Response Posted to Center Aisle Blog

This was a comment on John Ohmer's blog entry at:

http://centeraisle.wordpress.com/2009/07/09/a-parish-priests-perspective-a-lovers-quarrel/#comment-12

I agree with yofiki. The Diocese of Virginia has for much too long been committed only to noncommitment. That is really why we lost all those parishes in the ADV schism. Nobody wants to admit it. It is rude to suggest it. Our bishops especially cannot concede that it is true. You have people like Mary Ailes and Phil Ashey who used to belong to our diocese blogging away as outsiders. And their voices will only be heard from the outside. We need to look for the problems in increasingly wider circles from our own selves.
Now - as far as the issue in question...you might have pointed out that even bishops in states where same sex marriage has been legalized have taken different approaches to the question. Even the Bishop of El Camino Real put out a letter that expressly forbid what is being proposed after the first California Supreme Court decision. This was at least a consistent approach to addressing the canonical question, given the state of secular law. This is no small issue for us in Virginia, since our state is not likely to ever legalize same sex marriage on its own, but there will be demands for canonical recognition of civil marriages if the Supreme Court ever overturns DOMA and the state statutes on 14th Admendment grounds. You can read the letter I wrote to Ted Olson on my blog at http://billrsblog.blogspot.com/2009/05/email-sent-to-ted-olson.html