Muslims, Episcopalians, and Diversity Dreams

Is this how a liberal Episcopal church seeks to increase attendance and draw media attention?

By Mark Tooley

12.7.12

 

On December 15 the Muslim Public Affairs Council (MPAC) will have its annual convention at All Saints Episcopal Church in Pasadena, a prominent liberal parish within the increasingly liberal Episcopal denomination. It's the first time MPAC has convened at a church.

Last week a younger writer on national security issues named Ryan Mauro penned a column critical of MPAC's radical connections in its past and questioned the church's wisdom in hosting it. The article appeared in Frontpagemag.com and on the website of my group, the Institute on Religion and Democracy. On December 6, MPAC and the All Saints Episcopal convened a press conference at the church to denounce an ostensible "attack from right-wing extremists," which seemed mostly to be Mauro's article.

On Sunday, the church's senior pastor, Ed Bacon, cited the controversy in his sermon, faulting a "toxic narrative that too many of our religions have promulgated and that is, that in order to become a part of my religion, you have to hate someone else in another religion or you have to hate somebody else in another category." the rest

At the church press conference, nobody really dealt with the MPAC's controversial past. Instead the church's associate pastor complained of the "hateful, vitriolic, demonization of Islam." The Rev. Susan Russell specifically had in mind 50 offensive emails the church says it has received complaining about the MPAC conference. In a Huffington Post story, she had claimed the emails included "threats" against the church. But at the press conference the senior pastor, Rev. Bacon, as quoted by the Los Angeles Times, admitted there were no actual threats. Yet the emails and the complaints against the church expose the "underbelly of Islamaphobia in this country," Rev. Russell insisted. "It gives us an amazing teachable moment to demonstrate what it looks like when people of faith refuse to be polarized by our differences."