after two years of work, issued a masterpiece, a voluminous tome siding with the Church. The breakaway side immediately appealed this decision to the state supreme court. Last week's ruling overturns the appeals court's magnum opus. Find the appeals court decision of April 5, 2018 here .

The hang-up in the original intervention of the TSC, as it send the case back down to the lower court, was that the local diocese could revoke its accession to the TEC Dennis Canon since the Canon did not hold a provision that it could not be revoked, something that state law required. "trusts are revocable under Texas law unless they are expressly made irrevocable." (p. 10) It is ridiculous to argue that a law can be ignored unless the law explicitly says it cannot be ignored. Absurd. Nevertheless, this is the crux of the new decision---that the Dennis Canon could not be enforced in Texas since it did not have a provision that it had to be enforced. The effectiveness of a law is in the nature of law. The idea that a law, rule, or regulation has to spell out that it cannot be ignored is inane.

The big, glaring contradiction of the TSC decision of last week is that it accepts that the Episcopal Church is hierarchical and that the Diocese of Fort Worth entered TEC in 1982 explicitly under the terms of the TEC Constitution and Canons. The Dennis Canon was part of the C and C. "At that time, the corporate bylaws also provided that 'the affairs of this nonprofit corporation shall be conducted in conformity with the Constitution and Canons of the Episcopal Church.'" (p. 5)

 Then, the justices turned around and said the local diocese was self-governing and could amend its corporate documents at will. "In 2006, the Diocesan Corporation unanimously amended its articles and bylaws to remove all references to TEC." (p. 6) In another place, they said, "Congregants, local churches, and leaders of religious entities are free to disassociate from a hierarchical church at any time." (p. 12). In fact, individuals are free to leave any church at will but local churches and entities of hierarchical institutions are not.  

It is impossible to be under the TEC C and C and independent of them at the same time. Another absurdity.

Then, the justices tried to separate hierarchical authority and property ownership. In violation of hierarchy, the justices accepted the diocese as an independent entity free to amend its corporate charters and bylaws at will. The court then accepted the breakaway diocese as an equal entity under the concept of neutral principles and found for them on the matter of the ownership of the local properties. To do so, they had to ignore their own stated principle of hierarchy. So, the decision winds up contradicting itself---that the diocese could be under the Constitution and Canons of TEC and free to govern itself at the same time. Sovereignty cannot rest in two places at the same time---the whole church or its individual parts. The nature of a hierarchical institution is that sovereignty rests in the whole, not in the separate parts.

This decision begs to be appealed to the United States Supreme Court. In the first place, it is short, weak, and poorly substantiated by only a few cases which it repeats selectively. It will not stand up for a minute in Washington D.C., especially as it reflects so badly against the masterful appeals court decision that it purported, unsuccessfully in my view, to disprove. In the second place, the fundamental issue involved here has already been settled in federal court. Last September, U.S. District Judge Richard Gergel ruled very clearly that the Episcopal Church is hierarchical and as such is entitled to govern itself. He repudiated any notion that the breakaway group had any right to the historic diocese. He recognized the continuing diocese as the only legal and legitimate Episcopal diocese and, to boot, issued a permanent injunction forbidding the breakaway association from claiming in any way to be the historic Episcopal diocese. He backed this up with a second order. Too, there is the SCSC decision of August 2, 2017, that followed neutral principles and still found in favor of TEC on both the property and the ownership of the historic diocese. So, we have two competing state supreme court decisions, one for TEC and one for the breakaways. The two decisions are not equal, far from it. SCOTUS should say which should stand.

What the TSC has just issued not only contradicts itself, it contradicts federal court ruling. SCOTUS would no doubt throw out the TX decision in favor of Gergel's ruling. At any rate, federal law takes precedent over state law. Texas' absurd law that a trust can be revoked unless it says it cannot be revoked will be trumped by federal court adherence to hierarchy. Therefore, the Episcopal Church diocese of Ft. Worth should petition SCOTUS for cert asap.

While they are at it, the Church diocese of Ft. Worth should consider entering a suit in federal court along the same lines as the SC federal case---violation of the Lanham Act. Since the federal district court in Charleston has already ruled on this, it should be a simple matter to sue the breakaways in Ft. Worth for possession of the historic diocese.


[NOTE to readers. Sorry for the delay in making this commentary. I have been away from home and my computer for several days. I had to take a break.]  

ONCE AGAIN, CDC IGNORES

THE RE-OPENING OF CHURCHES

The Centers for Disease Control finally released its long-awaited detailed guideline for the re-opening of public places in America. The 60-page document was issued yesterday, May 19.

One should recall that the CDC originally sent a proposed detailed guideline to the White House for approval a month ago. The WH killed it on April 30. The original document included a section on religious communities. There was speculation at the time that the WH deep-sixed the proposed guide because of what it considered too stringent restrictions on churches. Now we can be confident this was in fact the case. The new guidelines of yesterday completely ignored churches. Obviously the WH approved of the new one. Why did the WH remove churches? Keep in mind a bedrock part of President Trump's "base" is the evangelical Christian coalition.

Yesterday's document covers practically everything except churches:  child care, schools and day camps, employers, restaurants and bars, and mass transit. Find the new CDC guideline here .

Although the original CDC guideline was not approved and adopted, it was posted on the Internet. It remains the most thorough (and in my view the best) guide to the re-opening of churches. Find it here .

What all this means is that churches are on their own to decide how to re-open their buildings to public worship following, of course, the local governmental policies and procedures. Both the Anglican and Episcopal dioceses in lower South Carolina have issued guidance directives for their local parishes and missions as they plan for re-opening. Find the Anglican document here  and the Episcopal one here .

Local churches are now trying to figure out the best ways to resume public worship and still protect the health of the attendees. This is not an easy task. As we saw, on last Sunday, the first day the Anglican diocese allowed churches to re-open, only two of the eighteen churches surveyed re-opened, and they found only sparse congregations. In my view, the two churches that did re-open did not succeed in finding a happy balance between public worship and social distancing. 

It seems to me the best approach is a slow and careful one. Churches should certainly continue mainstreaming services on the Internet, something that has turned out to be successful and popular. As for re-opening, this is going to require experimentation and adaptation to find a good balance between corporate worship and safety. Surely the most sensible approach now is for vestries and councils to consider carefully the original CDC document on re-opening as well as the Anglican and Episcopal diocesan guides. 

20 MAY 2020, NOTES

Greetings, blog reader, on Wednesday, May 20, 2020, as we continue on through the long, dark night of the COVID-19 pandemic. We have been tracking the statistics of the disease in four-day increments seeking a pattern of movement, always longing for an easement. Today we have the figures from Worldometer for the period of May 16-20. Let us look at today's numbers as see how they compare with the two previous four-day periods:

NEW CASES,

                          May 8-12           May 12-16          May 16-20

World               340,654, +9%    371,044, +9%     357,727, +8%

U.S.                   93,014, +7%      98,394, +7%       86,731, +6%

SC                     650, +9%           615, +8%            649, 8%

AL                     1,118, +12%      1,209, + 12%      1,492, +13%


DEATHS,

World                16,575, +6%     21,314, +7%       16,255, +5%

U.S.                    4,834, +6%       6,711, +8%         5,035, +6%

SC                      30, +9%            34, +10%            19, +5%

AL                      34, +9%            80, +20%            25, +5%


We are looking at two categories here, numbers of new cases and deaths and rates of increase in these numbers. While raw numbers continue to climb, the rate of the increase seems to be leveling off. In other words, the pandemic seems to be increasing in arithmetical and not geometrical patterns. This is good news and bad news. Nevertheless, at the present rate of increase, the U.S. will pass 100,000 deaths in the next few days. By the end of the summer, the U.S. deaths will almost certainly be well in excess of 200,000. All of the experts are saying we can expect a new, and much worse, wave to hit in the fall. Bear in mind, almost all of the cases and deaths in the U.S. have occurred in just the last twelve weeks. We are barely into what will be a long and dark night. 

325,339 people in the world have died of COVID-19, all in the last six months. 93,542 Americans have died. 399 South Carolinians and 508 Alabamians have succumbed to the dreadful disease. I have to stop here. I am overwhelmed by sadness.

Remember we are here for the living of this hour. Peace.

ANGLICAN DIOCESE OF SC RESUMES

IN-PERSON CHURCH

Today, May 17, 2020, was the first Sunday in which in-person worship was allowed to resume in the Anglican Diocese of South Carolina. The Episcopal diocese of SC will not re-start public worship until June 7 at the earliest. So, how did the much-anticipated "re-opening" go today? I was curious to know and so checked the Internet offerings of most of the major parishes listed in the Anglican diocese.

I scanned eighteen prominent local churches for their morning services of today on Youtube and Facebook. I found only two that had in-person church. These two also offered live-streaming. I found sixteen that were not allowing in-person worship yet but were continuing live-streaming services. These were the sixteen not having public services today:

St. Philip's of Charleston, 

St. Michael's of Charleston, 

the Cathedral Church of St. Luke and St. Paul, 

St. Paul's of Summerville, 

St. Helena's of Beaufort, 

the Church of the Cross of Bluffton, 

Christ/St. Paul's of Yonges Island, 

St. John's of Florence, 

Prince George Winyah of Georgetown,

Trinity of Myrtle Beach

Christ Church of Mt. Pleasant

Holy Cross of Sullicans Island

St. James of James Island

St. John's of Johns Island

Our Saviour of Johns Island

Resurrection of Surfside

The two that I found that had in-person church today were Old St. Andrew's of West Ashley and St. Luke's of Hilton Head.

At St. Andrew's, I counted fourteen people in the congregation. There were four in the choir, a choirmaster, a pianist, and several robed men around the altar. Eucharist was celebrated and only the celebrant had the wine. The others around him took only the wafer. The people in the pews did not leave the pews in the communion. They did not go to the altar and the eucharistic ministers did not go to them. If the people took the wafers, I do not know how they got them. The few people scattered about the mostly vacant pews were wearing face masks as far as I could tell. Apparently, the service was printed in the bulletin. As far as I could make out, the congregation joined in the singing while wearing masks (the ADSC guidelines say "No congregational singing" highlighted in blue letters.)

St. Luke's of Hilton Head was a bit different. I counted approximately thirty people in the pews which were mostly empty. The service was projected on a screen but books were available in the pews. There were two people in the choir, several musicians, and several robed people at the altar. Eucharist was celebrated and the celebrant alone took the wine. At communion, the laity walked to the front, stood and each took a wafer. There was no kneeling at the altar rail. As far as I could tell, everyone was wearing face masks. Those around the altar removed theirs for singing and speaking.  

There may have been other local churches that held in-person services today. I did not look up every one of the parishes and missions. However, I think the eighteen that I did check give us an entirely clear picture on this first Sunday of the return of public services. 

Here is our take-away from today. The vast majority of local churches are not ready to resume in-person worship. In the two that did, the vast majority of the people are not ready to return to the church buildings. I do not know the usual Sunday attendance at OSA and St. Luke's, but I would guess it would be ten times the number of today. Could it be that only ten percent of the laity feel comfortable returning to church? If so, churches have a lot of work to do to reassure people that going back to church is a good thing to do.

If people believe that in returning to church they will be resuming their old church experiences, they will be sorely disappointed. "Coronavirus church" by necessity has to be radically different. The two public services I scanned today seemed to me to be awkward, flat and barely alive. In my view, they just did not function well as corporate worship. The lesson I see today for all church leaders is that they will have to work very hard in the near future to strike an effective balance between resuming group worship and protecting the individuals in the group from the virus. The two services of today show churches have an enormous challenge ahead.

EPISCOPAL DIOCESE OF SC ISSUES
GUIDELINES FOR THE RE-OPENING

OF CHURCHES

On yesterday, May 15, 2020, the Episcopal Diocese of South Carolina issued "Best Practices for Planning a Return to In-Person Worship," to guide parishes and missions as they plan the resumptions of public worship in their church buildings. Find the EDSC announcement, and the guide, here . Local churches of the diocese may resume services after the First of June.

There is no official, national directive for the re-opening of places of worship. However, the people in lower South Carolina now have three guides that they can, and should, consult as they plan the re-openings. In late April, the Centers for Disease Control sent out a proposed guideline that was detailed and stringent. Find it here . The second is the guideline of the Anglican Diocese of South Carolina, dated May 7, 2020. Find it here . The third is the new EDSC guideline published yesterday.

One should bear in mind that the dates for resuming public worship are only suggestions. No local church is required to re-start public worship. ADSC churches may re-open tomorrow while EDSC churches may re-start on Sunday, June 7. Of course, this means they may choose not to re-open. 

The only one of the three that actually demands compliance is the ADSC guide. In it, the bishop lists "Requirements" and "Recommendations" for resuming indoor and outdoor public worship. The requirements in the ADSC guide are more restrictive and detailed than in the CDC guide which was shelved apparently because it was too restrictive. Thus, ADSC puts the burden of decision making on the diocese.

The EDSC guide does not require or demand anything. It only suggests points local churches should consider as they make their own plans for re-opening. Its recommendations are couched in wordy reasons and explanations. Thus, EDSC, in contrast to ADSC, puts the burden of decision making on the parishes and missions.

(Note. 5-17-20. As someone rightly pointed out to me, the EDSC does require communion in one kind only so it is not quite right to say the EDSC guide does not require or demand anything. "Communion of One Kind in the Bread is to be practiced until further notice.") 

Otherwise, the ADSC and EDSC guides are quite similar in specifics for re-opening. ADSC suggests a 25% occupancy while EDSC offers 20%, not a significant difference. However, neither really provides for how this is to be administered. Exactly what is to be done with the overflow? (The Church of England is considering giving out tickets for admission.)

As for music in church, all three guides are unclear. The CDC says no choirs but ignores congregational singing. ADSC says no congregational singing but says nothing about choirs. EDSC says consider doing without a choir but skips congregational singing. At any rate, all three say attendees should wear face masks. Common sense would mean no congregational singing through masks. The guides should have been clearer on the best ways to incorporate, or not, music into the new worship formats. 

As for the grand old institution of the coffee hour, all three disagree. The CDC guide says food and beverage may be served but in individual containers. The ADSC says outright "no coffee hour." The EDSC suggests they may be a social hour but without food and beverage. Thus, ADSC churches have no choice but EDSC churches may decide to combine CDC and EDSC and have coffee hour with individual servings although consuming food and drink while wearing face masks and talking to people six feet away presents another problem.

It is no wonder that some churches are hesitant to reopen with all the confusing and complex issues at hand. My quick survey of four large ADSC parishes yesterday found that none of them will be resuming public worship this month. It remains to be seen when they will resume services and when the EDSC parishes and missions will re-open.

ADSC churches have no choice about stipulations of re-opening. They have "requirements" that must be met. EDSC churches do have choices. My advice to them is to study all three guides and make the most sensible specific provisions suitable to the local circumstances. The ADSC guide is the easiest to follow while the EDSC guide gives the better reasons for doing these things. 

Re-opening churches is serious business and should be approached with the utmost of care and caution. The coronavirus is highly infectious and we know churches are places of public interaction that can spread COVID-19. Keep St. Andrew's of Mt. Pleasant in mind. 

Churches should continue their live-streaming which has proved to be a popular alternative to in-person worship. They should also warn, perhaps discourage, vulnerable populations about attending: over 65, heart problems, lung issues, diabetes, cancer. 

This unwelcomed disruption of our old church lives will go on for a long time to come, at least until a vaccine appears. All indication is at least another year of this. Churches will have to reconfigure worship services and, no doubt, revise as they go along. There is no easy answer. There is not even agreement on exactly how to do things, as evidenced by the three guides. There will have to be a lot of experimentation ahead, but all should be done with one great thought in mind, the health and well-being of the people of the church.  

  

16 MAY 2020, NOTES

It is Saturday, May 16, 2020. Welcome blog reader. Here's a wish that all is well with you and yours. Our dark night continues as we walk together ever knowing that the dawn will come in time. We must keep the faith.

In order to try to get some sense of the trajectory of the pandemic, we have been following the data in Worldometer in four-day increments. Our new period is May 12-16. Here is what the figures show for incidence and rates of change:

NEW CASES,

                         May 4-May 8         May 8-12          May 12-16

World              351,825, +10%      340,654, +9%    371,044, +9%

U.S.                  104,053, +9%        93,014, +7%      98,394, +7%

SC                    516, +8%               650, +9%           615, +8%

AL                    1,158, +15%          1,118, +12%      1,209, +12%

DEATHS,

World               22,928, +9%         16,575, +6%      21,314, +7%

U.S.                   8,336, 12%           4,834, +6%        6,711, +8%

SC                     41, +15%              30, +9%             34, +10%

AL                     79, +27%              34, +9%             80, +20%

The raw numbers continue to be staggering. In the world there are now 4,646,409 cases and 308,984 deaths from the coronavirus. In the U.S., there are 1,484,287 cases and 88,507 deaths. At least 6,711 Americans died of the disease just in the last four days. That is a current death rate of app. 1,600/day. At this rate, there will be well over 200,000 Americans dead of the plague by the end of the summer. Indeed, there will be 100,000 dead before the end of this month. The great flu pandemic of 1918 killed some 600,000 Americans (in 1918-1919). Some experts are now predicting COVID-19 rate may exceed that before a vaccine appears. Leading scientists are now saying we will not have a vaccine in less than 12-18 months and perhaps longer. Thus, we are in for worse, much worse for at least the next year. It is best to accept this terrible reality and get prepared.

The last time we checked the numbers, for the previous four-day period, they suggested a lessening in the rates of spread and mortality of COVID-19. This is not the case this time. Rates are the same or increasing across the board except for a slight fall in new cases in SC. New cases in the world and the U.S. continue to rise at the same rates. An alarming change is the rise in the death rate. It is significantly up in the world and the U.S. in the last four days after having shown a decline. The death rates in SC and AL are cause for grave concern. 

Overall, the statistics show that the pandemic is spreading in size and intensity at the same or increasing rates. This is coming at the same time that most localities in America are re-opening public places. Many experts warn this is the wrong time to be doing this and we can expect rates to climb for the foreseeable future.

All of this is bad news. It is hard to take. We wish fervently this were not true. People are falling sick and dying all around us from a highly contagious and lethal disease that no one can stop. We feel helpless. We are frightened. We are sad. However, we need to know the truth what is happening in this crisis if we are to make good decisions about how we react to it.

As always, let us remember that no one wanted this. No one caused it. But, here we are caught in the grip of a microscopic organism. We must accept things as they are as we keep the faith that there is a higher order in the universe where light ultimately prevails over the dark. And so, we are here for the living of this hour. Peace.

NEW CDC GUIDELINES OMIT CHURCHES

On yesterday, 14 May 2020, the Centers for Disease Control officially released to the public new guidelines for the re-opening of public places in the United States. These included:  workplaces, child care centers, schools and camps, restaurants and bars, and public transportation. Find an informative article about this here . The new guidelines are brief, general, and simple. Basically they say to follow the local policies for re-opening. This reflects the abdication of national leadership in the face of the worst health crisis to hit the United States in a century.

One will recall that just a couple of weeks ago, someone(s) in the CDC leaked to the media the proposed new guidelines as they were sent to the White House for approval. They were long, detailed and quite restrictive. We know that the WH killed the proposal on 30 April. It was apparently afterwards that the the CDC personnel constructed the new and drastically watered down version which was approved by the WH and released yesterday. Find the original guidelines here .

The original version contained a lengthy section on churches. There was speculation at the time that the WH shelved the whole original version because of the what it saw as too restrictive provisions for churches. These suspicions may have been right considering the total absence of churches in yesterday's publication. The CDC may yet issue new suggestions for churches but if they do they will no doubt be as generalized and un-helpful as the others.

What all of this tells us is that the national response to the COVID-19 pandemic has become thoroughly politicized. The federal government's response to the pandemic has gone through three phases. In the first, January to mid-March, the presidential administration was in denial. It dismissed the problem as minor and temporary. It took very little action to stop the virus. By mid-March it was obvious this policy was failing. 

The second phase ran a month and a half, from mid-March to the end of April. In this, the Congress and the White House combined to produce a massive injection of money into the economy as local governments almost everywhere closed down most areas of public life. People were ordered to stay at home. Four acts were passed by Congress and signed by the president. The third was the most important. It was the $2.2 trillion "bail-out" program that included $1,200 checks to most Americans and "loans" to small businesses (and churches). This bill was passed unanimously in the Senate, an accomplishment that is all but impossible in today's political climate. Even though the administration refused to establish a unified, focused, dedicated national program to fight the pandemic, there was an overall national response, mostly from Congress. The right-wing elements in American coalesced to destroy this unity.

By the end of April, the country moved into the third and present phase of response. It is a return to the politics of polarization and deadlocked hostility which paralyzes any common national program. Conservative elements, voiced by Fox News, denounced the restrictive measures of the second phase and proclaimed the "crisis" to be fake. They verbally attacked the scientists and specialists who advocated for socially restrictive policies as the only viable alternative to the spread of the virus. The conservatives won the day and now dominate the political scene. The scientists have been sidelined. The Democrats in Congress are preparing a fifth and much larger "bail out" bill but the Republican leaders and the White House have publicly declared this to be DOA. Apparently there will be no significant fifth law. The fragile unity of common purpose in the second phase was short-lived. We are now back to pre-pandemic polarization. The CDC is a victim of this. It tried to make a meaningful directive to stop the spread of the virus but this came too late. By the time it floated the restrictive measures, near the end of April, the conservatives had already turned the presidential administration in their favor. Hence, CDC's toothless final version of yesterday. In this third period, the presidential administration and its congressional allies are turning away from the pandemic and focusing on the national election coming up in November. With this, the states and localities are on their own to fight against the worst public health crisis in a century. Meanwhile cases and deaths in America continue to skyrocket with no end in sight. With no national plan and a return to polarized political warfare, the pandemic will only take a greater and greater toll on the country. COVID-19 is highly contagious and deadly. There is no cure or even treatment for the disease. As the scientists are saying, we are in for darker days ahead. The country is facing even greater disruption of life than we have seen.

What this means for churches is that they are on their own according to the local governmental guidelines. As of this moment, there is no specific guidance from the CDC on re-opening churches, and I doubt there will be. This means, the Episcopal and Anglican dioceses of South Carolina are free to decide the conditions under which they will re-open churches as long as these do not conflict with local official policies. 

The Episcopal diocese has said there will be no in-person worship services until after 17 May. They have not announced a policy after that. The Anglican diocese has declared a re-opening of churches. Local churches may resume public worship on 17 May. However, the diocese issued a highly detailed and remarkably restrictive list of "requirements" for the re-openings. It is considerably more demanding that the proposed CDC guidelines that were killed by the White House. Find it here .

For whatever reasons, perhaps the heavy restrictions of the diocesan guidelines for re-opening, some of the ADSC churches are holding off on resuming in-person worship. I looked up several large parishes on the Internet to find their policies. According to their websites:

 St. Philip's of Charleston will not resume public worship for an indefinite time but will continue live-streaming; 

St. Michael's of Charleston will tentatively resume in-person services on June 7; 

St Helena's of Beaufort will continue only on-line church; 

Church of the Cross of Bluffton says "no in-person services will be held" as it continues live-streaming.

I did not consult all of the ADSC parishes, but it is interesting that large and important parishes are hesitant to resume in-person services.

At any rate, the point is that churches are virtually on their own to decide the best ways to resume public worship services. While this gives local church authorities a good amount of freedom, it also puts a great deal of responsibility on them for the welfare of the communicants. The officials' decisions may literally mean life or death to the people returning to their beloved church buildings. Surely, the ADSC has the right attitude about all of this--it is better to bite the bullet now than to face the bullet down the road.

As always, remember, friend, we are here for the living of this hour. Peace.