Sunday, July 25, 2010

Pushback

Both the MadPriest and The Anglo-Catholic are carrying the story of a playwright who feels marginalized at Toronto's Church of St Mary Magdalene over his "traditional" views on same-sex relationships. Following on the heels of the "dog bites God" story making the rounds, this one plays into a favourite conservative trope: the "illiberal liberal."

This tactic allows reasserters to shift attention from their own pet intolerance (marriages that fall short of the sacred penis-in-vagina ideal) by turning the principles of theological liberalism on their head. See, "liberals" aren't tolerant of intolerance, so we must be intolerant ourselves, get it? Of course, it's only a semantic trick, but it sounds like a good talking point and is second perhaps only to the "bums on pews" trope in terms of dangerous equivocation. (Churches that welcome gays, we are told, are hemorrhaging members - the paradoxical implication being that the way to fill churches is to restrict eligibility for membership).

As usual, the comparison is one of apples and oranges. Mr McKillop wrote a play, on the public record, that is openly disparaging of the plight of gays in the church who seek its blessing. Whether he agrees with them or not, that he then expects to be able to waltz into a community to which a fair number of such people have given their lives and be "welcomed" is the height of hubris. Now, a rational person would say, of course a gay couple in the choir is going to be unnerved by your presence. But in reasserter Bizarro World, it is the gay couple who are the bigots with their ungracious reception of him. Mr McKillop protests that he said nothing to the men "while singing" and so he cannot understand their rudeness and assumes the snub is attributable to "something they had heard about me or what I had written" (gee, ya think?) Funny that - gays can read? If I insult someone else in writing, it still counts? Go figure. I mean, if I had written negatively about black Canadians, I could hardly then show up at the local British Methodist Episcopal church and expect a warm welcome so long as I don't mention verbally what I've already made clear in print.

The headline of the piece is 'An Anglican who no longer feels safe.' This is particularly sneaky prose, since of course it is clearly the gay couple who would be made to feel less than safe by the arrival of a wag like Mr McKillop. This couple has presumably been singing without incident for some time before someone with an agenda showed up to make trouble. I'm sure I would have been similarly concerned in their shoes. My parish family is very important to me and if someone arrived who openly believed that my belonging there was an abomination I would of course consider that a threat. But because they cannot win the battle on theological grounds, "reassserters" have simply inverted the terminology. Now, the Anglican Church of Canada's tepid efforts to afford its gay and lesbian members a modicum of respect are portrayed as a campaign to hound out others. Since they can't argue with trying to make a few people feel a bit more safe, they spin it around and accuse the liberals of what they themselves have hitherto been doing. So now the slow move of the Anglican Church into the 20th century (only ten years late and counting!) is depicted not as a measure of greater safety (for gays) but less. The same phenomenon can be seen at synod where Essentials show up with their Zacchaeus Fellowship, whose mind-bending premise is that by allowing gays and lesbians who wish to enter committed relationships to do so, the church is somehow not respecting the rights of those who do not so wish (!)

Heterosexual Anglicans like Mr McKillop are eminently safe. For most of the church's history, they were the only ones who were. Now efforts are being made to extend that safety to others. But doing so does not diminish the safety of heterosexuals - instead, for once, it simply isn't about them. If Mr McKillop feels unsafe it is because of statements he has chosen to make publicly. That those whom he has attacked take umbrage at his presence is not some conspiracy - it is the consequence of his own actions.

So like much of the reasserter literature on homosexuality, Mr McKillop's tantrum in the Putz is high on scary sounding rhetoric and low on theology (see for example this post, whose author when challenged on his talking points tacitly confessed his inability to defend his matching-bits fetish on theological grounds). If Mr McKillop wishes to inhabit a church where he can write whatever venom he likes about gays on Saturday and they will docilely shake his hand at the Pax on Sunday, he is welcome to the Roman Catholic Church. Anglican gay folk reserve the right to be uppity.

Like Republicans in the United States, conservatives have a tendency to confuse losing with oppression. Finding themselves on the wrong side of history their only chance is to make as much noise as possible on the way out, in hopes of momentarily stunning us. But to anyone who has taken a first-year "reading critically" course, Mr McKillop's column is transparently hollow. While their argument has been indulged until now - and for too long - on the strength of its age, it is becoming clear that the Emperor has no clothes. While reasserters hate the comparison of the gay civil rights movement to its African American antecedent, they do not give people under 30 a reason to resist the analogy. Most of us believe that segregation was wrong not because blacks are some sacredly protected class but because it is unjust to treat a class of persons differently because of an involuntary personal characteristic. To hold this in the case of one group but not another is special pleading. In fact it is simply that the self-styled "orthodox" (who fought desegregation just as hard as gender-neutral marriage) have given up one prejudice but not yet another.

34 comments:

Malcolm+ said...

It was fascinating to read your exchange with David - until I recognized the usual far right tactic of arguing against what he pretended you said.

Of course, the far right like to pretend that the SSB issue is intrinsically related to every Christological heresy that ever existed so that they can pretend their posturing isn't all about hate.

Anonymous said...

This is an excellent post.

I would say (generalizing from personal experience, make of it what you will) that when push comes to shove straight people are not your problem. Straight people have a limited stake in same-sex attraction as a subject - it's just not all that interesting, past a certain point.

Your problem is with people who are conflicted about experiencing same-sex attraction, in denial about experiencing same-sex attraction, or are very threatened by people who live happy lives being public and open about experiencing same-sex attraction. These people are not *straight*. As is often pointed out.

In other words a lot of the culture wars around the issue seem to be largely fought out by two bitterly opposed factions of gay men. (In principle there should be women too, but they seem less visible.)

McKillop is a jerk (MadPriest's 'drama queen' label sticks), and Holy Family is welcome to him. Also he should learn to spell 'Tenebrae.'

Paul Goings said...

I am puzzled by the title of the article. If I understand correctly, Mr McKillop returned to his parish church after some years away and rejoined one of the choirs. Two persons in the choir objected to Mr McKillop's presence because of his well-publicized traditional views on sexuality, and left the choir. After a series of unpublicized emails with the choir's director, Mr McKillop has now also decided to leave the parish.

This is all very sad, of course, but I fail to see how Mr McKillop's experience justifies saying that he no longer feels that "the Anglican Church of Canada is a safe environment in which to think." Perhaps the approach to such matters varies widely from parish to parish, but at S. Clement's this would not have happened. I know this to be true because a few years ago a new server (who had been with us for something like six months) became aware that there was another server who generally held to what is taught by the Roman Catholic church on the topic of human sexuality. The new server was very distressed by this, and approached the head of the servers' guild to tell him what he had discovered, and request that the server in question should be dismissed, as he (the new server) was uncomfortable working with someone who held those views. The response was that there was not a moral theology litmus test for membership in the servers' guild, and that no dismissals would be forthcoming. His appeal to the rector received a similar response. In the end, he left the parish over it, and we haven't heard from him since.

So what I take away from Mr McKillop's story is that musicians (no matter their differing views on sexuality) are temperamental, and inclined to do irrational things.

The Religious Pícaro said...

The McKillop article was bizarre - it really does sound as if he's swimming the Tiber to spite members of the St. Mary Magdalene Ritual Choir. Is this person well known in Canada?

keith nethery said...

Job well done in this post and in the discussion with David on Samizdat. I've had more than one such conversation with David, Warren and the others that haunt the far right side of Anglicanism that ended similarly - oh, but we're right and you're wrong because we say so, thank you for coming and come back again so we can tell you how right we are. I honestly think that we need to bust into their world every once now and again to give them a dose of reality. I've just finished a two part series for the September and October editions of the Huron Church News in which I've tried to say some similar things, but in a way that most in the pews on Sunday morning can access it. I believe that discussion is an under utilized form of learning, because it takes hard work to listen, learn, contribute, and go through the same process over and over and over again. It's so much easier to say I'm right, and shut it down, but in the long run, I think the hard work of hanging on to relationship and discussion is worth it

McKillop said...

I'd also like to know where Holy Family Church was mentioned in my article. Oh the cowardice behind blogging.

McKillop said...

Sorry, but I think you must have missed my original pasting. My play is not a matter of public record as it has never been published and has yet to be produced in Canada. Furthermore, it has never been read or discussed with the people who took issue with me having written it. They threw a stone at me and ran away and still to this day have not said what it was I said or did to cause offense.
As the British Ambassador and her Cultural Attache said to me at the play's premiere in Prague, I managed to take a controversial issue and treat it with sensitivity and humour. Guess you will all just have to see it for yourself to see if I have succeeded or not.

Anonymous said...

Mr Goings' story is an interesting one.

Though I think there is something to Mad Priest's "drama queen" remark, this is a complicated question, and a hasty conversion to Rome seems over the top on one question alone.

Having recently been through an email battle with a friend who made similar disparaging remarks about gay relationships on the web, the friend in question told me "I didn't say it to your face so that shouldn't affect our friendship..."

But my angry reaction does trouble me somewhat. Where is the line between speaking one's conscience and speaking in charity? or is there a line?

Anonymous #2

McKillop said...

censorship reigns!!

McKillop

McKillop said...

Also, I think that Anonymous should come out of the closet. As I never mentioned Holy Family in my article he is obviously on to some insider information, and like the two persecuted souls in the choir is content to throw a stone at me and run away to safety rather than to have the courage to put his name to something he has written.

G said...

As I'm just processing the backlog of comments this has generated, I'll need to digest them before I respond to their substance. But in the meantime, I don't think there was anything sinister about the reference to Holy Family - it's simply where Anglo-Catholics in Toronto typically go to "pope." If we were in London, I'd expect a similar metonymic use of their Oratory. I do, however, ask anonymous contributors to devise an alias, not to identify themselves but simply to distinguish them from other anonymouses (as Anon 2 has done).

dpb said...

in response to the original post: hear hear! (and nothing to digest or respond to)

Barnabas said...

As to Mr McKillop's request that Anonymous come out of the closet - If he was speaking to me, then I am very much out, but would not wish to identify the person whose blog post so offended me. That wouldn't do

Barnabas, formerly Anonymous #2

Anonymous said...

Mr. McKillop is being so coy here. He has made an effort to publicize his side of the issue and to embarrass St. Mary Magdalene's and the Anglican Church of Canada. In the end, it doesn't loook good on him. His determination and vehemence to pusue this would imply that he hasn't really "poped" or he would just be gone. He keeps coming back to inflict (or absorb?) whatever abuse he can. It is one thing when a gay person or couple know that someone is uncomfortable or disapproves; it is quite another when someone has written a play and has made public statements and then deliberately carries this with him and intentionally provokes. It's splitting hairs to say that the play hasn't been published in Canada and to base his "innocence" on this supposed fact, when anything published anywhere is available and acccessible. has he ever heard of the internet or the postal system. He's having fun at the expense of Anglicans and doesn't care. Hopefully his new friends in Rome aren't encouraging him, since there are many principled Roman Catholics who don't bait others as he is doing. How sad for them.

Anonymous said...

"The Anglican Church is no lnger a safe place to think". Oh please. The Church has been too long a safe haven for opinionated conservatives-that's what Anglicanism means to some. Now that we have moved out of that sad place, people like Mr. McKillop no longer feel safe? How does he think gay people, including clergyhave felt for generations? Have they been safe? He is really saying that it isn't safe any longer for him to get away with riding roughshod over the opinions and lives of others. if it is only safe for him when it is unsafe for others, we can forget the Gospel.

Astonishing Hedgehog said...

I now see our host's point about aliases. The Anonymous in #14 and #15 is not the Anonymous in #2; that would be the poster now known as Astonishing Hedgehog.

Astonishing Hedgehog said...

1)
McKillop said...

censorship reigns!!

McKillop

July 27, 2010 3:40 PM

Our host strongly disagrees with your views, and to the best of my knowledge is giving you an open forum to explain and defend your views. I leave it to you to explain where the censorship comes in.

2)

The remaining Anonymous says:

"His determination and vehemence to pursue this would imply that he hasn't really "poped" or he would just be gone."

There is something to this. McKillop wants to pope; that is obviously between him, God, and the Supreme Pontiff's representatives. People make these shifts all the time - crossing the Tiber in both directions, crossing the Bosphorus in both directions and so forth. There are other, more obscure crossings involving other bodies of water - crossing the Solway is not unheard of. Ideally they find an environment that suits them better.

On the other hand, there is a type of Anglo-Papalist who spends years, decades, in some cases their entire adult lives threatening to go over to Rome (with lots of accompanying emotional drama) and never actually gets around to it. Either that or bouncing between the two churches in a sort of spiritual serial monogamy.

The StT's parish history tells of a mid-century parishoner who confronted the then rector, announcing 'That's it, Father! It's over! I am *going to Rome!*'

'That's all right, Harriet,' he replied, 'we'll still be here when you get back.'

All of which is to say that if McKillop thinks he can better live out the promises made at his baptism as a Roman Catholic, he should just go and do that, in a manly and straightforward way, without all this bile and energy directed backward at his now almost sort of former communion.

Go in peace, to love and serve the Lord.

Anonymous said...

How nice it is that Mr. McKillop can find safe haven in such a "gay-free zone" as the Roman Catholic Church. Nothing but heterosexuals there. Or good liars, or good deniers, or the selectively blind.

McKillop said...

Oh My...read, good but misguided people, or at least learn how to read. My problem isn't with homosexuality; my problem is with a gay agenda, an insecure one, that is demanding approval, extorting it in the case of the Anglican Church, when they just must reconcile themselves with the pro-creative gospels and universe on an individual basis as their own private concern; between themselves and their maker. I am so fucking tired of being labelled by know nothing "group think" agenda driven, navel gazing, don't disagree with me or I'll cry, asa homophobe. Nothing could be further from the truth. I am completely in agreement that same sex couples should be able to enter into legal situations to reap the benefits thereof. I do not agree with groupthink misappropriation of the longstanding institution of marriage as between a man and a woman for political gain. There is very little "social justice" to be seen in this crusade. At it's best it is mawkish in its sentimentality, and mocking in in its political persuit.

I don't agree with it. I wrote a play with that pthougt process in mind and I do have a pitch from where to both write and speak. Get over it; but more importantly; get over yourselves instead of expecting other people to do that work for you.

Now...want to go down to the beach and shoot some clams?

Jesus!!

McKillop said...

Oh, and by the by, there is no "traditional" view on same sex relationships. You migh want to re-think that sentence. Just trying to help.

Super Anglican said...

I haven't read back through every word of every post to glean where he found the expression he excoriates in his last 9so far) posting. The venom and vitriol he deminstrates is astounding. Most people don't have that much energy for the subject. Now we have the usual disclaimers about it's not gay people, but their agenda I can't stand. It is a fair observation that he loves to see his words in print and he is enjoying both the opportunity and attention, so much so that he cmes back for more and more. It's hard to see in this a humble supplicant to the See of Peter. The Cardinal Archbishop of Westminster (Nichols) said that, if Anglicans aren't comng to Rome because they embrace the Supreme Pontiff, but just to avoid gays and women, he would rather not have them. The "gay agenda" for others is simply "the human agenda". See ing gay people as sub-human, immoral, degenerate, and the "other" that one is allowed to hate (or whatever word fits-"dislike" is far too weak) is the classic stance of a person who needs someone to place below themselves, upon whom they can vent their otherwise anti-social and inhuman hatreds (self or toherwise) and pesonal frustrations. It's a good thing for mr. McK. that he can find people upon whom he can lavish so much negativity and, yes, abuse. It's better than going and kicking dogs and children in parks or stealing canes from the elderly. I assume he lives alone, or I would suggest police protection for his co-habitant.

Anonymous said...

As a gay person and gay Anglican of sixty years of life in the Church since Baptism, I was not aware that I had an agenda. My only agenda, like the agenda of my fellow Anglican Christians is to pray, work, and live together with my family in Christ and to offer my time, talent, and treasure for the ministry and mission of the Church. My agenda is to receive the Eucharist so that Christ may live in me and I in him and, in receiving His Body to become more like Christ in His Body, the Church. Living in the Church with respect, acceptance, support, and dignity may be my agnda, but it the agenda of every person. more importantly, it is the agenda of the Gospel. So much for the gay agenda in the Anglican Church.

eh.jay said...

Geoff, by comparing racial issues to homosexuality you have done exactly what you accuse McKillop of - comparing apples to oranges. The Bible never calls black people an "abomination" or destroys cities rampant with black people - the same cannot be said about homosexuality. Your constant comparisons to racial intolerance is a hollow attempt at making a point.

Your assertion that "they cannot win the battle on theological grounds" is not a fact and very short sighted. The bottom line is the Bible is quite clear that homosexuality is an abomination. It is also equally clear that despite that fact (I say fact because I am quoting verbatim), we are called to accept them as we would anyone else.

"A lying tongue" is also an abomination. Some people are pathalogical liars. Shall we bless this fact about people or help them overcome something that clearly God is not ok with?

I would also like to encourage you to take a long deep breath and try to soak up the thousands of years of knowledge and wisdom in Christiandom before assuming that just because the calendar turned to the year 2000 that we must buy something new. We are talking about the Alpha and Omega - He does not change. Don't confuse secular marketing theology (new year, new millenium, therefore buy new stuff because the old stuff is no longer cool) with the instructions God has given us.

Interestingly I'm listening to an 80s internet radio station... George Michael's "Faith" just came on. lol

Astonishing Hedgehog said...

What did the poor clams do to you?

G said...

jay: your counter-assertion does not explain on what grounds racial prejudice is wrong. I have suggested that it is because it extends differential treatment on the grounds of involuntary personal traits. If so, the gay issue is very much analogous. If not, then what do you propose in its place?

The "clear" meaning of the Bible is not always the most illuminating. That conservatives have been unable to account for their moral differentiation of conjugal relationships on the basis of genitals is indeed a fact as evidenced by the fact that we are still having this conversation and the question remains on the table.

Many things in the Bible are categorized as "abomination" (ritually proscribed). Even the most orthodox Jew would not suggest that these are universal moral laws binding on non-Jews and offensive to G-d in and of themselves. If monogamous same-gender relationships are indeed a sin, they are a sin committed by a relatively small proportion of individuals when it is the least immoral choice available. Such a case is in no wise comparable to that of a sociopath. I long for a day when people who find themselves in such circumstances will have equal access to drink freely of our rich inheritance which you cite and not be penalized for doing the best they can. "For they bind heavy burdens, hard to bear, and lay them on men’s shoulders; but they themselves will not move them with one of their fingers."

eh.jay said...

Geoff, while racism and homophobia both fall under the category of prejudice they are not analogous (pardon the phun) in this case because the former refers to a physical trait, the later is a behaviour. I propose you avoid analogies like this as they can be misleading and influence the reader's heart over his mind.

True Gen 19:24 and Lev 18:22 may not be illuminating, but we can't skirt the issue and pretend these passages don't exist because it's not in favour with contemporary views. I have much sin in my life. It's my job to shed light on it and let God help me change to be the man He wants me to be ... many times that is not necessarily the man I want to be.

Unlike the Pharisees, I am quite sincere and make every attempt not to be a hypocrite. Indeed, I feel ok to speak on this topic of loving the sinner but not approving of their sin for the simple fact the best man at my wedding/godfather to my eldest son is gay. We have discussed these issues at length (at his request) and he has never felt offended.

In terms of any kind of hierarcy where sin is concerned, let me say this - I think assaulting gay people, ostracising them and making them feel unwelcome in the church is more wrong than committing sodomy. And I also think that many people who are against having gay people worship God should take their unseem beams out of their eye before commenting on the speck in their homo brother's eye.

Super Anglican said...

I am astonished that the "homosexuality is an abomination" passage is quoted here without any context or interpretatation. in fact, it is homosexual acts you refer to, since "being Gay' is no longer regarded as a choice. I never met a gay person who made that decision. Sadly, have some who wish it were otherwise. Homosexuality is nothing new at all, but perhaps we can see it differently from those who have assumed over centuries that it was a poor moral choice or a bad decision that could be overturned. It cannot be a sin to "be" gay any more than a sin to be left-handed, although even the left-handed were viewed as "sinister". No one interprets the "sin" of Sodom and Gomorrah as homosexuality. So we are left with persons of homosexual orientation who must deal with this fact in their lives. They have never known anything else and every aspect of their life is affected by it. Did God make them in error? Does God hate them and want to condemn them for something they did not choose? You answer would be that they must accept this fact and live without intimacy, any form of normal human contact, affection, and support, and without any physical expression of love. Sex is banned from their lives and they must be celibate, even if it is against their will, however much they try to control and deny it, and their God-given human nature. However, this is no problem for straight people who were fortunate enough to be born heterosexual and whose relationship with God has no such complications. they can have realtionships, love, families, and an honoured place in society, as well as the legal benefits. And this is God's plan? Consigning gay people to empty, lonely lives with no possibility of sexual expression is easy for those who don't have to experience life in that way. How the tribal rules of nomadic Hebrews, without the Gospel of love, can be assumed to apply to the gay man, women, child, or couple who live on your street, work beside you, or attend your church, is astounding. Unless you want to refuse to eat seafood and refuse to cut your hair, or much worse, please consider the Commandment to love as you are loved.

G said...

But it isn't just a "behaviour," but something one is. "Homosexuality" isn't simply something done by recalcitrant heterosexuals. And the same "behaviour" by opposite-sex couples is one we not only condone but bless and sacralize. Moreover, despite your disclaimers, most who argue against same-gender unions don't simply believe that they are sinful in the way that, say, overeating is sinful. They usually believe that the extent to which those in them can participate in the life of the Church should be curtailed in formal ways. And this seems to me the position that is not sustainable whatever one may think of the morality of homosexuality.

As for those who would argue for head over heart, I am inclined to be suspicious of such exhortations as inviting casuistry over doing the common-sense right thing.

eh.jay said...

Geoff, I think you're mixing rhetoric with word meaning. Something "one is" is a matter of DNA. As far as I know a sexual preference gene has not been identified. Since homosexuality is a matter of action (either by viewing, participating, or feeling) it is therefore a behaviour. I'm just categorizing it and differentiating it from skin colour - not hinting that the feelings are ingenuine.

My view on same gender relationships is to simply to go ahead and have a civil ceremony. It should be their civil right in a democratic country to do so. Go right ahead and call it marriage. But just as I would not insist on going to a synogogue with a pork chop I do not think gays should come to a Christian church and ask for their relationships to be blessed. And just because they come and just because some bless them doesn't automatically mean they are blessed in the eyes of the Lord. Cain, Ananias & Sapphira each sought blessing, but the Lord did not grant it because they brought their offering on their terms, not Gods.

Although I agree that glutony is a very under appreciated sin, I don't recall as harsh a penalty for that as fire and brimstone reigning down on a town as did Sodom & Gomorrah.

A sinner who acknowledges their sin and doesn't try to excuse it should never be denied the opportunity to serve. Unfortunately heteros are better at hiding and ignoring theirs.

JCF said...

eh.jay your ad nauseam repetition of DISPUTED TERMS is, well, nauseating.

Why can't you understand that a claim like "the Bible calls homosexuality an abomination" simply doesn't hold water? You have to make a CASE, NOT just repeat a talking-point (or 7 selected---by means of an agenda---Biblical verses)

But enough about rancid ol' eh.jay. McKillop, could you please explain this:

They threw a stone at me and ran away and still to this day have not said what it was I said or did to cause offense.

How does two people quitting a choir, without public comment, equal "throwing a stone"? [If you want to know what being on the receiving end of thrown stone, it looks more like this]

McKillop said...

By the way...I'd like to know how you could possibly know that I have written a play that is openly "disparaging" of gay people? That you have a website called The 'Rose' Maniple sort of indicates where your priorities are as a future Priest and I think it's very sad that the Anglican Church has become infested with the likes of you and those who post on this extremely fey sight; it's the enemy within, and I'm ashamed we don't have a current Bishop of this Diocese, or Primate for that matter, who lacks the courage or conviction to tell you all to tell you all to start your own Church instead of deliberately trying to rip this one apart.

That feels better

McKillop

G said...

The title of this site is not any sort of allusion, nor is the same-sex debate a "priority" of ministry for me. I would very much like for it to be over, but unfortunately it is kept alive by people like you who dig in your heels at the admission to church life of anyone whose personal circumstances differ from your own and in the absence of an actual theological argument (31 comments and still waiting!) for your penile-vaginal sacramental theology expect us to take your word for it that God views our lives with disdain.

This site is merely my own musings on a variety of matters including but not limited to liturgy, sacramental theology, and the occasional domestic political tangent. Its readership consists of those who happen to find these thoughts interesting or in some way worth engaging and is not any kind of "infestation." The notion that those of us seeking to belong to the Church without being penalized for something we can do nothing about are "deliberately tearing it apart" by our presence is both insulting and so absurd I cannot begin to address it. More reasserter bizarro world - your wish to be a Christian is commendable but mine is a malicious plot to destroy the Church from within.

If the notion of inhabiting a church with me is so repulsive to you then you indeed ought to go to Rome. We all know there are no "fey-folk" there. If your conduct at SMM was anywhere as rude as it has been to the readers of this blog it is no wonder you are persona non grata there as here. Goodbye Mr McKillop.

Super Anglican said...

It's obvious that Mr. McKillop has vener heard of Gaudete or Laetare Sundays, despite his pro-Roman pretensions. The man dost protest too much, methinks.

John K said...

I just came across this blog, so my comment, at the bottom of the list, refers back to comment #1.
"...so that they can pretend their posturing isn't all about hate..." seems like a rather hateful, or at least an extremely accusatory and judgmental comment in itself.