Legal Strategies Are Confidential

I have no knowledge of what the ACA intends in its various legal actions against Fr Kelley and the elected vestry of St Mary of the Angels. Nor, for that matter, do I have any special knowledge of what Fr Kelley and the elected vestry intend, other than what they have deemed appropriate to discuss with friends and supporters. On the other hand, my wife is a retired attorney, so we've been able to watch developments with some understanding of how the game is played.

The ACA, as I've mentioned here, has brought several actions against Fr Kelley, basically alleging that he stole money from the parish. In one action, it alleged that Fr Kelley forged the senior warden's signature (as well as, presumably, the signature of a second authorized signer) on a check. This was quickly resolved when the senior warden testified that the signature was in fact his; the court found in Fr Kelley's favor, and that action is no longer pending.

A civil suit is still pending against Fr Kelley, alleging that he stole money from the parish. It's worth pointing out that, despite brave words from Anthony Morello in 2012, no criminal charges have emerged from these allegations. The reason is presumably that a criminal case must be proven beyond a reasonable doubt to a unanimous jury, and if the ACA ever chose to bring its evidence before the district attorney, the DA would not have felt there was a case. A civil case, on the other hand, requires only a jury majority of nine out of twelve, based on the preponderance of evidence.

Even so, the ACA's case is going to be weak-to-nonexistent. As I've already said here, my first-hand experience of the parish's finances was that it was breaking even on authorized salaries and other expenditures. The parish was paying clergy and staff, paying heat and air conditioning, dealing with plumbing emergencies, buying candles and incense, and chasing away pests and termites, all proper and reasonable expenditures, all known to and approved by the vestry. There wasn't any surplus.

Quite simply, there was nothing there to steal. As interim treasurer in 2011, I saw no evidence that anyone was even trying. An accountant engaged to do an audit in early 2012 said the same thing. My current surmise, perhaps similar to the surmise at the Freedom for St Mary blog, is that the parish dissidents have been lying to the ACA and the attorneys about the real state of affairs. (That, of course, puts the best possible face on the actions of the ACA and its attorneys.)

In a puzzling strategy, though, the ACA brought a civil suit against Fr Kelley and then made a motion for summary judgment in its favor. My wife points out that a motion for summary judgment is normally a defense strategy -- in other words, the plaintiff brings the suit, the defense then asks the judge to rule that the plaintiff doesn't have a case. Here, though, the ACA asked the court to rule that its case was so strong that there shouldn't even be a trial.

Just recently, the court ruled the ACA's case wasn't that strong, there was going to have to be a trial. This is regarded as a defeat for the ACA. The feeling among Fr Kelley's friends and supporters is that the ACA simply has no evidence, which is why it wanted a summary judgment. Unfortunately, the rules for civil discovery in California make it impractical to move for discovery of the ACA's evidence until just before trial; at any earlier time, the plaintiff can simply say he doesn't have anything, and the defense's one shot at discovery is wasted. It's nevertheless hard not to surmise that the ACA simply has no evidence to support its case.

William Lancaster's record as an attorney is not good, with a well-publicized malpractice case against him that led to his leaving a prestige law firm. We'll have to see if handsome is continues to be as handsome does. The ACA, it seems to me, is doubling down on its future as well.

Who Is The Rt Rev John Vaughan? -- V

The Lakeview Ledger article has turned out to be a fascinating treasure trove -- there are lots of names in it, and whenever I google one, something new turns up. At the time the article was written, for instance, Vaughan was said to be "completing a year of Anglican studies with the Rev Richard Bowman, Episcopal priest in Apopka [FL]". The Rev Richard Bowman of Apopka, it turns out, is listed, along with some very liberal figures in The Episcopal Church, as a signer of the Religious Declaration on Sexual Morality, Justice and Healing. Among his fellow signers was Bishop of Pennsylvania Charles Bennison Jr, a major bête noire of conservative Anglicans, but there is no shortage of other liberal signers.

Just a part of this declaration reads as follows:

We are called today to see, hear and respond to the suffering caused by sexual abuse and violence against women and lesbian, gay, bisexual and transgender (LGBT) persons, the HIV pandemic, unsustainable population growth and over-consumption, and the commercial exploitation of sexuality.

Faith communities must therefore be truth-seeking, courageous and just. We call for:

• Theological reflection that integrates the wisdom of excluded, often silenced peoples, and insights about sexuality from medicine, social science, the arts and humanities.
• Full inclusion of women and LGBT persons in congregational life, including their ordination and marriage equality.
• Sexuality counseling and education throughout the lifespan from trained religious leaders.
• Support for those who challenge sexual oppression and who work for justice within their congregations and denominations.

Bowman's name also appears on a web page featuring "Pro Gay Pastors, Churches, & Chaplains." He appears at various times as a spokesman in the largely conservative Episcopal Diocese of Central Florida for pro-gay issues in TEC.

This is the guy who tutored Vaughan for a year in "Anglican studies" in connection with his ordination as an Episcopal priest? I certainly don't mean to imply that signing a statement says anything about one's personal conduct, but these "Anglican studies" must certainly have covered Cranmer, Laud, Andrewes, Pusey, and Keble less than Spong, Moore, Boyd, and Harris.

So let's recap. Vaughan left the Roman Catholic priesthood due to some number of unspecified reservations about doctrine. (There are Catholic priests, of course, who would ask how he got into seminary in the fist place.) Once he left the priesthood, though while still a nominal Catholic, he appears to have disregarded other key teachings about marriage and the family. Then he discovered Episcopalianism, and his systematic introduction to that denomination appears to have been the standard product of the 1990s -- and he was, by his account in 1996, happy about it, just one big, happy, extended, non-traditional family.

Yet by 2005, it appears that Vaughan had discovered the virtues of the 1928 BCP, the error involved in ordaining women, and quite possibly had discovered his own reservations at the consecration of Gene Robinson. Indeed, as of October 14, 2012, Vaughan was presumably part of the ACA House of Bishops when it unanimously endorsed the following statement:

Our Creator made us male and female, with the result that the physical union in marriage is a reality. Male and female really unite in a way that is impossible for members of the same sex, and that union is open to the possibility of procreation in a way that no “same-sex union” could possibly be.

So we know he had reservations about Catholic doctrine, and disregarded it as it suited him. Maybe he had reservations about the standard Episcopalian doctrine of the 1990s, too -- we don't know. Now he's a bishop in the theologically [sorta-kinda] conservative ACA. Does he have reservations about any of that? Did he sign the 2012 statement on gay marriage with any reservations?

I think the answer is it doesn't matter, at least not to his colleagues in the ACA House of Bishops. It's more important that he's utterly reliable. Let's recall one more time that David Moyer, a man who, despite his flaws, comes across as someone with integrity, was purged from that same House of Bishops at precisely the same time Vaughan was elevated to it. Moyer, with backbone, was unreliable. Vaughan, with secrets, is at least reliable.

Who Is The Rt Rev John Vaughan? -- IV

If you check the Lakeville Ledger piece, you'll see a picture of Fr Vaughan as of 1996, a newly ordained Episcopal deacon posing beneath a stained glass window, wearing a Roman collar, doing his very best imitation of Bing Crosby in Going My Way.

All that's missing is the straw hat! But by then, of course, Vaughan had left the Catholic priesthood, and despite the collar, he was no more a Catholic priest than Bing Crosby.

Other details given in the story are puzzling in light of the record. It says, for instance, that Vaughan's wife, Rebecca, had been "an Episcopalian for 15 years". However, the obituary for her first husband says he was a Presbyterian. Her second husband, Louis Ira Fein, may have come from a Jewish family. Her fourth husband, Amr Darwish, has a Muslim name. If Rebecca was or is Episcopalian, she appears to be an Episcopalian of a certain sort.

The Ledger piece reflects a certain optimism and desire to get ahead on Fr Vaughan's part. Praising the rector and the permanent deacon there, he is reported to have said "the three of them work as a team." He's described in the piece as a transitional deacon and curate; it looks like there was some expectation at the time that he would go on staff there as an assistant.

This didn't happen. As I reported last year, according to both St Paul's Winter Haven and the Episcopal Diocese of Central Florida, he served as an interim priest there for only a short time. The only other reference I have to that period is a wedding there at which he officiated in 1998. Indeed, the tone of the replies I got to my inquiries last year verged on the defensive: well, yeah, he was a priest here, but not for very long. What happened?

The only other assignment Vaughan had in The Episcopal Church, according to the Diocese of Central Florida, was as vicar of a failing mission, St Joseph's Orlando. We don't know when he started there, but by several accounts, he left in 2005. We now know that as of early January 2006, he'd sold his interest in a house to Rebecca, presumably by now his ex-wife. According to the ACA, "In 2005 he began his service in the Anglican Church in America at St. Patrick's Church in Port St. John, Florida[.]"

In other words, his service in The Episcopal Church, by TEC's account marginal, ended at roughly the time of his divorce. The index of priests on the Episcopal Diocese of Central Florida's web site no longer carries any reference to John Vaughan. There's still a great deal we don't know.

Who Is The Rt Rev John Vaughan? -- III

I don't mean to be the Grinch who stole Christmas here, but Vaughan, while he'd left the Catholic priesthood, still considered himself a Catholic. According to the Lakeland Ledger piece, he "attended St Joseph's Catholic Church" in Lakeland after he and his new wife moved there.

For a Catholic to marry a divorced person whose spouse is still living is, of course, problematic. One Catholic explanation goes as follows:

[I]f your spouse was previously married and has not received an Decree of Invalidity from a Tribunal, there is a problem. In such circumstances, you may not partake of the sacraments, including the reception of Holy Communion. We respect all marriages, even those which have ended in a civil divorce. Every prior marriage must be examined, since each is presumed to be valid with a lasting and lifelong commitment. Until it is shown otherwise through the ministry of the Tribunal, no person is free to enter into another marriage without the appearance or occasion of serious sin.

It seems highly unlikely that Vaughan and his wife applied to have her previous marriages declared invalid, since the process normally takes at least two years, and one would assume that it could take at least that long or longer if two marriages were involved. But they married within eighteen months of meeting. In addition, tribunals do in fact examine the circumstances of prior marriages carefully, and the decrees are by no means a sure thing. One might expect the process to be riskier if two marriages were involved.

This must be another of the several unspecified reservations Vaughan had about Catholic doctrine while he was in seminary and in the priesthood. Er, where did the reservations stop? After he became an Episcopalian, which many former Catholics do following divorces and remarriages, we might think his wife's marital history would be less of a problem, although simply as a matter of good judgment, I would still question marrying a two-time divorcee -- I married late in life, I dated some of those ladies myself, and I can tell you, they have issues. That's why they got two divorces. The Catholic Church here is looking out for its faithful.

The question also arises: what is Vaughan's actual view of marriage -- indeed, what is his view of the sacraments? Holy orders are a sacrament as well, equivalent in the Catholic Church to marriage. Did Vaughan take his orders seriously? Well, he had reservations. By his account, he had them all along. The priesthood got him to the US, of course. It got him to the Archdiocese of Miami, an anything-goes sort of place by all accounts. Was Vaughan using holy orders for his own purposes, quitting the priesthood as soon as it suited him to do so?

By the same token, it's interesting that in the minimal information Brian Marsh provided at Vaughan's consecration, the ACA saw fit to mention, "He is a resident of Titusville, Florida and has one son." This of course is a tacit way of saying that Vaughan, by the time of his consecration, was divorced, although the marriage had been blessed with issue. And that, too, is a tacit way of reassuring anyone who might be uncertain about it that Vaughan is not, no way, can't happen, that bugbear of conservative Anglicans, a gay bishop.

Florida real estate records show that the house at 3295 Timucua Circle, Hunters Creek, FL 32837 was sold by John Vaughan on January 6, 2006, to Rebecca Vaughan, and sold again on September 22, 2006 by Rebecca Vaughan to Rebecca Vaughan and Amr Darwish. Rebecca Vaughan had had a career since 1980 as a speech therapist; Amr Darwish is a physical therapist whose business is located at that address. They were presumably colleagues prior to their marriage. The former Mrs Vaughan now styles herself Becky Vaughan-Darwish.

The marriage to John Vaughan was just one of four. What does that say about Rebecca's view of marriage? What does that say about the marriage overall? What does that say about Vaughan's view of marriage as a sacrament? If it seems possible that he used the sacrament of holy orders for his own purposes, could he have used the sacrament of marriage for the same, perhaps as a beard of respectability?

I ask this as a Catholic, of course, where that marriage seems to have involved serious sin. But even as a sorta-kinda Episcopal or Anglican priest, people would be going to Vaughan for marriage counseling. What kind of counseling would he be equipped to provide?

I note, too, that Vaughan's ACA home parish now calls itself St Patrick's Anglican Catholic Church. Catholic indeed.

Who Is The Rt Rev John Vaughan? -- II

Although the ACA has maintained strict radio silence about the biographical information on its two most recent bishops, it did in fact release the following about John Vaughan last year, when he was consecrated suffragan bishop of the Diocese of the Eastern US:

In 1985 Bp. Vaughan was ordained to the [Roman Catholic] priesthood at St. Michael's Church Upper Glanmire County Cork Ireland. Shortly after Ordination he left Ireland and relocated to the United States to serve the people of the Roman Catholic archdiocese of Miami Florida and the Episcopal Diocese of Florida. In 2005 he began his service in the Anglican Church in America at St. Patrick's Church in Port St. John, Florida until being appointed Vicar General of the Diocese of the Eastern United States in 2011. He is a resident of Titusville, Florida and has one son.

As I observed a year ago, this thumbnail is sketchy and notable for its omissions. I've recently had reason to go back and check Bishop Vaughan's biography in greater detail, and I will add some additional material to the record in this and subsequent posts.

Pope Francis is recently reported to have acknowledged, at least informally, that there is in fact a gay mafia in the Roman Catholic Church:

[In} the Curia, there are also holy people, really, there are holy people. But there also is a stream of corruption, there is that as well, it is true... The "gay lobby" is mentioned, and it is true, it is there... We need to see what we can do...

The Roman Catholic Archdiocese of Miami is frequently mentioned as a center for gay mafia activity in the US. This is often suggested as a reason for the premature removal of Archbishop John C. Favalora prior to his mandatory retirement at age 75. Although he was installed as Archbishop of Miami in 1994, discussions of the scandals in the Miami Archdiocese indicate that the problems there had existed for decades prior to his arrival.

Priests speak, too, about the culture of "sex-driven favoritism" at St. John Vianney College Seminary—a kind of gay Hogwarts with palm trees, located out in the flat suburban wastes of southwest Dade County. . . . One seminarian who dropped out in disgust in the 1980s recalls a miserable year being bullied by gay faculty, and the rector, Robert Lynch, fawning over his favorite seminarian: an attractive upper-classman named Steven O'Hala.

It's worth pointing out that the Roman Catholic Archdiocese of Miami was also the place where the "Father Oprah" scandal took place, wherein Alberto Cutie, a Catholic priest well-known for his media appearances, was forced to leave the Catholic priesthood after publication of pictures in which he was shown kissing Ruhama Buni Canellis at a public beach. (He later married Ms Buni Canellis and became an Episcopal priest.)

There is no record of what John Vaughan's activities may or may not have been in the Roman Catholic Archdiocese of Miami during the time he was a priest there. According to this article in the Lakeland, FL Ledger, Vaughan had disagreed with Catholic doctrine while in seminary, and after transferring to the Miami archdiocese in 1985, by 1990 reached a decision that he could not continue as a Catholic priest. The "doctrines" with which he disagreed, according to the article, included, but apparently were not limited to, the requirement of priestly celibacy. (Priestly celibacy, however, is a "discipline", not a "doctrine"; Vaughan, who has a Master's degree in theology, was presumably aware of this.)

However, although Vaughan disagreed with not fully specified Catholic doctrines, he had not met anyone whom he might have considered marriage material before he left the Catholic priesthood. This would change.

According to the Florida Department of Health, John Vaughan married Rebecca Susan Fein in Miami on 22 June 1991. The Lakeland Ledger story indicates that Rebecca Fein's parents are Leslie and Ellen Spoor of Winter Haven, FL. According to the Florida Department of Health, Rebecca Susan Spoor married Beatty Scott Blanton III on 31 August 1974. According to the Florida Department of Health, Rebecca Susan Blanton had another marriage, to Louis Ira Fein, on 15 October 1983. A third marriage for Rebecca Susan Spoor is listed for 22 June 1991, which is presumably the marriage of Rebecca Susan Fein to John Vaughan, her third.

The story, though, doesn't end here.

Do I See A Pattern Here?

The Rt Rev James Hiles is just the most recent example of what I think is a distressing pattern in the ACA, even more so than in "continuing Anglicanism" generally -- jurisdiction hopping among the highest leadership in order to escape from either formal deposition in The Episcopal Church (the case with Louis Falk and James Hiles) or what appears to be less formal edging-out, which appears to be the situation with the late Anthony Morello and the Rt Rev John Vaughan. (Morello's rapid promotion in the ACA, from newcomer assistant priest in 2010 to vicar general in 2012, suggests he would almost certainly have become a bishop if he'd lived a year longer.)

It's worth noting that Hiles had never expressed objection, at least in any sort of record, to the 1979 Book of Common Prayer, the ordination of women, or the election of the first woman suffragan in his own Episcopal diocese, over the two-decade period when these developments took place before TEC threw him out. This apparently more mainstream position might have made him a good candidate for the ACNA after 2007, and we can only speculate why he either did not choose to take his parish into the ACNA during the jurisdiction-shopping he must have done then, or why the ACNA may not have found him suitable.

Stephen Strawn and Brian Marsh were never ordained in The Episcopal Church, unlike those above -- Strawn attended an unaccredited seminary, while Marsh, despite becoming a postulant and then a candidate for holy orders in the Episcopal Diocese of Massachusetts, for whatever reason was apparently not deemed suitable for eventual ordination there. As I said earlier this week, the fact that we know absolutely nothing of the Rt Rev Owen Rhys Williams is a matter for serious concern.

I'll next be addressing further information on the Rt Rev John Vaughan.

My wife and I pray daily for the people of the Anglican Church in America.

Who Is The Rt Rev James Randall Hiles?

I didn't originally intend to post on this subject, but I wandered into it yesterday, and the more I looked, the more I saw. Hiles was consecrated a suffragan bishop in the ACA Diocese of the Northeast on April 27, 2013. There are two things I gathered from the photo below:

One is that it appears to have been quite a do, with even the assistant principal from South Africa, the Rt Rev Michael Gill, on the scene. The other is that Bishop Hiles, seated at the center among the smarmy smiles around him, appears to be quite elderly. Checking, I found that he was ordained to the Episcopal priesthood in 1958. If we make the optimistic assumption that he was 25 at the time of his ordination, this would give a birth year of 1933, and that would make him 80 in 2013. If his ordination was later -- as it frequently is for Episcopal priests -- this would of course make him older.

The mandatory retirement age for an Episcopal bishop is 72. A Roman Catholic bishop must submit his resignation at age 75, although the Pope may delay mandatory retirement in individual cases. Hiles's age suggests several things. First, Presiding Bishop Marsh, a dilettante part-timer, does not want threats to his position, so he allows only bishops who can't credibly challenge him, something we'll eventually get to in the case of John Vaughan. An octogenarian can hardly aspire to higher office. Second, Hiles's rise to the episcopacy, especially in light of his age, is largely honorary, although I suspect it's also a quid pro quo.

There's the question of Hiles's sudden arrival in the Anglican Church in America at all. Yesterday I noted a Virtue Online story that had him and his breakaway parish in the Anglican Mission in America as of 2007. In the years after 2007, the AMIA grew steadily more erratic in its affiliations, essentially disintegrating by 2011. ACA Diocese of the Northeast newsletters place Hiles as a "special guest" at the 2011 diocesan synod; by March 2012, St Paul's Anglican Brockton was listed as an “associated Anglican parish”. In other words, Hiles had left a sinking ship and hopped jurisdictions -- no doubt, I would guess, shopping around among more than one; the ACA finally offered him the best deal. St Paul's Brockton sorta-kinda joins the ACA in 2012; a year later, Hiles, in an unrelated move, becomes a bishop.

But wait a moment. Isn't Hiles some kind of a hero to the "continuing Anglican" movement? Isn't it some kind of feather in the ACA's cap to have the guy at all? All those other smarmy bishops in the picture certainly suggest that's the case. I mean, Pope Emeritus Benedict might be an octogenarian as well, but wouldn't it be a feather in the ACA's cap to make him a suffragan, too?

Let's look at Hiles's case. As of 1995, Hiles, an Episcopal priest, had two posts: one was Rector of St Paul's Episcopal Church, a full-fledged parish in Brockton, MA, and one as Vicar of the Church of Our Saviour, a mission church in Milton, MA. A parish has a vestry that calls a rector with the assent of a bishop; a parish is financially self-supporting. A mission runs a deficit, receives financial support from the diocese, and has a vicar who is appointed directly by the bishop -- the bishop directly controls the mission's finances as well.

According to the court case I cited yesterday, Hiles's problem arose when, in 1990, a parishioner bequeathed approximately $2 million to the Church of Our Saviour. The Episcopal diocese and Hiles disagreed as to which entity was entitled to the bequest -- the church or the diocese. From the facts as outlined in the case, since the bequest was to the mission, the bishop had a definite case for a claim on that money, since he controlled the mission's finances. Hiles somehow thought the money should go to St Paul's Episcopal Brockton, a different entity.

One thing that strikes me is that this dispute had nothing to do with any developments in The Episcopal Church regarding prayer books or women priests. It was an argument over money, and it could as easily have happened over exactly the same issues in 1795 or 1895. The bishop had a strong argument, and beyond that, the bishop was the boss, especially over Hiles in his capacity as vicar. The record shows the bishop was angry indeed with Hiles (as quite possibly I would have been in the same circumstances), to the extent that he came as close as a bishop might to cussing Hiles out, and threw a pen at him in the bargain.

At no point in this dispute did Hiles ever say, "Well, Bishop, not only are you trying to steal our rightful bequest, but you're using the 1979 Book of Common Prayer! And not only that, but you are tolerating a suffragan of the female persuasion!!" Indeed, since this dispute took place in 1995, we may assume that Fr Hiles had been saying mass from the 1979 BCP without complaint for over 15 years. Hiles's dispute had nothing visibly connected with any liberal-conservative church divide -- unlike, for instance, the dispute between David Moyer and his bishop, Charles Bennison Jr. Moyer had a credible reason to join a "continuing Anglican" denomination; Hiles did not, except as a way to avoid disgrace and keep getting a paycheck.

Next, let's look at the charges on which Hiles was then inhibited and deposed, an alleged adulterous relationship with a parishioner. It's sad on one hand that The Episcopal Church does not appear to be consistent in how it enforces ethical standards in matters like these. On the other hand, the Massachusetts Supreme Court eventually ruled in 2002 that The Episcopal Church was entirely within its rights to enforce the standards it did enforce in Hiles's case -- Hiles was inhibited and deposed following an ecclesiastical trial, for an adulterous affair with a parishioner. In the court's view, that trial and any subsequent canonical appeals were all Hiles was entitled to. Hiles knew this when he became a priest.

Hiles's legal and public position at the time and since has been that the allegations of the affair, while untrue to start with, were the result of the dispute over money. At no point did the 1979 BCP or women priests and bishops enter into this dispute -- the whole discussion was over (a) money, and (b) sex -- and beyond that, one gets the sense that if The Episcopal Church had worked out a settlement that allowed Hiles to keep his well-paid, prestigious job as a rector in that denomination, he would have been perfectly happy.

How on earth does any of this make him some kind of hero to "continuing Anglicanism"? When you think about it, David Moyer had a dispute with Episcopal Bishop Bennison involving Bennison's broken promise to allow conservative parishes to be supervised by a sympathetic bishop. Bennison was much more clearly in the wrong. Moyer's dispute had no side issues involving money or sex. Yet Moyer is more or less in disgrace in the "continuing Anglican" movement, even though he actually did good work as a bishop once he went to the ACA, yet the ACA simply purged him as a bishop in 2012. In 2013, though, it made Hiles a bishop at age 80, with duties that strongly reek of sinecure.

Why are all those bishops smiling?

Who Is The Rt Rev Owen Rhys Williams? -- I

The Very Rev Owen Rhys Williams was consecrated suffragan bishop in the ACA Diocese of the Northeast on April 25, 2013. Subsequently, on August 8, ACA Presiding Bishop Brian Marsh designated Williams episcopal visitor to the Diocese of the West, which has not had a bishop since the sudden retirement of Daren Williams (presumably no relation) in late 2010. As is simply not unusual with the ACA, no biographical information was given on Williams at the time of his consecration. In the announcement to the Diocese of the West, Marsh said, "Bishop Owen Williams is known to most of the diocese from his years at Saint Mark’s in Portland, Oregon."

Curious, I e-mailed a former ACA DOW priest, who left the DOW/ACA with the Patrimony of the Primate but who had been in the diocese since Robin Connor was rector of St Mark's Portland, if he knew anything about Owen Rhys Williams. He replied, "I have never heard of the man." It's worth pointing out I've sent an e-mail to another former ACA/DOW priest, with the diocese since the early 1990s, but haven't had a reply.

Williams is also Rector/Dean of Trinity Anglican Pro-Cathedral in Rochester, NH. However, there is no bio of Williams on that web site, nor on the web site of the ACA Diocese of the Northeast. And this is simply all we know about him -- repeated efforts in Google turn up only the announcement of his consecration as suffragan, parroted on the usual "continuing Anglican" cheerleader sites. Period.

Normally, bishops have a photo and bio on their diocesan web sites -- in fact, respectable rectors have such things on parish web sites. For example, the web site of the ACNA Diocese of New England, which would be their equivalent of the ACA DONE, carries this full page, with photo, of its current bishop. On that page, we learn, among many other things, that "Fr. Bill holds a B.S. from the University of New Hampshire and a Master of Divinity from Gordon-Conwell College. He has read for Holy Orders in the Diocese of Massachusetts and was ordained to the priesthood in May 1986."

Shouldn't communicants in the ACA feel entitled to equivalent information on one of their bishops? Where, in fact, did Bp Williams do his undergraduate work? Where did he receive his priestly formation? What was his ecclesiastical career prior to his rectorship at Trinity Anglican? I would say that not to provide this information to communicants and the public at large verges on a sin of omission, and by sin I mean a sin.

By the way, a Google search on The Rev James Randall Hiles, also recently consecrated a DONE suffragan, quickly turns up Hiles v Episcopal Diocese of Massachusetts, which covers some salacious material indeed:

[T]he Right Reverend M. Thomas Shaw, III, Bishop of the [Episcopal] Diocese of Massachusetts (Shaw), summoned Hiles to his office, accused him of being stubborn, a bully, and a liar, and struck him with a "missile" (i.e., a pen) [Note 5]. Shaw threatened to remove Hiles from his position as vicar of the Church of Our Saviour. Hiles, apparently, was unyielding [Note 6]. The complaint continues with an account of additional events. Hiles, a married man, met the defendant Hastie (then unmarried) in the late 1960's. Hastie had accepted Hiles's invitation to perform certain work for the Church of Our Saviour. Her subsequent romantic advances to Hiles, it is alleged, were rejected.

Shortly prior to March 27, 1996, Hastie wrote a letter to the defendant Shaw accusing Hiles of having had an adulterous relationship with her that continued from the Spring of 1970 until the Fall of 1975, and stating that on December 4, 1975, she terminated a pregnancy, aborting the fetus fathered by Hiles. The complaint alleges that Hastie's letter "was the culmination of several prior contacts between her and employees of the Diocese in which these employees and agents urged her to write the letter. Defendants Shaw and the Diocese knew or reasonably should have known that the allegations contained in the letter were . . . false.["]

The Episcopal Church did in fact inhibit and depose Hiles, and most of his parish left TEC with him, although not for the ACA. The link indicates St Paul's Anglican had been with the Anglican Mission in America and the Province of Rwanda since 1999 -- apparently this has changed since the 2007 link, so Hiles must be a fairly recent arrival in the ACA, quickly promoted. As with so many other things connected with St Mary of the Angels, the ACA, and various individuals in this tangled story, we seem to be looking at just the tip of an iceberg.

These are people with secrets.

So What's The Big Deal About The Parish "Rededication"?

Trying to figure out who's going to be at the St Mary of the Angels "rededication" on November 16, I come up with this speculation: I'm assured that Presiding Bishop Marsh will be there. Bishop Vaughan of the Diocese of the Eastern US has it on his calendar. I assume that the designated episcopal visitor, Owen Williams, will be there, although I have no assurance of the latter two. I assume the nominal "rector", Frederick W. Rivers, will be there, although he is technically a "priest in charge", not having been called by an elected vestry and simply appointed by the Presiding Bishop. I assume the current guy who says mass, Fr Bayles, will be there.

Should be quite an altar party for, what, 20 parishioners, plus a security guard? This would be the approximate number Mrs Bush gave the local paper in July. What's the big deal here?

The only conclusion I can draw is it's the money. But how much money are we actually talking about? For the short time I was interim treasurer, in late 2011, I got a picture of what was involved. I prepared a budget plan before the dissidents threw me out, so here's what the money looked like as of 2012: Total monthly income was about $28,000. However, this included pledge and plate of about $6,000, which can't possibly be the same with the purge in membership after 2012, as well as maybe $400 from hall rental to 12-step and other groups, which were thrown out by the dissidents. So we're down to maybe $22,000 a month rental from Citibank for the corner lot belonging to the parish.

Total monthly expenses at the time I put together the budget were in the $24,000 range, so without pledge and plate and hall rental, the parish would not have been able to remain in the black after the 2012 problems, all other things being equal. However, the competing vestries, elected and unelected, have both promised money to two competing sets of attorneys for ongoing legal expenses. All things simply are not equal now. The parish's resources are going to be largely dissipated in lawsuits, which haven't ended, and for which attorneys have yet to be paid.

In addition, the building is 80 years old. A windfall payment in 2011 allowed some deferred maintenance to be undertaken, but the building has continuing plumbing and termite issues, and it will still need to be maintained.

Without attending the November 16 festivities (if I tried, I assume Mrs Bush would summon the police, with Marsh et al pretending this wasn't happening), I could probably write for Bp Marsh and the others something much like the empty verbiage and happy talk they'll deliver in their homilies and little speeches at the reception. New beginning! Great new things! Bright new future for the ACA! Let us move forward in a spirit of (I hate to write this, but I'm sure it will be said) RECONCILIATION!! The security guard will be watching the door and will not applaud, of course.

The money, though, is what this has all been about, and the money isn't there. The church was barely in the black before the troubles began; now everything and more is certainly spoken for. The ACA is not going to get any money out of St Mary of the Angels, and it will likely lose money net-net on all the travel expenses for the bishops to attend the rededication. What happened?

I'm still intrigued at yesterday's comment at the Freedom for St Mary's blog, to the effect that the dissidents lied to Messrs Lancaster and Anastasia about the legal status of the agreements that the elected vestry had executed with the Catholic Church. I'm less interested in the legal specifics, which can be argued (that's what courtrooms are for), than in the assumption that the dissidents lied. In my experience, they've made so many statements that I know to be false that I've got to say this is a most reasonable assumption.

So many lies were being told in that place that more than one person familiar with the parish's history has sighed and said, half in jest, "That place needs an exorcism". As a Catholic, I believe in the existence of both angels and demons as a matter of faith, as outlined in the Catechism. Indeed, Fr Kelley conducted the 2011 Lenten study group on C.S.Lewis's The Screwtape Letters. At the time, I thought they were a little too cute and far-fetched; now I think Fr Kelley was on to something.

The Tempter and his assistants approach us through our weaknesses. Greed is one of the seven weaknesses that can lead us to sin, according to traditional theology. Our weaknesses also interfere with the spiritual discernment that lets us know if people are, among other things, telling lies. As the Orthodox priest Fr Zosima said in The Brothers Karamazov, if you lie to yourself, you'll never be able to tell if other people are lying to you.

The parish dissidents, I suspect, have been lying to the ACA all along about the money they can get out of St Mary of the Angels. They must certainly have been supported in this by the late Canon Anthony Morello, who appears to have gained the trust of the bishops by suggesting he could get that money for them. The ACA hierarchy, a group of people with character flaws and secrets, has never been in a position to discern whether they're being lied to. Beyond that, greed is something that works out of all proportion to reality: true crime programs on cable are full of stories about people who will kill for a few thousand dollars insurance, money they'd run though in a matter of weeks. But they'll kill for it. Something like that, I'm convinced, is what's working in the little minds that run the ACA.

Indeed, the glimmer of understanding that the money isn't really there is what's driving the continuing lawsuits against Fr Kelley -- if it isn't there, he must have stolen it! The fact is, though, that the money was never there.

The money and the ACA's deluded expectations are what this "rededication" is all about.

A Meditation For Guy Fawkes Day

It's worth pointing out that the rededication of the St Mary of the Angels parish hall, scheduled for November 16, is drawing ever closer. Per the announcement, the "bishops of the diocese" will attend. As I noted yesterday, exactly who those bishops are is by no means clear: on August 8, 2013, ACA Presiding Bishop Marsh designated the Rt Rev Owen Rhys Williams, a suffragan bishop of the Diocese of the Northeast, as episcopal visitor to the Diocese of the West. However, Bishop John Vaughan's calendar showed him making an episcopal visit to St Mary's on October 27.

When I checked Bishop Vaughan's calendar on the ACA Diocese of the Eastern United States website yesterday, it showed him attending the November 16 rededication at St Mary's as well. However, when I checked this site again this morning, it appears to be having intermittent problems. Meanwhile, the ACA main web page is also still down, having been down since late last week. (Guy Fawkes, I assure you, did not do this, and neither did I.) UPDATE: as of about 9:00 AM Pacific time, it appears to be back up, with no apparent change.

Curious, I e-mailed a knowledgeable party, who replied that he was sure Presiding Bishop Marsh would be attending the rededication, but he couldn't speak for anyone else. So there we are, it sounds as though one or more bishops will be attending, but exactly which of those is a bishop of the diocese is still an open question, and it's becoming more open as we speak. I've actually sent about half a dozen e-mails to various parties in authority at the ACA, from Bishop Vaughan himself, to Canon Rivers, who is nominally in charge at St Mary's, to Bishop Vaughn's vicar general at DEUS, to Suffragan Bishop Williams, among others. Here's what I sent Bishop Williams,

I was checking the calendar of Bishop John Vaughan of the DEUS, and it indicated that he had made an episcopal visit to St Mary of the Angels Hollywood on October 27. However, the Diocese of the West web site says that Bishop Williams is now the episcopal visitor for the Diocese of the West. Did Bishop Vaughan in fact make an episcopal visit to St Mary of the Angels, and can you provide any clarification regarding Bishop Vaughan’s current status?

Many thanks.

However, neither Bishop Williams nor anyone else has replied. I have some reason to think Bishop Vaughan's status may have changed in very recent days. Nobody, though, has answered my e-mails, and the ACA web site is still down.

Interesting Comment At The Freedom For St Mary Blog

Regarding my comment there and my subsequent post here about William Lancaster, freedomforstmary offers this insight. While I can't really speculate on Mr Lancaster's motives (who would want to?), the commenter's perspective is that the St Mary's dissidents didn't tell Messrs Lancaster and Anastasia the whole story:

More than likely, their clients did not tell them that all the charges were made up, falsities, nor that a valid commitment already existed prior to the commencement of legal actions, a contract by agreement and conduct excluding from the Corporation of St Mary of the Angels those very same “authorities” their clients claimed as their own.

I suspect, though, that Mr Lancaster's response would be that since this matter involves a first-amendment issue, however remote, the court simply can't get involved. My concern about that argument, and Judge Linfield's acceptance of it last year, is where does the first amendment stop? If my sect says I'm a heretic and must be burned at the stake, are the courts allowed to interfere? There's no question that the St Mary's dissidents, backed up by the ACA and assisted by an attorney with a reputation less than stellar, have taken us into a sort of legal twilight zone.

A New Episcopal Visitor For St Mary of the Angels?

I was checking the calendar for The Rt Rev John Vaughan, Bishop of the ACA Diocese of the Eastern US, which placed him at St Mary of the Angels this past October 27 for an episcopal visit. (To update the information about Vaughan I provided last year on this blog, he was consecrated diocesan bishop of the Eastern US on February 20, 2013. Because this blog has had some traffic searching for information on Vaughan in the past week, I should stress that he is not a Roman Catholic bishop, he is, at least as of October 30, a bishop in the tiny Protestant Anglican Church in America. As I noted last year, he left the Roman Catholic priesthood in 1990.)

However, on August 8, 2013, Presiding Bishop Marsh announced on the ACA Diocese of the West home page,

On August 8, 2013 Bishop Brian R. Marsh, President of the ACA House of Bishops, with the approval of the House, appointed The Ven. Canon Frederick Rivers, Vicar General and ecclesiastical authority of the Diocese of the West. Canon Rivers has been a clergyman in the diocese for 30 years and has held numerous positions in the administration thereof. Bishop Marsh also announced the appointment of The Rt. Rev. Owen Williams as Episcopal Visitor to our diocese, and in that capacity he will be available for Episcopal acts such as confirmations and ordinations. Bishop Owen Williams is known to most of the diocese from his years at Saint Mark’s in Portland, Oregon.

The ACA home page has been down at least since October 31, so good luck trying to find any good information there. So far, e-mails I've sent to various parties, including Bishop Vaughan himself, regarding the specific role the bishop is playing, and his current status in the ACA, have gone without answer.