Bishop Geralyn Wolf, one of the increasingly rare Episcopal bishops of integrity, has given the Rev. Anne Holmes Redding until March 30 to decide that she isn’t really both a Muslim and a Christian, or be defrocked as an Episcopal priest. The Providence Journal, in a story on the run-up to the deadline, says Redding is apparently unmoved:
Redding had been, until March 2007, the director of faith formation at St. Mark’s Episcopal Cathedral, in Seattle, and was just starting a stint as a visiting scriptural scholar at the Jesuit-run Seattle University. News of her unusual embrace of Islam and Christianity had gotten into the local papers and had been warmly received by the then-bishop of Olympia, the Right Rev. Vincent Wardell War[n]er, who called her move innovative.
But Redding received a different set of marching orders from Bishop Wolf, who directed her not to wear the collar or to act as a priest for one year, and then extended it for three more months.
When the bishop and priest met again last September, Redding repeated her view that she saw no conflict between embracing Islam and following Jesus. It was then that Bishop Wolf said she would begin proceedings to have her deposed.
Though it is Redding who has gotten the publicity, it is Warner who deserves the greater condemnation. He abandoned his vow to teach and defend the Christian faith, and approved the ministry of an apostate within his diocese. If ECUSA’s Presiding Bishop ought to be deposing any bishops (last count I saw was 12, including several retired ones), it should be the hen-house guarding wolves such as Warner.
Reached at her home in Seattle, Redding said Thursday that unless something causes her to radically change her convictions in the next few weeks, she will “continue to be faithful to the call and invitation that God has given to me.”
She says that while she had been familiar with some of the teachings of Islam, she began looking at them more seriously after inviting Muslims to speak at the cathedral in the aftermath of 9/11.
But it was a personal crisis, one she does not wish to share, that led her, she says, to a realization that “I needed to totally surrender myself to God. Surrender to God is what Islam is about.”
One can only imagine the inadequacy of the catechesis and seminary education that Redding must have had to think that “surrender to God” is an exclusively Islamic notion. I guess she’s never sung “I Surrender All” in church.
“It never occurred to me I was leaving Christianity any more than the early disciples of Jesus would have felt they were leaving Judaism by becoming his followers,” she said. “It was only after the fact that I recognized it could be very confusing to many people.”
I can only repeat my previous observation regarding her education. It apparently escaped her notice in New Testament 101 that the Messiah fulfills the faith of Israel, while she missed in World Religions 101 that the teachings of the Koran explicitly contradict those of Christianity regarding the Messiah. You know what the really scary thing is? This extraordinarily ignorant woman was, at the time the controversy about her broke, a visiting theology professor at Seattle University. Do you suppose anyone’s going to own up to that bone-headed hire?
Redding, who’d like to be a bridge between the two faiths, insists that the two religions are closer than many think. The Koran, like the New Testament, teaches that Jesus was born of a virgin. She says she finds that Muslims are more firm in that belief than many Christians she knows, who seem not to be sure.
That’s true. Both religions say Jesus was born of a virgin. It is also true that a far larger percentage of Muslims than Episcopalians believe that, I’m certain. Good for them.
She says she continues to believe that Jesus is divine but goes on to explain that she believes there is an element of the divine in all of us. “We are all children of God.”
“When Christians say that Jesus is the only-begotten son of God, we are putting into words an understanding of the uniqueness of Jesus and the unique intimate relationship we have with him and his mission,” she says. “But I don’t think that the ‘only begotten Son’ language is to be taken literally.”
So she believes that Jesus was born of a virgin but was not the unique Son of God. Sounds like a Muslim to me–except that Muslims have a view of the transcendence of God that would make a statement like “there is an element of the divine in all of us” at least borderline blasphemous (though I recognize it isn’t a quote in this story, she has said stuff like this before).
In a departure from traditional Islamic teaching, Redding holds that Jesus was crucified and was resurrected. She argues that the Koran doesn’t explicitly deny that Jesus was crucified but only that the Jews did not crucify him.
However, Imam Abdul Hameed of the Islamic Center of Rhode Island disputes her reading. The Koran, he says, makes clear that Jesus was not crucified or killed, but was “lifted up” to God.
“I think she is a little confused. There is no possibility for one to be both a Muslim and a Christian,” Hameed said. “If she doesn’t believe that [Jesus] is the son of God, she is not Christian. And she can’t be a Muslim if she believes Jesus died on a cross.”
She’s more than a little confused, but the Imam is absolutely right. Redding, like her kindred spirit Kevin Thew Forrester, insists that she has the right to redefine the world’s great religions in accordance with her own highly idiosyncratic preferences, and that the followers of those religions, having seen some of their most cherished beliefs mutilated in her hands, then have to accept her as one of their own, despite her lack of respect for the beliefs of others.
Redding says she prefers to stay away from some of the constructs theologians have built to help decide “who is in and who is out, who is going to heaven and who is not.”
“The Trinity is a wonderful way of thinking about God. … But will I reduce God to a formula? No.
“To those who say you have to believe in the formula, I say, ‘No, God cannot be packaged.’ ”
The Trinity is, in the Christian view, an accurate (though necessarily limited, because of our limited ability to comprehend God) description of what God has revealed to us in the incarnate Son and the sending of the Holy Spirit. To Muslims, it is a blasphemous assertion of tritheism. She can take her pick. But her supposed third way, “a wonderful way of think about God” is wholly inadequate from a Christian perspective, and abhorrent from a Muslim.
Even now, facing the possibility of being defrocked, Redding continues to worship at various Episcopal churches and to receive communion. On Fridays, she goes to recite prayers at the Islamic center.
Bishop Greg Rickel, who became leader of the 33,000-member Olympia Diocese after the controversy started, said he agrees with Bishop Wolf that Redding can’t be a member of two faiths.
But he adds: “I also want to say I love Ann Holmes Redding. She has taught me a lot and I enjoy her company. As a person of faith here, she gets a lot of support.”
Like being able to receive Communion despite her public stance as an apostate, which in my book makes those who give her the sacrament apostates as well. But that’s just me.
Redding, who has just co-authored a book, Out of Darkness Into Light, that looks at the Koran from Jewish, Christian and Muslim perspectives, says she doesn’t know how her story will end and only time will tell if she is wrong in saying she can be both Muslim and Christian.
“In both traditions we have criteria for judging whether one is following God: Does this bear fruit? Is it useful to the communities we’re a part of? Is healing, compassion and love the result?
“Let others have their opinions about it.”
What’s missing from her criteria? Exactly what you’d expect: any consideration for the truth, whether of Christianity or of Islam.
Only God can judge her soul, but the church can judge her ministry. Here’s hoping that Bishop Wolf stands firm, and strips this person of her ability to use her ordination, at least, to lead others astray.
(Via T19.)
UPDATE: Fixed the spelling of Bishop Warner’s name. Thanks to Anglican Prayer for the correction.
