Amazing Grace and A Beaver

I have been ranting lately about the Episcopal Church--and some of you think I'm being extreme about the subject. I admit it. I am. It is probably the only way to be in a community that thrives on accommodation. Look at how our church handled the issue of slavery: we did not split, as other denominations did, but we also simply never addressed the matter honestly. That left us in a position of some awkwardness during the civil rights era. We were simply a segregated church. The same was the case with the ordination of women. It took extreme action to change the dynamics. Someone wrote to say that I am using the divisive tactics of the right. And that is probably accurate. A united church or communion is not the holy grail.

But what I want to write about today is the film, Amazing Grace, which my wife and I saw on Saturday. It is about William Wilberforce and the effort to abolish the slave trade in Britain in the early eighteenth century. Amazing Grace is not a great film, but it is a good film. The acting is fine, the story line is well developed. Good and evil are somewhat less than black and white, although Wilberforce seems to lack all fault. Nonetheless, it is a film we Episcopalians should see and hear carefully. At one point in the story, the House of Commons and the leaders of the church caution that while they agree that slavery is an abomination, it is necessary to go slowly in order to protect business interests. The society runs on the slave trade and there is no easy way to change the order of things without distrupting economic and social comfort. (The same argument is almost always made against social change.) While the British government went carefully, thousands of Africans were sold and died. (What might happen in a forty-day period of reflection on whether gays are human? Gays may die from hate crimes here and around the world, while we pray for guidance.)

In the film there are clergy active on behalf of abolition. They are perceived by those in the mainstream as being "nuts." And indeed they seem to be somewhat off the rails. They are driven by one idea and one wonders if that is such a healthy way to live. But at the same time, it is obvious that Wilberforce is unable to let go of what he hears as a calling from God to take action against an obvious evil. In that, of course, he was absolutely right. As were those who took action against segregation in the US and died in defense of those who could not change the system on their own. The Episcopal Church has a martyr or two among the dead, Jonathan Daniels, to name one. He was vilified by his church and his bishop attempted to rein him in.

Amazing Grace reminds us that social change does not just come about on its own, as our Presiding Bishop intimated in her recent remarks to the staff at the Episcopal Church Center. Progress, she said, is being made. I think the underlying message is: be patient. But left alone, physics tells us, things decay, including the pursuit of justice--although it is interesting to note, that left alone injustice seems to flourish, contrary to the laws of physics. Perhaps evil is above such things. It appears that we need to be instruments of grace in order to counteract the ordinary course of evil. That's what Christians are meant to be.

Bishop John Chane of Washington, DC, has also spoken out on the subject. He says that he will not roll back the clock to appease the Anglican Communion. Take a look at the website for the Episcopal Diocese of Washington and read what he has to say: www. edow.org.

On the good news front, a beaver has returned to the Bronx River, setting up a house where no beavers have been seen in two centuries. Somehow this beaver came to learn that it is ok to be in the Bronx River again, that the right kind of tree is there for him, that there is good clean food. It is not clear whether he is alone. He may be bringing a mate. We can hope. I like to think of this lonely beaver, taking off on his own. Back among his beaver relatives and friends I imagine their is a lot of talk. "Imagine, going off like that on his own. Why does he think he knows more than the rest of us? You watch, he'll be back. Beavers were never meant to be in the Bronx. Am I right? Huh?"