Post-GAFCON briefing in London
In the wake of GAFCON, a ‘briefing for Incumbents and local Church Leaders’ is being held on July 1st at All Souls, Langham Place in London.
Special guest speakers will be Archbishop Henry Orombi, Archbishop Greg Venables, Archbishop Peter Jensen and Dr Jim Packer.
Details from Anglican Mainstream.
GAFCON programme announced
An outline of the programme for the Jerusalem component of GAFCON has been released.
It includes expositions on Genesis 12 (The Promise of God), Exodus 24 (The Presence of God), 2 Samuel 1–17 (The King of God), Luke 24 (The Son of God) and Revelation 21 (The Throne of God).
Further details of the programme are expected soon – on the GAFCON website.
1,000 to attend GAFCON in Jerusalem
Over 1000 senior leaders from seventeen provinces in the Anglican Communion, representing 35 million church-going Anglicans, have registered for the Global Anglican Future Conference (GAFCON) in Jerusalem at the close of the online registration process. They include 280 bishops, almost all accompanied by their wives. Final attendance figures will depend on smooth processing of requested visas, and other factors. …
– Read the full press release from GAFCON.
Philippi or Corinth: Where is the Anglican Communion?
As I sit here at the beginning of May, one major question is facing all those who want to uphold the truth of the gospel in the Anglican Communion: should we go to Lambeth? Of course, for most of us that’s an academic question – we don’t have an invitation (although that’s not stopping some).
Nevertheless we have an emotional investment in the issue, for the question of how much we associate with those that we disagree with is (or at least should be) a constant dilemma for those who take the Scripture seriously, especially where there is clear evidence of willful unrepentance in the matter of public sin. …
– David Ould responds to those who “make a case for orthodox attendance at Lambeth by framing the current divisions in the context of Paul’s letter to the Philippians”. Read it at Stand Firm.
GAFCON: 267 bishops signed up so far
Organizers of the June Gafcon meeting in Jerusalem report that as of April 25, 267 bishops have registered for the June meeting in Jerusalem. …
Approximately 150 bishops and conferees from Muslim majority countries unable to travel freely to Israel along with the Gafcon leadership team will meet at a resort on the Dead Sea in Jordan from June 18-22, while a further 600 are expected to join the self-styled “pilgrimage” in Jerusalem from June 22-29. –
– Report by George Conger for the Church of England Newspaper.
For Kenyan Bishop it’s GAFCON
When the Rt. Rev. Dr. Eliud Wabukala, from Bungoma in Western Kenya, was asked why he was going to GAFCON, but not to the Lambeth Conference in July, he told a congregation of Kenyans in his diocese that you don’t go to a place where men marry men. …
The bishop said it was a “hard agonizing decision to make choosing not to go to Lambeth. The question then was what do we do? It became clear to us that we had to go to GAFCON.”…
David Virtue interviews The Rt. Rev. Dr. Eliud Wabukala for VirtueOnline.
(Photo: kenya2007.com.)
Archbishop Benjamin Kwashi responds to alleged attacks
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(!). Read more
Good news is no news in Nnewi!
A funny thing happened in Nnewi, Nigeria, last week. (Nnewi is a bustling city in southeast Nigeria.) Archbishop Peter Akinola presided over a remarkable meeting of the Standing Committee of the Church of Nigeria (Anglican Communion), but nobody from the world media noticed.
It wasn’t that it was a closed or secret meeting – it’s hard to keep a gathering of a thousand church leaders quiet, and preparations had been public for months. So why didn’t any of them care?
For one thing, he didn’t talk about anything that would make a good headline; instead he focussed on a call to personal and corporate holiness. He told all those present that they were too attached to the ways of the world and they needed to change. …
Read the full article by CANA Bishop Martyn Minns. (Photo: Truro Church.)
See also the Church of Nigeria website.
Why the Global Anglican Future Conference is Necessary
The Archbishop of Canterbury, the Anglican Communion Office, Middle East bishops, Episcopal Church liberal bishops, Church of England liberals and some 25 Church of England evangelical bishops wish that the June meeting of the Global Anglican Future Conference (GAFCON) in the Middle East would either evaporate, or, at a minimum, be little more than a prelude to the Lambeth Conference in Canterbury. …
– Opinion from David Virtue on VirtueOnline.
Statement from the Global South Primates Steering Committee
Five Primates – Archbishops Peter Akinola, Greg Venables, Emmanuel Kolini, Mouneer Anis and John Chew – met together as the Global South Primates Steering Committee from 13th to 15th March 2008 in London. They have released a statement which can be read on the Church of Nigeria website.
(Photo of Archbishop Kolini via George Conger.)
The Sydney Lambeth Decision Briefing
Audio and PDF files of Friday’s Lambeth Decision Briefing called by Dean Phillip Jensen, and held in the Chapter House of St. Andrew’s Cathedral, Sydney, are now available, courtesy of SydneyAnglicans.net.
All very helpful in understanding the crisis facing the Anglican Communion.
The topic of the briefing was – ‘The Lambeth Decision: Refining or Redefining Anglicanism?’
The mp3 audio and PDF files will open in a new window.
Phillip Jensen – Are there limits to fellowship? (70 min / 24MB) – PDF file.
Mark Thompson – The Anglican Debacle. (30 min / 11MB) – PDF file.
Robert Tong – Doing the Lambeth Walk. (21 min / 7 MB) – PDF file.
Russell Powell – What is GAFCON all about? (7 min / 2.4MB) – PDF file.
Communiqué reaffirms goals of GAFCON
Communiqué from GAFCON leadership meeting
We met in England as the leadership team of the Global Anglican Future Conference and Jerusalem Pilgrimage from March 10-12, 2008 and were encouraged by the support and enthusiasm of bishops, clergy and lay leaders around the Anglican Communion who have welcomed GAFCON and expressed their desire to attend.
Read more
The Lambeth Decision: Dean calls briefing on 14th March
‘The Lambeth Decision: Refining or Redefining Anglicanism?
Sydney’s Bishops are not attending Lambeth – What do we do?’
It’s been announced that Dean Phillip Jensen is planning an afternoon briefing on the reasons for, and implications of, recent decisions concerning Sydney’s participation in world Anglicanism.
To be held in the Chapter House at the Cathedral on Friday 14th March, 1:30 – 3:30pm. The speakers will be –
Phillip Jensen – Should we break fellowship? Why? When? With whom?
Mark Thompson – What has happened in World Anglicanism to bring us to this point?
Robert Tong – What can Lambeth achieve?
Russell Powell – What is GAFCON all about?
“Arrogant Archbishop’s protest conference ignores own advice”
“Prelates such as Sydney’s Anglican Archbishop Peter Jensen demonstrate considerable arrogance by holding their protest conference in Jerusalem against the wishes of its bishop, Suheil Dawani. …
Dawani is closely involved with efforts to achieve peace in the Middle East, to which he gives a higher priority than the theological squabble over homosexuality. …”
– An unsympathetic opinion-piece in The Sunday Canberra Times.
However see Archbishop Peter Jensen’s statement to the Standing Committee of Sydney Diocese about that “theological squabble”.
And in a report about the Diocese of Kentucky’s annual Convention, the whole debate is characterised as “a family argument”.
Bishop Iker of Fort Worth to attend GAFCON
The Rt. Rev. Jack Leo Iker, Bishop of the Episcopal Diocese of Fort Worth, announced today that he plans to participate in the Global Anglican Future Conference, to be held in Jerusalem, June 22–29, 2008. Read more
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