Rome to Lambeth: You're in Bad Shape

This is not your typical "church-speak" stuff.

...from Cardinal Dias's address to the conference yesterday evening:

"Much is spoken today of diseases like Alzheimer's and Parkinson's. By analogy, their symptoms can, at times, be found even in our own Christian communities. For example, when we live myopically in the fleeting present, oblivious of our past heritage and apostolic traditions, we could well be suffering from spiritual Alzheimer's. And when we behave in a disorderly manner, going whimsically our own way without any co-ordination with the head or the other members of our community, it could be ecclesial Parkinson's."

Damian Thompson, from whose blog the above was extracted, comments:

The comments by Cardinal Ivan Dias, Prefect of the Congregation for Evangelisation, must count as one of the rudest things a Vatican prelate has said to Anglicans since the dawn of the ecumenical era.

It can mean only one thing: Rome - and therefore the Pope - has given up on the Anglican Communion.

Umnnhhhh....yah. At some point in time, somebody had to say it; the Lefty Anglicans have walked out into the pond WAY beyond where the stones support them.

I don't usually get into discussions of other religions' difficulties--because the Roman Catholic Church provides plenty of fodder all by itself, and as an RC, that's (kinda) my business.

Here, of course, we have a confluence, where Rome spoke to the Anglicans.

Sorry to have to blog about it, but it cannot be avoided, as Cdl. Dias has signaled.