Media should love this one

I shall caution my readers that, contrary to custom, I shall not be having great theological reflections today. I'm going to indulge my rather naughty side for a moment. I just read that there will be a webcast, plus satellite coverage, for the installation of ++Katharine Jefferts Schori as presiding bishop of the Episcopal Church in the United States. I know nothing of Washington DC, but recall watching the broadcast of Ronald Reagan's funeral from that cathedral - a singer who sounded as if he belonged in a tavern, jokes, an odd treatment of the 'city on a hill' gospel as if the evangelists had Reagan in mind. I am hoping this service will be dignified, glorious - everything that Cranmer plus the Oxford Movement would have intended. (I doubt it - a Washington e-correspondent led me to anticipate a far different picture.) And I do hope it is treated, liturgically, no differently than were it any other bishop. I saw too many 'relevant' liturgies turn into circuses in my day. It certainly is a monumental event, and one which should be quite interesting in the right hands of the press.

My immediate thought was the potential for boring, predictable media statements from those who believe themselves to be newsworthy. Not to mention any names, of course, but I can think of at least one US priest and Sister (prolific, if not deep), both "American Catholic" (therefore technically Roman), who would love a spotlight to go on about how Catholic women have to endure job discrimination (not being priests) because the eleventh commandment (US separation of church and state, which somehow is more sacred than anything at Sinai) prevents their suing employers and demanding equal rights. Then there are those, along the lines of Falwell (who somehow thought Osama bin Laden's action five years ago were divine punishment - God having lifted a 'veil of protection' - for the US being a place where abortion is legal and gays exist), who can see anything involving the Episcopal Church as somehow connected to abortion and gay rights, and therefore the work of Satan. (Sadly, there is another variety of Roman Catholic - as some web sites to which I'd never link would show, which would be Falwell with a rosary in hand.) And I'm sure there will be some loud-mouthed ECUSAns who will relish the thought of a split with Canterbury because it is a remnant of 'colonialism'...

...Yawn... Talk about old news... :) .... Considering that, from all my studies, I have seen that, in the first generation after Jesus's earthly life, apostles (beyond the Twelve, such as Paul) were specifically those who gave witness to the resurrection and all that this meant for the new church. The first witness to the resurrection, and the one who shared this news, was Mary Magdalene, so women as apostles seems a longstanding tradition.