The Diocese of
Western North Carolina
My Brothers and Sisters in Christ,
On January 22, Presiding Bishop Michael Curry and the Rev.
Gay Clark Jennings, president of the House of Deputies, called on all people to
examine and repent the many ways in which our Church has been complicit in the
marginalization and victimization of women.
In the letter, they
write, "As our societies have been forced into fresh recognition that
women in all walks of life have suffered unspoken trauma at the hands of male
aggressors and harassers, we have become convinced that the Episcopal Church
must work even harder to create a church that is not simply safe, but holy,
humane and decent."
Indeed, our Lord counted among his disciples several women, and the Gospels record that women were the first to encounter the resurrected Jesus and were the first evangelists. Clearly, he honored, valued and empowered women as vital participating members of his community. As such we, too, are called to advocate for the safety, protection and equality of all women and girls, our sisters in Christ.
I therefore invite everyone to read and reflect on
Bishop Curry and the Rev. Jenning's letter and then to
talk about the implications for our ministry and mission in your parish. It is
my hope that we all take part in an Ash Wednesday Day of Prayer on February 14,
"devoted to meditating on the ways in which we in the church have failed
to stand with women and other victims of abuse and harassment and to consider,
as part of our Lenten disciplines, how we can redouble our work to be
communities of safety that stand against the spiritual and physical violence of
sexual exploitation and abuse."
It is so very important that we join together in prayerful
reflection and recommit ourselves to the holy work of standing up against and
eradicating exploitation and abuse of all God's children.
Faithfully,
The Rt. Rev. José A. McLoughlin ,
VII Bishop of Western
North Carolina
The Episcopal Church
– The Presiding Bishop and the President of the House of Deputies
Dear People of God in the Episcopal Church: January 22, 2018
In recent weeks, compelling testimony from women who have
been sexually harassed and assaulted by powerful men has turned our minds to a
particularly difficult passage of holy scripture: the story of the rape
of King David’s daughter Tamar by her half-brother Amnon (2 Samuel 13: 1-22).
It is a passage in which a conspiracy of men plots the exploitation and rape of
a young woman. She is stripped of the power to speak or act, her father ignores
the crime, and the fate of the rapist, not the victim, is mourned. It is a
Bible story devoid of justice.
For more than two decades, African women from marginalized
communities have studied this passage of scripture using a method called
contextual Bible study to explore and speak about the trauma of sexual assault
in their own lives. Using a manual published by the Tamar Campaign, they ask, “What can the Church do to break the
silence against gender-based violence?”
It is, as the old-time preachers say, a convicting question.
As our societies have been forced into fresh recognition that women in all
walks of life have suffered unspoken trauma at the hands of male aggressors and
harassers, we have become convinced that the Episcopal Church must work even
harder to create a church that is not simply safe, but holy, humane and decent.
We must commit to treating every person as a child of God, deserving of dignity
and respect. We must also commit to ending the systemic sexism, misogyny and
misuse of power that plague the church just as they corrupt our culture, institutions
and governments.
Like our African siblings in faith, we must create contexts
in which women can speak of their unspoken trauma, whether suffered within the
church or elsewhere. And we must do more.
Our church must examine its history and come to a fuller
understanding of how it has handled or mishandled cases of sexual harassment,
exploitation and abuse through the years. When facts dictate, we must confess
and repent of those times when the church, its ministers or its members have
been antagonistic or unresponsive to people—women, children and men—who have
been sexually exploited or abused. And we must acknowledge that in our church
and in our culture, the sexual exploitation of women is part of the same unjust
system that also causes gender gaps in pay, promotion, health and empowerment.
We believe that each of us has a role to play in our
collective repentance. And so, today, we invite you to join us in an Ash
Wednesday Day of Prayer on February 14 devoted to meditating on the ways in
which we in the church have failed to stand with women and other victims of
abuse and harassment and to consider, as part of our Lenten disciplines, how we
can redouble our work to be communities of safety that stand against the
spiritual and physical violence of sexual exploitation and abuse.
Neither of us professes to have all of the wisdom necessary
to change the culture of our church and the society in which it ministers, and
at this summer’s General Convention, we want to hear the voice of the wider
church as we determine how to proceed in both atoning for the church’s past and
shaping a more just future. May we find in our deliberations opportunities to
listen to one another, to be honest about our own failings and brokenness, and
to discern prayerfully the ways that God is calling us to stand with Tamar in
all of the places we find her—both inside the church and beyond our doors,
which we have too often used to shut her out.
Faithfully,
The Most Rev. Michael B. Curry, Presiding Bishop
The Rev. Gay Clark Jennings President, House of Deputies
