Updated again Saturday evening
The latest official bulletin is this: Still laughing, despite GAFCON trials.
More news reports this morning:
New York Times Laurie Goodstein Conservative Anglicans Plan Rival Conference as Split Over Homosexuality Grows.
This report says that Archbishop Drexel Gomez also had a visa problem:
…The news conference was called in haste, after the conservatives abandoned a preliminary strategy session in Jordan because two of their most influential members, Archbishop Peter Akinola of Nigeria, and Archbishop Drexel Gomez of the West Indies, were denied visas…
The Telegraph has Orthodox sect justified by gay clergy row, say Conservative Anglicans By Tim Butcher and Martin Beckford.
The Times has a much shorter article: Anglican conference moves to Israel after Archbishop of Nigeria ban by Ruth Gledhill.
The ENS report is headlined Conservative Anglicans, former Episcopalians arrive in Jerusalem for GAFCON.
Rachel Zoll of the Associated Press filed this: Anglican Bible conservatives hold strategy summit.
The Telegraph has another swing at GAFCON, in Hard-line bishops make a mess of it in the Holy Land by George Pitcher
And the Guardian had this in the People column.
David Van Biema in Time has Are the Anglicans About to Split? He ends up with this:
What’s more, the GAFcon conference itself has been a bit of a Keystone Kops affair. Several key conservative bishops who were slated to appear chose not to travel to the Mideast, leaving open the possibility that they will attend Lambeth instead. The group even had trouble finding a location for its conference. At first it was scheduled for Jerusalem, but then the Anglican bishop there said he had enough problems without a divisive conference on his turf. The site was switched to Jordan, but on Wednesday the Jordanian border authorities delayed Akinola and another bishop from entering the country. The reasons were not stated, but opponents suggest that the Jordanians finally caught up with some of the remarks Akinola made in Nigeria a few years ago that may have contributed to violence between Christians and Muslims.
James Naughton, a Canon with the Episcopal diocese of Washington and one of his church’s more outspoken liberals, says, “I don’t think these guys have the juice to pull off a genuine schism. I don’t think Archbishop Akinola speaks for Africa. The coalition he once touted as the ‘global south’ has shrunk to three hard-line provinces [Nigeria, Rwanda and Uganda] and [some] Western culture warriors.”
Observers will be counting very carefully the number of bishops who actually shown up in Jerusalem for the conservative conference on Monday. But even if the group does not manage to force Williams’ hand in Lambeth, its statement marks a seemingly irrevocable step toward either a split or a redefined Communion that could have a huge impact on the already turbulent state of Anglican religion in the U.S.
And yet again (is this a record) the Telegraph has an article, this one is headlined Archbishop of Canterbury’s control over Anglicans ‘is ending’ by Martin Beckford.
Saturday
The Living Church has Anglican Leaders Gather for Mideast Conference, in which it says:
…A conference spokesman said that contrary to some reports, Jordanian authorities did not bar two archbishops from entering the kingdom from Israel to participate in a pre-meeting planning session. The Rev. Arne Fjeldstad told the Jordan Times that Archbishop Peter Akinola of Nigeria was not denied entry into Jordan on June 18, but that Archbishop Akinola gave up and returned to Jerusalem after remaining in bureaucratic limbo for several hours at the border.
“They claimed that, as a diplomatic passport holder, he had to give advance warning that he was coming,” Fr. Fjeldstad said, as quoted by Reuters.
Because of the densely-packed agenda, leaders decided not to delay the start of the meeting until all participants were cleared to enter Jordan, but decided to move the planning meeting to Jerusalem after they learned that additional rooms had become available there.
Peter Frank, director of communications for the Diocese of Pittsburgh, said that Bishop Robert Duncan of Pittsburgh is one of several members of the GAFCON leadership team who chose to remain in Jordan. Bishop Duncan and a handful of other participants to the Jordan portion of the meeting have decided to remain in Jordan until the scheduled end of that meeting on June 22.
“This was really not a big deal,” Mr. Frank said. “For most it meant that they went on a five-hour bus ride on one day rather than on another.”
Presiding Bishop Gregory Venables of the Southern Cone also did not attend the planning session in Jordan because he was remaining with his wife after her recent surgery. He is hoping to join the conference later in Jerusalem, Mr. Frank said.
“Archbishop Peter Akinola of Nigeria, and Archbishop Drexel Gomez of the West Indies, were denied visas…”
That’s interesting. A poster at Fr Jakes said that +Gomez also travels on a diplomatic passport, from the Bahamian government.
The title of Bob Duncan’s opening address at the Pre-GAFCON meeting in Amman is, ‘Anglicanism Come of Age: A Post-Colonial and Global Communion for the 21st Century’, Anglican Communion Network site, 19 June 2008. George Conger wrote an article on 5 September 2007 which gives a decidedly ‘colonial’ impression of American involvement in the Province of Rwanda from the Anglican Mission in America. There are, now, 16 bishops in the House of Bishops of Rwanda: 9 are Rwandan and 7 are American. George Conger’s article is as follows: Rwanda appoints more bishops for USA Wednesday, 5th September 2007. 6:40pm By:… Read more »
The whole passport/visa thing is very curious. 1. If +Akinola was using a regular passport:- Some nationalities may get a visa at the border on entry to Jordan. Nigeria is not one of them. All Nigerians must apply for a visa in Nigeria first. Presumably the other Nigerians got theirs as they gained entry. Therefore it is not correct to report that +Akinola was denied a visa by the Jordanians at the border. Such a denial would have come from the embassy in Nigeria initially. 2. If, as reported, +Akinola was using a diplomatic passport:- When travelling on a diplomatic… Read more »
According to David Virtue, +Drexel Gomez is not at GAFCON nor was he planning to be.
http://www.virtueonline.org/portal/modules/news/article.php?storyid=8455
I was surpised at the BBC on the midnight news last night reporting that 350 ARCHbishops are attending! I thought it was a mistake with the headline writers…but no, it was repeated by the clearly well informed BBC religious affairs correspondent!
Or maybe he was prescient and there will be imminent subdivisions amongst the ever so charitable Gaff cons?
Well of course they’re laughing; the point all along was to be in – and focus on – Jerusalem. Of course, they will be sharing the city with the annual Gay Pride event, which is bound to bring a smile to a few faces outside GAFCON as well. Maybe even a little chuckle. No doubt the GAFCON PR team will – if they address this at all – say they intended all along to bear witness in the face of “depravity” or some such nonsense. They’ll be lucky if that sort of thing is even heard above the techno music,… Read more »
If there was any doubt as to who is funding GAFCON, here is a clue. A letter from +John Guernsey (of the US Church of Uganda congregations), printed in the June 10th newsletter of Good Shepherd Church, Louisville, KY: “Thank you to all who have so faithfully and generously given to help with the enormous costs of the Church of Uganda bishops and their wives to the Global Anglican Future Conference in Jordan and Jerusalem. The Church of Uganda churches and individuals in the U.S. have given just over $90,000 to date! This is an extraordinary expression of generosity and… Read more »
The GAFCON website has changed the title from “Still laughing despite GAFCON trials” to “Smiles all around as GAFCON gathers…”
Someone felt, I guess, that the first was a bit over the top.
BBC’s 1 O’CLock News featured Henry Orombi interviewed, and the GAFCON document. Robert Piggott said to the newsreader that this document gives all Anglican conservatives a different focus and its effect with come to Britain. He didn’t use any discrimination, e.g. that several leaders of even southern Anglicanism have decided not to go. Another broadcast was on Pat Robertson’s 700 Club (the CBN that is a mimic of CNN but from the far right wing) and it said The Episcopalian Church was “consigned to the ash heap of history” and it was its own fault. This included an interview with… Read more »
If the Renaissance Hotel is in Jerusalem then the Hilton Hotel Heathrow is in London.
Neither is true.
The Renaissance Hotel is a self contained international (Marriott) hotel on the outskirts of Jerusalem with no connect whatsoever with the Old City. It seems like a strange choice.
‘Could not his have been spent on the poor ?’
The Telegraph is a broad church these days: it has to cater for a very diverse readership, from Norman Tebbitt, Ann Widdecombe and the Bishop of Winchester, to David Cameron’s pro-gay bright young trendies in the Shadow Cabinet. Indeed, it did a lovely feature a while back on Alan Duncan – MP for Melton and Rutland, in the heart of true-blue rural England and one of Mrs Thatcher’s blue-eyed boys – and his boyfriend, on the announcement of their civil partnership this summer. And it has an openly gay assistant editor, Andrew Pierce. The paper has called the shots all… Read more »
The cost of Uganda, kenya and Rwanda on board means the GAFCON book does not tackle the issue of womens ordination. The Presiding Bishop is criticised for her liberalism and not for her sex. GAFCON is not as conservative as you initially think…. they have gathered from all five continebnts and yet there is no mention in the GAFCON HANDBOOK of Our Blessed lords teaching on marriage!
“Another broadcast was on Pat Robertson’s 700 Club (the CBN that is a mimic of CNN but from the far right wing) and it said The Episcopalian Church was “consigned to the ash heap of history” and it was its own fault.”
This is the same Pat Robertson, I would point out, who blamed the 9/11 attacks on US support for abortion and gay rights, and Hurricane Katrina’s devastation of New Orleans as God’s vengeance on that city.
OK then: Gay Pride and GAFCON together at last – smiles all around!
We’ll always have…er…Jerusalem!
I’m sure some of the Gafcon people will enjoy gay pride jerusalem–even if on the q t.
Human beings are just not that monolithic. It’s our saving grace.
Bishop Duncan’s tunnel vision continues to amaze me, though I should long ago have grown accustomed to this scotoma in his carefully crafted conservative hermeneutics. In simple – probably too simple yet indicative – terms: We can rethink all manner of biblical-traditional things – flat earth, Ptolemaic cosmology, usurious interest on bank loans of all sorts, permitting or prohibiting anatomy dissections of the human body, adopting the anesthesias which initially occasioned great guffaws at the mention of Lister, women with equal access and training and power in any number of competency-based occupations or other endeavors (including military?), Jews of many… Read more »
You’re correct drdanfee. Big tent Anglicans will continue. Big Tent prophets have been rolling out God’s plans for millenia. Consider Jesus’ understanding and affirmation of Elijah aka John the Baptist e.g. Matthew 11:12 “From the days of John the Baptist until now, the kingdom of heaven has been forcefully advancing” or 17:11-12 “Elijah comes and will restore all things (as ordained e.g. Malachi 4:5-6). But I tell you, Elijah has already come, and they did not recognize him” And when Jesus spoke of John the Baptist in Luke 7:18-35 “All the people, even the tax collectors, when they heard Jesus’… Read more »
I have said before and I reiterate:
“How people will laugh in 50 years!”And cry.
In 50 years people will know everything people thought and said today, in a way that is not possible about the “issues” of 50 years ago. Many un-fortunate will hide their head in shame and change their names, which today isn’t needed…
The difference is the Internet.
All will be preserved, all will be there… Many will point their fingers and whisper, like they do after Franco in Spain today, like we did many years after WW2.
“The Rev. Arne Fjeldstad told the Jordan Times that Archbishop Peter Akinola of Nigeria was not denied entry into Jordan on June 18, but that Archbishop Akinola gave up and returned to Jerusalem after remaining in bureaucratic limbo for several hours at the border. “They claimed that, as a diplomatic passport holder, he had to give advance warning that he was coming,” Fr. Fjeldstad said, as quoted by Reuters. Because of the densely-packed agenda, leaders decided not to delay the start of the meeting until all participants were cleared to enter Jordan, but decided to move the planning meeting to… Read more »