Post by Paddy by Grace on Sept 7, 2008 19:30:50 GMT -7
www.nytimes.com/2008/06/30/world/30anglican.html?_r=1&oref=slogin&partner=rssuserland&emc=rss&pagewanted=print
JERUSALEM — Anglican conservatives, frustrated by the continuing stalemate over homosexuality in the Anglican Communion, declared on Sunday that they would defy the church’s historic lines of authority and create a new power bloc within the church led by a council of predominantly African archbishops.
The announcement came at the close of an unprecedented week-long meeting of Anglican conservatives in Jerusalem, who contend that they represent a majority of the 77 million members of the Anglican Communion.
They depicted their efforts as the culmination of an anti-colonial struggle against the church’s seat of power in Great Britain, whose missionaries first brought Anglican Christianity to the developing world. The conservatives say many of the descendants of those Anglican missionaries in Britain and North America are now following what they call a “false gospel” that allows a malleable, liberal interpretation of Scripture.
They insisted that they were not breaking away from the Anglican Communion or creating a schism. But if carried out, their plans would create severe upheaval in the Communion, the world’s third largest grouping of churches after the Roman Catholic Church and Orthodox churches. After more than 1,000 delegates to the meeting at a Jerusalem hotel affirmed their platform statement, Africans, Australians, South Americans and Indians danced and swayed to a Swahili hymn and shouted full-throated hallelujahs.
Archbishop Peter Akinola of Nigeria, who leads the largest province in the Communion, said at a news conference afterward, “It’s quite clear we have been in turmoil.”
“With this decision we have a fresh beginning,” he added.
He was accompanied by the archbishops of Uganda, Nigeria, Rwanda and Sydney, Australia, as well as a former American priest, the Rt. Rev. David C. Anderson Sr., whom Archbishop Akinola made a bishop of the Church of Nigeria.
The statement the delegates released in Jerusalem said that it was time to create a new province in the United States and Canada that would absorb the churches that have been outraged by the American church’s consecration of an openly gay bishop in 1993 and the Canadian church’s blessing of same-sex unions.
Bishop Anderson said a new province would unite believers in North America who had abandoned the Episcopal Church over the last few decades, because they disagreed with the ordination of women priests and bishops, the interpretation of Scripture and the acceptance of homosexuality.
“It brings them the hope now finally of regathering the portion of the church that scattered when heterodoxy just became untenable and many were driven out, not all at once, but over the years in different stages,” he said.
The conservatives also challenged the authority of the Archbishop of Canterbury. The current archbishop, Rowan Williams, has been a disappointment to conservatives, because he did not discipline the liberal North Americans or engineer their eviction. The Archbishop of Canterbury historically has not had the power to decree policy in the Communion, but in the past he determined which churches belonged to the Communion.
The conservatives’ statement said they acknowledged Canterbury’s historic position, they did not accept the idea “that Anglican identity is determined necessarily through recognition by the Archbishop of Canterbury.”
They said that membership in their conservative alliance within the Communion would be determined by 14 principles of theological orthodoxy laid out in a manifesto they released on Sunday, which they called the “Jerusalem Declaration.”
There was no official response on Sunday from the Archbishop of Canterbury, the Episcopal Church in the United States or the Anglican Church of Canada. Some liberal American bloggers sought to play down the conservatives’ actions, dismissing them as nothing new. The conservatives held their meeting, which they called the “Global Anglican Future Conference,” in Jerusalem despite attempts by Bishop Suheil Dawani of Jerusalem to deter them, because he said it would set back relations with other churches and religions in the Middle East.
Most of the conservatives at the meeting said they would boycott the Lambeth Conference, a gathering of Anglican bishops from around the world that takes place once every ten years in Britain. That conference begins in mid-July.
Dina Kraft reported from Jerusalem and Laurie Goodstein from New York
JERUSALEM — Anglican conservatives, frustrated by the continuing stalemate over homosexuality in the Anglican Communion, declared on Sunday that they would defy the church’s historic lines of authority and create a new power bloc within the church led by a council of predominantly African archbishops.
The announcement came at the close of an unprecedented week-long meeting of Anglican conservatives in Jerusalem, who contend that they represent a majority of the 77 million members of the Anglican Communion.
They depicted their efforts as the culmination of an anti-colonial struggle against the church’s seat of power in Great Britain, whose missionaries first brought Anglican Christianity to the developing world. The conservatives say many of the descendants of those Anglican missionaries in Britain and North America are now following what they call a “false gospel” that allows a malleable, liberal interpretation of Scripture.
They insisted that they were not breaking away from the Anglican Communion or creating a schism. But if carried out, their plans would create severe upheaval in the Communion, the world’s third largest grouping of churches after the Roman Catholic Church and Orthodox churches. After more than 1,000 delegates to the meeting at a Jerusalem hotel affirmed their platform statement, Africans, Australians, South Americans and Indians danced and swayed to a Swahili hymn and shouted full-throated hallelujahs.
Archbishop Peter Akinola of Nigeria, who leads the largest province in the Communion, said at a news conference afterward, “It’s quite clear we have been in turmoil.”
“With this decision we have a fresh beginning,” he added.
He was accompanied by the archbishops of Uganda, Nigeria, Rwanda and Sydney, Australia, as well as a former American priest, the Rt. Rev. David C. Anderson Sr., whom Archbishop Akinola made a bishop of the Church of Nigeria.
The statement the delegates released in Jerusalem said that it was time to create a new province in the United States and Canada that would absorb the churches that have been outraged by the American church’s consecration of an openly gay bishop in 1993 and the Canadian church’s blessing of same-sex unions.
Bishop Anderson said a new province would unite believers in North America who had abandoned the Episcopal Church over the last few decades, because they disagreed with the ordination of women priests and bishops, the interpretation of Scripture and the acceptance of homosexuality.
“It brings them the hope now finally of regathering the portion of the church that scattered when heterodoxy just became untenable and many were driven out, not all at once, but over the years in different stages,” he said.
The conservatives also challenged the authority of the Archbishop of Canterbury. The current archbishop, Rowan Williams, has been a disappointment to conservatives, because he did not discipline the liberal North Americans or engineer their eviction. The Archbishop of Canterbury historically has not had the power to decree policy in the Communion, but in the past he determined which churches belonged to the Communion.
The conservatives’ statement said they acknowledged Canterbury’s historic position, they did not accept the idea “that Anglican identity is determined necessarily through recognition by the Archbishop of Canterbury.”
They said that membership in their conservative alliance within the Communion would be determined by 14 principles of theological orthodoxy laid out in a manifesto they released on Sunday, which they called the “Jerusalem Declaration.”
There was no official response on Sunday from the Archbishop of Canterbury, the Episcopal Church in the United States or the Anglican Church of Canada. Some liberal American bloggers sought to play down the conservatives’ actions, dismissing them as nothing new. The conservatives held their meeting, which they called the “Global Anglican Future Conference,” in Jerusalem despite attempts by Bishop Suheil Dawani of Jerusalem to deter them, because he said it would set back relations with other churches and religions in the Middle East.
Most of the conservatives at the meeting said they would boycott the Lambeth Conference, a gathering of Anglican bishops from around the world that takes place once every ten years in Britain. That conference begins in mid-July.
Dina Kraft reported from Jerusalem and Laurie Goodstein from New York