The Radio 4 breakfast programme Today had these segments:
0609 Is the Anglican Church moving closer to a split over the issue of gay priests? Robert Pigott reports.
Listen with Real Audio here
0750 Rev Susan Russell, president of America’s gay Christian movement, Integrity, and Canon David Anderson, discuss the divisive issue of gay priests.
Listen with Real Audio here
The news story US Church excluded for gay stance has been updated to include quotes from these interviews.
0 CommentsInclusive Church Press Release
Wednesday 22nd June 2005
Inclusive Church welcomes the reinstatement of the Episcopal Church USA and the Anglican Church of Canada within the bodies of the Anglican Communion.
The grassroots network of Anglican Christians and various church interest groups and bodies regrets that the Anglican Consultative Council meeting in Nottingham today was not able to include the North American churches unconditionally. However, that the vote taken failed to achieve a clear majority is an affirmation of the diversity of the communion and a powerful reminder of our identity as Anglicans. Now, we can move forward to the listening process called for by the 1998 Lambeth Conference and begun at the Anglican Consultative Council.
The Revd Giles Goddard, Executive Secretary of Inclusive Church said: “The landscape has changed. The Church is not polarised in the way people have assumed. The simplistic characterisation of the Global South and the West has been shown to be false. Inclusive Church looks forward to building on these creative dialogues formally and informally to combat the many forms of exclusion within and beyond our Church.”
LGCM – see below the fold.
41 CommentsReports of today’s events will be added here as they are found.
Canadian Press Canadian Anglican church plays down exclusion from two communion panels
National Post Anglicans ‘expel’ Canada
Anglican Church of Canada press release ACC decision regrettable, but of little practical consequence, Canadian Primate says
TLC George Conger Council Somber After Vote to Exclude North Americans
Official text of Resolutions Passed Today At ACC-13
The Times Ruth Gledhill American churches shown door as gay row deepens
Telegraph Jonathan Petre has a one sentence summary at the foot of a preview of Friday’s session:
The Anglican Consultative Council yesterday reaffirmed its commitment to traditional Church teaching on homosexuality following efforts by liberal Americans and Canadians to justify their consecration of a gay bishop and sanctioning of gay “blessings”. The council also narrowly voted to exclude Americans and Canadians from key committees of the Council, at least until the 2008 Lambeth Conference.
Anglican Journal Solange De Santis
Council votes to include primates
Council narrowly supports censure of Canada, U.S.
ENS
Matthew Davies and Bob Williams ACC affirms Communion-wide listening process, members’ voluntary withdrawal
(this includes comments from the Presiding Bishop)
Neva Rae Fox ACC votes to add Primates to membership
TLC George Conger ACC Suspends North American Churches
BBC US Church excluded for gay stance
Associated Press Jill Lawless Canadian, U.S. Anglicans avoid censure
This report also appears in many US papers under other headlines such as Conservative Anglicans fail in bid to censure North American churches over gay issue or Anglicans won’t censure wings of church
Bishop Duncan’s Blog Entry (item dated 22 June)
TLC George Conger Vote on Resolution to Expel North Americans Scheduled
6 CommentsPassed by 30 votes to 28, with 4 abstentions. A secret paper ballot was used.
The Anglican Consultative Council
(1) takes note of the decisions taken by the Primates at their recent meeting in Dromantine, Northern Ireland, in connection with the recommendations of the Windsor Report 2004;
(2) notes further that the Primates there reaffirmed “the standard of Christian teaching on matters of human sexuality expressed in the 1998 Lambeth Resolution 1.10, which should command respect as the position overwhelmingly adopted by the bishops of the Anglican Communion”;
(3) endorses and affirms those decisions;
(4) consequently endorses the Primates’ request that “in order to recognise the integrity of all parties, the Episcopal Church (USA) and the Anglican Church of Canada voluntarily withdraw their members from the Anglican Consultative Council for the period leading up to the next Lambeth Conference”;
(5) further requests that the Episcopal Church (USA) and the Anglican Church of Canada withdraw their members from all other official entities of the Communion for the same period.
interprets the reference to Anglican Consultative Council to include its Standing Committee and the Inter-Anglican Finance and Administration Committee.
Proposer:
Stanley Isaacs (South East Asia)
supported by
Peter Akinola (Nigeria)
Henri Isingoma (Congo)
Amos Kiriro (Kenya)
Andres Lenton(Southern Cone)
Gerard Mpango (Tanzania)
Samson Mwaluda (Kenya)
Bariira Mbukure (Uganda)
Damien Nteziryayo (Rwanda)
D Okeke (Nigeria)
Elizabeth Paver (England)
Humphrey Peters (Pakistan)
Enock Tombe (Sudan)
In response to the request of the bishops attending the Lambeth Conference in 1998 in Resolution 1.10 to establish “a means of monitoring the work done on the subject of human sexuality in the Communion” and to honour the process of “mutual” listening including “listening to the experience of homosexual persons” and the experience of local churches around the world in reflecting on these matters, in the light of Scripture, Tradition, and Reason, the Anglican Consultative Council requests the Secretary General:
1. To collate relevant research studies, statements, resolutions and other material on these matters from the various provinces and other interested bodies
2. To make such material available for study, discussion and reflection within each member Church of the Communion; and
3. To identify and allocate adequate resources for this work, and to report progress on it to the Archbishop of Canterbury and to the next Lambeth Conference and to the next meeting of this Council, and to copy such reports to the provinces.
Passed unanimously.
8 CommentsENS reports:
Wednesday, June 22, 2005
ACC votes to add Primates to membership
By Neva Rae Fox
ENS 062205-3
[ENS, Nottingham] — After discussion in three business sessions, the Anglican Consultative Council (ACC) voted June 22 to change its constitution to include the 37 Primates as ex officio members, thereby increasing the membership from 78 to 115.
Originally introduced at Monday’s session, the action included a provision to attempt to ensure balance for clergy and lay members. Under the new configuration, laity representation would no longer be the majority of the ACC, one of the four “instruments of unity” within the Anglican Communion. (A detailed ENS report will follow.)
link to ENS report here (covers a number of other items as well)
7 CommentsThis is the planned agenda item for the afternoon session. It now appears that at 2.30 pm discussion of this item will be preceded by the closed session mentioned in an earlier item, as requested by Peter Akinola.
Proposed Resolution from the Joint Standing Committee on the listening process as requested by the Primates at Dromantine
In response to the request of the bishops attending the Lambeth Conference in 1998 in Resolution 1.10 to establish “a means of monitoiring the work done on the subject of human sexuality in the Communion” and to honour the process of mutual listening including “listening to the experience of homosexual persons” and the experience of local churches around the world in reflecting on these matters, this Council requests the Secretary General:
1. To collate relevant research studies, statements, resolutions and other material on these matters from the various provinces; and
2. To make such material available for study, discussion and reflection within each member Church of the Communion; and
3. To identify and allocate adequate resources for this work, and to report progress on it to the Archbishop of Canterbury and to the next Lambeth Conference.
4 CommentsArchbishop Akinola wants the following document considered, in closed session. See also his cover letter here.
The ACC has just decided to go into closed session at 2.30 pm to do so.
Document text:
A Global South statement regarding the request for listening
The Primates Meeting asked ECUSA and the Anglican Church of Canada to explain the thinking behind their recent actions.
The presentations that we heard from ECUSA and the Anglican Church of Canada did not explain that thinking with reference to the teaching of the Anglican Communion as expressed in Lambeth 1.10 and statments from Primates Meetings in Brazil, Lambeth and Newry.
They also failed to explain why they have chosen to:
– depart from the received and agreed teaching of this Communion
– ignore all four instruments of unity
– disregard the processes by which we come to a common mind, and
– overlook the specific request described in the Windsor Report.
Instead they advocated a position that reinforces our current divisions.
The proposal that the Communion “listen to the experience of homosexual persons” is an ongoing concern but must be preceded by an affirmation of Lambeth 1.10 and the Primates Communiqué at Dromantine.
17 CommentsDraft Resolution on the Episcopal Church (USA) and the Anglican Church of Canada
The Anglican Consultative Council
(1) takes note of the decisions taken by the Primates at their recent meeting in Dromantine, Northern Ireland, in connection with the recommendations of the Windsor Report 2004;
(2) notes further that the Primates there reaffirmed “the standard of Christian teaching on matters of human sexuality expressed in the 1998 Lambeth Resolution 1.10, which should command respect as the position overwhelmingly adopted by the bishops of the Anglican Communion”;
(3) endorses and affirms those decisions;
(4) consequently endorses the Primates’ request that “in order to recognise the integrity of all parties, the Episcopal Church (USA) and the Anglican Church of Canada voluntarily withdraw their members from the Anglican Consultative Council for the period leading up to the next Lambeth Conference”;
(5) further requests that the Episcopal Church (USA) and the Anglican Church of Canada withdraw their members from all other official entities of the Communion for the same period.
Proposer:
Stanley Isaacs (South East Asia)
supported by
Peter Akinola (Nigeria)
Henri Isingoma (Congo)
Amos Kiriro (Kenya)
Andres Lenton(Southern Cone)
Gerard Mpango (Tanzania)
Samson Mwaluda (Kenya)
Bariira Mbukure (Uganda)
Damien Nteziryayo (Rwanda)
D Okeke (Nigeria)
Elizabeth Paver (England)
Humphrey Peters (Pakistan)
Enock Tombe (Sudan)
Again today, reports will be linked here as they become available. My apologies for misplaced items yesterday.
Full text of Stephen Andrews’ presentation
Full text of Peter Elliott’s presentation (PDF FILE)
Full text of Bishop Jenkins’ presentation
Anglican Church of Canada press release Canadians address Anglican Consultative Council
ENS Canadian Anglicans speak to same-gender blessings
ENS More that unites than divides, Episcopalians tell ACC
Full text of Susan Russell’s presentation
Associated Press Jill Lawless U.S. Episcopals Defend Openly Gay Bishop
(note: this is not in the Guardian newspaper, only on its website, it is of course in hundreds of US newspapers)
AP Photos here
Washington Times N. American wings defend stances on gays
Pittsburgh Post-Gazette Steve Levin U.S. Episcopal leaders defend ordaining gays
TLC Communion’s Spotlight is on Presentation Panels
Anglican Journal Solange de Santis Canada, U.S. tell Council about debates on gay issues
The Times Ruth Gledhill US Anglicans bless ‘sacred’ gay unions
BBC US Church defends gay bishop move
Guardian Stephen Bates Vengeance in the air as churches face expulsion
ENS Audio streams: Episcopalians respond to Windsor Report
Canadian presentation: ‘Key messages’ for the Anglican Consultative Council
Kendall Harmon “liveblogged” the American presentation here
ENS Theologians offer response to Windsor Report request
PDF download of the report To Set Our Hope On Christ
Associated Press Jill Lawless U.S., Canadian Anglicans Gather in England
Washington Times Julia Duin Alexandria seminary official to defend gay clergy
0 Commentspress reports and releases will be linked here as they become available.
TLC Archbishop Says Common Ground Still Exists
also a series of photos from Nottingham
ENS Theological education: Archbishop of Canterbury underscores global importance
(this report covers other events of Monday as well)
Guardian Stephen Bates Williams pleads for Anglicans to hold together
Press Association Gay Bishop Decision to Be Discussed
TLC Status Quo at ACC Holds on Second Day
ACNS Anglican Consultative Council begins its work
ENS Audio, text links offered for Archbishop of Canterbury’s ACC presidential address
Anglican Church of Canada Rowan Williams stresses value of friendship in opening address to Anglican Consultative Council
Not a report on today, but a preview of tomorrow, Ruth Gledhill US church leaders justify ordination of gay bishop
0 CommentsThe full text is now available from ACNS here, or below the fold.
I recommend reading the entire document carefully.
6 CommentsRowan Williams was interviewed for an hour (less commercial breaks) by Melvyn Bragg. This was recorded last Thursday, and was shown today, Sunday, at noon on ITV1.
No transcript of this interview is available as yet.
The following news stories have appeared:
Press Association Archbishop Threatens to Reopen Rift on Women Bishops
Observer Woman might head church, says Williams
Telegraph Homophobia is rife, says Archbishop
Further news reports today on the ACC meeting will be posted here, newest items at the top.
TLC Withdrawn Status of North Americans Noted
TLC ACC Opening Session Surprise
ENS Archbishop of Canterbury celebrates ACC opening Eucharist
ENS Bob Williams Anglican Consultative Council opens Nottingham meeting under theme ‘Living Communion’
TLC George Conger ACC Meeting Opens with Dinner and Orientation
0 CommentsAnglican Consultative Council
The meeting of the Anglican Consultative Council which begins today in Nottingham could be a slightly awkward affair. The ACC is the only worldwide Anglican body which includes lay people and priests as well as bishops – all thirty eight provinces of the Anglican Church send representatives. This time, however the Anglican Churches in the United States and Canada were asked to withdraw their delegations because of the row over the ordination of Gene Robinson and the blessing of same sex unions. Stephen Bates is the Guardian’s Religious Affairs correspondent and has written a book about the divisions in the Church over homosexuality.
Listen here with Real Audio (3.5 minutes)
Profile of Archbishop of York
The Church of England is to get its first black archbishop – as Archbishop of York John Sentamu will be the Church’s second most senior figure and stands 98th in a line that stretches back Paulinus in the year 625. It is a remarkable journey for someone who began his working life as a lawyer in Uganda. Mike Ford reports.
Listen here with Real Audio (10 minutes)
John Sentamu
The appointment of John Sentamu to the number two job in the Church of England has provoked plenty of column inches in the papers – most of them positive. Much is made of his background. He worked as a lawyer and judge in Uganda before escaping to Britain; he was beaten up under the Idi Amin regime when he refused to acquit one of the president’s cousins. Much is also made of the fact that he is the Church of England’s first black archbishop – the Independent newspaper adds for good measure that he is the first “senior prelate of the Church of England to be flagged down by the police and asked the standard PC plod stop-and-search questions” Here are some reactions to his appointment – The Rev Rose Hudson-Wilkin chairs the Committee for Minority Ethnic Anglican Concerns, the Most Rev Henry Orombi, is Archbishop of Uganda & and Bishop of Kampala, but first here are the views of Rt. Rev. Joe Aldred a pastor in Birmingham, and secretary for minority ethnic Christian affairs in Churches Together in Britain and Ireland. Whatever the ethnic background of the incumbent the position of Archbishop of York is, potentially at least, a hugely important one – both in the life of the Church and in the life of the nation.
Listen here with Real Audio (2.5 minutes)
update
BBC news report based on the above, Archbishop vows to ban homophobia
12 CommentsThe archbishop told BBC Radio 4’s Sunday programme homophobia had “no place” in the Church.
He wanted people to stop using “ghastly” language that implied people were “not human beings” because of their sexual orientation.
Archbishop Sentamu, who was born in Uganda, was appointed to the second highest post in the Church on Friday.
“I want to say to people, ‘Please, please, please don’t use such ghastly words,’ because every human being regardless of their sexual orientation are standing in for God, each one of them is actually loved of God.
“And when you use language which implies they were not human beings who are you to do that because you did not create them?’”
Richard Chartres writes in The Times about church finances. In Church coffers are half full, not half empty he writes in part:
ALL Barchester has been roused by reports that a cash crisis in the Church of England could lead to a cut in clergy numbers by up to a third, with worshippers being directed to meet in one another’s homes. This doomsday scenario is mistaken, but despite Archdeacon Grantly’s derisive snorts, it is good to have a serious debate about the present state of the Church of England…
…The report which gave rise to the initial press reaction will be discussed by the General Synod next month. Its main thrust is that “the key challenge facing the Church is not financial but the need for it to develop a more dynamic mission emphasis”. This is the point on which we need the real debate to be focused.
The inhibiting factors have to be faced. One is the way the Church does its business, with the postwar explosion of boards, synods, councils and committees, all involved in a carousel of consultation,. John Sentamu, the new Archbishop of York, as Primate of England is just the right person to tackle this plate of spaghetti. His appointment is very good news…
Over in the Guardian Jane Shaw writes about the Anglican Communion in Rival bids for the Anglican franchise, and she concludes her column with:
…There is a new set of alignments, in which people want to be with other people who read the Bible like them more than they want to unite with all other Anglicans. These alignments cross national boundaries. We might call this the confessional versus the communion.
The bullying behaviour of those united in an alignment to oppose the North American decisions suggests that they have no interest in the integrity of the communion unless we all think like them.
The Windsor report, the 2004 document meant to sort out the divisions within the communion, attempts to do that by changing the nature of the communion. We need to be clear about that. We will go from being a “fairly loose federation of kindred spirits, often grateful for mutual fellowship but with each province reserving the right to make its own decisions”, as church historian Henry Chadwick described the communion in 1993, to one in which, as the report says “no province, diocese or parish has the right to introduce a novelty”.
Local differences, or dispersed authority as we understand it in Anglican terms, will have no place in this more authoritarian global structure. Someone’s version of Anglicanism will prevail, but whose? Who will own the Anglican franchise?
Christopher Howse in the Telegraph discusses Prayer and God’s rescue plan
6 CommentsThe Yorkshire Post has this column by Michael Brown A life less ordinary for the very different Archbishop together with this front-page news report Archbishop elect calls for visionary church and a leader here (scroll down)
From the London papers:
Guardian
leader Ebor’s handicap
Stephen Bates A cleric’s journey: from Idi Amin’s Uganda to York
The Times
Ruth Gledhill and Andrew Norfolk Church reveals its changing face with choice of a visionary Bishop
Alan Hamilton A fearless campaigner who stood up to terror of Idi Amin
and this online only analysis by Ruth Gledhill The man to help the CofE live again
Telegraph
leader African spice
Jonathan Petre Sentamu becomes Britain’s first black archbishop
Independent
Ian Herbert Judge who fled Amin becomes first black archbishop in C of E
As the Anglican Consultative Council meeting in Nottingham draws near, many articles have appeared concerning it.
The Episcopal News Service published Listening central as delegates, observers prepare for ACC-13
and also this account of the recent Province IV Synod: From Nigeria, New Zealand: Voices on Windsor Report heard in U.S. forum.
Presiding Bishop Griswold has issued this letter to ECUSA bishops which mentions that:
In addition to making our presentation we will deliver to the members of the ACC a document entitled To Set Our Hope on Christ. This report is offered as a response to the request put to us in the Windsor Report paragraph 135 which asks the Episcopal Church to explain “from within the sources of authority that we as Anglicans have received in scripture, the apostolic tradition and reasoned reflection, how a person living in a same gender union may be considered eligible to lead the flock of Christ.” The report was prepared by a small group coordinated by my Canon Theologian, Mark McIntosh of Loyola University Chicago. We can be very grateful for his efforts and those of Michael Battle, Katherine Grieb and Timothy Sedgwick (all of the Virginia Theological Seminary) Jay Johnson (the Graduate Theological Union, Berkeley, California), Bishop Roskam, and Kathryn Tanner (University of Chicago). As well, we can be grateful for the work of Dr. Pamela Darling, an historian who has compiled an appendix which delineates our church’s exploration over these last 40 years of issues of human sexuality. Once the text has been delivered to the members of ACC it will be available online and you will receive word about how copies may be obtained in booklet form.
The Living Church has published this editorial comment: ACC Meeting Could Bring Clarity
and this news article, Bishop Griswold Confident Before ACC Meeting
The Anglican Journal has Church Groups Make Plans for Council Meeting in Nottingham.
The Church of England Newspaper had two articles:
Americans set to defy Primates’ call
Ordinands ‘should study homosexuality’
And the CEN has now added this week’s trenchant View from Fleet Street column, by Stephen Bates in which he comments:
2 Comments…It is clear that the North Americans are no more going to retreat from what they – rightly in my opinion, for what it is worth – perceive to be a more realistic, tolerant and Christian attitude towards gays in the clergy, than that the bishops of the Global South will be struck by a blinding revelation that homosexuality does not have to be the defining, now-or-never, communion-breaking issue for Anglicanism.
The best analogy I’ve heard in all this has been that of Kendall Harmon, the South Carolina theologian, who says it is as if the two sides are playing tennis, but on separate courts, so that there is no one to bat the ball back from the other side of the net. As in any divorce, schism or civil war, it is when the two sides not only stop talking to each other but also cease listening – a process which implies the possibility of change and even reconciliation – that breakdown is inevitable. They may not openly admit it, but too many people in Anglicanism just want to bring that on.
Well, the time has come. It is surely evident that the strains of keeping together an international communion, traditionally based on mutual affection and respect for each other’s traditions and provincial autonomy, are just too great when stretched across societies of vastly different cultural, social and religious realities, particularly when it is evident that there is no mutual understanding and appreciation left to hold the show together…
The main bulk of the papers for next months meeting of General Synod arrived in the post this morning, and are listed below. I’ve also included papers due to be circulated next week (marked with an asterisk).
I’ll add links to online copies as they become available.
GS 1571 Agenda
Friday 8 July Saturday 9 July Sunday 10 July Monday 11 July Tuesday 12 July
GS 1572 Report of the Business Committee
GS 1574 Formation for Ministry within a Learning Church: Reviewing Progress
GS 1575 Assisted Suicide and Voluntary Euthanasia: Report by the Mission and Public Affairs Council *
GS 1576 Children and Holy Communion *
Annex 1
Annex 2
GS 1577 Presence and Engagement [This is a 20 MB (sic) document.]
GS Misc 788 Covering Note from the Mission and Public Affairs Council
GS 1578 Thirty-Ninth Report of the Standing Orders Committee
First Notice Paper (listing proposed amendments to standing orders)
GS 1579 Church Urban Fund: A New Future
GS Misc 789 Covering Note from the Mission and Public Affairs Council
GS 1580 Strategic Spending Review
GS 1580A Accountability and Transparency
GS 1580B Resourcing Mission
Annex A Annex B Annex C Annex D Annex E
GS Misc 782 Review of Administrative Costs *
GS 1583 Annual Report of the Archbishops’ Council’s Audit Committee
GS 1582 Archbishops’ Council’s Annual Report *
In the Spirit of the Covenant: Report of the Joint Implementation Commission
GS Misc 784 Covering Note by the CCU
Listing continues below the fold.
0 Comments