in fairness

and following the previous post, here is an open message from the male accuser in the case.  He might have been better advised not to put this message in the public domain, but he has, and I note the ugly dead-trees have been sent it too.  btw I don't know the protagonists here, I picked this up from various Facebook friends and online postings, I just thought the response of the Episcopal bishops to this matter was spot on and should be shared.

Erik Campano, the accuser of Ginger Strickland, has sent the following open letter.

From: campano@gmail.com [mailto:campano@gmail.com] On Behalf Of Erik Campano
Sent: Wednesday, July 11, 2012 7:03 AM
To: undisclosed-recipients
Subject: Public Message

Bishop Matthews, Bishop Henderson, and Presiding Bishop Katherine
Jefferts-Schori: please note that I see in my inbox that there is another decision from the reference panel, but I will not be opening that email for reasons described below. I wish you all PLEASE only the COMPLETE LOVE of CHRIST OUR LORD -- as I wish everyone.

To all my friends and family that I can find to list right now: please publicize the following note, which I have posted on the website of the New York Post and on my Facebook page.

To the Internet:

I do not feel now as I felt when I made that quote. It was immediately after I received the decision, and it was a hasty reaction. I do NOT think it was in the spirit of spiritual reconciliation that I called for. I do not know how I feel now: but I wish to express something more charitable than that comment to the Episcopal Church.

If I have broken any laws, I ask you to point this out to me and take fair legislation against me. Please do not take any illegal or unethical action against me (or anyone else). I have never believed my actions to be illegal, but I may have been unable to judge that, because I am not a legal expert.

I am going, after I post this note, to seek full psychiatric treatment.

I believe I am unstable.

I have asked my family, after I write and post this note on Facebook and the Post website, to physically restrain me from the Internet for one month, or I have been judged by a psychiatrist stabilized. I ask this of everyone. Actions sometimes have unintended consequences, going to the public with this information has produced horrible consequences that I did not intend, and I cannot control. When I made this decision, I believed it to be ethically true. I do not know now.
THAT DOES NOT mean, however, that I discourage any sexual misconduct survivors, male or female, to come forward publicly.

If anyone can definitely figure out whether I have done anything ethically wrong, I would like you to point this out to me. I expect to be constantly examinating my conscience over the next month. When I have become stable again, I will do everything I possibly can to right, personally, any wrongs I have done.

When I initiated the complaints against Ginger and Bishop Whalon, I believed that action to be ethically correct. I still do. However, please note that by the Canonical process I was required to make the cases AGAINST them. I did the best I could, and I think these cases are reasonable. I always did my utmost to only speak TRUE facts.
However, reasonable people can also make the case FOR them, and I encourage both sides to present the most reasonable cases possible, as seems fit for public dialogue. Ultimately, I do still believe that both of them have violated Title IV of the Episcopal Canons.

Beyond this, I am extremely confused about other questions of right and wrong related to this case.

The Post has copies of these documents. So does, obviously, the Episcopal Church. However, I do not know, legally, if they can be shared fully with you.

There are probably other things I should say here which I do not understand now, and more elegant or less sensationalistic ways of expressing them.

Please repost this letter wherever deemed appropriate.

I wish only GOODNESS and RECONCILIATION for Ginger, Bishop Whalon, the church, and all our brothers and sisters - that is, everyone.

Erik Campano

that's the way to do it

an assistant curate of the Episcopal church in New York has been subjected to vile, misogynist and apparently entirely untrue coverage (which I will not reproduce) , after she ended a relationship she was having with a parishioner at her previous church.  She was effectively accused too of being a paedophile, although the man she had had a relationship with, who instigated the media coverage, was an adult.  As assistant curate she is an office holder in the church, and accountable to her bishop, to whom she made full disclosure.  If you are an office holder in an organisation and there is lying shitbag media coverage about you, this (below) is the kind of statement those who are senior in the organisation should make to its members.  Usually, they don't.  Take heed.  Especially those in politics.

July 9, 2012

Dear Sisters and Brothers,
We write to express our unqualified support for the Reverend Ginger Strickland, curate at the Church of the Incarnation in Manhattan, over an inaccurate and misleading article which appeared about her in Sunday's New York Post. The article reports the complaint brought against her by Mr. Erik Campano, a person with whom she had a romantic relationship while working as a lay minister at the non-denominational American Church in Paris. In 2011 she broke off the relationship with Mr. Campano and subsequently moved to New York to begin her employ at Incarnation. He then filed a complaint with this diocese stating that he believed that she had violated the church's policies regarding romantic relationships between clergy and parishioners.

The Episcopal Churches in Europe are under the jurisdiction of the Presiding Bishop, and the investigation of this matter was referred to her offices, where it has been conducted in full accord with established church policy. Our own preliminary investigation, though, showed that Mother Strickland had met every canonical obligation in such a relationship by disclosing her friendship with Mr. Campano to her bishop and superiors, and that there was no canonical breach of church policy.
We have complete confidence in our sister Ginger, as do the rector and congregation at the Church of the Incarnation. She is an able priest of good standing, and a person we believe to be of exemplary character. She did not deserve to have this story reported as it was, and we deeply regret the embarrassment this has caused her. We ask the prayers of this diocese for her and assure you of our complete support for her and her continued ministry in the Diocese of New York.

Read, and learn.

Update: Ginger Strickland has been fully exonerated by a range of church investigations.  Now will the media SHUT UP.