The Episcopal Church - Is she Christian?

The Presiding Bishop of the Episcopal Church (if one can truly call her a bishop) exclaimed that the idea of personal salvation through Jesus Christ is the "great western heresy." Such an idea, she said, is "caricatured in some quarters by insisting that salvation depends on reciting a specific verbal formula about Jesus.' Hmmm. What might St. Paul have to say about this?

Romans 10:9 , ".. if you confess with your mouth, "Jesus is Lord," and believe in your heart that God raised him from the dead, you will be saved."

"You will be saved." I am not quite sure how Ms. Schori missed the point St. Paul is making about salvation in this passage. I am sure, however, that she is convinced that St. Paul did not really mean what he wrote.

Does St. Paul say anything else about a confession of Jesus as Lord and its impact on one's eternal condition?

In the very next verse, Romans 10:10, St. Paul writes, "For with the heart man believeth unto righteousness; and with the mouth confession is made unto salvation." St. Paul once again seems to be quite clear about the power of confessing Jesus as Lord. That Ms. Schori could miss this is extraordinary but I am sure she has what she considers a rotational reasoning that far surpasses the weight of Scripture and over 2000 years of Church teachings.

Let us see if St. Paul or any other New Testament writer might have had something else to say about confessing the name of Jesus and its effect on the eternal condition of one's soul.

St. John in his first epistle writes, "Whosoever shall confess that Jesus is the Son of God, God dwelleth in him, and he in God." St. John seems to be saying that if one confesses Jesus is Lord God dwells in him or her. Thus, if God dwells in them, the act of salvation has taken place in that person's life. John wrote in this same epistle that if one does not confess Jesus as Lord and the Son of God, God does not dwell in him. Rather, the spirit of the Antichrist resides in that person. So, for St. John, the power of confessing the name of Jesus carries with it the power of salvation.

Once again, I am sure Ms. Schori believes that St. John simply got it wrong and that since she is far more evolved and enlightened that St. John, who was Jesus' disciple and rested on his at the Last Supper, she better understands what God really intends when it comes to salvation and confessing the name of Jesus.

Another, you ask?

In the Book of Acts, St. Luke quotes St. Peter who quotes the prophet Joel who said, " And it shall come to pass, that whosoever shall call on the name of the Lord shall be saved." A three-fold witness to the power of confessing the name of the Lord. The prophet Joel spoke prophetically about Jesus and Peter spoke with first-hand knowledge of Jesus and the power of salvation that comes with confessing with one's mouth the name of the Lord.

One could go on and on throughout the Scriptures to show the blatant disregard for the teaching of scripture as it relates to confessing the name of Jesus that Ms. Schori has exercised. Such an exercise, while helpful, would only get the likely response from Ms. Schori and the majority of the Episcopal House of Bishops that proof texting is not the answer and that they, as enlightened and more highly evolved humans, better understand what God wants today than did these men in their time.

Given Ms. Schori's claim to hold title to what truth is, one must then conclude that if she makes no effort to retract her above cited statement and if the Episcopal Church's General Convention makes no effort to correct her then they no longer can lay claim to be a Christian church. TEC may as well simply acknowledge the fact that they have rejected Christ and join the likes of the Unity church where all beliefs are possible.

Please, Ms. Schori, like Ray Johnson from the 1970's Natural Light beer commercial who told people they could call him Ray or Jay or anything but they did not have to call him Johnson, please call yourself anything but Christian if you choose to continue to deny Christ.