Gafcon 'to take place as planned'

This is on the Gafcon site today: 'We have heard that GAFCON has aroused considerable interest and enthusiasm. We would encourage those who are planning visits to the Holy Land to coincide with GAFCON to await the announcement of the venue and the exact start and finish dates before making final plans.'

This makes it sound as though change is on the cards but Paul Eddy, doing the PR for Gafcon, insists that nothing has changed. He says: 'The final details of venue, hotels are being finalised, a team was out in Middle East just last week with conference and hotel and transport reps, all according to plan. Full details to be sent out to non-Bishops March 1.' He continues, 'The timetable agreed at the beginning has always been that Bishops nominate clergy and lay folk and the official invites will be sent to non-Bishops on March 1.'

I wrote a little about Gafcon and Lambeth in my latest CEN column, reproduced below. Incidentally, I love Pluralist's latest suggestion - that Lambeth has nicked the Unitarians' logo.  Leaving aside the giveaway 2008, can you tell which is which?

This coming Lambeth Conference will be my third. At the 1988 one I served as Clifford Longley's 'legwoman', covering mainly the spouses' conference. My efforts there were so 'successful' that all subsequent spouses' conferences have been closed to the press. As far as the 1998 conference goes, Andrew Brown tells the story of that one better than I ever could. He wrote a long essay that was in the end not published in print in full, so it has been a little neglected by Anglican 'nerds', those of us who are fascinsted by the minutiae of such things, among which I suppose I must include myself.

He has put it online however on his website, which given his habitual mode of writing about  me I publicise here with considered Christian charity. Is there a word for the opposite of 'schadenfreude'? Here are a couple of pertinent extracts from the essay, 'How Christians Love Each Other.'

Brown, who merits the description of 'intellectual', one of the few of us who could possibly take on the Archbishop of Canterbury on his own terms, was  formerly the religion correspondent of The Independent. Although he'd already stopped doing that by 1998, he was still present at Lambeth. He wrote:  'The schism between East and West, which formed the Orthodox and Catholic branches of Christianity took place about a thousand years. Like all divorces it was a process as much as it was a succession of dateable facts. But it is not misleading to date it at around 1000 AD. In the three weeks that the Lambeth Conference at Canterbury lasted, I came to believe that we were watching a split of equal moment, this time between North and South. Like the first great schism — and like the Reformation 500 years later — this one involves authority and sex; and it ends up with flatly incompatible creeds.'

He continued: 'When I wrote about religion for a living, much of my work consisted in listening to Christians tell lies about each other; I suppose they believe that Jesus would not have approved of their behaviour but I can’t see what difference his opinion would make. Christianity is not whatever Jesus had dreamed and hoped. It is what Christians have made it; and often I feel that they share more with me, an outsider, than they do with each other.'

He addressed the beginnings of the phenomenon that became, in a broad-brush sort of way, the Global South. Describing one of the venues where the Southern attack on liberalism was run from, he wrote: 'There were endless overlapping groups The Association for Apostolic Ministry, The Episcopal Synod of America, The American Anglican Council, the Oxford Centre for Mission Studies, Episcopalians United: there were nearly as many varieties of orthodoxy as of Trotskyism. But they were based around Texan money. The English traditionalists regarded them as pompous barbarians. "Have we shown you the bunker?" I was asked when they showed me the American headquarters and when I asked what they were doing
in this galere, Stephen Parkinson, the director of Forward in Faith, replied "the money, dear boy, the money."

'They had organisation as well as money. The central Anglican organisation was unable even to produce a comprehensive list of names and addresses of the bishops attending the conference. The Southerners produced and published a glossy directory with details and where possible photographs of every single bishop. They had prepared for Lambeth by organising two preliminary conferences in the immediately preceding years for Third world bishops, one in Kuala Lumpur, and one in Dallas. For some of the attendees, this was the first time they had ever been out of Africa. They certainly did not adopt homophobic opinions to please the Southerners who were bankrolling these meetings: their detestation of homosexuality and  liberalism was absolutely sincere. But the conferences allowed for the preparation of agreed statements, or manifestos denouncing homosexuality and other Northern vices, which were introduced into all four sections of the Lambeth conference, not just the one that was meant to be dealing with the topic.'

Reading this a decade on, what comes across is how hopelessly unprepared the 'northerners' were for the level of organisation among the conservatives gearing themselves up to fight the liberal creed. The Global South got off to a flying start, giving them a massive advantage in the subsequent battle for the hearts and minds of the Anglican Church which they almost won.

I say 'almost' because as of the last two weeks, the ground on which they are standing seems a bit less firm than before. But it is not just them. The ground on which all Anglicans are standing at present is shifting. It may be a bit 'last century' to talk of schism. A bit last four centuries even. But there is a sense of something seismic underfoot.

At the Anglican Mission in America conference in the US this week, more bishops are being ordained, including the Rector who succeeded Chuck Murphy in his TEC parish. The model clearly being adopted by the conservatives is of a Biblical, presbyteral style of episcopal ministry. This is not dissimilar to what Archbishop Peter Akinola has done in Nigeria. As long as these bishops don't all expect palaces, gardeners, secretaries and chauffeurs as they've rather come to do in England, the model has a lot going for it simply by contributing through the orders of the church to the authority of a church's pastor. The ongoing erosion of the essentially catholic differentials between laity and presbyter is another reason why the present episcopal proliferation is to be welcomed.

AMiA is under the oversight of Rwanda. England's own Sandy Millar, an Anglican bishop appointed by Uganda as a bishop in mission to London with the full cooperation and approval of the Bishop of London, was one of the speakers at the AMiA conference. Rwanda's primate Archbishop Emmanuel Kolini, vice-chair of the influential Council of Anglican Provinces of Africa, was present also. But what of CAPA's chair? Archbishop Ian Ernest of the Indian Ocean was not expected at the AMiA conference this time, although he was there last year. Instead, as vice-chair of the Lambeth Design Group, he showed up at Lambeth Palace, helping the Archbishop of Canterbury do the 'official launch' of the 2008 Lambeth Conference.

I believe his absence from the AMiA conference was significant. Slowly, little by little, the united front of the conservative 'orthodox' is being eroded.The most dramatic example of this is the fall-out from the Global Anglican Futures Conference, the rather ineptly-styled 'Gafcon' scheduled to take place in Jerusalem in June. Bishop Suheil Dawani of Jerusalem would at one point have been placed comfortably in the orthodox camp. But he has links with The Episcopal Church. Further, no reader of this column needs me to point out the complex religious and political nature of the region in which he ministers. Minutes of two meetings between him and two key Global South leaders, Archbishop Akinola and also Archbishop Peter Jensen
of Australia, were widely leaked this week, to me and others.

It is easy to understand why Gafcon organisers would go for Jerusalem, for the powerful religious symbolism of an Anglican conference in such a place. But it is not easy to understand why, given the tense political background of Israel, never mind what is happening in the Anglican Communion, there was not just a little more consultation beforehand.

For a long time before his recent handover to Riazat Butt, the Guardian's former religious affairs correspondent, Stephen Bates, was insistent that schism was on the cards. I was sceptical. Surely no-one could actually want schism? But given the liberal drive of the US church and many other dioceses in the West, my strong belief was that there must be a strong 'orthodox' wing on the other side to keep the whole Anglican ship, as it has been styled, balanced and afloat. Even with the departure of so many Anglo-Catholics after the ordination of women priests, there still had to be a way to walk
Newman's 'via media'. The liberal intellectual elite, of which both Brown and Bates are both more than eloquent spokesmen, should not be allowed to have it all their own way.

But the signal given out by Gafcon does seem, sadly, to be in line with Bates' prophecy. Certainly from the outside, where I sit, Gafcon looks to be the beginnings of a 'new foundation', for which that most ancient of cities, Jerusalem, has been chosen to serve as the primatial building block. 

Sandy Millar, a presbyteral genius who has had little truck with the media during his truly blessed ministerial career, has an answer. Bishop Millar's own church, Holy Trinity Brompton, is unparalleled in its extraordinary success. Church planting can sometimes be controversial. But if the orthodox are right about liberalism, then it contains within it the seeds of its own destruction. Surely another policy, other than schism, could be to remain within the Church and, when a parish is dying, simply move in and take over, to reform from within. That way, God would decide in the end, not us, who is wrong and who is right. And maybe God actually wants a church that is a vast mixture of all creeds, meaning creeds in the broadest sense.

To journalists given a rare opportunity to question Dr Rowan Williams at Lambeth Palace this week, he gave the distinct impression of planning a Lambeth Conference that will be more like a university seminar than anything else, a rather large seminar with lots of house groups for spouses thrown in. And I have to confess, re-reading Andrew Brown and looking across the water at the US and Jerusalem, who can really blame him? Cancelling Lambeth would have been the easy option. His courage has to be applauded, simply for going ahead.

Comments

[Dr. Irene Lancaster FRSA]

Many of us feel that it is great that there will be an Anglican conference in Jerusalem, especially in the wake of the 2006 Lambeth Palace statement endorsing the British churches' role in the establishment of the State of Israel, let alone the ties that are supposed to exist between Christians and Jews, or so Christians tell us.

Funnily enough, I'm coming back to Britain in February and hope to be in Rochester visiting my father-in-law, one of the leaders of the Jewish community there.

He's also a very good pal of the Bishop of Rochester and admires the latter's stance on a number of issues, not least on his truth-telling about Muslim no-go areas in Britain (loads of those in the Greater Manchester area, unfortunately - the police are always advising residents of the dangers of the trouble spots), as well as his support for an Anglican meeting in Jerusalem.

[pendennis88]

RG - You said "Surely another policy, other than schism, could be to remain within the Church and, when a parish is dying, simply move in and take over, to reform from within."

Don't think that has not often been considered. Under US canon law, the approach of US bishops and a few practical concerns, though, it simply has no chance of working. The bishop has almost complete control over who the rector is and can reduce parishes to mission status and remove clergy and vestry almost at will. Most TEC bishops would never allow an orthodox congregation to call an orthodox cleric in the first place, and certainly no one from one of the orthodox seminaries. Then, in many diocese, there are significant financial exactions to support the diocese and TEC, and you can't get people to support the diocese financially. And the practical issue is that people with young families want their children to receive a Christian education, which is typically either nonexistent or the type of thing you really wouldn't want to expose your child to. (As one of my friends once mentioned complaining of a particular diocesan youth event and why it was actually worse then just letting them watch TV all weekend, "at least the writers of Gossip Girls [a popular US teen TV series] deal with issues of character".] Ultimately, people will choose to start an AMiA or CANA church instead, both of which are planting churches like mad.

The reason that TEC churches have left is so that such churches can continue to exist, and the choices of the ABC, going back to his choice not to put in an effective panel of reference, have greatly helped put them in that position.

Further, while it is a good question whether it is better for orthodox bishops to skip Lambeth or not, and legitimate complaints can be made regarding its location, the way everyone is attacking it seems to me to be a bit much. First, it suggests that it must be viewed as a huge threat to merit such attacks, and I also wonder if those who do want to attend GAFCON will start to sense that they are being written off. Far better for NT Wright to go to GAFCON and explain why the bishops there should attend Lambeth than further estrange them.

My own prediction, though, for what it is worth, is that there will be greater clarity about the choice to attend Lambeth before Lambeth.

[Neal in Dallas]

As one who has long defended +Rowan with his balanced views, careful statements, and high ecclesiology, I must say that I fear that Stephen Bates' prediction of schism is being lived out, due in great part to Dr. Williams' failure to lead through this crisis.

I have greatly appreciated his statements supporting the statement on human sexuality from Lambeth 1998 as the teaching of the Communion. I have also been encouraged by his statement that 'actions have consequences', but the only consequences resulting form the actions of the Episcopal Church in the United States at our General Conventions of 2003 and 2006 seem to be that Bishop Gene Robinson has not been invited.

Beyond that, the only thing that the 'Windsor bishops' in America have gotten from Dr. Williams is general hints regarding his position as the Archbishop of Canterbury. And they and we are left with seeking consolation and encouragement from innuendo.

Americans do not take hints or suggestions. The American Episcopal Church leadership is comprised of people expert in the art of power politics. They will not listen to the professor from Lambeth Palace. They will politely nods their head at his comments and then go home and do what they had been doing all along because they know that actions do not really have consequences. Actions have only comments.

I'm not convinced that courage is being exhibited in not postponing Lambeth. I do believe that Lambeth is being designed to play on Dr. Williams' strength, namely theological study and reflection. That is not what the Windsor Report called for. The Windsor Report was designed to keep the Communion together in the face of the violation of Lambeth 1.10 (1998) by the American Episcopal Church. Because the Windsor Process has gotten stuck in commentary without action, the very people that the Windsor Report aimed at keeping in the Communion will be the very people that will boycott Lambeth 2008.

The result is that schism will occur. Anglicanism will have no claim to catholicity as it will have been divided into a federation of denominations that once traced their liturgical roots to the Book of Common Prayer.

No, there will be no legislation at the Lambeth Conference in 2008. Legislation will not be needed to overturn Lambeth 1.10. It will simply be ignored.

[Ann]

Interesting that they use the symbol (or close to it) of the Unitarian Universalist Church for their group.

[Malcolm+]

"[I]t is not easy to understand why, given the tense political background of Israel, never mind what is happening in the Anglican Communion, there was not just a little more consultation beforehand."

Come now, Ruth. You're not that naive.

There was no consultation because Pope Peter of Abuja and his acolytes don't believe that they have to consult with anyone about anything, ever. They are not accountable, in their own eyes, to anyone but God.

Thus, they believed that having pronounced that they would hold a conference in Jerusalem, that all conservatives would simply do as they were told.

They made the same mistake so many arrogant and unaccountable leaders have made over the years. They over-reached themselves. They alienated their potential friends. They galvanized their foes to action.

I think your overall analysis is correct. The "conservatives" have been defeated. But they haven't been defeated by the liberals. They've been defeated by their own arrogance and incompetence.

(Note: I draw a distinction between "conservatives" - such as Bishop Howe of Central Florida or Archbishop Buckle of Yukon - and "conservatives" - such as Archbishops Akinola or Jenson. The distinction is fully explained in an older post on my blog.)

As to Pendennis's usual conspiracy theory, it is entirely possible for a conservative parish in either TEC or the ACC to call a conservative rector from a conservative theological college. Where there have been problems is in the small handful of cases where "conservative" rectors or candidates have taken uncanonical action. Your persecution myth is, as they say, a dog that won't hunt.

[Alice]

Malcolm, the facts directly contradict your statement that Archbishop Akinola does not regard consultation as neccessary. Why did he bother to go to Jerusalem to consult with the Anglican bishop there?

[Malcolm+]

Neal, granting that the American Church's actions play no small part in the present crisis, I note that every one of your complaints can also be made regarding the lack of consequences related to unilateral actions of "conservatives." There is blame enough to go round here.

Finally, there will be no legislation at Lambeth 2008 because there has never been legislation at any Lambeth Conference. In fact, resolutions of successive Lambeths have clearly eschewed any legislative, canonical or juridical authority for these gatherings.

[EPH]

If one visits the GAFCON site, they will find what appears to be the Anglican Compass Rose in purple on the website banner. Did they get permission to use the logo, although purple, seemingly implying that GAFCON has something to do with the Anglican Communion ACO, Compass Rose Society etc. or did they "nick" that too?

[Neal in Dallas]

Malcolm+,

I agree with you that many of the conservatives in the American Church have acted unilaterally as well. I am extremely unhappy about that as well. I am not in favor of the "border crossings". Within my circle of influence I have urged American conservatives to support the Windsor process as the only good solution to the current crisis.

I must respond to your comment that it is entirely possible for a conservative church to call a cleric from a conservative theological school. I don't know if you are from America, but in the circles I run in, I have heard numerous stories of bishops excluding candidates from Trinity Episcopal School for Ministry. I personally know several bishops who have steadfastly refused to send students there. In the US bishops will often send a theologically conservative to a more "liberal" seminary to "broaden that student's worldview." Those same bishops never send a liberally formed student to a more conservative seminary.

There is a very decided bias against conservatives at all levels of the Episcopal Church. Is it a conspiracy? No. But it is definitely a pattern that is more than isolated to a small handful of cases where candidates have conducted uncanonical actions. Saying it ain't so doesn't make it not so. It is a way of life in our denomination.

By the way, of course, I know that Lambeth does not legislate. It was a statement made for effect.

[Malcolm+]

Why did Akinola go to Jerusalem?

Damage control, dear Alice.

It certainly wasn't consultation. Consultation is something you do BEFORE you invite yourself for dinner.

Damage control it was Alice. And that done incredibly badly.

[David Ould]

I one visits the Inclusive Church site, they will find what appears to be the Anglican Compass Rose in white on the website banner. Did they get permission to use the logo, although white, seemingly implying that Inclusive Church has something to do with the Anglican Communion ACO, Compass Rose Society etc. or did they "nick" that too?

[Robert Ian Williams]

The fatal flaw in GAFCON is that they have made it inclusive of Anglo-Catholicism. Rather than say we are the Evangelical remnant of the Reformed Anglican Church they have partnered Anglo-catholics, and turned a blind eye to their theology.

Incredibly Jensen of Sydney is on his website giving a talk, " Why I am a protestant reformed Evnagelical " and sates ... "NO Archbishop of Sydney attends Mass. "

Yey he will appear on a platform with Bishops who claim to offer Mass!

What dioes this say to homosexuals?...you will bury your prejudices and serious diasgreements to bash us, and at the same time pretend you are orthodox

Imagine a stately liner, and Captian Jensen is helping Anglo-Catholics aboeard. Whilst in the hold there is the ticking time bomb of lay presidenc, which he will detonate after Lambeth 2008.

[David Palmer]

"But if the orthodox are right about liberalism, then it contains within it the seeds of its own destruction. Surely another policy, other than schism, could be to remain within the Church and, when a parish is dying, simply move in and take over, to reform from within. That way, God would decide in the end, not us, who is wrong and who is right."

This is going to be messy.

Liberalism whilst dying in the sense of seeing their children say in effect, "Why bother?" clings to the institutions and therefore to the trust funds which means it can still shrink and yet remain in power, control clergy appointments, etc.

It is better to have a clean break.

In 1977 most Presbyterians in Australia went into the Uniting Church along with all the Methodists and most Congregationalists. The Presbyterian rump remained comprising traditionalists (culturally, but theologically liberal) who took the non theological college leadership positions whilst the evangelicals took the Colleges. Today the Presbyterian Church of Ausytralia has returned to its confessional roots, the liberals are a small elderly rump, we have almost but not quite turned the corner on Sunday attendances and best of all we DON'T HAVE FIGHTS ON DOCTRINAL MATTERS we are all evangelical in the Calvinist tradition of Presbyterianism. I can't say this will never change, but the relief after the pre 1977 internecine warfare is palpable.

So whilst it will be messy and hurtful, sometimes it is best to part company. Knowing something of Sydney Diocese and its people, I don't think they will shrink from taking sides and all the anti Sydney, anti Jensen brigade can heave a sigh of relief.

[Alice C. Linsley]

Neal in Dallas said, "The American Episcopal Church leadership is comprised of people expert in the art of power politics. They will not listen to the professor from Lambeth Palace. They will politely nods their heads at his comments and then go home and do what they had been doing all along."

Neal is right! TEC's leadership is characterized by a commitment to homosexualism, one-world-religion and realpolitik. They seek to lead, not a church, but a political organization to effect their radical social "reforms", and they have many like-minded friends in the UK.

[Malcolm+]

Seems to me the best example of ethics-free realpolitik in recent events is the secretive and underhanded tactics of the "conservatives" - all as laid out in the secret Chapman memo many years in advance.

And, frankly, the "conservaives" might well have succeeded in their scheme to rend the church asunder, were it not for the arrogance and over-reaching of their self-appointed leaders, most especially Dr. Akinola.

[pendennis88]

You mean this memo?

"Via Meeting Steering Committee 9/29/05...

How to prepare for split after 2006 GC...

Appeal to ABC to suggest that only diocesans be able to vote at the next Lambeth conference, or to ask for other actions...

1. What will be our response the “Day After” when the bishops start announcing they are in a
“new” Anglican Communion and the Network is “recognized” as the only legitimate expressions of the A.C. in North America?

• Have ready blank presentments for abandonment of the communion.
• Have already drafted request stating that the see is vacant and requesting appointment of interim bishop. Need to coordinate with PB on these appointments.
• Have request for special convention ready to give to interim bishop so that vacant spots in diocesan government can be filled (trustees, council, standing committee, commission on ministry, etc.)
• Be ready to take legal action on property identify who will serve as litigants, what property needs to be covered.
• Have plan for locations and personnel to provide worshipping communities and “safe havens” for the faithful remnants. Identify retired priests and deacons, lay leadership. 2."

Looks like it is proceeding more or less according to plan.

You can believe that orthodox priests in the US are under no pressure from the revisionists within TEC, that everything is just fine in the US, that it is just a few unhappy people who will finally leave the Anglican Communion if Lambeth will just tell Akinola and Orombi et al to stuff it, and then everything will be just fine.

But it won't. The truth is that the orthodox have been leaving with the support of orthodox bishops and primates elsewhere so that they can continue to have orthodox parishes and diocese. No one would go through this pain if they didn't have to. Unless a way is found to keep them in the communion with adequate protections, some of the primates will find a way to protect them anyway. At this point, it does not look like the Archbishop of Canterbury wants to keep the orthodox in TEC in the communion. I think that will lead to a de facto split.

Malcolm, this is just my view. I could be wrong. The way things are going, we may find out.

[David Palmer]

"And, frankly, the "conservaives" might well have succeeded in their scheme to rend the church asunder, were it not for the arrogance and over-reaching of their self-appointed leaders, most especially Dr. Akinola."

Is this meant to be a serious comment?

The only thing that gives Akinola air is the actions of the American Church in consecrating an an openly homosexual male as Bishop with no regard to the Bible and 2000 years of Church tradition.

And no I don't agree with the proposition that since historically speaking there have been closet homosexuals made up into either priest or Bishop, this somehow robs the Church of its ability to call sin a sin.

I'm not an Anglican but looking from the outside in I really think you need to cool it and ask God for the grace to part company gracefully and allow Him to be the final judge of right and wrong.

[Malcolm+]

It was a perfectly serious comment.

Had Akinola and the rest of the "conservative" leadership been less over-reaching, there is every reason to believe they'd have gotten what they wanted - expulsion of the Episcopal Church (and possibly the Canadians) from the Anglican Communion and the establishment of a "new" Anglican province in North America.

Instead, Akinola especially (but not only) has been traipsing about alienating folk that agree with him on the substantive issue.

Oh, there will be a parting. But now it shall be Akinola et al. outside the tent - not expelled, but decamped on their own.

[Father Ron Smith]

It will be most interesting to see whether GAFCON actually takes place - at least as the jerusalem 'pilgimage' its prime promoter (Mr. Akinola) has proclaimed. It certainly will provide no picnic for the asserters of the 'Global South'. Also it may just alert the more 'catholic' of the attendees to its profound and other-wordly ambitions towards the takeover bid for leadership of our Communion, something which some of them might not consider appropriate.