Libyan leader Col. Moammar Gadhafi, who holds increasing sway in the Italian economy, upset some Italians by urging conversion to Islam during a three-day visit to the predominantly Roman Catholic country.
Col. Gadhafi held a series of private meetings on Sunday and Monday with some 800 Italian women and a small group of young men organized by a hostess agency and paid for by the Libyan government.
The “compassionate release” of a convicted PanAm bomber in 2009 was an affront to justice and to the families of the 270 people who died in Lockerbie, Scotland, on Dec. 21, 1988. It looks even worse given the perspective that the following year has provided….
The week-long All Africa Bishops Conference closed yesterday, with the prelates condemning corruption.
“Our political leaders are urged to have a hard look at the style of leadership that has so far engendered corruption, poverty, insecurity and underdevelopment,” the prelates said in a five-page resolution.
The communiqué was read to journalists by the chairperson of the Coalition of African Prelates Association, Ian Ernest, at a briefing attended by other archbishops at the Kampala Serena Conference Centre.
The second All African Bishops conference ended yesterday with the primates calling on Africans to stick to their culture and reject Western ways tearing the church a part.
While addressing a press conference yesterday, the clergy men, led by Archbishop Henry Luke Orombi, said Western cultures like homosexuality should be shunned. He said they will not change their stand on homosexuality, saying the practice is against the scriptures.
The question of homosexuality reared its head for the umpteenth time this week at the all African Anglican Church conference that is taking place in Entebbe. Despite pressure from the western world, African bishops have renewed their condemnation of the practice of homosexuality in the church.
Via email:
1. In a spirit of unity and trust, and in an atmosphere of love the Primates of the Council of Anglican Provinces in Africa (CAPA) as well as Archbishop John Chew, the Chairman of the Global South, which represents the majority of the active orthodox membership in the entire Anglican Communion, met during the 2nd All Africa Bishop’s Conference in Entebbe, Uganda. We enjoyed the fellowship and the sense of unity as we heard the Word of God and gathered around the Lord’s Table.
2. We gave thanks to God for the leadership of the Most. Rev. Ian Ernest, Archbishop of the Indian Ocean and Chairman of CAPA and for the abundant hospitality provided by the Most Rev. Henry Orombi, Archbishop of Uganda and the entire Church of Uganda.
3. We were honored by the presence of the His Excellency General Yoweri K. Museveni, President of the Republic of Uganda, for his official welcome to Uganda and for hosting an official state reception for the AABCH. We are very grateful to him for his support of the work of the Anglican Church in Uganda and for his call to stand against the alien intrusions and cultural arrogance which undermines the moral fiber of our societies. We recall his admonishment to live out the words and deeds of the Good Samaritan. We are also grateful to the Rt. Hon. Prime Minister of Uganda for his presence and words of encouragement to us.
4. We were very happy and appreciated that the Archbishop of Canterbury, the Most Rev. Dr. Rowan Williams, accepted our invitation to attend the 2nd All Africa Bishop’s Conference. We were encouraged by his word to us. We also appreciated the opportunity to engage face-to-face with him in an atmosphere of love and respect. We shared our hearts openly and with transparency, and we have come to understand the difficulties and the pressures he is facing. He also came to understand our position and how our mission is threatened by actions which have continued in certain provinces in the Communion. We therefore commit ourselves to continuously support and pray for him and for the future of our beloved Communion.
5. We were very saddened with the recent actions of The Episcopal Church in America who went ahead and consecrated Mary Glasspool last May 2010, in spite of the call for a moratorium (1) and all the warnings from the Archbishop of Canterbury, the Standing Committee of the Anglican Communion and the 4th Encounter of the Global South.
This was a clear departure from the standard teaching of the Anglican Communion as stated in Lambeth Resolution 1.10. We are also concerned about similar progressive developments in Canada and in the U.K.
6. Being aware of the reluctance of those Instruments of Communion to follow through the recommendations of the Windsor Report (2) and taken by the Primates Meetings in Dromantine (3) and Dar es Salaam (4) we see the way ahead as follows:
A. In order to keep the ethos and tradition of the Anglican Communion in a credible way, it is obligatory of all Provinces to observe the agreed decisions and recommendations of the Windsor Report and the various communiqués of the past three Primates Meetings, especially Dar es Salaam in 2007. We as Primates of CAPA and the Global South are committed to honor such recommendations.
B. We are committed to meet more regularly as Global South Primates and take our responsibilities in regard to issues of Faith and Order. (5)
C. We will give special attention to sound theological education as we want to ensure that the future generations stand firm on the Word of God and faithfully follow our Lord and Saviour Jesus Christ.
D. We are committed to network with orthodox Anglicans around the world, including Communion Partners in the USA and the Anglican Church in North America, in holistic mission and evangelism. Our aim is to advance the Kingdom of God especially in unreached areas.
E. We are committee to work for unity with our ecumenical partners and to promote interfaith dialogue with other faiths in order to promote a peaceful co-existence and to resolve conflicts.
F. We are committed to work for the welfare of our countries. This will involve alleviating poverty, achieving financial and economic empowerment, fighting diseases, and promoting education.
7. Finally, we are very aware of our own inadequacy and weaknesses hence we depend fully on the grace of God to achieve his purpose in the life of his church and our beloved Anglican Communion.
Footnotes:
1. The Windsor Report Section 134.1 The Episcopal church (USA) be invited to express its regret that the proper constraints of the bonds of affection were breached in the events surrounding the election and consecration of a bishop for the See of New Hampshire, and for the consequences which followed and that such an expression of regret would represent the desire of the Episcopal Church (USA) to remain within the Communion (2) the Episcopal church (USA) be invited to effect a moratorium on the election and consent to the consecration of any candidate to the episcopate who is living in a same gender union until some new consensus in the Anglican Communion energies.
The Windsor Report Section 144.3 We call for a moratorium on all such public Rites, and recommend that bishops who have authorized such rites in the US and Canada be invited to express regret that the proper constraints of the bonds of affection were breached by such authorizations.
2. Windsor Report. Section D. 157 There remains a very real danger that we will not choose to walk together. Should the call to halt and find ways of continuing in our present communion not be heeded, then we shall have to begin to learn to walk apart.
3. The Communiqué of the Primates Meeting in Dromantine (2005) Section 14. Within the ambit of the issues discussed in the Windsor Report and in roder to recognize the integrity of all parties, we request that the Episcopal Church (USA) and the Anglican Church of Canada voluntarily withdraw their members from the Anglican Consultative Council for the period leading up to the next Lambeth Conference.
4. The Communiqué of the Primates Meeting in Dar es Salaam in 2007. If the reassurances requested of the House of Bishops cannot in good conscience be given, the relationship between The Episcopal Church and the Anglican communion as a whole remains damaged at best, and this has consequences for the full participation of the Church in the life of the Communion.
5. Lambeth 1988 Resolution 18.2(a) Urges the encouragement be given to a developing collegial rule for the Primates Meeting under the presidency of the Archbishop of Canterbury, so that the Primates Meeting is able to exercise an enhanced responsibility in offering guidance on doctrinal, moral and pastoral matters.
Lambeth 1998 Resolution III.6 (a) reaffirms the Resolution 18.2(a) Of Lambeth 1988 which “urges that encouragement be given to a developing collegial role for the Primates’ Meeting under the presidency of the Archbishop of Canterbury, so that the Primates’ Meeting is able to exercise an enhanced responsibility in offering guidance on doctrinal, moral and pastoral matters”.
President Yoweri Museveni on Wednesday evening hosted the visiting African and foreign Bishops to a dinner at State House Entebbe. The prelates are here for the second All Africa Bishops Conference in Entebbe at Imperial Resort Beach Hotel which ends tomorrow.
As they arrived atop the hill at snail pace in three minibuses, many were awe struck by the breath taking beauty of the palatial structure, imposing majestically over Entebbe town. They ate and drank, with the President who called on them to champion social economic transformation.
“It is very important that the church leaders, political leaders and traditional leaders understand that social-economic transformation is the main problem in Africa”, the President said.
(Via email):
(Church of Uganda) In a 27th August letter to Archbishop Henry Luke Orombi, Archbishop of the Church of Uganda, the Most Rev. Ian Earnest, Chairman of CAPA (Council of Anglican Provinces of Africa), apologized for “embarrassing” the Church of Uganda when CAPA received a $25,000 grant from Trinity Grants (USA) for the All Africa Bishops Conference taking place in Uganda. (Letter is attached.)
In 2003, the Church of Uganda broke communion with the Episcopal Church (TEC) over their unbiblical theology and immoral actions that violated historic and Biblical Anglicanism and tore the fabric of the Communion at its deepest level. At the same time, the Church of Uganda resolved to not receive any funds from TEC.
The 2nd All Africa Bishops Conference was hosted by the Church of Uganda, but the programme and speakers were chosen by CAPA. The Church of Uganda received no outside funding for its role in hosting the 400 Bishops and other participants in the week-long conference. All funds were raised locally within Uganda.
Archbishop Henry thanked Archbishop Ian for acknowledging the awkward position CAPA had put the Church of Uganda in and appreciated his humility and generous spirit in writing.
O Lord God, who art the light of the minds that know thee, the life of the souls that love thee, and the strength of the hearts that serve thee: Help us, following the example of thy servant Augustine of Hippo, so to know thee that we may truly love thee, and so to love thee that we may fully serve thee, whom to serve is perfect freedom; through Jesus Christ our Lord, who liveth and reigneth with thee and the Holy Spirit, one God, now and for ever.
Bishops from Singapore, Southeast Asia and Africa told Archbishop of Canterbury Rowan Williams in closed-door sessions Tuesday and Wednesday that there should be no more diplomacy on homosexuality, an issue that has split the Anglican communion.
Archbishop Henry Luke Orombi, head of Uganda’s Anglican church and the host of the week-long All Africa Bishops Conference, said the Archbishop of Canterbury (pictured administering communion at the conference) faces a complicated task in trying to reunite the church.
“He (Williams) spoke what was on his mind and we also spoke. We impressed it on him that he had totally gone in a different direction and he has to sort it out,” Orombi told journalists after their closed-door meeting on Wednesday.
A draft UN report says crimes by the Rwandan army and allied rebels in Democratic Republic of Congo could be classified as genocide.
The report, seen by the BBC, details the investigation into the conflict in DR Congo from 1993 to 2003.
It says tens of thousands of ethnic Hutus, including women, children and the elderly, were killed by the Tutsi-dominated Rwandan army.
Rwanda’s justice minister has dismissed the claims as “rubbish”.
Six years ago, all of Africa’s Anglican bishops met in Lagos, Nigeria, and complained that the Archbishop of Canterbury had not accepted their invitation. They are meeting in Uganda this week, with Dr Williams present, but ”” given the events of the intervening years ”” not all of them are happy that he is here.
Although every Anglican pro vince is represented, the majority of bishops here ”” as in Africa as a whole ”” are from Nigeria and Uganda, where there has been the most public dissocia tion from the Anglican Com munion, including the 2008 Lambeth Conference, and es pecially from the actions of the Episcopal Church in the United States.
Some Primates, including the Archbishop of Cape Town, the Most Revd Thabo Makgoba, are conspicuous by their absence. But seated very publicly among the Primates is the former Bishop of Pittsburgh (News, 26 Septem ber 2008), the Archbishop of the Anglican Church in North America, the Most Revd Bob Duncan.
Read it all (there are two articles; this is the one at the bottom, but both should be perused–KSH).
Check it out for a lot of good material–I really liked the slide show. (Earlier in the week the site was down due to bandwith exceeded issues because of the degree of interest in the meeting).
The continent of Africa is facing a future in which climate change will kill more people than traditional causes such as malaria and HIV, according to a Ugandan environmental expert. Dr Rose Mwebaza warned Anglican bishops from Africa in Entebbe that lakes across the continent are shrinking and drying up, crops are failing, deforestation is leading to terrible flooding and, as a result, people are fighting and killing each other over resources. “Africa is facing several [environmental] challenges,” said Dr Mwebaza, a senior legal advisor on environmental security at Nairobi’s Institute of Security Studies. These include increased droughts and reduced availability of water; desertification – one factor in major flooding – and increased incidents of diseases in previously unaffected areas. “Lake Chad in 1973 covered several countries,” she said. “It is reduced to a shadow of its former self. It is vanishing from the continent right in front of our eyes.”
(Please note that the video for this address was posted last evening–KSH).
Finally, but not the least, we cannot shy away from the state we are in. We cannot afford to continue to lurch from one crisis to the next in our beloved Communion. Despite attempts to warn some western provinces, action has been taken to irrevocably shatter the Communion. Sadly existing structures of the Anglican Communion have been unable to address the need for discipline. These can become irrelevant to our needs as Africans and are now, moreover, unrepresentative demographically. We need new structures that are credible and representative of the majority.
President Yoweri Museveni has warned against religious intolerance, saying it is one of the reasons that prompted him and his comrades to go to war in order to stabilize the country.
Addressing the All Africa Bishops Conference in Entebbe yesterday, Museveni said the formative years of religion in Uganda were characterised by friction between denominations.
“There was friction between the Protestants and Catholics and later between the two and Muslims. Protestants came in 1877 and the Catholics in 1879, but by 1890, we already had a civil war. You can imagine the confusion allegedly in the name of God,” he said.
The archbishop of Uganda yesterday urged hundreds of African bishops to shake off their fears, shame and superficial dependency and re-evangelise the “ailing” churches of the west.
In a rallying cry to the biggest constituency of the Anglican Communion, the Most Rev Henry Orombi said it was time for Africans to “rise up and bring fresh life in the ailing global Anglicanism”.
His call came on the same day that US Episcopalians published a guide on liturgical and ceremonial resources for clergy and same-sex couples.
Anglican bishops attending the All Africa Bishops Conference in Entebbe have reiterated their firm stand against homosexuality.
In speeches, most of which received standing ovations, the prelates said the practice was alien and an “innovation of the truth”.
Present was the Archbishop of Canterbury, Rowan Williams, whose open support of the practice has made him the centre of attraction for the media at the conference.
The seven-day conference, at the Imperial Resort Beach Hotel, attracted over 400 bishops, a quarter of whom are from Nigeria. Participants were excited by the attendance of bishops from the Muslim countries of Sudan and Egypt.
The Bishop in Egypt Dr Mouneer Anis told bishops from more than 400 dioceses at the 2nd All Africa Bishops Conference that this was an historic moment for Africa’s Christian community.
“There is no doubt that history is going to record what happens at this conference for future generations,” he said at today’s opening service in Entebbe, Uganda. “This is no ordinary conference because it’s happening in an extraordinary context.”
He explained that although “Africa groans” under the weight of conflicts, epidemics and poverty the African church was growing in an extraordinary way. It was predicted, he said, to become a continent of 673 million Christians by 2025.
He said that, as a consequence of this growth, the centre of the Christian world was shifting and so was the global role of the church of Africa. He issued a challenge to the bishops present to consider the African church’s place in such a world and said this weeks’ conference could be a turning point in the life of the church of Africa
Your Grace, The Most Rev Luke Orombi, I have chosen to publicly address this communication to you as the Honourable Host to the 400 African Anglican bishops who are coming to Uganda this week. We are informed the purpose of their coming here is to discuss a host of issues affecting the continent. Among the issues are poverty, diseases, matters of justice and peace, wars, ethnic cleansing, genocide; and the relationship between the Church and the State. This is a tall agenda.
According to Amanda Onapito, the public relations officer of the Province of the Church of Uganda, “It is time believers combined their efforts to find solutions to problems that affect Africa.” I am hopeful of all attempts to do so.
The Archbishop of Canterbury, Dr Rowan Williams, will today meet African bishops, most of whom are unhappy about his perceived tolerance of homosexual behaviour in the Anglican Communion.
Dr Williams, who arrived in the country yesterday, will be the lead preacher at the opening of the All Africa Bishops Conference in Entebbe aimed at fostering unity and breathing life into a Church, the Archbishop of Uganda Luke Orombi, described as “broken”.
About 400 African bishops begin a seven-day meeting in Entebbe today for the second All Africa Bishops Conference. The theme of the conference, organised by the Council of Anglican Provinces of Africa (CAPA), is “Securing the future, unlocking our potential”.
President Yoweri Museveni will officially open the conference tomorrow.
The conference takes place at Imperial Resort Beach Hotel. Yesterday, the lobby of the hotel was a beehive of activity, as delegations of clergy from Burundi, Central Africa, Congo, Egypt, Indian Ocean islands, and Kenya checked in for registration.
The Anglican Church of Burundi kicked off its 75th anniversary celebrations during the Aug. 14-15 weekend with a service of thanksgiving and prayer at St. Luke’s Cathedral in Gitega and a service of Holy Communion at St. Peter’s Church in Buhiga.
Bishop Nathan Kamusiime Gasatura of the Diocese of Butare in the Anglican Church of Rwanda reminded the congregation in Buhiga that “there was cause for celebration because of the dedication, commitment, and witness based on the Word of God of the first Christians. They set an example for future generations to follow,” according to a press release from the Anglican Church of Burundi.
During his sermon in Gitega, Bishop Geoffrey Rwubusisi of the Diocese of Cyangugu, Rwanda, asked the congregation to stand in silent prayer and thanksgiving for the early pioneers “who sacrificed much to bring the Gospel of God’s saving and reconciling love to Burundi. Such love and unity should characterize the church of the future,” the release said.
Now, Kenyans have voted after having heard what we, the Catholic Church in Kenya, and various people had to tell them. We respect the outcome of the referendum, where the larger numbers of Kenyans have voted to accept this new constitution. However, truth and right are not about numbers. We therefore, as the shepherds placed to give moral guidance to our people, still reiterate the need to address the flawed moral issues in this new Constitution. That voice will never be silenced.
We thank all the Christians and many Kenyans of good will who voted “no” in consideration of the issues raised by the Church. We also acknowledge many who voted “yes” while having serious misgivings on the moral issues contained in the constitution. We understand the many pressures that were at play at this time, and call upon you to revisit and play a crucial role in addressing these issues as we now seek to implement the Constitution and forge a way forward in the general reforms we now have to embark on.
The Church desires an authentic reform process, and will remain at the forefront to support a good Constitution and the legal reform process in this country….