Attendees set for GAFCON
Attendees have been streaming into Jerusalem ahead of this evening’s opening session.
Matt Kennedy, who is now in Jerusalem, comments at Standfirm on the first media reactions to the meeting –
It is fascinating to read the various leftist and mainstream accounts of the “failure” of GAFCON since, in fact, it hasn’t started yet. Many key leaders have only just arrived. I was on the bus with many of them this afternoon and on an airplane with them earlier in the day.
I do not know whether GAFCON will be “successful”. I do not know what measure to apply to assess that. I do think, especially now that we are here, that it was a good thing to come to Jerusalem.
If you have not read the “The Way, The Truth, and the Life” I encourage you to do so. It is not, as some have said, simply a regurgitation of previously published material.
– See also Official GAFCON study document released.
(Photo: The queue for GAFCON registration on Saturday – by Joy Gwaltney / GAFCON.)
Where the responsibility for schism lies
Dr Peter Jensen addresses British press reports that claimed GAFCON leaders were planning “schism” –
“What the Americans did in 2003 and what the Canadians did was to rip the Communion. If we’re talking about schism and the breakup of the communion – that’s where it starts and that is where the responsibility is. What GAFCON is doing is saying that given that new state of affairs, how now can we live together and how can we sustain the highest level of communion and work well together. My way of putting it is to say that the British Empire has now ceased to be and the British commonwealth of nations has come into existence or the nuclear family has turned into an extended family. This is the new reality. I don’t hear GAFCON saying or GAFCON being a further cause for schism. …”
– from Archbishop Peter Jensen’s remarks to the press – via the GAFCON website. You can listen to the 4 minute excerpt in this 3.6 MB mp3 file (direct link). (Photo: GAFCON.)
‘Sun sets on Church of England’
“The Anglican Archbishop of Sydney has declared a formal split in the worldwide Anglican communion over the consecration of openly gay clergy and the blessing of same-sex unions. …”
– Jason Koutsoukis in The Age reports on the press conference at which Dr Jensen actually spoke of an effective – but not a formal (in the sense of “officially sanctioned”) – split in the Anglican Communion.
(Photo: Abp Peter Jensen at the BBC’s Amman bureau last week – by Russell Powell.)
GAFCON set to start tomorrow
More than one thousand Anglicans from 25 nations, including 300 bishops are on their way to Jerusalem to attend the Global Anglican Future Conference. The meeting, which will be held June 22 – 29, includes daily addresses from key Anglican pastors, teachers and leaders. …
– GAFCON press release. (All attending would be glad of your prayers.)
Reclaiming Orthodoxy
Archbishop Peter Jensen interviewed for Christianity Today:
“… Evangelicals find themselves in all sorts of different denominations. The convulsions which are striking [Anglicans], if they have not reached your mainstream denomination, will do so without a doubt. Evangelicals will then have to decide whether their denomination comes first or whether their adherence to the gospel comes first.”
Christianity Today features an interview with Archbishop Peter Jensen.
‘Hard-line bishops make a mess of it in the Holy Land’
“If it was being held in a brewery, it’s a fair bet that the organisers of the supposedly greatest threat to authority in the Church since the Reformation would not be feeling particularly tipsy. …”
– This piece, by George Pitcher in The Telegraph in the UK, ably demonstrates that you can’t believe everything you read in the newspapers.
GAFCON leaders seek renewed Anglican Communion
The pre-GAFCON conference, which began in Amman, Jordan, was suddenly terminated for reasons beyond the control of those planning the event. …
Secular media outlets are saying the Anglican Communion is at an end. GAFCON leaders are saying that is not true. …
– full report from David Virtue in Jerusalem.
See also David’s story, “Leaders Disavow Accusation of Schism”.
Anglicanism Come of Age
The Anglican Communion Network has published online Bishop Robert Duncan’s opening plenary address written for the leaders’ GAFCON meeting in Jordan.
Entitled “Anglicanism Come of Age: A Post-Colonial and Global Communion for the 21st Century” it’s available as a 100kb PDF file (direct link).
GAFCON: The end of the Communion is not nigh
A report in Britain’s Telegraph newspaper referring to the book was headlined Hardline bishops declare Anglican split and went on to declare that they had “formally declared an end to the Anglican communion”.
That was firmly rejected by one of the GAFCON leaders, Sydney Archbishop Peter Jensen, who referred to the actions in North America by churches in defiance of the Lambeth decisions of 1998 on homosexuality.
“If we’re talking about schism and the break up of the communion, that’s where it starts and that’s where the responsibility is,” Archbishop Jensen says. …
– Report by Russell Powell for SydneyAnglicans.net.
– Also hear Archbishop Peter Jensen at this morning’s press conference in Jerusalem.
(Photo: Archbishop Peter Jensen speaks to the BBC in London from the BBC’s Amman bureau – Russell Powell.)
Holy smoke! What a headline!
Again and again, we need to stress that newspaper reporters rarely, if ever, write the headlines for their stories.
I mention this because of a stunning headline in The Telegraph about the pre-Lambeth strategy meeting that conservatives are having right now in Jerusalem (after making a quick exit from Jordan, for complicated and perhaps political reasons). There are many complex angles to the Global Anglican Future Conference, or GAFCON, which is why this particular headline simply leaps off the page:
Anglican church schism declared over homosexuality
– Terry Mattingly at GetReligion comments on some of the more sensational reports about GAFCON.
Official GAFCON study document released
The official study document for the GAFCON Jerusalem Pilgrimage – a 102 page book to be published by The Latimer Trust – has been made available as a free download from the GAFCON website. The document will be launched at a press conference in Jerusalem later today.
The Way, the Truth and the Life is the product of the GAFCON Theological Resource Group. It’s a 484kb download in PDF format. Click here for a direct link to the PDF file.
GAFCON leadership team travels to Jerusalem
The GAFCON leadership team and key participants in the week long conference are on their way to Jerusalem for the final preparations for the meeting beginning Sunday.
The Pre-GAFCON consultation in Jordan wound up early, and the participants move to Jerusalem today. …
– Russell Powell at GAFCON writes for SydneyAnglicans.net.
(Photo: SydneyAnglicans.net)
Key document to be released as GAFCON moves to Jerusalem
The pre-GAFCON preparatory consultation in Jordan wound up early, and the participants moved to Jerusalem on Thursday, 19th June. Hotel and meeting rooms previously unavailable in Jerusalem became available at the same time GAFCON leaders learned that previously granted permission for the Jordan consultation was deemed insufficient.
The time in Jordan was very valuable for prayer, fellowship, and networking. The group made pilgrimages to Mt. Nebo and the Baptism Site of Jesus. GAFCON Chairman Archbishop Peter Akinola of Nigeria, and Archbishop Greg Venables of Southern Cone, were for different reasons unable to be in Jordan. Both are, however, expected to play significant roles at GAFCON in Jerusalem.
GAFCON book, The Way, The Truth and the Life, will be released on Thursday, 19th June, in Jerusalem. A press conference will be held at the Renaissance Hotel on Thursday, 19th June at 19:00 hours. …
– Read the full story from the GAFCON website.
David Virtue has a report on the reason for the re-location – as does Ruth Gledhill in TimesOnline.
From the Files: The Limits of Fellowship
Dean Phillip Jensen’s paper, The Limits of Fellowship, was delivered at the Sydney Lambeth Decision Briefing, at St. Andrew’s Cathedral, Sydney, on Friday 14th March 2008.
With whom can, and should, we have Christian fellowship? And when should we withdraw fellowship? These are important questions for turbulent times in the Anglican Communion.
Anglican unity strained as conservatives prepare for key conference
Conservative Anglican leaders from around the world are preparing for a gathering to discuss the way ahead amid a deepening rift over homosexuality, just days after news broke about the ‘wedding’ of two male Anglican priests in Britain.
More than 1,000 Anglicans clergy and laity, including 280 bishops, many from Africa, are planning to attend the invitation-only Global Anglican Future Conference, to be held in Jerusalem from June 22-29. …
The Lesbian and Gay Christian Movement (LGCM), a British organization… said “the power-hungry Global South and the separatist and divisive GAFCON-ites” were trying to take over the Communion.
– Report from CNSNews.com.
What we believe
The message at the heart of Christianity is really quite simple…