Short and Packer threatened by Bishop Ingham with charges of trespassing

Short and PackerFormer Sydney Anglican, the Rev David Short, who has been charged with abandoning Anglican doctrine, has now been threatened with charges of trespassing if he sets foot on the property of St John’s Shaughnessy, in moves which could see more Canadian churches forced from their properties.

Mr Short, who is the rector at St John’s, and all other clergy belonging to the Anglican Network in Canada in the Diocese of New Westminster received letters outlining the charges from Bishop Michael Ingham on Monday.

The letters also advised that the clergy were forbidden to ‘trespass’ on the church properties, exercise any ministry and remove anything from the properties, including books. …

– Read the full report from SydneyAnglicans.net. Emphasis added.
(Photo: David Short and James Packer.)

J. I. Packer’s rare Puritan library digitised and available online

Dr J I PackerIn one of the sad attempts to deal with faithful, Bible-believing clergy, in 2008, the then Bishop of the Diocese of New Westminster issued a ‘notice of presumption of abandonment of the exercise of ministry’ to Dr J.I. Packer, and others.

As well as being a much-loved and respected theologian and preacher, Dr. Packer is a foremost Puritan historian.

“The John Richard Allison Library in Vancouver—which hosts the joint collections of Regent College and Carey Theological College—has now made available their entire rare Puritan collection to be read online for free. What a gift of modern technology to help us recover these gifts from the church of the past.

There are currently 80 Puritan authors in their collection, many of whose works were digitized from J. I. Packer’s private library.”

– Justin Taylor at the Gospel Coalition has a list of the titles and links to the digitised versions.

Faith Today Interviews J.I. Packer

Dr J I PackerFaith Today, the magazine of the Evangelical Fellowship of Canada, has interviewed Dr J. I. Packer for its current issue –

I could have said ridiculous. I could have said fantastic. I could have used other adjectives but I’ll stick with grotesque. I do not think a bishop who has not convicted me of grave moral or heretical practices is in a position to revoke my spiritual authority in Word and Sacrament. The most he can do is withdraw my permission to minister in The Anglican Church of Canada.

Since the thing that has occasioned this is the decision St. John’s and other churches have taken to leave The Anglican Church of Canada, revoking my authority to minister in the ACC changes absolutely nothing.

So I’m not losing sleep over it. Though over age, I am still a professor at Regent College and director of the Anglican studies program at Regent. No action on Michael Ingham’s part can change either of those things.

It’s worth reading the full interview here. (Photo: Ed Hird.)

David Short, J I Packer face legal action

David ShortEcclesiastical charges have been filed by a Canadian Bishop against former Sydney Anglican, the Rev David Short and one of the world’s top Anglican theologians, Dr J.I. Packer.

Bishop Michael Ingham has launched legal action over the vote by their congregation in Vancouver to seek alternative oversight from a South American bishop. …

The charges not only involve revocation of licence, but also seek to nullify the ordination of Mr Short and Dr Packer. …

Full story by Russell Powell from SydneyAnglicans.net. (updated)

Bishop Ingham sends ‘notice of presumption of abandonment’ to St. John’s Shaughnessy

Bishop Michael InghamBishop Michael Ingham has asked eight of his clergy to formally declare whether they’re in or out of the Anglican Church of Canada.

The priests have been involved in a series of meetings in which congregations in two Parishes in the diocese have voted to join a foreign Church. Read more

Give thanks for the last ten years of gospel ministry in Vancouver

Ten years ago this month, Michael Ingham, Bishop of the Canadian diocese of New Westminster, declared David Short (Rector of St. John’s Shaughnessy), his colleagues Dan Gifford and Dr. J I Packer, as well as eight others, to have abandoned the ministry.

A Diocese of New Westminster e-mail, dated May 16, 2008, put it this way –

“As you may have heard, with a group resignation from the Anglican Church of Canada, we now have some clerical vacancies in four of our parishes: St. John, Shaughnessy, St. Matthew, Abbotsford, St. Matthias and St. Luke, and Good Shepherd.

THOSE WHO ABANDONED MINISTRY:  Here is the list of the Clergy for whom Bishop Michael issued “Notice of Abandonment of the Exercise of the Ministry” (under Canon XIX): …”

Though regarded by that diocese as having ‘abandoned the ministry’, give thanks that they continue to serve the Lord Jesus, as ministers of the gospel, as before.

Today, the church which used to meet at St. John’s Shaughnessy is St. John’s Vancouver.

Remembering that history, please be encouraged to pray for the congregation of St. John’s, and others who stood, and still stand, for the authority of God in his Word.

Pray for the clear and faithful proclamation of the gospel in Vancouver, and across Canada.

Related:

Bishop Ingham sends ‘notice of presumption of abandonment’ to St. John’s Shaughnessy – February 23 2008.

Largest Anglican Church congregation in Canada leaves historic church home – September 9 2011.

“In what may be the greatest rupture in Christianity since the Reformation, disagreement over basic Christian beliefs has separated Anglican congregations around the world into two camps, usually labeled orthodox and liberal, with those holding to historic, Bible-based values and beliefs in the vast majority. The St. John’s Vancouver Anglican congregation has aligned itself with the mainstream global Anglican Church, rather than continue as part of the local, more liberal Diocese of New Westminster. The decision by this congregation and sister parishes resulted in frozen bank accounts and a court action to determine which party was conducting the ministry for which the buildings were intended.”

New Westminster considers plans for three ‘returned’ parishes – April 16 2012.

“Having won the court battle for the buildings of St. John’s Shaughnessy, St. Matthias and St. Luke, and St. Matthew’s Abbotsford, the Diocese of New Westminster must decide what to do with them…”

St. John’s Shaughnessy, Imposters – Anglican Samizdat, May 1 2018.

One of the current uses for the old building.

Read other posts from our archives concerning St. John’s Shaughnessy here.

Photo: Dan Gifford, David Short and J I Packer chat before the first Sunday service of St. John’s Vancouver in their new location, 25 September 2011.

‘Are we stronger than He?’ by David Short

From our archives –

The landscape of Sydney has changed drastically since the ACL was formed over 100 years ago, however the core business of Christian ministry remains the same. We hope these articles ‘from the vault’ will encourage and strengthen your faith and ministry.

This was written by David Short, Moore College Graduate and Rector of St. John’s Vancouver.

This issues addressed by David, back in late 2004, continue to beset the Anglican Communion.

To date, leadership from Lambeth has fudged on these vitally important issues of Biblical authority. They are set to be discussed again at the Primates’ meeting this month (January, 2016).

Please join with us in praying that all Anglicans might renew their confidence and trust in God’s Word.


Dabid Short and J I Packer 2011Are we stronger than He?

In the United States of America a jeweller rents wedding rings. You pay a weekly rental and after 12 months can keep the rings because “Statistically, people change their marriage partner before they change their Miele washing machine.”1

The current crisis of Anglicanism in Canada and the USA reflects a deep and disturbing change in Western culture. We are living through a profound cultural shift in the way men and women enter, leave and re-enter sexual relationships, and in the way we think about child-bearing, nurture and family structure. Cohabitation, for example, has virtually replaced engagement, and increasingly couples have children later, out of marriage, if at all.2

There are four elements in this shift.3

First, in the aftermath of sexual revolution and contraception, the purpose of sex has moved from procreation and relationship to relationship alone. You can see evidence of this shift in the changes to the marriage service from the Canadian Book of Common Prayer (BCP 1962) to the Book of Alternative Services (BAS 1985). The BCP states three purposes of marriage: “for the hallowing of the union betwixt man and woman; for the procreation of children… and for the mutual society, help and comfort, that the one ought to have of the other, in both prosperity and adversity.”

The BAS asserts only two purposes namely: for the couples’ “mutual comfort and help, that they may know each other with delight and tenderness in acts of love [and that they may be blessed in the procreation, care, and upbringing of children].” Notice that the second purpose is bracketed in the service, and that procreation is demoted from being a discrete purpose of God for marriage in itself to being part of the couple’s future experience of blessing. It reflects our culture where children are increasingly optional, accidental and peripheral to sexual relations.

Second, sexual relationships have become radically privatised. If sex is primarily about relationship, it becomes increasingly isolated from any wider dimension of public service or extended family. Sex is part of my personal lifestyle choice. Part of this shift is the whole notion of ‘sexuality’—in itself an individualistic notion cut free from a larger moral ecology of family, society and church.4

Third, sex is for self-fulfilment. If marriage or sex now have no outward goal and if sex is focussed just on my relationship, then sex is for my personal development and fulfilment. Hence I have a moral obligation to divorce my present wife if she can no longer promote my growth and development. Sex is understood as the expression of my inner freedom and gratification.

Fourth, sex becomes my saviour. To be self-fulfilled I must be free to express ‘my sexuality.’ How can I be a fulfilled human being if I cannot express myself sexually? Western culture is implicitly anti-child and sex obsessed with sex portrayed as a deep necessity of life, even a reason for living. It has become a substitute for communion with the living God. The romantic myth preached by Hollywood exalts sex as a metaphysical absolute so that it has become the real sacrament, the one mediator between God and man. Atonement is no longer salvation from sin through Christ’s cross. Rather, it is through sexual release where I express the real me and thus a return to the Canaanite religion.

In response Christian churches have tended to two opposite reactions.

One is to capitulate to culture, to embrace the current worldview, to change fundamental historic teaching in the belief that the Spirit is leading the culture to a new place. The other is to turn inward and adopt a fortress mentality, to separate from the wicked world, to become isolationist and pure—even self-righteous. However, neither of these responses is faithful, helpful or biblical. We need to find a more excellent way.

 

Letter to a church in crisis

In the letter of 1 Corinthians the Apostle Paul writes to a church in deep crisis, a crisis which alarmingly echoes our own. Corinth had it all: they fought over leadership, some taught that they would not rise from the dead and they were deeply divided.

More relevant to the current crisis in the Anglican communion, there was open sexual immorality in the church (in a number of forms), not only tolerated but condoned, demonstrating that the Corinthians were puffed up with pride and self-confidence.

It is vital for us to hear what the Apostle wrote to this church in crisis. Parts of this letter are surprising, even shocking, particularly with regard to sexual immorality within the church. Paul raises extremely troubling and uncomfortable questions which Anglicans must face if we are to move forward in a way that exalts the sovereign grace of God in Christ Jesus our Lord. The individual texts of 1 Corinthians must be read within the context of the whole letter, otherwise the apostle’s meaning can be distorted and misapplied. For example in the first chapter Paul writes:

“I appeal to you, brothers, in the name of our Lord Jesus Christ, that all of you agree with one another so that there may be no divisions among you and that you may be perfectly united in mind and thought.” (1 Cor. 1:10)

This text has been liberally used to implore orthodox Anglicans in Canada to fall into line and stop disturbing unity—as the Joker said to Batman, “Why can’t we all just get along?”

But not all forms of unity are biblical. There was an immense unity in the hostility expressed toward God at Babel and the nations rage against the Lord’s Messiah in Psalm 2 with exquisite harmony. There was a form of unity in Corinth which opposed God by ignoring His word and condoning sexual immorality. So in chapter eleven the Apostle writes:

“In the first place, I hear that when you come together as a church, there are divisions among you, and to some extent I believe it. No doubt there have to be differences among you to show which of you have God’s approval.” (1 Cor. 11:18-19)

Just as Jesus taught so Paul teaches that there are necessary divisions which are part of God’s sovereign work to show who are truly his. The only true unity is unity in the truth of the gospel and the proof of the genuineness of our faith is not ecclesiastical status, or office, or even doctrinal orthodoxy, but behaviour which reflects the gospel. Paul opposes divisions based on the personality of the leader or other trivial issues as well as any unity that seeks to paste over disobedience. As Dietrich Bonhoeffer wrote: “Where Christ bids me maintain fellowship for the sake of love, I will maintain it. Where his truth enjoins me to dissolve a fellowship for love’s sake, there I will dissolve it, despite all the protests of my human love.”5

Some divisions the Apostle recognised as only inevitable but necessary. It depends on your view of the church and this is where the letter of 1 Corinthians is so important for us today. In chapter three Paul reveals the church’s true nature:

“Don’t you know that you yourselves are God’s temple and that God’s Spirit lives in you? If anyone destroys God’s temple, God will destroy him; for God’s temple is sacred [holy], and you are that temple.” (1 Cor. 3:16-17)

The Corinthians’ behaviour showed their false understanding of the church. The Christian congregation of believers is the temple of God’s Spirit; the inner sanctuary where God dwells, not just the outer precincts. The Old Testament promise of God dwelling among his people is now fulfilled through the presence of the Holy Spirit with the people of Christ. God’s people in Corinth were the temple of God, the dwelling place of the living God in Corinth, just as Christian congregations function today in Bombay, Nairobi, London and Toronto.

The crucial factor for us is that the one central feature of that temple is that it is holy. Holiness is the fundamental distinguishing mark of God’s people. Since the God of the Bible is Holy, Holy, Holy, we as his people are meant to be holy; not in a ritual sense but morally and ethically,6 with lives set apart for his purposes.

If we’re puzzled and wonder “what on earth does that mean?” it is fascinating to trace the answer the Apostle gives. In chapters 5–11 Paul spells out what commentators call the New Testament holiness code.7 He begins:

It is actually reported that there is sexual immorality among you, and of a kind that does not occur even among pagans: A man has his father’s wife. And you are proud! Shouldn’t you rather have been filled with grief and have put out of your fellowship the man who did this? (1 Cor. 5:1-2)

The word used for ‘sexual immorality’ is porneia (from which we derive ‘pornography’), widely used in Hellenistic Judaism to cover all extra-marital sexual sins including homosexuality, adultery, incest, bestiality.8 It appears often in the New Testament lists of sins not because the early Christians were uptight about sex but because these sins were so prevalent and accepted in the culture of that time that early converts found it hard to break clear of their former lives.9 The specific form of sexual immorality being tolerated and condoned in Corinth was a form of incest, meaning that a member of the congregation was living in sexual sin.10

Yet what staggers the Apostle in verse 2 is not so much the open sin, but that the Corinthians were proud of it. When Paul writes “And you are proud!” he is not referring to arrogance and pride in general but to the fact that some in Corinth were affirming their right and authority to condone incest and promiscuity (chapter 6:12-20). It had become a cause célèbre. They were loud and proud and trying to give this behaviour a theological basis. One is tempted to say that they were seeking to affirm the integrity and sanctity of open sexual immorality.

The Apostle deals with this situation in a remarkable way. In chapters 5 and 6 he gives very little attention to the specific sins of immorality. What distresses him so deeply is the churches attitude to these open sexual practices. The allowing, condoning and celebrating of this sexual immorality, Paul felt, was a crisis of authority and of the gospel itself. The Corinthians’ failure to deal with the sexual immorality in their midst did not simply represent their low view of sin, what was at stake was the church itself. They were in danger of destroying the temple of God.

This issue is so urgent that the Apostle instructs the Corinthians on it no less than five times.

•    In verse 2 he asks with astonishment:

“Shouldn’t you rather have been filled with grief and have put out of your fellowship the man who did this?”

•    In verse 7 he commands:

“Get rid of the old yeast that you may be a new batch without yeast — as you really are. For Christ, our Passover lamb, has been sacrificed.”

•    In verse 9 referring to a previous letter addressing this issue he claims:

“I have written you in my letter not to associate with sexually immoral people.”

•    In verse 11 Paul commands:

“you must not associate with anyone who calls himself a brother but is sexually immoral or greedy, an idolater or a slanderer, a drunkard or a swindler. With such a man do not even eat.”

•    Perhaps most significant is verse 5:

“hand this man over to Satan, so that the sinful nature may be destroyed and his spirit saved on the day of the Lord.”

Handing over to Satan means moving the immoral person back out into the world which is Satan’s sphere; something done by the whole community not just one or two.

Wonderfully, the purpose of these actions is ultimately redemptive: that “the sinful nature,” meaning “what is fleshly or carnal in him” might be destroyed so that he might be saved eternally. The discipline of dissociation is remedial. Paul is no separatist but clearly, for this man living in open sexual immorality, there is meant to be an actual separation from fellowship with God’s people, so that ultimately he will repent and rejoin that community.

The separation will do two things: it will protect this man from deceiving himself that he can pretend to call upon the name of the Lord while living in open, unrepentant sexual immorality; and it will protect the temple of God from being becoming contaminated. That is the point of verses 6-8:

Your boasting is not good. Don’t you know that a little yeast works through the whole batch of dough? Get rid of the old yeast that you may be a new batch without yeast — as you really are. For Christ, our Passover lamb, has been sacrificed. Therefore let us keep the Festival, not with the old yeast, the yeast of malice and wickedness, but with bread without yeast, the bread of sincerity and truth. (1 Cor. 5:6-8)

Left alone, open sin, unrepented of, and when not dealt with by the Christian community, acts like yeast (leaven) infecting the whole body of Christ. Christ has died, not just to win us a ticket to heaven but to create a new humanity where together we express the holy character of God.
The Apostle knows exactly how this sounds so to clear up any misunderstanding he goes on:

I have written you in my letter not to associate with sexually immoral people — not at all meaning the people of this world who are immoral, or the greedy and swindlers, or idolaters. In that case you would have to leave this world. But now I am writing you that you must not associate with anyone who calls himself a brother but is sexually immoral or greedy, an idolater or a slanderer, a drunkard or a swindler. With such a man do not even eat. What business is it of mine to judge those outside the church? Are you not to judge those inside? God will judge those outside. “Expel the wicked man from among you.” (1 Cor. 5:9-13)

Paul urges them forward in two directions: first to continue to immerse themselves in the life of their city, having friendships and associations with non-Christians, irrespective of their morality or lack of it; but secondly to disassociate themselves and not even celebrate the meal with those who call themselves Christian yet insist on their right to continue immoral pagan practices.

His principle is simple: free association outside the church, discipline within. The reason the Apostle gives for this is that God judges those who are outside the church but in Paul’s view the church is meant to judge those who are inside.

We seem to have these two exactly the wrong way round; we are judgmental about those outside the church and tolerate open sin inside the church. There is a great difference between, on the one hand struggling with sin, failing, asking God for forgiveness, beseeching him to grant us true repentance and his Holy Spirit, and on the other hand openly persisting and condoning what is against the will of God and pretending that we are forgiven. God pardons and absolves all who truly repent and unfeignedly believe his holy gospel.

In the New Testament there are two boundary lines for communion, two grounds for restricting fellowship: belief / doctrine, and behaviour / holiness. It is possible to have communion with other Christian believers with whom we honestly disagree, we confess our knowledge is partial and we need to grow in wisdom. However, it is not possible in New Testament terms to have communion and fellowship with those who do not believe the central tenets of the gospel or who believe a different gospel (read, for example, Galatians 1:6-9): this is the ‘belief / doctrine’ boundary line.
Here in 1 Corinthians the Apostle’s concern is with the ‘behaviour / holiness’ boundary to fellowship.

The principle is clear: it is not possible to have communion with those who call themselves Christian but who condone and practice sexual immorality.

Some have tried to argue that the blessing of same sex unions is not sufficient ground for breaking fellowship because it does not involve central or creedal doctrinal issues such as the incarnation, the trinity or the resurrection. The arguments are entirely unpersuasive and even disingenuous, ignoring the fact that those advocating same sex unions do so on the basis of a revisionist understanding of the doctrines of creation, the image of God, the nature of sin, salvation, redemption, the Christian life, the cross and the afterlife.11 However, putting aside whether the blessing of same sex unions does breach central, creedal doctrinal questions (which it does), it certainly violates the ‘behaviour / holiness’ boundary line for Christian fellowship. It is impossible to deny that what is at stake is the holiness of the church, indeed our very understanding of holiness.12

To the Apostle Paul, for a church to bless, condone or even allow open sexual immorality is a crisis for the church and for the gospel, which can only be healed by the church disassociating and separating itself from those promoting the yeast of unholiness. If Paul instructed the Corinthians to disassociate themselves from the immoral man what on earth would he say to a whole congregation that voted to affirm the integrity and sanctity of incest or prostitution? What in heaven’s name would he have written to a group of congregations that did the same?

The truth is that the Apostle goes on in 1 Corinthians to deal with homosexual intercourse (6:9-11) and with prostitution (6:12-20). In chapter 10 he reveals the links between sexual immorality and idolatry. Throughout these chapters Paul’s sustained concern is for the holiness of the fellowship of the temple of God. Both idolatry and immorality provoke the risen Lord to jealousy. “[T]his is the final warning that God’s ‘jealousy’ cannot be challenged with impunity. Those who would put God to the test by insisting on their right to what Paul insists is idolatry are in effect taking God on, challenging him by their actions, daring him to act”13 and he asks with chilling candour in 10:22 “are we stronger than he?”

 

By way of conclusion

There are three things to say by way of conclusion.

The first has to do with grace. Every word of 1 Corinthians is written to people who have failed morally and sexually14—as Paul says in chapter 6, “this is what some of you were.” Therefore there is no room for self-righteousness or superiority on the part of any of us. Woven through the very passages quoted in this article is the heartbreaking grace of God in Jesus Christ, wooing us from our sins, opening our eyes to the beauty of holiness, calling us to be the new creation.

“For Christ, our Passover lamb, has been sacrificed. Therefore let us keep the Festival, not with the old yeast, the yeast of malice and wickedness, but with bread without yeast, the bread of sincerity and truth.” (1 Cor. 5:7b-8)

The gospel of Christ crucified offers grace to all who fail, it does not matter how far we may have fallen it is not too late for us to turn to Christ for his forgiving grace.

But grace without transformation is cheap grace…

That is what we mean by cheap grace, the grace which amounts to the justification of sin without the justification of the repentant sinner who departs from sin and from whom sins departs… Cheap grace is not the kind of forgiveness of sin which frees us from the toils of sin. Cheap grace is the grace we bestow on ourselves. Cheap grace is the preaching of forgiveness without requiring repentance, baptism without church discipline, Communion without confession, absolution without personal confession… Cheap grace is grace without discipleship, grace without the cross, grace without Jesus Christ, living and incarnate.15

It is a cruel distortion of grace to say “we are all sinners therefore we dare not deal with open sin in the church.” To hide behind Paul’s word that  “we are all sinners” and use them as an excuse for inaction or silence is nothing more than Corinthian nihilism. Gordon Fee writes: “those who concern themselves with grace without equal concern for behaviour have missed Paul’s own theological urgencies.”16

The second conclusion has to do with ministry. Gospel ministry is not just proclamation, evangelism, and pastoral care; it involves contending for the faith once for all delivered to the saints. If, at the end of the day, we have maintained Christian orthodoxy but failed to proclaim the gospel, we cannot claim to have pleased Christ nor fulfilled the New Testament ministry. In just the same way, if, at the end of the day we have proclaimed the gospel but failed to maintain Christian orthodoxy, we will have failed Christ.

Paul’s first letter to the Corinthians is a brilliant example of contending for the faith. If the church is the temple of the living God, and if that temple is holy, then tolerance of what God calls unholy will provoke his jealousy. There is an astonishing campaign at present in Canada and the USA to portray the blessing of same sex unions as a little in-house issue for the church, that those opposing this constitutionalisation of sexual immorality are somehow missing the point and being side-tracked from gospel ministry. I received a letter this week from someone in the diocese of New Westminster who referred to the stance of biblically orthodox Anglicans as a “tedious and unnecessary conflict.” If that is the case then 1 Corinthians is a tedious and unnecessary book and the holiness of the people for whom Christ died is also tedious and unnecessary.

We cannot just be pragmatic about this. We cannot believe those who say: “Peace, peace, when there is no peace.” Christian ministry which pleases Christ and is faithful to the New Testament will involve both gospel proclamation as well as contending for the faith once for all delivered to the saints.

The third conclusion has to do with Jesus himself. We need to ask ourselves: how can we judge (as Paul commands) without being judgmental? How do we insist on holiness without being holier than thou?
I admit the issues are complex. Some denominations exercise swift and harsh discipline and are all too ready to exclude those who do not measure up without having any genuine conversation. As Anglicans we must maintain a godly generosity of spirit and we are rightly slow to discipline or exclude anyone.

But if, as a denomination, we are unwilling to consider discipline as the Apostle does, we cannot hope for a restored Anglicanism and we need to ask if we are really the temple of the living God.

If you are tempted to think that this position is just the opinion of a curmudgeonly Apostle, listen to the risen Jesus as he speaks to the church of Thyatira:

To the angel of the church in Thyatira write: These are the words of the Son of God, whose eyes are like blazing fire and whose feet are like burnished bronze. I know your deeds, your love and faith, your service and perseverance, and that you are now doing more than you did at first.

Nevertheless, I have this against you: You tolerate that woman Jezebel, who calls herself a prophetess. By her teaching she misleads my servants into sexual immorality and the eating of food sacrificed to idols. I have given her time to repent of her immorality, but she is unwilling…

Only hold on to what you have until I come. To him who overcomes and does my will to the end, I will give authority over the nations — ‘He will rule them with an iron scepter; he will dash them to pieces like pottery’ — just as I have received authority from my Father. I will also give him the morning star. He who has an ear, let him hear what the Spirit says to the churches. (Rev. 2:18-29).

This paper was delivered at The National Canadian Anglican Essentials Conference – “The Way Forward” – Ottawa, Ontario, Canada, August 31, 2004, and is reprinted with the author’s kind permission.

 

Footnotes

(Please note that some of the links mentioned below are no longer active.)

1     From Ash, C. Marriage: Sex in the Service of God (Leicester: IVP, 2003), 40.
2     The National Marriage Project, http://marriage.rutgers.edu.
3     I am following the superb and incisive analysis by Ash, 34-59 and 134-156.
4     Ash, 49 quoting Woodhead, L. ‘Sex in a wider context’, in Davies and Loughlin, Sex these Days, 98-120, (Sheffield: Academic Press, 1997), 99, and Bellah, R. Habits of the Heart (Berkeley and Los Angeles: University of California Press, 1985), 112.
5     Bonhoeffer, D. Life Together (London: SCM, translated by John W. Doberstein, 1954) 22.
6     Fee, G. The First Epistle to the Corinthians (Grand Rapids: Eerdmans, 1987) 149.
7     E.g. “Here we may discern a parallel with the ‘Holiness Code’ for the people of Israel found in the teachings of Moses in Leviticus (especially chapters 18-21).” Barnett, P. 1 Corinthians: Holiness and Hope of a Rescued People (Ross-shire: Christian Focus Publications, 2000) 77.
8     Fee, 200, Barnett, 78.
9     Fee, ibid.
10     The present tense indicates an ongoing sexual relationship, Barnett, 78.
11     See the excellent articles by J. I. Packer, Why I Walked, (Christianity Today: January 21, 2003, Vol. 47, No. 1 www.christianitytoday.com/ct/2003/001/6.46.html and P. F. M. Zahl, Last Signal to the Carpathia, (an address delivered at the Episcopal Church Foundation Fellows Forum, “Reconstructing Anglican Comprehensiveness,” 5-6 February 2004, Cathedral Church of the Advent, Birmingham, Alabama www.adventbirmingham.org/articles.asp?ID=1625) where Zahl demonstrates that blessing same sex unions stands opposed to classic Christian doctrine because it undermines the anthropology of the gospel, eviscerates Christian soteriology, Christology and the historic understanding of the trinity, confuses creation with redemption and is therefore implicitly Pelagian and explicitly Arminian.
12     See E. M. Humphries, Holy is as Holy Does, June 2004, (www.anglican.tk/modules.php?name=Content&pa=showpage&pid=593).
13    Fee, 474.
14    The second chapter of Ash’s book is titled ‘Prejudice and Grace,’ and he finishes with three points: that Christian sexual ethics is addressed to moral failures, that the gospel offers grace to moral failures and that the Spirit of God works in us, who are moral failures to change us. Ash, 24-33.
15    Bonhoeffer, D. The Cost of Discipleship (London: SCM, 1948, translated by Kaiser Verlag) 3-4.
Or as the Apostle Paul himself wrote in Titus 2, “For the grace of God has appeared for the salvation of all men, training us to renounce irreligion and worldly passions, and to live sober, upright, and godly lives in this world, awaiting our blessed hope, the appearing of the glory of our great God and Saviour Jesus Christ, who gave himself for us to redeem us from all iniquity and to purify for himself a people of his own who are zealous for good deeds.”
16    Fee, 248.

acl-news-jan-feb-2005Published in ACL News, January–February 2005.

Available in PDF format.

Photo at top of page: David Short and Dr. J I Packer at St. John’s Vancouver in 2011.

New Westminister nominees list is out

michael_ingham_3The names of those nominated for the position of Bishop of New Westminster, in the Anglican Church of Canada, have now been released. Anglican Essentials Canada Blog have helpfully added links to the CVs and videos of the candidates. Lots of talk of diversity.

The Synod begins 30th November, to replace Michael Ingham, pictured, who retired in August. Bishop Ingham famously declared that J I Packer and David Short had abandoned Christian ministry.

Canadian Anglican Clergy deny charges

Short and PackerAnglican Network in Canada – 21 April 2008

“We have therefore determined that in order to uphold our ordination vows, we must leave your jurisdiction, and by this letter, we hereby relinquish the licences we hold from the Bishop of New Westminster.”

Clergy in six Lower Mainland Anglican Network in Canada (ANiC) churches today denied charges they have abandoned their ministry.

In February, Bishop Michael Ingham of the Anglican Church of Canada Diocese of New Westminster issued a “Notice of Presumption of Abandonment of the Exercise of the Ministry” to nine Anglican priests and two ordained deacons. These priests and deacons – including world renowned theologian, the Rev Dr J I Packer – all serve in churches where parishioners had voted to join the Anglican Network in Canada.

In their response, the clergy and deacons point out the glaring lack of evidence as required by church canons (bylaws). They then declare that they continue to be actively engaged in the Anglican ministry to which they were ordained and intend to continue to minister in the Anglican Church – however, not under the jurisdiction of Bishop Ingham and his diocese, both of which have departed from historic orthodox Anglican teaching and practice in defiance of the Lambeth Conference, the Windsor Report and the Primates of the global Anglican Communion.

The clergy conclude their response by declaring: “We have… determined that in order to uphold our ordination vows, we must leave your jurisdiction, and by this letter, we hereby relinquish the licences we hold from the Bishop of New Westminster. Each of us will receive a licence to continue our present parish ministries from Bishop Donald Harvey, who, as you know, is under the jurisdiction of the Primate of the Southern Cone. In this way, we will be able to continue our Anglican ministry within the Anglican Church, under the jurisdiction of and in communion with those who remain faithful to historic, orthodox Anglicanism and as part of the Anglican Communion worldwide.” The two deacons signed a similar statement.

Members of the Anglican Network in Canada are committed to remaining faithful to Holy Scripture and established Anglican doctrine and to ensuring that orthodox Canadian Anglicans are able to remain in full communion with their Anglican brothers and sisters around the world. Since it launched its ecclesial structure last November under the jurisdiction of the Anglican Province of the Southern Cone, ANiC has received two bishops – Donald Harvey and Malcolm Harding – and 15 parishes.

The text of the statement released may be seen here (pdf) – or here below –

Statement by nine Anglican Network in Canada clergy to
Bishop Michael Ingham

Delivered April 21, 2008

We, the undersigned clergy, are writing in response to the Notice of Presumption of Abandonment of Ministry that you have sent to each of us. We would like to point out that the Notice is not in compliance with the Canons in that it does not set out the required facts but simply repeats the language of the Canon. The canonical process has therefore not been engaged.

We have not abandoned the “ministry to which we were ordained”. Each of us was ordained into Anglican ministry; indeed, we were ordained into ministry in the “Church of God” as per our ordination vows. We have been privileged to serve in the Anglican ministry for many years and it is our intention and prayer that we may continue in the Anglican ministry.

Further, it is our intention to remain members of the Anglican Church. We are not leaving the Anglican Church to become members of another church or to minister in another church, which is the concern of Canon XIX.

However, with deep reluctance and regret we have concluded that we cannot continue the Anglican ministry to which we were ordained under your jurisdiction. The Diocese, under your leadership, has departed from historic, orthodox Anglican teaching and practice. It has departed from what the Primates have unanimously recognized as the standard of teaching of the Anglican Communion. The Diocese is in a state of broken or impaired communion with the majority of Anglicans worldwide. Sadly, it appears the Anglican Church of Canada has now similarly departed from Anglican teaching and practice.

We have therefore determined that in order to uphold our ordination vows, we must leave your jurisdiction, and by this letter, we hereby relinquish the licences we hold from the Bishop of New Westminster. Each of us will receive a licence to continue our present parish ministries from Bishop Donald Harvey, who, as you know, is under the jurisdiction of the Primate of the Southern Cone. In this way, we will be able to continue our Anglican ministry within the Anglican Church, under the jurisdiction of and in communion with those who remain faithful to historic, orthodox Anglicanism and as part of the Anglican Communion worldwide.

Signed by:

Rev. Dr. James I. Packer
Rev. Dr. Trevor Walters
Rev. David Short
Rev. Simon Chin
Rev. Stephen Leung
Rev. Dr. Archie Pell
Rev. James Wagner
Rev. Dan Gifford
Rev. Mike Stewart.

See also the Anglican Network in Canada website.

St. John’s Shaughnessy stays focussed

David ShortDavid Short, the Rector of St. John’s Shaughnessy in Vancouver, writes –

A number of people have asked me what has happened since our Vestry vote of February 13th to join the Anglican Network in Canada and receive the Episcopal oversight of Bishop Don Harvey under the jurisdiction of the Southern Cone. Across the country, 14 other congregations have voted to join the Network and the response of the different dioceses has been varied. …   Read more

The Anglican Debacle: Roots and Patterns

– by Dr. Mark Thompson

No Golden Age

Dr. Mark ThompsonThe first thing to note about the crisis the Anglican Communion is facing today is that it has been coming for a very long time.

I remember almost twenty years ago reading an article by Robert Doyle in The Briefing entitled ‘No Golden Age’.1 (It’s shocking that it is actually so long ago!) The gist of the article was that the idea of a golden age of Anglicanism, in which biblical patterns of doctrine and practice were accepted by the majority, is nothing but an illusion. Biblical Christianity has always struggled under the Anglican umbrella. At some times it did better than at others, but there was never a time when evangelical Anglicanism, even of the more formal prayer book kind, was uniformly accepted or endorsed by the ecclesiastical hierarchy. Latimer, Ridley and Cranmer were, after all, burnt at the stake with the consent of most of the rest of the bishops in Mary’s church.

The Puritans who stayed within the Church of England suffered at the hands of Elizabeth I, and William Laud and others made life increasingly difficult for them after Elizabeth’s death. The re-establishment of the Church of England following the restoration of the monarchy in 1660 was never a determined return to the Reformed evangelical version of Archbishop Cranmer, but a compromise designed to exclude anything that resembled Puritanism. Wesley was hunted out of the established church. Whitfield had to preach in the open air when pulpits were closed to him.

However, the real seeds of the problem we now face lie in the nineteenth century. John Henry Newman’s infamous Tract 90, published in 1841, encouraged Anglicans to read the Thirty-nine Articles as a Catholic document.2 In this way he opened the door to the possibility that you might publicly assent to the Articles while reinterpreting them to say what you wanted them to say. What he did in the interests of a more Catholic version of Anglicanism others would do in the interests of a more liberal version before very long. As one scholar put it, ‘whether he intended to or not, he taught us to lie’.

Later in the century liberal approaches to the Bible and Christian doctrine were introduced into Anglican thought through men like Samuel Taylor Coleridge (whose Confessions of an Inquiring Spirit was published in 1840 though it had most likely been circulating privately before then) and two collections of essays: Essays and Reviews published in 1860 and Lux Mundi published in 1889. By the end of the nineteenth century, liberal Anglo-Catholicism was the dominant form of Anglicanism in Britain and elsewhere (with one or two significant exceptions).

So it is not simply that a couple of rash actions in the past five years or even the last fifty years have undermined what was a pretty well-functioning institution prior to that. Evangelical Anglicans have struggled in a hostile environment within the denomination for a very long time. Sometimes their ministry has flourished, despite the hostility of the hierarchy. Whitfield, Simeon, Ryle, Stott, Packer, Lucas — God has raised up many Anglican evangelical leaders in England and elsewhere.3 But their faithful ministry has always involved struggle within the denomination.

That background might lead you to ask, ‘So what’s changed now?’ If the denomination has long been compromised in these ways, and evangelicals have always struggled within it, why are we arguing that we have now reached a moment of crisis where decisive action needs to be taken? What is different about what’s happening at the moment?

The Five New Elements

I want to suggest that there are five features of what has been happening in the last fifty years or so that have brought this current crisis to a head.

1. The first is an increasing number of public challenges to orthodox doctrine grounded in plain biblical teaching by serving bishops and other leaders in the Anglican Communion. It really is simply a matter of historical record that the last fifty years or so have witnessed an increasingly virulent attack upon biblical truth and biblical morality led by those who should have been guarding both. There had, of course, been a long history of such an attack from within the universities and colleges. Academic liberal theology had been flexing its muscles for over a century. Yet in the nineteenth and early twentieth century serving bishops within the Anglican communion had mostly been rather guarded in their public comments and made no attempt to change the teaching of the denomination in any official way.

Although it might not have been the first instance of this, we might start with the publication, in 1963 of John A. T. Robinson’s book Honest to God.4 At the time he was the Bishop of Woolwich. In that book he questioned the doctrine of God and many other elements of classic Anglican teaching. And this was the new thing: that a serving bishop should mount a challenge to the doctrine of the articles and the teaching of the Bible in such a public and unashamed way.

Even before his consecration as Bishop of Newark in 1976, John Shelby Spong, an admirer of J. A. T. Robinson, had been writing controversial books. In fact his controversial views would eventually lead to charges of heresy, which were dismissed in 1987. In 1986 he published Beyond Moralism: A Contemporary View of the Ten Commandments. Two years later he wrote Living in Sin? A Bishop Rethinks Human Sexuality. A year later he openly and knowingly ordained a practicing homosexual man. He has denied the uniqueness of Christ as the only saviour of the world, and the authority of the Scriptures to determine Christian doctrine and Christian practice. In 2001 he published his autobiography: Here I Stand: My Struggle for a Christianity of Integrity, Love and Equality.5 In it he appended ‘Twelve Theses for Christianity in the Twenty-first century’ which begin with the breathtaking statement, ‘Theism as a way of defining God, is dead’.

In 1984, the then bishop of Durham, David Jenkins, gained notoriety by commenting in a BBC interview that the belief that Jesus was raised bodily from the grave was ridiculous, an infantile preoccupation with ‘a conjuring trick with bones’. His comments were regarded as controversial and he has argued they were taken out of context, but on any account is hard to reconcile them with the words of the apostle Paul in 1 Corinthians 15 — ‘Christ died for our sins in accordance with the Scriptures, he was buried, he was raised on the third day in accordance with the Scriptures, and he appeared to Cephas, then to the twelve’ (vv. 3–5).

In 1995 the then bishop of Oxford, Richard Harries, defended his cathedral’s invitation to a practicing Muslim to preach the university sermon on the BBC’s ‘Thought for the Day’. He quoted Jesus’ words ‘Blessed are the peacemakers for they will be called sons of God’ and then went on to deduce that since the Muslim concerned was working for peace in his own country he not only came under the blessing of Jesus, but shared the title Son of God with him. When challenged about the uniqueness of Jesus on the basis of John 14:6 he wrote ‘to suggest that Jesus actually said those words is to deny 150 years of scholarship in the Gospel of John.6

Michael Ingham, the present day Bishop of New Westminster in the Church of Canada was interviewed by the Ottawa Citizen in September 1997. In that interview he insisted, ‘It’s time for Christians to drop the idea that Christ is the one sure way to salvation’.7 He developed these ideas in his book of the same year, Mansions of the Spirit: The Gospel in a Multifaith World.8

Outlandish statements by bishops of the Anglican Communion, undermining the teaching of Scripture and the doctrine of the Thirty-nine Articles of Religion are only barely newsworthy these days. They seem to come with such regularity and disdain for anyone who disagrees with them that only rarely do they provoke controversy. Instead, it’s the orthodox who are the source of scandal as far as the secular press is concerned. Statements of orthodox Anglican doctrine are often ridiculed and then dismissed.

2. The second feature we should mention is the redefinition of the gospel that has occurred in some parts of the Anglican Communion. It is increasingly clear that the gospel of salvation by the cross and resurrection of Jesus, with its call to faith and repentance has been replaced in some quarters by a liberal gospel of universal reconciliation, what some call ‘the gospel of inclusion’.9 It is vitally important to recognise that this is what has happened. It explains why the hierarchy in the American and Canadian churches won’t let go of their advocacy of homosexuality, for instance. The full inclusion of practicing homosexuals into the life and ministry of the churches is a gospel issue as far as they are concerned. As one website put it last year, under the heading ‘Drenched in Grace: Anglicans, Inclusion and the Gospel’ —

More than at any time in the recent past, those who seek to offer an open, inclusive and welcoming Gospel within the Anglican Communion are facing great challenges. Now more than ever we need to be equipped with the theological and ecclesiastical resources which mean that we can with confidence affirm that the Gospel of justice, inclusion and peace we try to communicate is scriptural, rational and central to Anglican tradition.10

No one must be excluded from the Christian table, these people insist, no matter what they believe or what life choices they have made. Love must triumph over all so that no one is any longer considered ‘unclean’ (with obvious allusions to Acts 10). Exclusion from fellowship or responsibility with the churches on any grounds is interpreted as an act of discrimination, an issue of social injustice which must be overthrown.

Ashley Null, commenting on the consecration of Gene Robinson, a practicing homosexual man, as bishop of New Hampshire in 2003 put it this way:

The legislative leadership of the Episcopal Church, including a majority of the House of Bishops, believes that they have been called and therefore, inspired by the Holy Spirit to establish the guidelines by which the Bible is to be interpreted. And in keeping with their commitment to religious truth as an experience of the inherent oneness of all things, they have selected those biblical texts which talk about the inclusion of outcasts as the true definition of the Gospel of Christ. All other parts of Scripture are either interpreted so as to support this explanation of Christianity or rejected as no longer being applicable in our day.11

There have, of course, been alternative explanations of the gospel before. However, this redefinition has become a rallying point for a redefinition of Christianity which aggressively seeks to eliminate all other understandings. Its adherents are crusaders, and the battle for the acceptance of homosexual practice is simply the next battle in one long war to overcome prejudice and discrimination.12 The civil rights vigilantes of the 1960s have a new cause and a new justification.

3. The third feature that has made this a moment of crisis is the way attempts have been made to officially endorse teaching which is in direct conflict with the teaching of Scripture. This could be illustrated in a number of areas. We might focus on the defeat of a motion affirming the authority of Scripture on the floor of the General Synod of ECUSA in August 2003. Or we could think again about the refusal of the Australian General Synod even to allow a vote on a motion rejoicing in what God has done for us in the cross of Jesus just last year. However, because it is the catalyst for our immediate decisions, I will simply trace the official shift of position on homosexuality in the American and Canadian churches. Perhaps a time-line might be helpful.

The roots of this shift in thinking can be seen way back in the 1940s. However, in the last ten or eleven years the pace of the push to officially revise the church’s teaching on this issue has sped up. Now it is not just a matter of an individual bishop’s heretical opinion, either expressed in private or published for general consumption. This is the institution changing its official position.

4. The fourth feature we should mention is the way these developments have taken place in full knowledge and in open defiance of the objections of the rest of the Anglican Communion, most commonly on biblical grounds. Those involved were asked not to proceed. Carefully reasoned arguments explaining the teaching of Scripture were presented again and again. Letters were sent between bishops and primates. Phone calls were made. But so committed to the cause were the bishops of ECUSA and the bishop of New Westminster that they refused to listen and rejected all calls to turn back.

The repeated nature of the calls to turn back is very easily demonstrated.

In 1997, three years after Bishop Spong’s Koinonia Statement began to circulate throughout the Episcopal Church, the Second Anglican Encounter produced the Kuala Lumpur Statement, upholding the biblical teaching on human sexuality. A year later at the 1998 Lambeth Conference, after extensive discussion, Resolution 1.10 was passed, again affirming the biblical teaching on the subject. That same year ECUSA rejected the Kuala Lumpur Statement and the New Westminster synod voted to bless same sex unions.

In March 2001 the Primates of the Anglican Communion met in Kanuga, in North Carolina and called upon churches to avoid actions which might damage the credibility of mission, after identifying the theology and practice regarding human sexuality as a flash point. Within months the synod of New Westminster voted for the third time to bless same sex unions. A Global South Steering Committee visited New Westminster to investigate and in the end advised orthodox parishes to seek alternative episcopal oversight.

The Anglican Consultative Council got in on the act in September 2002, approving a motion urging dioceses and bishops to refrain from unilateral actions that would strain communion.

A month after the election of Gene Robinson as Bishop of New Hampshire in June 2003, a group of over sixty worldwide Anglican leaders warned the General Convention of ECUSA that a confirmation of Gene Robinson’s election would result in ECUSA having placed itself outside the boundaries of the Anglican Communion.14 Indignant at the interference, the General Convention confirmed Gene Robinson a month later (August 2003).

In October 2003 the Primates of the Anglican Communion released a statement following an emergency meeting in Lambeth Palace which included the observation that the consecration of Gene Robinson and the blessing of same-sex unions in Canada, if they should proceed, would ‘tear the fabric of our communion at the deepest level’.15 This meeting called for the protection of dissenting parishes and set up the Lambeth Commission to propose a way forward. Within a month Gene Robinson was consecrated in defiance of the rest of the Communion.

5. The fifth and final feature I want to highlight is for many people one of the most disturbing of all. It is the open persecution by the hierarchy of the Episcopal Church and the Bishop and Diocese of New Westminster (and indeed others) of all who dissent from their program of doctrinal and moral revision. In early 2003, as the situation in New Westminster was deteriorating, and following the encouragement of the Global South for parishes in dispute with the bishop to seek alternative episcopal oversight, Bishop Buckle of the Yukon offered to provide just that to the beleaguered parishes. In response, Bishop Ingham of New Westminster instigated charges against Bishop Buckle and the parishes seeking his oversight and before long the offer was withdrawn.16

Just over a week ago the same Bishop of New Westminster wrote to Professor Jim Packer, author of numerous books including the classic Knowing God, and David Short, the Rector of St Johns Shaughnessy following their vote (along with their church) to stay within the Anglican Communion yet seek the oversight of a faithful bishop, the Bishop of the Southern Cone. The letter charged them with a relatively new ecclesiastical offence, ‘Presumption of abandonment of Communion’ and threatened to remove their ‘spiritual authority as a minister of Word and Sacraments conferred in ordination’.17 The bishop’s supporters have protested that this action is entirely legal and in accord with the constitution of the denomination. However, these measures are devices which the liberal establishment has created with this one purpose in mind: to punish anyone who object to their practice and who seeks a way of remaining true to biblical teaching and Anglican doctrine when the denomination itself has abandoned it.

There are many other horror stories. The new presiding bishop of The Episcopal Church, Katharine Jefferts Schori, began suing those who opposed this program almost as soon as she was elected to the position. To date the dioceses of Fort Worth and Quincy and more recently the bishop and diocese of San Joaquin have had legal action taken against them.18 The denomination is suing these churches for their property, seeking to depose those who speak out. The legal action may well be protracted. Some have resigned because they do not have the financial resources to resist the revisionists in the courts. Yet the opposition is not going away.

Individual parishes are being targeted by bishops with the revisionist agenda. ‘The Connecticut Six’ are a group of six clergy and parishes who have opposed the diocesan bishop on the issue of support for Gene Robinson the acceptance of homosexuality more generally. Ministers have been unceremonially deposed, church vestry meetings declared illegal, church officers sacked, and in some extreme cases a diocese has moved in at night to change the locks and so prevent the dissenting ministers and congregations from having use of their church buildings.19

Despite repeated calls from many quarters to respect those who disagree with them and to seek ways to provide alternative oversight where this is requested, the Presiding Bishop of The Episcopal Church and others in the house of bishops have pursued a program of retaliation and persecution of the orthodox in their dioceses. It is not too much to say that ecclesiastical bullying of the orthodox has reached epidemic proportions in The Episcopal Church, in Canada, and in other places as well.

Those of you who follow the websites will no doubt know of many more instances. Friends of mine in the UK have been called in and threatened by their bishop in response to votes of no confidence following the appointment of Jeffrey John and Dean of St Albans. Jeffrey John has since publicly ridiculed the idea of penal substitutionary atonement.

It is true that in the recent round of invitations to the Lambeth Conference this July, the bishop of New Hampshire was not included. This has been greeted with protest from the Episcopal Church’s House of Bishops. But the Presiding Bishop of The Episcopal Church is still invited, although she supports Gene Robinson and has acted in this unconscionable way towards orthodox bishops, dioceses, clergy and parishes in the USA. Those who took part in the consecration of Gene Robinson are still invited. Those who engineered Jeffrey John’s appointment as Dean of St Albans are still invited. Bishops within the Canadian church are still invited.

The parishes and Christian ministers who are under attack have been left out to dry by the Archbishop of Canterbury. He appointed Peter Carnley, the retired Archbishop of Perth who is no friend of evangelical Anglicans, to chair the panel of reference established to consider their cases. As was to be expected, nothing has happened. The legal cases are still proceeding. The confiscated property remains in the hands of the heretical institution.

Conclusion

The crisis we face at the moment has a different character to the background struggle that evangelical Anglicans have long endured. These five factors have taken us further down the road of denominational apostasy than we have ever been before. The embrace of teaching and practice which is directly opposed to the teaching of Scripture is now being institutionalised in a new way. And it is being done in the face of careful, godly, biblical calls to stop. What’s more, those who are making that call are being recast as the villains and every effort is being made to disenfranchise them and remove them from the Communion.

That’s what’s different now. That’s why we need to act.

___________________

Footnotes:

  1. R. C. Doyle, ‘No Golden Age’, The Briefing 22 (April 1989), pp. 1–6.
  2. ‘It is a duty which we owe both to the Catholic Church and to our own, to take our reformed confessions in the most Catholic sense they will admit: We have no duties towards their framers.’ See John Henry Newman, Apologia pro Vita Sua (repr. London, 1965), p. 197.
  3. In Sydney we can rejoice in the inheritance we have received from men like Frederick Barker, Nathaniel Jones, Howard Mowll, Broughton Knox, Marcus Loane and Donald Robinson.
  4. J. A. T. Robinson, Honest to God (London: SCM, 1963).
  5. J. S. Spong, Here I Stand: My Struggle for a Christianity of Integrity, Love and Equality (San Francisco: Harper, 2000).
  6. Private correspondence to the speaker, 4 June 1995.
  7. Ottawa Citizen, 26 September 1997.
  8. M. Ingham, Mansions of the Spirit: The Gospel in a Multifaith World (Toronto: Anglican Book Centre, 1997).
  9. C. Pearson, The Gospel of Inclusion: Reaching Beyond Religious Fundamentalism to the True Love of God (Azusa Press, 2007).
  10. www.thinkinganglicans.org.uk/archives/002141.html accessed 13/3/08. An interesting article by Philip Turner critiquing this redefinition of the gospel can be found at www.goodnewsmag.org/JulyAugust/ja06turner.htm Arguably these are simply catching up with the observation of Ashley Null in a lecture entitled ‘From Thomas Cranmer to Gene Robinson: Repentance and Inclusion in Anglican Theology’ delivered on 16 July 2004 in Grace Anglican Chapel, Rochester in which he argued that the centrality of repentance within Anglican faith and practice was being replaced by the theology of inclusion
  11. A. Null, ‘Understanding the Contemporary Episcopal Church’, posted at http://listserv.episcopalian.org/wa.exe?A2=ind0312b&L=virtuosity&H=1&P=1493.
  12. John Spong’s autobiography makes this identification explicit.
  13. The interview was published in the UK Telegraph on 2 June 2002.
  14. the statement has since been removed from the Anglican Communion website – its url was anglicancommunion.org/acns/articles/35/00/acns3522.html.
  15. The communiqué can be found at http://www.anglicancommunion.org/acns/news.cfm/2003/10/16/ACNS3633
  16. Details can be found at listserv.episcopalian.org/wa.exe?A2=ind0311b&L=virtuosity&H=1&P=1397
  17. See www.anglicanessentials.ca/wordpress/index.php/2008/02/29/ji-packer-threatened-with-suspension
  18. Details can be found on the diocesan websites: www.fwepiscopal.org/index1.php www.dioceseofquincy.org http://sanjoaquin.anglican.org.
  19. Statement from the Connecticut Six can be found at www.freerepublic.com/focus/f-religion/1412016/posts

________________

This paper was presented by ACL President, The Rev. Dr. Mark Thompson, at the Sydney ‘Lambeth Decision Briefing’, St. Andrew’s Cathedral, Sydney, Friday 14th March 2008.

St. John’s Shaughnessy to vote today on breaking with church

St. John’s Shaughnessy“The fate of what is described as the largest congregation in the Anglican Church of Canada hangs in the balance tonight.

Members of St. John’s Shaughnessy Anglican Church, a neo-Gothic landmark in the heart of the city’s wealthiest neighbourhood, are gathering for an expected vote on breaking with Vancouver-area Bishop Michael Ingham over same-sex blessings … Read more