It really is incredible: bare-faced, unashamed and quite incredible.
Some sections of The Daily Mail's further article on Bishop Pete Broadhurst have been lifted verbatim from that by His Grace, without a word of accreditation.
Blogs, of course, feed off each other habitually, and the honourable ones credit their sources. But they tend not to be profit-making mass-media organisations employing a plethora of journalists whose job it is to write original copy.
Today, Melanie Phillips writes:
Does he perhaps have a professional sideline reading the tea-leaves at church fetes?Yesterday His Grace wrote:
He really ought to read what the Bible has to say about soothsaying.Today Melanie Phillips writes:
Yet look at the feeble way Lambeth Palace has responded to this diatribe, declaring that the bishop was ‘entitled to his views’.Yesterday His Grace wrote:
Well actually, no he is not. As a bishop of the Church of England, anything he says has the imprimatur of the Church.
Bizarrely, rather than censure the Bishop, Lambeth Palace said: ‘(He) is entitled to his views.’Today Melanie Phillips writes:
His Grace begs to differ.
The views he is entitled to express are the views of the Church of England. He is a leader within the Established Church of which the Queen is 'by God's Ordinance’ Defender of the Faith and Supreme Governor.
He was also effectively denying the constitutional position of the Church of England — and indeed, similarly repudiating his own undertakings as a bishop of that Church.Yesterday His Grace wrote:
For the monarchy and the Church of England are umbilically linked. The Queen is Supreme Governor of the Church — as will be Prince William when he inherits the Crown — and the monarch is pledged to defend the faith which that Church represents.
Moreover, when he was ordained into the Church of England, Bishop Broadbent will have sworn ‘true allegiance to Her Majesty, Queen Elizabeth II, her heirs and successors, according to law, so help me God’.
The views he is entitled to express are the views of the Church of England. He is a leader within the Established Church of which the Queen is 'by God's Ordinance’ Defender of the Faith and Supreme Governor.Today Melanie Phillips asks:
And, God willing, Prince William will inherit those titles and responsibilities when he becomes King...
All who are ordained into the Church of England swear an oath of allegiance. Bishop Pete has said:
“I, Peter Broadbent, do swear that I will be faithful and bear true allegiance to Her Majesty, Queen Elizabeth II, her heirs and successors, according to law, so help me God.”
So did he falsely swear an oath in which he didn’t believe at the time? Or does he no longer believe it, making him a hypocrite who should depart the Church whose vow of loyalty he now rejects?Yesterday His Grace asked:
And when he ordains priests in turn, how can he require them to swear allegiance to an institution he regards as ‘corrupt and sexist’?
Has the Bishop become a hypocrite? A liar? Even a philanderer?..Perhaps His Grace should be flattered that such a highly-paid award-winning journalist has chosen to plagiarise not only his line of thinking but his very words. Perhaps The Daily Mail should employ him directly.
Do these vows have so little meaning that they are as easily disregarded as the marriage vows of Prince Charles and Diana, whom the Bishop so evidently disrespects and despises?
Does Bishop Pete uphold the traditional doctrine and teaching of the Church he purports to serve, or not?
When he ordains deacons and priests, does he cross his fingers behind his back as he asks ordinands to swear allegiance to the Queen and her heirs and successors?
