5. Respondents agree not to file or endorse any further amicus brief or affidavit in litigation outside of their respective dioceses and against the legal position of The Episcopal Church until the General Convention formally addresses this conduct… 8. In the spirit of reconciliation, Respondents undertake to help defray the costs of the Conciliation process.

Respondents not yet fully cowed, but at least successfully silenced until GC determines the limits of acceptable opposition. In the mean time, respondents are forced to pay for the rope used to hang them.

Cherie’s headline reads: Conciliatiion agreement announced.

Tails tucked firmly between legs and consciences muzzled.  What a sad spectacle.

Reminds me of the show trials of Russians under the eras of Stalin and Khrushchev.

“Respondents agree not to file or endorse any further amicus brief or affidavit in litigation .... until the General Convention formally addresses this conduct…”

Holy smokes. Didn’t they have attorneys? In the real world the single most likely outcome is that General Convention never addresses the conduct. These people are permanently silenced.

ACI response now available.

Respondents were told flat out to keep their mouths shut or else.

I wonder if these bishops are really so naive as to think that this capitulation will save their dioceses?  Four of them are diocesans, and apparently the threat of action against their diocese was held over their heads.  But all that means is that they and their dioceses will now have to keep capitulating to 815 until they are indistinguishable from the rest of TEC.

Its now becoming difficult to see why the Global South Primates should treat the Communion Partner bishops in TEC any different to the rest of TEC.

More proof that TEC is, if not hierarchical, authoritarian.  Today, is there a practical difference?

Once you pay the Danegeld, you’ll never be rid of the Dane!

18 USC § 1512 - Tampering with a witness, victim, or an informant

(b) Whoever knowingly uses intimidation, threatens, or corruptly persuades another person, or attempts to do so, or engages in misleading conduct toward another person, with intent to—

(1) influence, delay, or prevent the testimony of any person in an official proceeding;

shall be fined under this title or imprisoned not more than 20 years, or both.

http://www.law.cornell.edu/uscode/text/18/1512 Accessed 3/10/13

In legal and quasi legal proceedings, it is sometimes wise not to die in a stupid ditch. I think that is what the responding bishops decided.

Bishop Daniel’s helpful comments

I still think forcing the bishops into this process, and the outcome including requiring them to pay expenses for those who brought on this process amounts to felonious behavior in terms of witness intimidation and extortion. 

I hope that the courts involved in the original cases will consider that, and that someone in the appropriate situation will speak to the appropriate prosecutors about possible criminal action regarding the felonies committed.

10.  Then it’s time for them to file criminal charges against Schori and her cohorts in Federal court.  If they don’t stand up for their rights as Americans, then who will?