A.S. Haley: Who Dares Call It by Name?

January 19, 2016

Excerpt:
At the root of what ECUSA has seen fit to do with its marriage liturgies is, to speak simply and directly, the sin of blasphemy -- against both Jesus Christ our Savior, and against the Holy Trinity. Nothing has changed since I laid it out in this earlier post:

The blasphemy begins in the rite at the point where the celebrant says to the congregation (see p. 98 of these materials; my bold emphasis added):

Dearly beloved: We have come together in the presence of God to witness and bless the joining together of N. and N. in Holy Matrimony. The joining of two people in a life of mutual fidelity signifies to us the mystery of the union between Christ and his Church, and so it is worthy of being honored among all people.

As I wrote in an earlier post, critiquing the rite when it was first proposed, the bold language evinces a category mistake of the worst sort, by equating the union of two people of the same gender to the holy union between Christ and His Church. (How can they be so equated? In the former, which of the two men -- or two women -- signifies Christ, and which the Church?)

The earlier posts also explain how the trial rites for same-sex marriages go on to blaspheme the Holy Trinity, as well as each of the three Persons separately, so that the sin is comprehensive and complete. (Was no one on the drafting committee, or among the bishops, clergy and laity who voted for the rituals, mindful of Jesus's warning in the twelfth chapter of Matthew?

[31] Therefore I tell you, every sin and blasphemy will be forgiven people, but the blasphemy against the Spirit will not be forgiven. [32] And whoever speaks a word against the Son of Man will be forgiven, but whoever speaks against the Holy Spirit will not be forgiven, either in this age or in the age to come. (Matthew 12:31-32 ESV))

Regardless of what may be the spiritual consequences of such blasphemy, it simply cannot be that a Communion of Christian churches will ignore, let alone accommodate, one of their member provinces as it systematically goes about promoting and uttering blasphemy in its rites and liturgies.

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