Fr Ramey’s appeal against a decision by the diocese of Virginia to remove him from the priesthood was being heard online this week by the Court of Review of the Episcopal Church in the US.
Fr Ramey, who is white, was Rector of All Saints’, Alexandria, until he stepped down in December 2022, 18 months after beginning his fast. He resigned just after the diocese began Title IV disciplinary proceedings against him, in which he was accused of neglecting his parishioners by not administering communion.
His fast was promptEd by a visit to Ghana in 2017. While there, he toured Cape Coast Castle, a slave-trading fort, where an Anglican chapel was built immediately above the dungeon for male slaves.
“The site of the first Anglican celebration of Holy Eucharist in Ghana, was directly above hell on earth,” he wrote in a pretrial document. “Men stood in the dungeon, surrounded by and on top of bodies and blood, while an Anglican priest and a congregation of worshippers received the body and blood of Jesus Christ.”
The visit moved him to pursue a Doctor of Ministry degree at Virginia Union University, a historically Black Baptist institution in Richmond. He completed the degree in 2022. “I have felt called to a prophetic voluntary fast, refraining from celebrating or receiving Holy Eucharist,” he wrote.
“I was ordained into a part of God’s church built on the wealth, power, and privilege gained from the enslavement and ongoing oppression and exploitation of Black people. . . How then can I administer the sacraments at the whites-only lunch-counter-altar built on top of the bodies and blood of people our theology enslaved?”
In material released by the diocese of Virginia, and available on its website, he pointed out that his parishioners were not denied the eucharist, as worship at All Saints’ was carried out with neighbouring congregations.
Some parishioners also wrote in support of Fr Ramey’s fast. One, Dixie Ross, emailed him on May 2022 to say: “I have so much respect for those who stand up for what they believe and you are a shining example of that. I’m sorry we won’t share the eucharist together, but there are so many other ways that you are involved and celebrating Jesus’ teachings with us. I think this is a wonderful, Christ like way of practicing what you preach, literally.”
Linda James, who describes herself as a “Black woman of African descent”, wrote to him: “You are an asset to us all. Whether you choose to take eucharist or not, your presence and participation means a great deal.”
In a letter explaining his fast to the diocese, Fr Ramey said: “I believe that the white church knows our siblings have something against us, so we must act. I believe we can find repentance and reconciliation through the justice and mercy of God if we prioritize our relationship with our BIPOC [Black, Indigenous and People of Colour] siblings.”
Episcopalians must prioritise those relationships “even over the demands” of the Book of Common Prayer. “The purpose of a fast is always to bring change, healing, justice, humility and hope. I continue to long for the day I can return to the altar to celebrate in reconciled life with my siblings.”
His legal counsel told the Court of Review that there was nothing in the Church’s constitution, canons, or Book of Common Prayer “prohibiting the Eucharist fast that Father Ramey is engaged in”.
The diocese has insisted that the case is not about racism, but about discipline. “The Diocese of Virginia has acknowledged over and over and over again that there is racism throughout the Church and throughout the Church’s history,” the diocese’s attorney, Brad Davenport, said.
The Court of Review is composed of lay and ordained members from all nine provinces of the Episcopal Church.
One of its members, the Revd Gregory Jacobs, said during the live-streamed hearing, reported by Episcopal News: “My problem fundamentally with this case is one of trying to figure out how we resolve the issue around a clergyperson whose individual conscience or theological difference comes to a place where . . . he did not celebrate, he did not administer, and he did not receive Communion. And, at the same time, how do we reconcile that with the impact that that inevitably has on the community of the faithful?”
The Bishop of New Hampshire, the Rt Revd Robert Hirschfeld, asked whether another priest could refuse to distribute communion as a fast over the Church’s use of fossil fuels, its investments in weapons manufacturers, or any similar protest in the name of seeking justice.
The session closed, and the Court will review and publish its decision, with no date set for publication.
Fr Ramey’s successor as Rector of All Saints’ administers the sacrament.