A Response to the Primates Meeting in Rome
Archbishop Dr. Laurent Mbanda, Chairman of the Gafcon Primates Council, has released this response, 6 May 2024:
“To my dear Anglican brothers and sisters contending for the faith once delivered to the saints,
Grace to you and peace from God our Father and the Lord Jesus Christ.
Last week, at the invitation of the Archbishop of Canterbury, 32 Primates of the Anglican Communion gathered in Rome to meet with one another and to hold a private audience with Pope Francis. In their Communiqué, published on May 2, they highlighted the pope’s admonition to them to “embrace our disagreements without fear” and issued their own call “to mutual respect and accompaniment with one another.” They also expressed their own renewed commitment to “make every effort to maintain the unity of the Spirit in the bond of peace.”
As the Communiqué itself acknowledges, however, multiple Anglican Primates did not attend the gathering. To be specific, 12 primates did not attend this meeting in Rome, which means that those who did attend represented 30 of the 42 recognized provinces of the Anglican Communion. Such numbers are misleading, however, since the Primates of the three largest Anglican provinces (Nigeria, Uganda, and South Sudan) were among those absent. Those Primates who did attend represent a minority, perhaps 30%, of active Anglicans worldwide. The Communiqué makes no mention of how unrepresentative a gathering this meeting was, nor does it explain the reason that multiple Primates declined the invitation to participate.
The truth is that most of those who refused to attend are leaders of Gafcon and the Global South, and our absence was not accidental, but intentional. Though we do pray for the unity and health of the Anglican Communion, we chose not to attend because, as last year’s Kigali Statement made clear, the current divisions within the Anglican Communion are neither minimal nor new. These divisions have arisen from more than 25 years of “repeated departures from the authority of God’s Word” that, despite the persistent warnings given by the majority of Anglican Primates, have continued unabated.
We know how dear the unity of the church is to the heart of our Lord. For it is he who prays to his Father that we might be one, even as he and the Father are one (John 17:21). At the same time, we also recognize that such unity is not simply a matter of institutional belonging or cultivating attitudes of “mutual respect.” The unity of the Father and the Son consists in a harmony of will and mind, of mission and message (John 8:16-18, 10:37-38, 12:49-50, 17:25-26). Jesus came speaking the word of his Father and he wanted us to be sanctified in the truth of that word (John 17:17). It is only as we agree on the truth and authority of Scripture, therefore, that we can be one as Jesus prayed.
It is unfortunate when the orthodox remnant within the Anglican Communion are portrayed as the source of disunity. To the contrary, as Bishop J.C. Ryle once said,
If people separate themselves from teaching which is positively false and unscriptural, they ought to be praised rather than reproved. In such cases separation is a virtue rather than a sin…He is the schismatic who causes the schism…Unity which is obtained by the sacrifice of truth is worth nothing. It is not unity that pleases God.
The proposals made by the Anglican Primates at the Rome meeting, which consist of minor revisions to the description of the Anglican Communion and modifications to its existing structures, will do nothing to mend the torn fabric of our Communion. Nothing apart from a return to the Lord through deep repentance and renunciation of false teaching by erring provinces will suffice. To quote the Kigali Statement once more, “without repentance this tear cannot be mended.”
In Christ, I am your servant,
The Most Rev. Dr. Laurent Mbanda
Chairman of the Gafcon Primates Council
Archbishop of the Anglican Church of Rwanda
Bishop of Gasabo.”
Also at the Gafcon website.
Related:
The Kigali Commitment – GAFCON IV, 21 April 2023. (PDF file)
Save the date for Anglican Aid’s 2024 Conference
From Anglican Aid in Sydney:
“We are thrilled to announce that Anglican Aid’s 2024 one-day conference will take place on Saturday 31 August at Moore College.
After the success of last year’s ‘Social Justice Reframed’ event, we will once again gather with 200 thoughtful Christians to consider the intersection of Christian aid, development, and the gospel.
This year’s international guest speaker is Bishop Mwita Akiri, Anglican Aid’s partner in the Diocese of Tarime, Tanzania and Chairman of GAFCON Tanzania. …”
Working Together so More People Meet Jesus
“We believe that knowing Jesus changes everything. He alone can deal with our sins and failures. He is our saviour who rescued us and our friend who loves us. He is our Lord who graciously and powerfully rules all things. He is the source of our hope in life and in death. He is living and active and he is coming again as judge of all. Why wouldn’t we want other people to meet Jesus?
Across Australia a campaign is unfolding this year so that many more people might have the opportunity to meet Jesus. …”
– At The Gospel Coalition Australia, Murray Capill reports on a recent gathering in Melbourne.
Related:
Australia: Meet Jesus! — Richard Chin and Rory Shiner.
Inside the ‘Compelled to Resist’ movement in the Church of England – with Charlie Skrine
“Charlie Skrine, the senior minister of All Souls Langham Place London, says his church (and other evangelical churches in the UK) are in a world of pain at the moment over the growing split in the Church of England.
Mr Skrine, who is speaking at the Evangelical Fellowship in the Anglican Communion Conference in Sydney, says All Souls is united in its commitment to biblical teaching on sexual ethics, but divided on what the best response should be.
He says a third of All Souls members are wanting to leave the Church of England now, a third want to stay and fight (never leave), and a further third are confused. …”
And do pray for our brothers and sisters in the Church of England as they consider what must be done.
Justin Welby left Spinning
Comment from Anglican Futures:
“The Primates Meeting has been wonderful,” declared the Archbishop of Canterbury in the official Press Release.
But his face at the Press Conference suggested that it had also been exhausting, which might explain why he appeared to struggle to give coherent answers when it came to some pretty simple questions. …
– Read here.
(Some) Anglican Primates meet with Archbishop Welby in Rome
“This week Archbishop Justin Welby will meet with his primates in Rome in the hope of rectifying the world’s wrongs, then putting them to right with various resolutions, aided by a beleaguered Pope.
What is most significant is the absence of primates who represent some 75 percent of the Anglican communion which must come as something of a shock to the deep thinkers and spinmeisters at Lambeth Palace.
There will be no GAFCON primates and perhaps a small handful of GSFA primates, but Sudan Archbishop Justin Badi has already signaled his displeasure with Archbishop Welby over human sexuality issues, that it might just be enough to dissuade them from attending. …”
– David Virtue wonders who will turn up and what they will talk about.
Photo credit: Jacqui J. Sze, via The Archbishop of Canterbury’s website.
Rico Tice: ‘I was naïve about current culture in the CofE’
“Well-known evangelist Rico Tice has recently left the Church of England and now worships at the International Presbyterian Church (IPC), Ealing.
In an exclusive interview with Evangelicals Now, he explains why he made the switch, and what his advice is to evangelicals themselves wrestling with leaving. …”
– Read here.
Image: Rico Tice at the Coronation Prom in May 2023.
Bishop Mari Emmanuel forgives his attacker and endorses freedom of speech and religion
Screenshot
For ANZAC Day, Bishop Mari Emmanuel of Christ the Good Shepherd Church in Wakeley has spoken out in forgiveness and in support of freedom of speech and freedom of religion.
Remembering the Sacrifice: ANZAC Day 2024
“Grant Dibden, Anglican Bishop to the Australian Defence Force, shares the story of sacrifice about Corporal Reginald Samuel Thorn from Broken Hill, NSW.
A recently discovered letter from Corporal Thorn was sent one day prior to his sacrifice at Pozières, France.
At deaths door, Reginald Thorn’s letter shares the hope of a better place beyond the grave made available through the greatest sacrifice made by Jesus.
Greater love hath no man than this, that a man lay down his life for his friends. John 15:13.”
– At Defence Anglicans.
A high stakes game of ecclesiastical poker in the Anglican Communion — with Justin Badi Arama and Paul Donison
From The Pastor’s Heart:
“It is almost D day in the Anglican Communion.
Today we give the background for two highly significant meetings. One to take place next week in Rome. The second in June in Cairo.
The Rome gathering has been called by the rejected Canterbury leadership. The Cairo gathering has been called by the leadership of the Global South.
As background, The Church of England, the historic mother church of the Anglican Communion, under the leadership of the Archbishop of Canterbury formally abandoned the historic Christian faith when the English General Synod voted to follow Archbishop Welby and his house of bishops in voting for same sex blessings.
In reaction, the majority theologically orthodox have drawn a line in the sand and parted company with The church of England.
The Global South Churches said in their important Ash Wednesday 23 statement that the Church of England has disqualified herself from leading the Anglican communion.
Gafcon said the Archbishop of Canterbury’s leadership has been irreparably damaged.
We speak with the chair of the Global South Archbishop Justin Badi Arama of South Sudan and the new General Secretary of Gafcon Bishop Paul Donison.”
Asked by Dominic Steele if the Rome gathering is “an attempt to play ecclesiastical poker”, Gafcon General Secretary Bishop Paul Donison replies –
“…I can’t really speak with much clarity or knowledge on what Archbishop Welby is hoping for, but we should assume based on all the games that have been played, I think poker is a good analogy over the last decade and longer from Canterbury that this is yet another attempt to obfuscate, to confuse, to get a win for the traditional revisionist structures.
And my prayer is simply that all of the Bible-loving global primates can see through that.
Hopefully many will see that ahead of time and not go.”
The Church of England is losing young people – and fast
“Attendance by children in Church of England churches is plummeting. Might that indicate that the push by revisionist bishops to ditch the Church’s traditional teaching on marriage and sexual morality is not persuading young people to join C of E churches?
Andrew Selous MP, who fields questions about the established Church in the House of Commons as Second Church Estates Commissioner, has revealed that the number of children attending C of E churches on an average Sunday has halved since 2003. …”
– Former CofE vicar Julian Mann reports at Christian Today.
A good reminder to pray for the clear proclamation of the gospel across England.
Time to remove Canterbury as the guardian of the entrance door to the Anglican Communion?
From Church Society:
Canterbury and the Future of the Anglican Communion
Two crucial Anglican gatherings take place in the next few weeks. First in Rome (29 April to 2 May), a gathering of the Anglican Primates, called together by the Archbishop of Canterbury. Soon afterwards, in Cairo (11 to 15 June), a gathering of the Global South Fellowship of Anglican Churches, for their inaugural assembly. High on the agenda at both meetings will be the future structures of the Anglican Communion. But twelve Primates from the Global South Fellowship have already publicly rejected the current Archbishop of Canterbury, Justin Welby, as leader of the Communion. It remains to be seen whether any of these twelve will be present in Rome. Several younger Anglican provinces, like Chile (founded in 2018) and Alexandria (founded in 2020), have begun the process of deleting Canterbury from their constitutions. Other Global South provinces will soon follow suit.
Yet in our Anglican polity, to be “in communion with the See of Canterbury” is often viewed as an essential part of Anglican identity. For example, in the controversy over the failed “Anglican Covenant” proposals, the Church Times declared: “Communion with the see of Canterbury has always been the defining feature of what it means to be an Anglican”. Likewise, Paul Avis asserts in his popular textbook, The Identity of Anglicanism: Essentials of Anglican Ecclesiology (2008): “The litmus-test of membership of the Anglican Communion is to be in communion with the See of Canterbury.” Avis goes so far as to call it “the ultimate criterion”.
Almost a century ago, the 1930 Lambeth Conference include the phrase, “in communion with the See of Canterbury”, as part of its famous description of the Anglican Communion (Resolution 49). This idea has cascaded down the generations and still holds sway in the 2020s. But its origins and contested meaning are interrogated in a new article in the Spring 2024 edition of The Global Anglican, written by Andrew Atherstone, an Oxford historian and member of the Anglican Consultative Council (one of the four so-called “instruments of Communion”). He argues that our Anglican textbooks should be re-written, and that the time has come for Canterbury to be removed as the guardian of the entrance door to the Anglican Communion. …
Church Society has made Andrew Atherstone’s article available for free download as a PDF file. Well worth reading and pondering.
(Emphasis added.)
Religious Freedom and the NSW Conversion Practices Ban Act 2024
Associate Professor Neil Foster writes at Law and Religion Australia:
“I have prepared a paper exploring the operation of the NSW Conversion Practices Ban Act 2024 in relation to the freedom of churches and other religious groups to continue to provide teaching and guidance based on the tenets of their faith. The Act has received assent but will not commence operation until 3 April 2025.
Overall, the Act contains much better protections for religious freedom and the welfare of vulnerable children and young people than similar legislation elsewhere. But there are some areas where it is not clear, and it will require careful consideration by religious groups, as well those interested in so-called ‘gender transition’ issues even from a non-religious background.”
“The Lord who gives the vision gives the provision.”
A new Global Anglican Podcast from GAFCON:
“In this second interview, Archbishop Miguel Uchoa speaks about the boldness required to put the gospel mission first when church planting. His vision for Brazil is to see no less than everybody reached by the ministry of Christ, and doing so requires church leaders to reject a spirit of maintenance as they seek after the lost.
Anglicans can become a cultural conquerors when our compassion for the world consumes more of our time than merely combating heresy. Archbishop Uchoa urges us to ‘send the best’ leaders among us to plant new churches, trusting that God will multiply his people.”
– Listen here.
Explainer: NSW Conversion Practices Ban
Anglican Media Sydney has published a helpful explanatory post on the newly passed NSW “Conversion Practices Ban Act”.
See it out for an outline of what the law means, and how church leaders have responded.
What we believe
The message at the heart of Christianity is really quite simple…