The Episcopalian Circus

I wish I could say this surprises me:

Shortly after noon on Fridays, the Rev. Ann Holmes Redding ties on a black headscarf, preparing to pray with her Muslim group on First Hill. On Sunday mornings, Redding puts on the white collar of an Episcopal priest. She does both, she says, because she’s Christian and Muslim.

Redding, who until recently was director of faith formation at St. Mark’s Episcopal Cathedral, has been a priest for more than 20 years. Now she’s ready to tell people that, for the last 15 months, she’s also been a Muslim — drawn to the faith after an introduction to Islamic prayers left her profoundly moved….

Redding’s bishop, the Rt. Rev. Vincent Warner, says he accepts Redding as an Episcopal priest and a Muslim, and that he finds the interfaith possibilities exciting.

This sort of incoherent idiocy isn’t as unusual as you’d assume it would be. And it’s not the dumb ones who are prone to it either, but the intelligent maleducated. I once dated a girl with a degree from a well-regarded college who thought she was still a Catholic in good standing after converting to Mormonism.

Her: “Just because I’m Mormon doesn’t mean I’m not Catholic anymore.”

Vox: “How did you manage to graduate without learning what ‘convert’ means? Oh, that’s right, you’re an IR major.”

This sort of thing tends to make one suspect that perhaps there is a very good reason the Bible forbids putting women in leadership positions in the Church. If you want to kill a church, just put a woman in the pulpit.

Interfaith possibilities are exciting. So is the Dark Lord obtaining the Ring of Power. That doesn’t make either one of them desirable. Both the bishop and the priest should be excommunicated; the fact that they will be celebrated instead is proof that the Episcopalian organization is no longer a Christian church, but a post-Christian circus.