"The Archbishop of Canterbury and Canon Kenneth Kearon, the secretary general of the Anglican Communion, committed themselves at the Lambeth Conference to ensuring that the absent bishops were kept fully informed of what had taken place ..."

Maybe if those absentee bishops had been willing to show up in the first place and associate with those whom they deem outcasts, unclean and impure, they would know what had taken place.

But, as it is, they can't risk contamination by association, so they demand to be informed by various forms of communication in order to determine if the Lambeth Conference measured up to their expectations.

I don't see how it can be correct that "the 230 or so absent Anglican bishops have not yet been contacted" as suggested.

It was announced on 26 August 2008 that the Archbishop of Canterbury had that day "sent a letter to the bishops of the Anglican Communion, setting out his personal reflections on the Lambeth Conference."

In case any copies were lost in the post, the text is available on the internet at http://www.archbishopofcanterbury.org/1942

The letter makes it clear that it is addressed both to those who were at Lambeth and those who were not.

On the road to getting where Rowan now wants us all to be, period, he has preached some dodgy and dubious particulars - 

(1) that dioceses have independent relations with Canterbury (a view as difficult to implement inside CoE as elswhere?)

(2) that bishops count for more in church life than lay people, 

(3) that weaponized doctrines against target groups like the current hot button favs of queer folks and uppity women and modernity in general are serious Anglican theology - such that we are boldly encouraged not to ever look behind those conservatively realigned sacred narratives to see who might be doing what to whom? - such that covert scapegoating in church life becomes the master key to our new and newly realigned closet mandates in Anglican church life? 

With a coup de grace being:
(4) claiming credit for being anti-antigay prejudices in Anglican church life while really making sure that exclusive spaces (and exclusively subordinate spaces?) continue to exist globally for just such prejudices to thrive, dress up, and do liturgy to bless this dodgy trash talking Status Quo.

What Canterbury cannot bear to do with queer folks, i.e., really imagine that he is one, is precisely what he cannot do with women whom God raises up for leadership among us, i.e., imagine that he is one.

So Canterbury counsels going slowly, slowly, slowly with forebearance towards the people who scapegoat and trash talk you - saying this is a daily crucifixion that will bear much godly fruit of the spirit. Except that all the while, Rowan helps preach the unintelligent, flat earth conservative nonsense - about you - about queer folks, women, progressive believers, modern democracy across diverse cultures - thus maintaining space and cover for the traditional scapegoating he says he so deplores. Rowan will even police and punish to maintain this special Anglican space to preach false witness, alas. Lord have mercy.

Dear Rowan, you cannot have credit both ways.

If you are going to side with unintelligent readings of the scriptures which precisely bear false witness against all these people, then you cannot at the same time get credit for nobly standing in love with these same people being scapegoated by this conservative Status Quo.

Note, All: The Jeffrey John fix is still in, folks. Whatever that fix was, it still is. Whatever scared Rowan utterly stilly, way back then, is still filling him with great fear, now.

The story doesn't, in fact, happen to be true. Kenneth Kearon has written to non-attenders.

Impossible not to be cheered by this. 'This' = both the continuing feisty integrity of liberal Anglicans and the continuing evidence that many, many Evangelicals do not want the gay issue to be a communion-dividing issue. Anglicanism lives!

How very odd that TA should republish via the Guardian newspaper on Friday a precis of what was posted on Wednesday.

"Overwhelmingly, the Communion is still opposed to the sexual revolution which sparked this crisis. Both GAFCON and Lambeth have made that clear. Yet there are powerful forces which will not retreat when it comes to the ‘sanctification of sin’ as Jim Packer calls it" - Archbishop Peter Jensen.

What a gross mis-statement that 'the Communion is still opposed to the 'sexual revolution' which sparked this crisis". It must by now be quite obvious that this is not the view of the main-stream Church. If Jensen had bothered to attend the Lambeth Conference, he might have understood that the majority of the Bishops who actually did attend were agreed that more must be done to try to understand the implications of homosexuality, and that the Church needs to oppose any injustice towards the homosexual population - both inside and outside the Church.

The Fact that the ABC chose to affirm the 1998 Resolution 1.10 for the time being confirms that very fact. What was then agreed to was that 3 moratoria were to be recognised as the way forward at this time. It appears, though, that Gafcon will not assent to their part of the bargain - that of ceasing to evangelise in foreign provincial areas of the Anglican Church.

The assertion by the GAFCON no-shows at Lambeth that a 'sexual revolution' was the cause of their split with ther Anglican Communion is only partly true. What is at the base of the whole matter is the different views of Scriptural interpretation

The fundamentalist view of Scripture must give way to the discipline of a modern hermeutical process, which allows for modern scientific and other social and cultural experiences to be brought into the equation - under the influence of Hooker's three-fold Scripture, Tradition and Reason basis of discernment. To base theology on only one of these - the Scriptures - is to overlook the ongoing work of the Holy Spirit in the contemporary Church.

One does wonder whether Archbishop Peter Jensen is shaping up for a division of the Australian Anglican Church, which would pit the Sydney Archdiocese against the rest of the Dioceses in the Anglican Church of Australia. I'm pretty sure that most Australian Anglicans would want to see a more reasonable missionary outlook than that of the Biblical Literalists.

Question about Fr Ron Smith's comment: It was agreed to that 3 moratoria were to be recognised as the way forward ...
I thought nothing was 'agreed to' at Lambeth and that 3 moratoria were proposed. In most Anglican provinces agreements can only be made in synod.

"One does wonder whether Archbishop Peter Jensen is shaping up for a division of the Australian Anglican Church, which would pit the Sydney Archdiocese against the rest of the Dioceses in the Anglican Church of Australia."

Lay presidency is a fact, in spite of Jensen's failure to make it legal. Church planting from Sydney in almost all of the Australian dioceses is also a fact, regardless of the issues it raises -- Jensen is delightfully oblivious to the idea that his actions might need to be governed by process. He doesn't want to hear the legitimate objections of another bishop, say, for instance, +Newcastle, and won't take account of any objections in a process of reconciliation.

But cross the man, and he will want his grievances built into the process.

Father Ron Smith wrote: “The fundamentalist view of Scripture must give way to the discipline of a modern hermeutical process, which allows for modern scientific and other social and cultural experiences to be brought into the equation – under the influence of Hooker's three-fold Scripture, Tradition and Reason basis of discernment. To base theology on only one of these – the Scriptures – is to overlook the ongoing work of the Holy Spirit in the contemporary Church.”

Buy it doesn’t. Instead the Modern American form of 1610 Arminianist Inerrantism have grown more strident in late modernity. In fact, claiming to be the Tradition of the Church – although no Church ever believed even in Indo-European Integrism the way Egyptian Islam does.

More, Modern American Inerrantism is 20th century, only.

The Gnosticisms of a Philo of Alexandria or a “Flavius” Josephus, né Levi, have never been accepted in Judaism or the Church, until late 20th Century anti Modern Academics into the “Dynamic Equivalence” of the 1952/1972 RSV made them – and their Gnosticisms – un-baptised, a kind of “honorary Fathers”.

It’s the Emperor’s New Clothes, again. What is – variously – claimed to be Biblical in most anti Modern translations and non-translations into Modern Social Policies simply isn’t there.

Never was.

But Bible Greek, the Koíne of the LXX and the NT, has been mis-read and mis-understood and mis-interpreted from the Alexandrian Platonists of the Early Church who read it as the artificial Academic Greek of the Platonizing Academy.

I almost said *from the Academy*, but, as always, it’s the Museiån, not the Academy ;=)

Sara,

You are almost correct when you say that 'nothing was agreed to' at Lambeth - implicitly. However, the tenor of the final communique was that the moratoria would be presented to the Churches as 'The Way' to a resolution of the present conflict.

You are right, of course, about the fact that there is moral, but no legal persuasion from the Lambeth conference for the Provinces to agree to the moratoria (as has been proven already by the GAFCON promates stating that they will not abide by their particular moratorium - to withdraw from missionary endeavours into other provinces).

In the light of this obvious fact, the moral aspect of persuasion has lost some of its bite already for the rest of the Anglican Communion to abide by the other 2 moratoria. One can hardly expect TEC and A.C.of Canada to agree to resile from what it sees as a Gospel imerative.

As I see it, there is still the oustanding matter of how we interpret the Scriptures that is the real and abiding issue at stake.

"Lay presidency is a fact, in spite of Jensen's failure to make it legal."

Really? Sydney Anglicans are actually doing this, now? If so, why? I read somewhere that Sydney ordains far more men to the priesthood than they actually need to staff their churches...?

"Sydney Anglicans are actually doing this, now? If so, why?"

Reportedly. As far as I can see from what I read, there are two reasons: it reduces the argument that we need ordained women to make up for a shortage of priests. Not a good argument anyway, but I guess their position is that there is nothing wrong with a layman "celebrating", but a lot wrong with female headship, which says a lot. Second, Sydney is very Evangelical and anti-Roman. Having a layman "celebrate" is a strong political statement of "non-Romish" beliefs. The dean of the catheral is on record as claiming the Real Presence is to be found in te fellowship of the worshippers, that he would never celebrate a Mass, and at one point instituted individual communion cups a few years ago. Also, either he or his brother has referred to RCs as "subChristian". On another site, I have encountered Sydney Evangelicals mocking things like Lent, and basically anyone who does not share their extreme Evangelical beliefs. Now where have I heard that kind of language before?

"I read somewhere that Sydney ordains far more men to the priesthood than they actually need to staff their churches...?"

This is also true, but the reasons are purely power-based in two ways.

Lay presidency is based on a notion of delegated authority -- the priest is still in charge, because any lay person presiding at the "communion" has to be appointed by the parish priest. Of course, it does beg the question that, if a lay man (and it will be a man) is sufficiently qualified to preside, why not just ordain him?

However, the second reason is a more bluntly power-political. Here in Australia, diocesan representation in the clerical houses at General Synod is based on the total number of ordained persons in a diocese. Most of the ordinations are to the diaconate (many don't proceed to priestly orders), but because they're ordained it increases Sydney's representation at General Synod. Peter Jensen miraculously believes in the graces of ordination when they confer a bigger bite of the ballot for him in national church government.

He's hoping not to get rolled (again) the next time we have to elect a primate...

Sydney Anglicans are actually doing this, now?
Yes, they are. Primarily in congregations which they have transferred to "independent ministries" so as to render them beyond jurisdiction, but in more than a few "Anglican" congregations as well.

If so, why?
Because they can, because they see themselves as above external canonical law and answerable only to a “higher” doctrinal understanding, and because they are utterly ruthless when it comes to silencing internal dissent and criticism. And because no external bodies have taken steps to stop them.

It’s interesting that those dioceses most likely to object to Sydney’s lay presidency, namely hard-line Anglo-Catholics such as Ballarat, have so far been spared incursions in what appears to be part of the strange alliance formed between the two extremes of the Australian Anglican perspective in order to keep the moderate majority in check. Despite Sydney long having been deemed the Oxford Movement and its successors as “sub-Christian” (and as recently as the lead-up to GAFCON a senior Sydney figure was citing Tract XC as the source of modern liberalism, as well as of all the Communion’s current divisions) these dioceses have been overlooked in favor of those most critical of Sydney, such as Newcastle and Brisbane.

Sydney won’t leave the national church, however. +Jensen’s on record as saying all the legal advice points to them being unable to the not inconsiderable church assets and property with them. He may be a dedicated dissenter, but this devotion doesn’t extend to leaving the money behind.