Misquotation is a fact of life both for people written about and especially for periodicals which contain articles written under an extreme time pressure. It is in fact remarkable thatThe Living Churchprovides the church with a news source faithfully every week. However, because of the way incorrect information appears in other media sources, some of which seem subject to the strategy of the organizations they serve, there is added need to verify quotations and their context. Misquotation or misattribution inevitably leads to repeated misquotation. Errors lead to mis-characterizing individuals, and future reports then fall into a pattern from a preconception about what they will say.

No one wants to see conservatives and traditionalists leave the Episcopal Church. Nevertheless, we seem to be witnessing the unfolding of a strategy whereby the mainstream of the Episcopal Church is portrayed as increasingly radical and pushing the brothers and sisters who disagree with them out of the church. This perspective is served by the press of those groups which, to serve their own purpose, are willing to offer interpretive statements about what an individual says as exact quotes - that is, by quoting people incorrectly - as well as to alter significantly what a person intends to communicate by taking words and statements out of context and rearranging them.

Some examples are in order:

The first instance took place at the fall 1995 meeting of the House of Bishops in Portland. At that time, the bishops passed a mind-of-the-house resolution that we intended to interpret the original canon authorizing the ordination of women as mandatory at the 1997 General Convention in Philadelphia. During the debate, a substitute motion to receive the report without comment until the 1997 convention was offered. I argued against this postponement, saying that the four dioceses and bishops that have not allowed women to function as priests and bishops deserved our earliest and clearest statement of intention in order to prepare themselves, and especially, to receive our help in finding some way to meet the demands of both a mandatory canon and their personal conscience.

I said, "If we are going to be definitive at the convention in Philadelphia, then you (the four dioceses and bishops) should find it helpful to see clearly what is coming so that you can develop a plan which will satisfy the dictates of your conscience, while finding a way to put you in communion with a woman who functions in your diocese as a priest or bishop. You and your dioceses will have 27 months to develop your plan, and I know anyone here would do anything - we would each turn backflips if you asked - we would do anything to help."

After the substitute motion failed by a large margin and the committee's recommendation passed even more overwhelmingly, Bishop William Wantland of Eau Claire rose to make a statement in protest. In his statement he declared, "As the Bishop of New Jersey said, 'In 27 months the coercion will begin'." Bishop Wantland knew, and has formally recognized, that these were not my words! He knew the House of Bishops had just heard what I had to say and assumed his words would be taken as an interpretation of my comments. However, I can assure you that the word "coercion" or any such exaggerated and alarmist reaction was the farthest idea from my mind, indeed, the very reverse of my sentiments. I was offering help and clarity. Nevertheless, several publications, picked up his words as a quote and reported them as my own. I have been misquoted widely ever since. It is time for it to stop.

The next instance took place in July at General Convention, when the House of Deputies surprised many by coming within one vote in each order of authorizing the Standing Liturgical Commission to develop rites for the blessing of same-sex unions. The House of Bishops then voted to refer the issue to the Standing Liturgical Commission for further study. The report in the daily newspaper Foundations, published by the Episcopal Synod of America and the Prayer Book Society, did all it could to picture this as radical action. Sure enough, some other church media picked up their version and gave it credence. Among the erroneous impressions one might receive from these reports were: (a) that the resolution which passed in the House of Bishops was one offered by the Diocese of Missouri, asking the Standing Liturgical Committee to study the blessing of same-sex unions with special attention to those rites currently being used, (b) that what the House of Bishops passed was highly controversial, with one side on the issue presented as "winning" and the other as "losing," (c) that the resolution was permissive of the blessing of same-sex unions, because I answered "no" to Bishop John-David Schofield's question as to whether it would make such blessings inappropriate.

The resolution passed was a carefully worded substitute that eliminated the controversial issue of whether or not to recognize the legitimacy of rites presently being used to bless same-sex unions. Though I suggested the wording, the substitute resolution was adopted by Bishop William Frey as his own and was so immediately and broadly accepted that there was minimal debate before it passed almost unanimously by voice vote. I think everyone in the room except the questioner understood that the reason I replied negatively to a series of questions as to whether or not the resolution would establish a moratorium against the blessing of same-sex unions was simply that there were no such references in the resolution. Indeed, the resolution was carefully worded to avoid a debate on such rancorous issues at that time.

The third instance took place toward the end of the convention, when I was asked to participate in a theological round-table discussion sponsored by Integrity. The report in ESA's daily on the last day of the convention claimed that I had declared a "complete triumph for the far left." It supported this conclusion by shaping a statement I was supposed to have made, taking certain of my words and phrases out of context and re-ordering them to suit the purposes the organization, not I, had in mind.

Once again, what the paper communicated was the exact opposite of what I intended. If anything, I was trying to raise the level of discourse out of the trenches of a political struggle into a larger and longer-range social justice context. I addressed this context historically in terms of much more sweeping reform, internationally in terms of different cultural needs and understandings, and ecumenically in terms of longer-range goals.

Especially, I addressed the place the Episcopal Church has within our larger Anglican Communion. I wanted to acknowledge that I was pleased to stand shoulder to shoulder with the members of the gay and lesbian community at the end of a truly historic General Convention for them, one which had demonstrated real progress in their acceptance and inclusion. Nevertheless, I suggested that the discussion on homosexuality is only seriously beginning within Anglicanism.

In the Anglican Communion, we do not excommunicate one another as provinces. We communicate through our primates and by establishing commissions to study theologically appropriate considerations. The Eames Commission addressed the question of ordaining women from the Anglican understanding of the nature of ministry and sacramental theology. The ordination of women is doctrine which has now been received in the Episcopal Church, but the process of receptivity continues throughout the Communion as Anglicans explore ever more deeply the nature of ministry and the more complete sacramental inclusion of women. In the same way, a commission has been established by the Anglican Communion to consider sexuality issues, of which homosexuality is the most pressing issue. It will take time for us to find clarity and come to any substantial agreement on the mind of Christ. This discussion and our eventual clarity will turn on theology. I suggested that the most appropriate basis is our baptismal theology.

If all of the words left out of the quoted statements, the sustained laughter by everyone on the panel, and the context had been presented, no reader could have doubted that I was pointing up the absurdity of won/loss ways of dealing with such issues. The panel was composed largely of people who know too well the oppression of win/lose politics.

The House of Bishops has made significant progress in the development of our community life. We can disagree on the most difficult and thorny issues, while holding one another in the most profound regard and respect. We must not allow issue-oriented elements of the media or a minority strategy to portray our on-going efforts to find God's guidance in dialogue and debate as divisive, much less as an excuse for schism. o

The Rt. Rev. Joe Morris Doss is the Bishop of New Jersey.