A little over a week ago, I read in the Seattle Times that Ann Holmes Redding, the Episcopal priest who had been disciplined by her bishop for also adopting Islam, was indeed defrocked for failing to renounce the Muslim faith.  While I am not particularly surprised by this outcome, I wonder if her bishop and faith community were surprised that she did not back down. 

Redding’s story is of ongoing interest to me as I have experienced a certain degree of angst about remaining employed in a Catholic school while adopting Pagan spirituality.  I have no illusions that I could ever openly express my Pagan spirituality where I currently work, but every so often I daydream that I can, if nothing else, become more open with my co-workers about my departure from the Catholic faith I was raised in.  However, in light of the outcome for Redding as well as other situations that are popping up in my school, I understand that I must reveal nothing if I expect to retain my job, which I do need in order to maintain my financial stability.

But I am writing this to focus not so much on me or even on Redding.  I have no doubt that Redding will come out of this all right in all the ways that matter.  It appears that her faith in the God of Abraham, Jesus, and Mohammed has not been destroyed; indeed, it may be stronger for having been tested in this way.  And the number of Redding admirers and supporters has probably grown as we observed the dignified way she dealt with her faith community and the Episcopal hierarchy as her story continued to unfold publicly.  If I feel sorry for anybody as a result of the decision by Redding’s bishop, however, my sorrow is for the regular Episcopal church-going folk who have learned as a result of this that their God is narrow-minded and exclusionary.

Recently, I had a chance to hear Ann Holmes Redding speak about her decision to embrace Islam. If you have been reading my blog for the past few months, you may recall that I wrote a previous post about Redding, an Epicscopal priest who is in the process of being de-frocked for her commitment to Islam.  She has maintained that she can be both a Christian and a Muslim; the powers-that-be in the Episcopal Church have obviously decided she cannot. 

Her story resonates with me because of my own situation—having been a seeker over the past several years for a fuller and more fulfilling spirituality than that of the Catholicism I have practiced virtually all my adult life, I have within the past year embraced Paganism, but I am (at least for the time being) in the closet due to my ongoing employment at a Catholic school.

So, wanting to know more about Redding, when I learned that she would be speaking at a nearby Unitarian Universalist congregation, I decided to be in the congregation that day.  As she shared her story with the assembly, the following three ideas stuck with me particularly . . .

• The Abrahamic religions are a “dysfunctional brotherhood” (I couldn’t help thinking at the time, if it were more of a sisterhood, maybe they would be more functional . . . J)
• The anger Redding has encountered in others in her quest to express her spirituality more fully actually has fear at its core.  I imagine those who seek or support Redding’s de-frocking see Redding’s spirituality as an electric light bulb that must either be on or off in one room at a time, when in reality her spirituality is a candle flame, and she could share the flame of her faith life with other candles (Islam, Unitarianism, etc.) while still that Episcopal flame could remain as brightly lit as always.  How sad it is that others are seeking to snuff the Episcopal flame out.  Definitely their loss.
• I was impressed by Redding’s calm resoluteness in the face of this situation.  I got the feeling that her spiritual journey has been quite similar to mine, and while I am not exactly comforted by the probable outcome of her situation (I imagine myself being fired if it were ever to become public knowledge at my school that I have embraced worship of the Goddess), I see in Redding a model to emulate in terms of not allowing others to intimidate me out of a spirituality that is personally fulfilling.

As I alluded to in my last post before this one, there are some unsettled aspects to my life just now—some due to deliberate choices I have made recently, others that are not under my direct control.  If any of these situations come to an unpleasant head, I will definitely need the kind of “soft strength” I saw in Ann Holmes Redding.