Archbishop Benjamin Kwashi responds to alleged attacks

Posted on April 19, 2008 
Filed under News

Archbishop Benjamin Kwashi of Jos Archbishop Benjamin Kwashi of the Diocese of Jos in Nigeria, has replied to allegations, published last week, of attacks on leaders of Changing Attitude in Nigeria and the UK. See the Changing Attitude website for the allegations and an open letter to GAFCON leaders who were supposedly behind the attacks(!).

In response to the initial allegations, the Archbishop of Canterbury released a statement –

“The threats recently made against the leaders of Changing Attitudes are disgraceful. … I hope that this latest round of unchristian bullying will likewise be universally condemned.”

For some analysis of the allegations, see Peter Ould’s website (here and here.).

Archbishop Benjamin Kwashi writes –

“The church in Nigeria knows much about suffering from persecution, but the stories have not generally been brought to the attention of the world’s media. We are now, however, faced with vilification, bullying and unfounded accusations from fellow Christians, and while we struggle to understand why this should be, these stories are blown up into world headlines. …

Simply to accuse the Anglican Church [of Nigeria] of being the perpetrator of a physical attack on the streets of a large city, does not make sense. If a Nigerian Bishop or church leader were mugged in England, would the Archbishop of Canterbury, or even the Church of England in general, be blamed for this? That the Archbishop of Canterbury, backed by a group of English bishops should – without evidence being presented – choose to accuse any other person(s) of resorting to violent crime and illegal acts, is in fact to resort to the unchristian bullying and behaviour which they so abhor.”

Read Archbishop Kwashi’s comments via Anglican Mainstream. (Photo: Church of Nigeria.)