The main Anglican community in the world continues to distance itself further from orthodox Christianity. During the last 40 years the idea, first of approving priestesses, contrary to the Scriptures and unheard of in the 2000- year history of Christianity, followed immediately by the instalment of female bishops, has created such an abyss between mainstream Anglicans on the one hand and Catholics and Eastern Orthodox on the other that formal theological discussions are no longer possible for the time being, or perhaps forever.

            The situation is further aggravated by the Anglican community’s surrender to the western world’s abandonment of Christian morality, first contraception (1930), then abortion (1967), today especially the acceptance of homosexuality as a principle and as a church-approved way of life and agenda. While contraception and abortion remain mostly unheard and unseen as private family matters, homosexuality, in contrast, is loud, provocative, ugly, and eminently destructive of unity. Even the collapse of Canada’s largest Protestant community, the United Church of Canada, in its abandonment of both dogma and morality, seems to have left no impact on Canadians.

Anglicans in Canada

            Anglicans in Canada are an example how quickly the ground shifts. In January 2009 the Canadian Anglican diocese of Huron in London, ON, informed its congregations that while a nuptial blessing could not be conferred over same-sex unions, it would still be possible to “celebrate a Eucharist” with the “couple,” including “appropriate intercessory prayers.”

            Later that same month the Anglican Archdiocese of Toronto, Canada’s largest Anglican community, let it be known that it will start blessing same-sex relationships within a year; for now, however, it announced, the blessing will be restricted to couples in “stable long-term committed relationships” (“Anglicans eyeing same-sex blessing;” Toronto Star, Jan. 21, 2009).

            On March 4, 2009, the Anglican diocese of Ottawa announced, without further ado, that it would begin to perform same-sex blessings, becoming thereby the first diocese to make such a move since the ban imposed by the international Anglican community. The 2007 moratorium of worldwide Anglicanism was imposed after the Canadian Diocese of New Westminster, in Vancouver, British Columbia, had struck out on its own and began performing same-sex blessings in 2002. This was followed by the ordination of Gene Robinson, as bishop of New Hampshire, USA, an openly “gay” man who had first left his wife and children for his male lover.

            Ottawa’s Archdeacon Ross Moulton meanwhile explained that Ottawa’s move was not a violation of the moratorium but an “experimental” move to help the diocese to continue its process of “discerning.” (“Anglican diocese will defy and bless,” National Post, March 4, 2009).

            In April 2007 Anglican leaders of Africa and Asia, meeting in London, announced that they would accept protestant Anglicans separating from mainline Anglicanism, as a new legitimate branch of the Anglican community. They themselves were about to separate as well. However, not all Africans are opposed to accepting homosexual behaviour: Archbishop Desmond Tutu is a well-known exception. 

            Back in Canada, in May, 2009, the Anglican Bishop of London, ON, reiterated his determination to move forward on same-sex blessings and develop an appropriate “liturgy.” In August, the Anglican diocese of Niagara Falls followed suit in support of same-sex unions.

The larger context

            On June 23the North American Protestant-Evangelical-oriented Anglican splinter groups opposed to same-sex unions and to women bishops became known as the Anglican Church in North America (ACNA) and in Canada as the Anglican Network of Canada. As for the US Episcopalian bishops, they affirmed that from now on in their community male and female homosexuals could be ordained to “any ordained ministry” (LifeSiteNews.com, July 14).

            As for Catholic-leaning Anglicans many of whom had broken away earlier, they are now known as the Traditional Anglican Community (TAC) with Archbishop Hepworth of the Anglican Catholic Church in Australia as their primate. It was on the invitation of this group that Pope Benedict created a new opening for Anglicans to join the Catholic Church. This group, despite its name, has ties neither to the newly formed Protestant group nor to mainstream Anglicanism, except in England. Here the “Forward in Faith” movement is still connected to the Church of England.

            On the international scene. homosexuals continue to expand their grip on Christian communities. The Lutheran Church of Sweden “ordained” its first lesbian bishop on November 8, 2009, less than a month after it gave its ministers the right to “marry” same-sex couples in church. (LifeSiteNews.com, Nov. 11).

            In the United States, the Evangelical Lutheran Church declared its clergy open to “same-gender” relationship in August 2009, with a vote of 55% to 45%, once again splitting a community in half (Washington Times, Aug. 23, 2009). The outcome of all this agitation is undoubtedly the destruction of the communities involved and the end of serious ecumenical theological discussions with Catholicism or Orthodoxy.

Propaganda vs. Morality of the Minimum

            With a “Morality of the Minimum,” so widespread even among believers, as a Vatican Archbishop Luis Ladaria put it recently, people find it increasingly difficult to resist the propaganda for the homosexual community.

            In Canada the federal law itself now works against traditional values, having replaced traditional marriage between husband and wife with “marriage” between any two persons in July 2005. The Prime Minister responsible for getting the legislation through Parliament, Paul Martin of the Liberal party, was a Catholic, itself a revealing sign of the tottering moral condition of many in the Canadian Catholic community. Since that date few people have even noticed the dire threat to education that has been one of the consequences of the change in the law. Almost overnight activist homosexuals who had presented themselves for over 30 years as sorry and helpless victims of discrimination, transformed into a species of bullies demanding immediate equality for same-sex “marriage” in the school curriculum from grade one to twelve across the country, and threatening to sue any and all opponents.

Human Rights Commissions

            Unknown to many, behind the homosexual “rights” agenda stands a system of government controlled, taxpayer- financed Human Rights Commissions which since the adoption of the Hate Crimes Legislation in 1976 have facilitated the homosexual agenda through the Courts, Parliament and the Provinces. They sue and convict opponents of “Gay” Pride events and its ideologues. Influenced by the media, many Canadians today believe that they must acquiesce to these “rights,” even though they know they are based on sin and perversion. A current example is the media--driven campaign to get George Smitherman, an openly “married” homosexual and recently retired provincial cabinet minister to run for mayor of Toronto.

A “gay” Mayor for Toronto?

            The election is not until November 2010, a year from now. But already all four Toronto newspapers have published articles and photos of “furious” George Smitherman and “his husband” kissing each other and holding hands. The Toronto Star rushed in with an editorial (Nov. 10, 2009) welcoming him to the race.

            Four days later, on Saturday, November 14, the same newspaper, Canada’s largest circulation daily paper, carried a full portrait of him in the centre of its front page, with all of page 6 devoted to someone whom the author readily admitted is regarded as “a bully.” Oh, shouted the Star, Toronto needs “a bully!” A second article also discussed him at length, with another smaller photo on an additional page.

            Toronto’s Globe & Mail, which some years ago had an openly “gay” editor-in-chief for ten years, does not like to be outdone. On the same Saturday, it carried a photo of Smitherman holding a cat with the title a “Tamer, Gentler George,” accompanied by a photo a third of a page high on the front-piece of the Toronto section. Two additional articles filled more than another full page and carried more photos of George and “his husband.”

            Both newspapers played up Smitherman as a homosexual activist, treating this aspect as an achievement worthy of praise. Comedians, meanwhile advertised a new musical called “My Mother’s Lesbian Jewish Wiccan wedding” in the Globe & Mail (Nov. 14) and on Moses Znaimer’s FM Radio, the New Classical Station. Clearly, the overall purpose of the media is to marginalize possible opponents of a “gay” mayor as “bigots” and “extremists.”

Catholic Insight is opposed

            In the summer of 2009, C.I., on its website, opposed the municipal councillor candidacy for the city of Toronto of lesbian Sue Levy and we now oppose the candidacy of George Smitherman for mayor.

            The position of mayor is a representative one, representing the citizens of a city to outsiders and to other levels of government. It is a “value-creating, value-carrying and consensus forming” position (to borrow a phrase from Margaret Somerville, Ottawa Citizen, Nov. 6) for society as a whole. The person elected as mayor is seen as the best person to do this. He or she should unify the citizens, not divide them from the very beginning. But that is exactly what a homosexual activist accomplishes.

·         Homosexual activity is sinful and morally evil: it is contrary to

      God’s law.

·         The homosexual condition itself is an objective disorder (ordered

      toward an intrinsic moral evil, that of homosexual behaviour);

·         The promotion of homosexual activists as legitimate and acceptable

      role models:

holds up narcissism as a value to imitate; undermines the nature and rights of the family; divides the community; promotes pornography; exhibits vulgarity (as in “Gay” parades); confirms others with a homosexual tendency to surrender to erroneous opinions when they should resist instead; misleads youth and society at large; distorts truth, with a materialist ideology which denies the transcendent nature of the human person and that person’s call to seek eternal life.

            Let Toronto citizens be encouraged to think carefully before voting.