Our fab political pundit Rachel Maddow, in her eponymous show, has a segment called "Talk Me Down."

I hope somebody can "talk me down" on the good that could come from such a meeting---'cuz I'm not seeing it. :-/

I do hope the Archbishop will be as charitable if Reform or FIF attempt to take the Church of England assets. After all the Pittsburgh Diocese has an endowment fund of $48 million dollars.

I think this shows the "disconnect" involved right now.

Oh well, perhaps ++Rowan is doing some MORE listening...+Duncan, formerly of Pittsburgh was at Lambeth Conference...unfortunately, when ++Rowan ¨listens¨ (as suggested in Lambeth 1.10 which he refused to have discussed at Lambeth Conference) he only listens to high pitched screams and victimized destructionist pouts.

Where did this man learn his version of common sense?

I just find this amazing.

The ABC won't invite a duly elected, consented to, consecrated Bp to Lambeth, but will chat with a schismatic deposed Bp who has abandoned the TEC and is attempting to steal its property. What planet does the ABC live on? Why should anyone pay any attention to him?

So, Duncan still considers himself a bishop-in-good-standing of the Anglican Communion -- his deposition from the ranks of TEC bishops suggests otherwise.

What WAS +Rowan thinking?!?!?

"I do hope the Archbishop will be as charitable if Reform or FIF attempt to take the Church of England assets. After all the Pittsburgh Diocese has an endowment fund of $48 million dollars."

Exactly!!!

And that he will be as charitable if +Gene Robinson ever swings through England and ++Rowan is nearby.

Oh, wait, what's that you say? +Gene has already been on English soil a couple of times, near ++Rowan, yet ++Rowan failed to invite +Gene over for the same private tea and crumpet blessings he bestowed upon +Bob???

Well, I'm sure it was just an oversight.

But I do find myself agreeing with ++Akinola on one thing: The road to Christ need not run through Canterbury.

meeting with the Bishop of New Hampshire, no, can't happen. meeting with the deposed and disgraced ex-bishop of Pittsburgh, who is earnestly desiring schism and the dismantling of the Anglican Communion, all good. feh.

Was he planning to be meeting with +Gene next week?

Why does +Rowan do these things? One can only imagine how this will be used against him by the deposed Bishop. How come he oesn't se that?

(Not to mention that +Rowan never met with the Bishop of New Hampshire at Lambeth).

So, if some bishop in the C of E set out to destroy the C of E, and the C of E deposed him, and the Presiding Bishop of the Episcopal Church were to conduct a formal meeting with such a rogue bishop, what would Lambeth Palace do?

Before too much is made of this in the context of a second North American province, remember that Cantuar had a private meeting with Bishop Gene Robinson on November 3, 2005. The statement from Lambeth Palace at that time was "...The encounter came as part of the Archbishop's commitment to listening to the voices of all concerned in the current challenges facing the Anglican Communion."

That's not much different that the official comment about the meeting with Moderator Duncan.

Note that as Archbishop, Rowan Williams has had Gene Robinson to tea at Lambeth Palace. Of course Duncan, now, would be uninvitable to the Lambeth Conference.

Perhaps this news - of the meeting of the ABC and the deposed Bp.Duncan - will make American and Canadian Anglicans more determined not to go along with the proposed 'Covenant' Treaty.

Nor would it encourage them to observe the proposed Communion Moratoria - which are not about to be observed by Duncan, Akinola, Cana or Foca, in any case. ---

UNLESS, of course, the ABC is taking this opportunity to give Duncan his marching orders from the Anglican Communion! That would not please Venables, Orombi, Akinola or the Global South - but it might please everyone else.

It was after this meeting that former Bishop Duncan made all those remarks about how Canterbury was finished as the center of the Anglican Communion and power would now move to Gafcon. I think this means that Rowan met with him and disappointed him mightily concerning the new province in North America.

"That's not much different that the official comment about the meeting with Moderator Duncan."

Well, exactly. Bp. Duncan is one of the authors of schism. As such, the ABpofC ought, I think, to meet with him and try to pour oil on the waters, try to find common ground, try to assuage his rabid anger born of fear. Gene Robinson has done none of the schismatic things Duncan has, has not plotted against his fellow Christians, has not fomented schism, has not schemed behind anyone's back to exert his power, has not misrepresented his opponents, did not create a situation where any bishop was forced to wear a bullet proof vest at his consecration, but prays for rather than reviling those who oppose him. Thus, while ++Rowan did meet with him in 2005, such a meeting is not as imperative for the good of the Church, since +Gene has not threatened the unity of the Church. Of course, conservatives would say otherwise, but it is not +Gene's existence that is the cause of schism, it is the response to him by people driven by a hatred of all things different, born of fear that God will actually abandon the Gospel. At the very least, ++Rowan has a responsibility to have a talk with such a person as Bp. Duncan so as to try to bring him back to some basic Gospel principles from which he has been led astray by his fear of change. I would hope ++Rowan held up the example of +Gene's Christian behaviour towards those who treat him as something less than human and who call him a "cancer" on the Body of Christ in comparison to +Duncan's unChristian malice. And to my conservative brethren and sistren, let me be clear: it is not Bp. Dunca's stance so much that is the issue here, but the manifestly unChristian tactics he has used to get his way. His use of such tactics makes one think that, if his understanding of the Gospel is such that he believes his behaviour to be consistent with it, he is not a very reliable interpreter of that Gospel.

As far as I can see, Rowan Williams just takes the shape of the last person who sat on him.

Please pay attention to what Lynn reminded us of - namely the similar meeting with Bishop Gene Robinson.

In all fairness to Rowan, Bishop Robinson has also been graciously received at Lambeth Palace, as will the new authentic Anglican Bishop of Pittsburgh in due course.

dmitri reminds us that this meeting took place before the press conference set up by Anglican Mainstream on 17th October.

At that conference Duncan said that the Archbishop was "aware of his presence" in the UK. He did not say that he had seen him. This suggests that he didn't get the affirmation he was looking for, and that if he had admitted to having seen the Archbishop he would have faced some questions more difficult than he was prepared to answer.

All of which suggests that some of the cries at the top of this thread, as well as Poppy Tupper's rather offensive comment, are a touch wide of the mark

I wonder if this won't help bolster his court case. It's possible he could use this to say, "see, I'm still a bishop in good standing and Pittsburgh is connected to the AC." I wonder if there is a plan to abscond with the endowments?

This doesn't quite square with "one of many private meetings” the archbishop hosts at his London residence…", does it?

"Just a meeting - of no particular consequence"

... that is hardly how anti TEC propaganda will portrait it...

... but maybe there are revolving doors at Lambeth Palace...

"see, I'm still a bishop in good standing and Pittsburgh is connected to the AC."

Well, given the rather loose definition of 'orthodoxy' these people have, I'm sure they would consider meeting an Archbishop to be sufficient contact to confer legitimate episcopacy on a person.

Thanks dimitri for the encouraging dates comparison and inference. I do hope and pray that new conservatively realigned provinces, invading the provincial churches which comprise our global Anglican fellowship of churches will not go through Canterbury. Regardless.

If Duncan The Deposed wishes to carry on, apart from Canterbury, God speed. He has so far been able to connect with several other leave-taking groups, and one guesses that a test of this new unity (which mirrors typical Anglican big tent traditions by permitting yet again a range of doctrines and liturgies and so forth?) will be whether DTDs carrot (forming a new competing province recognized by Canterbury) was a main strategic lever, or whether in truth all involved are just typical good diverse Anglican fellows who have nothing at all but sheer boundless love for one another in their conservative mini-Anglican fellowship of confessing believers.

Maybe one sign will be whether such commonality still has to be propped up by conservative believer meanness and weaponized doctrine targeting of all the fav bullseyes (who are never, ever real, live people, let alone real, live alternatively onscienced believers?). Or whether affirming their confessional positives alone will carry a confessing fellowshipping good day.

Will we all still see that they are Jesus disciples, owing to their expert doctrinal confessional abilities to ever take aim and shoot to kill? And that, admirably, from a virtuoso range of shooting distances, using a mind-numbing array of presuppositional deflection angles?

I do wish DTD would cease and desist in his frequent reliance on ends justify means ethics. It will only come back to bite him sorely in the long, long, long run. Then again, we have a long cultural missionary tradition of stealing natural resources from the heathen peoples we say God has sent us to convert - all for their own pagan betterment of course.

As far as I can see, the ABoC has made it clear on any number of occasions that all must be according to due process in this communion business. He may, and it is a very big may, recognize another province in the US if - and only if - TEC does not sign on to whatever Anglican Covenant is developed over the next decade, and assuming that England itself signs on, of course. Only then is there an outside chance for a different Anglican province in NA. Rowan has indicated this clearly time and again. Duncan, however, lives in a world of self-delusion, and security in his own rightness, and so can say to Canterbury, "Whether you recognize us or not, we will be the new Anglican presence..." on the basis of recognition by a handful of English bishops and a few of the Primates of the Global South and Friends. Duncan was no doubt disappointed by Rowan, if he even understood what was being said to him over the background of his own devices and desires.

That's my perception of the situation.

Tobias --

Interesting that you should say "assuming that England itself signs on" rather than "The Church of England", since (as long as the C of E is established) the C of E can't sign on to any Covenant that disregards HM Govt's control of the church (a point that was made at Synod, IIRC).

Precisely, good Prior A. Unless the moves at disestablishment succeed, there'll always be a [Church of] England!