The Anglican Church in Nova Scotia and Prince Edward Island approved a motion last week that would allow for individual churches to bless same-sex couples.

The Anglican Church offers blessings for various things, including weddings, births, graduations, and even inanimate objects like boats and pets, but until now same-sex couples had been an issue of particular contention.

I’m happy that gay couples have advanced to the same level of respect as Rover and the H.M.S. Slapafore within the Anglican hierarchy, but it sure took a lot of kicking and screaming to get there. At least one participant in the vote was reported to have become so distraught with the results as to have fled the scene entirely.

Still, I take this as a good sign that things are moving forward, even within the religious community. Why, at this rate, the Catholic Church will be offering same-sex blessings in only several hundred thousand decades!

• Same-sex blessing passes [Chronicle Herald]

Gene Robinson, the world’s first openly gay bishop in the Anglican Communion, has announced that he will be leaving his post after seven years in service.

The Episcopal Church elected Robinson the Bishop of New Hampshire in 2003, making history in the process. During his term, Robinson served the church splendidly, elevating religion to a higher standard of the love and respect it’s meant to teach.

It hasn’t been easy, though. Members of the Anglican church have been sharply divided on having gay clergy members. When Robinson was consecrated, he wore a bulletproof vest. He has received numerous death threats, requires extra security, and became a symbolic focus point of an increasingly noncivil campaign from conservatives within the church. With a split of the Anglican church nearly inevitable, the job became too much to bear.

“The last seven years have taken their toll on my, my family, and you,” Robinson wrote in a letter to the yearly diocean convention. “Death threats, and the now worldwide controversy surrounding your election of me as bishop have been a constant strain, not just on me, but on my beloved husband, Mark.” The letter was Robinson’s announcement that he will be stepping down from him position in 2013.

This isn’t to be considered a victory by those motivated by hate. Robinson was threatened and bullied as a 63 year old bishop, but stood up and served for seven years despite these threats. While he is stepping down, his legacy is continuing. The Anglicans have already elected a lesbian as an assistant Bishop back in May, and there will be others.

Thank you, Gene Robinson. I wish you the very best.

• First openly gay bishop to retire after strain of backlash [Digital Journal]

Archbishop of Canterbury Rowan Williams has warned that gay blessings and the ordination of women in the Anglican church had caused “chaos.”

“Fellowship,” Williams said, “is strained or shattered and trust destroyed.”

The Archbishop began to explain further, but then the world ended before he could finish.

• Anglican head warns of ‘chaos’ over gays and women [Montréal Gazette]

An amusingly bizarre rift over same-sex blessings in the Anglican Church has felt its latest tremor after a court decision late last month.

Harnessing the healing power of embittered legal conflict, four Anglican parishes sued the Diocese in May over a property battle stemming from a disagreement about same-sex blessings and other differences of very, very little significance. (The lawsuit was heartily endorsed by Jesus himself, purportedly.)

Well, now the court has reached its verdict. The land and buildings claimed by St. John’s Shaughnessy, St. Matthew’s, St. Matthias, and St. Luke’s parishes are rightfully the property of the Diocese, and the breakaway parishes can not seize them for themselves.

Having settled the property dispute, all sides have now decided to put their disagreements behind them and rejoin, strengthened by a renewed commitment to sheltering the homeless, feeding the hungry, and offering comfort to the less fortunate…

Hahaha! Ah, I’m just pulling your leg. They’re totally still exchanging petty insults and stuff.

• Court rules on same-sex church battle [BC Local News]
• Court denies breakaway parishioners [Canada.com]

As far as religions go, I suppose you could do worse than the Anglicans. They at least entertain discussions about how to best integrate their doctrine with reality. They bless gay couples, for example, and extend to them the same dignities as any other parishioner—including eligibility for ordination.

Of course, all this love and tolerance doesn’t sit too well with churchgoers who miss the unity that only old-fashioned judgment and condemnation can bring. Priests and bishops have split, some have been fired, the locks on church doors have been changed to keep out congregations with differing perspectives—they’ve even started suing each other. Yet, all this kicking and moaning hasn’t stopped the church from trying to stay as relevant as it can. What are bitter coots to do?

Well, the Vatican has a proposal: Join the Catholic Church! Be as rabidly anti-gay as you like! Heck, they’ll even overlook the events that caused the Anglicans to split from Catholicism in the first place (it was a disagreement over King Henry VIII’s denied divorce in 1534, for what it’s worth) and recognize differing Anglican traditions by creating a new legal entity.

Aw, isn’t that just the most adorablest thing ever? There’s just nothing like a common dislike of us gays to mend a 475 year old religious rift.

• Catholic Church reaches out to Anglicans [CBC News]

Same-sex blessings have been the epicentre of a bizarrely deep rift in the Anglican Church. Now the divisive issue has culminated in.. well, in pretty much the same way as all ridiculous issues: A court case.

Yes, the Anglicans are suing each other, as four parishes in British Columbia (St. John’s Shaughnessy, St. Matthew’s, St. Matthias and St. Luke’s, and the Church of the Good Shepherd) are scheduled to meet the Diocese of New Westminster in court next week over the ownership of four Anglican church buildings.

The Diocese locked out the parishes from their churches last year over disagreements about same-sex blessings, the appointment of a gay bishop, and other absurdly small differences in doctrine.

While both sides lament that it has come to this, they had failed to reach an agreement through a mutually selected, third-party mediator: Jesus.

• Vancouver Anglicans go to court [Canadian Christianity]