A Holy Communion of Wackiness

Over the last couple of years, several hundred Episcopal parishes have broken away from the mother church. Their conservative members have been upset by what they view as the increasingly liberal policies of their former leaders. This week many of those breakaway parishes are expected to form a new denomination called The Anglican Church of North America.

Anyway, some of the important changes that the new church will adopt include excluding women and gays as bishops. It's not clear what they have against women, but conservative Episcopalians, who are really big on family values, hate gays. And if there's one thing those Episcopalians know, it's family values.

Some historical background: The Episcopal church is the American division of the Church of England, and the combination of the two is called The Anglican Communion. The Church of England was founded by King Henry VIII. And why did Henry decide to break from the then dominant Catholic church and create his own religion? Well, basically because the Pope refused to grant Henry a divorce from his first wife, Catherine. And why did the king want this divorce? So he could marry his mistress, Anne Boleyn. And as you probably know, that second marriage kind of ended badly for Anne as well. Henry went on to marry several more times.

So as you can see, when it comes to lecturing others about family values, the Episcopalians have a lot of credibility.