Bp. Mark Lawrence: A Conservationist among Lumberjacks

October 1, 2010
By Mark J. Lawrence
(The Rt. Rev. Mark Joseph Lawrence is the 14th Bishop of South Carolina.)

They were like men coming up with axes to a grove of trees (Psalm 74:5)

It may well be true that “The pen is mightier than the sword.” Unfortunately, it has not always been mightier than the axe. As that eloquent environmentalist Aldo Leopold wrote: “A conservationist is one who is humbly aware that with each stroke [of the axe] he is writing his signature on the face of his land.” Far too many of the leaders in our church have never learned this lesson.

There is much axe swinging these days in the Episcopal Church. I have grown sad from walking among the stumps of what was once a noble old-growth Episcopalian grove in the forest of Catholic Christianity. It may surprise some, but I write not to bemoan the theological or moral teaching that is in danger of falling to the logger’s axe. I have done that elsewhere. My concern here is that as the church’s polity is felled only a few bother to cry “timber.”

I have space to raise three concerns, and these briefly: the presiding bishop’s threat to our polity —litigious and constitutional; the revisions to the Title IV canons; and, finally, a passing word about inhibitions and depositions to solve our theological/spiritual crisis.

The rest at The Living Church