The Archbishop of Canterbury and the Lambeth Design Group, as they planned Lambeth 2008, made the decision that this time around, the Conference would not deal with any resolutions. Archbishop Rowan made it clear that Lambeth I.10 remains the mind of the Communion on the subject of human sexuality and would not be re-visited in 2008; nor, in the process, would we take up any other subjects in a legislative mode. We would instead have a season of “fasting” in which we listen to each other, take counsel, pray and reflect together, but avoid any definitive actions that would further exacerbate the conflict that has engulfed the Anglican Communion particularly since the actions of the Episcopal Church’s General Convention in 2003. The decision to “fast” from resolutions was a controversial one, but in the end I’m convinced that it was wise, prudent, and courageous.

That means that “Lambeth Indaba” isn’t an authoritative teaching document; it doesn’t intend to be. Rather, it is a report of our conversations, a snapshot of the bishops in the midst of a long and ultimately productive time together. The document seeks to be faithful to the Gospel, faithful to the Indaba process, faithful to the bishops and their context, and faithful to the Communion (pp. 7-8). It goes on to describe conversations on mission and evangelism, the environment, ecumenism, relations with world religions, Anglican bishops and Anglican identity, human sexuality, the Bible, the Anglican Covenant, and the Windsor process. Necessarily, the document contains contradictory material. After all, it simply reports what we said to one another; and since we sometimes (often!) didn’t agree, “Lambeth Indaba” allows us a glimpse at the theological and pastoral diversity that characterizes the Anglican Communion. Don’t read the document looking for an authoritative pronouncement. You won’t find it; and I think it’s safe to say that this Lambeth Conference probably couldn’t have found a consensus on some of the difficult matters that continue to divide us. Yet, as I mentioned at the beginning of these reflections, the search for unity in the midst of significant conflict was a kind of subtext that permeated the whole Conference, from start to finish; you’ll find echoes of that yearning throughout “Lambeth Indaba”. I encourage you to download the document and to read it prayerfully and carefully, and in that way to pray with and for the bishops who spend nearly three weeks in Canterbury.

I should add a bittersweet footnote to the preceding paragraph. We weren’t all there. Four provinces (Nigeria, Rwanda, Uganda, and Kenya) declined the Archbishop’s invitation to come to Lambeth (though in the end several Kenyan bishops did attend); several Australian and British bishops were also missing, as were a couple of Americans. Those who chose to say away did so in large part to protest the presence of the Episcopal Church, and in part as well because they disapproved of Lambeth’s non-legislative format. Many, though not all, of these bishops had attended a meeting in Jerusalem entitled “Global Anglican Futures Conference” at the end of June, though some bishops were present both at Lambeth and at GAFCON. (Note the GAFCON website.) The absence of so many Christian friends from the Lambeth Conference was a grievous loss indeed. We needed their strong voices. The Conference was less robustly representative because of their absence.

Archbishop Rowan’s concluding presidential address summarized our time together and gave what I believe to be an authoritative interpretation of the Lambeth Conference and its long-term effects.

Read it all.

Although the Reflections document is merely a report of our discussions (Lambeth has no legislative authority), many of its comments related to human sexuality are bound to gain attention in the coming months. The American Church realizes that our policy of inclusion is not shared by the majority. The document reflects that fact. Even though I had hoped that the Communion could accept the American Church’s actions, I was disappointed that this was not the case. Bishop Gene Robinson’s exclusion was personally difficult for me, and I supported him the best I could by attending an off- campus Eucharist with him. Most (but not all) of the 38 constituent provinces still feel that there is need for a covenant agreement which would contain some kind of discipline for those provinces that proceed with the consecration of openly gay or lesbian bishops, or who offer blessings of same gender unions. Both the meaning of these passages, and the disciplinary implications are still unclear, but I don’t think it would be an overstatement to say that many of us in the American Church feel caught between our love for the Communion and our conviction that in the church there can be no outsiders. The result, as someone half jokingly remarked, is that “the Anglican Communion welcomes everyone, except a few, and the Americans, who welcome everyone.” So this tension will continue.

For my part, I intend to do three things. The first is to nurture the friendships I made with my colleagues from around the world. I am sure my prayer-group members (which included one very vocal critic of the American Church) and I will be friends for life, for we pledged to pray daily for each another. Second, our mission partnerships need to be strengthened. I hope to build on our relationship with Western Mexico and Dar es Salaam, and both will be present at our Convention in October. Third, the clergy and I will be discussing the pastoral implications of the Reflections document at our clericus meetings this fall and how we as one Diocese can best respond to it.

Read it all.

It does not lay out a timeline or suggest a new way forward to unifying the Anglican Communion around the mainstream Christian consensus on issues of human sexuality. Instead, it offers general support for ongoing initiatives that were first suggested in the 2004 Windsor Report and subsequent meetings of the primates of the Anglican Communion, such as the Anglican Communion Covenant and the proposed moratoria on same sex blessings, the election of bishops in same-sex relationships, and bishops taking foreign parishes and dioceses into their churches.

The indaba document also expresses general support for the creation of the latest in a long line of committees and commissions intended to offer some relief to faithful Anglicans who have been forced into conflict or have had to leave their dioceses or national churches. This latest effort, called the “Pastoral Forum,” has no clear timeline, authority, budget, or membership.

A number of Network bishops attended the Lambeth Conference. Writing after the conference concluded, Bishop Mark Lawrence of South Carolina stated, “I had come to speak a word of hope and perhaps to intervene on behalf of our beloved, but in the last resolve the family refused the long needed measures.”

Read it all.

In his farewell, Williams pleaded with Lambeth ’08 participants to have “a season of gracious restraint” over the months that it will take to prepare, negotiate and circulate the Anglican Covenant. He beseeched liberals not to ordain gays and lesbians to the priesthood, elect them as bishops or allow priests to officiate at same-sex, partnership ceremonies. He asked conservatives threatening to walk out not to leave.

In University City, [the Rev. Brooke] Myers expects that most priests will follow what their bishops ask about holding same-sex consecration ceremonies during the moratorium season. Most would ask permission and not follow the more audacious “do it, then ask forgiveness” mode, he said — although the hiatus already has been breeched in Massachusetts and California.

Late Monday, a weary Bishop Wayne Smith returned to St. Louis, with high praise for his fellow bishops and “the near absence of poisonous statements, the tendency away from grandstanding, the fact that no one stormed out in protest.”

Still, Smith, the bishop of the Missouri Diocese and its 14,000 Episcopalians from central Missouri to the Mississippi River, does not see a clear solution to heal the fissure. “The shape of any Anglican Covenant, from what I can see, remains an open question.”

Read it all.

Ok, suppose you had to write what you think happened Lambeth 2008 in 20 words or less, written as a headline. What would you say?

Mine is: Rowan Williams tries really hard himself; but is it too little too late for the Anglican Communion?

Metropolitan Kallistos Ware (Orthodox) was simply outstanding. ”˜If one member of the body suffers, all suffer’, he began, referring to 1 Corinthians 12.16. ”˜Your questions are our questions’. He continued by noting that there are two questions he would be asked on his return from Lambeth (I wonder will they be the same two in Down and Dromore for me?)

* Did the bishops at Lambeth clearly proclaim Jesus Christ as the only Saviour of the world?
* Did they clearly uphold Christian teaching on marriage and the family?

On the first, from the Indaba reflections, he is clear we pass the test, but on the second, he felt there was a degree of ambiguity. Have we fully affirmed Lambeth 1.10, he asked? His speech finished with a clear comment that our answers on these questions would have a decisive impact on future ecumenical dialogue with the orthodox churches, and that truth matters more than outward unity. I wanted to say ”˜Amen’!

The second ecumenical speaker was Professor Ian Torrance, representing the World Alliance of Reformed Churches, who was also most helpful in his comments. He noted that some people were living with the notion that the Anglican Communion might ”˜self-correct’, which he said he did not believe. A quiet and reserved man, he had given himself to a great deal of listening, and said ”˜I could feel the anxiety’. His speech ended with a quote from St Cyprian about bishops (great to have a Presbyterian telling us what bishops should be!), ”˜The episcopate is one, each part of which is held by each bishop for the whole.’ The message couldn’t be clearer.

Read it all.

Is it still possible to be a liberal Anglican? Not in the old way. Liberal Anglicans have to follow Williams onto the high wire, to some extent. By staying within an institution that has taken an anti-liberal turn, they collude in his act. In other words, liberal Anglicans have been Rowanised. They buy his long-range hope for reform that the church as a whole can accept.

Why has this happened? Why hasn’t a tougher liberal Anglicanism emerged that says that the truth of liberalism must not be sacrificed to “unity”? If Christian unity is so important (it would say), then surely the break with Rome was a mistake ”“ surely Anglicans should repent of it right now. Isn’t this version of Christianity one that tries to incorporate liberal principles? Why is such liberal Christian rhetoric more or less absent among Anglican clergy?

The answer, as I see it, is that institutional religion is not very compatible with liberalism, at the end of the day. It is addicted to some degree of authoritarianism, legalism. The Church of England concealed this, for centuries ”“ thanks to its cultural establishment it was a fairly liberal Christian institution. But that era’s over. It now follows the logic of Roman Catholicism ”“ liberalism is a threat to unity.

Read it all.

IN THE end it held together, but only just. The 650-odd bishops who attended the once-a-decade Lambeth conference went home with open schism between the liberal and conservative wings of the worldwide Anglican Communion averted. A split may prove no more than postponed, as the agreed mechanisms for making minds meet are oh-so-slowly put in place (see article). But at least the unedifying spectacle of comrades in Christ tearing strips off each other over gay sex will vanish from the headlines for a bit.

Does it matter if Anglicans fall out? Most churches are riven by tensions: it is not so long ago that the Roman Catholic Opus Dei glared at liberation theologists, and Moscow’s Orthodox still squabble like mad with Constantinople’s. But Anglicans lack the glue that binds those churches together: the power of the pope to impose discipline on straying Catholics; the body of undisputed theology that unites Orthodox believers even when they quarrel. Anglicanism works through relationships, a sense of belonging to a family with a shared inheritance. That now has waned. Despite the apparent reprieve, this year’s Lambeth conference could well be the last of its kind.

As a secular newspaper that supports gay marriage and believes in a firm line between church and state, we can hardly claim to be a neutral observer in this. Yet trying to look at the Communion from an Anglican perspective (or that of most of them), two things stand out. First, schism might not be a bad thing. And disestablishment would be a very good thing.

Read it all.

The third principle that I am working with is that there will be little further change on the international front and little prospect for pulling back together the various shards of the Communion while Rowan Williams still occupies the see of Canterbury. Please note carefully that I’m not blaming him for this conference or for other failures of the Communion as a whole — I don’t really believe that the blame lies on merely one person.

Nor do I necessarily know that a new occupant of the see of Canterbury would be able to pull the shards back together again.

Nor do I believe that the see of Canterbury is “irrelevant” or “unimportant.”

I merely say, as a statement of belief, that while Rowan Williams is the Archbishop of Canterbury, the Communion will essentially be in a “holding pattern” of increasing fragmentation and distancing among various groups. The trust that has been lost and continues to be lost prevents renewed closeness and connection as a whole within the Anglican Communion. It is sad, and I don’t like it. But it is what it is, and we need to understand and accept that as reality and work within that reality, or move on and join another denomination. That applies, actually, to those Primates and bishops of the Anglican Communion as well who are associated with GAFCON.

The fact is that no action has occurred that will cause the Anglican Communion to step back from the brink of fragmentation. There have been words — but no action as of yet — and I see nothing that causes me to believe that this time Rowan Williams will do the hard things necessary to call the Anglican Communion back.

The thing to do is to make the best of how things are now and work within how things are now, doing the small things well within our parishes and dioceses, while waiting for a turn of the tide and winds on the international front, if that turn is to come. If that turn never comes, then the Anglican Communion will continue to whirl apart — the center not only did not hold but it will continue not to hold. And thus, the Anglican Communion will continue to further fragment until all but the bare bones of the structure remain.

Of course, if that is to happen, we certainly will not have been hindered or damaged by doing the small things with great love and attentiveness. It will simply be done while in the midst of living out the consequences of the lack of discipline within the Anglican Communion.

Read it all.

BY ITS own unusual lights, the Lambeth conference of Anglican bishops was a great success. Its self-imposed task was to avoid any nasty rows between 650 purple-clad gentlemen (and a few purple-clad ladies) who hold widely diverging views on issues which they see as matters of principle, not detail. And a “surprising level of sheer willingness to stay together” was finally reported, on August 3rd, by Rowan Williams, the Archbishop of Canterbury””after nearly three weeks of well-choreographed confraternity in which participants took no votes and made no firm decisions. (Such a luxury would hardly be possible for a body like, say, the International Telecommunication Union, where success is judged by earthly yardsticks.)

Still, the Anglican leader’s own standing as a mediator, doing his best to hold together the almost irreconcilable, rose as a result of the gathering. And in a very Anglican way, the thorny issues facing the church were artfully concealed by euphemism and arcane procedures that will unfold over several years. Minds were distracted from trickier subjects by a hyper-inclusive march against poverty.

Read it all.

2. The call from the Archbishop of Canterbury for a Primates Meeting in 2009. This will determine where the wider communion is and how broadly support for the Instruments remains. We hope all Primates will be present and that the work of the Communion will continue in these challenging days. If there is to be a Faith and Order committee of some description, as suggested, the input of the Primates into this important initiative is critical.
3. The endorsement from the Archbishop of Canterbury of the Covenant Process, Lambeth 1.10, Communion Partners, and a Pastoral Forum. In several public statements he clarified considerably his own view on the teaching of the church in the area of human sexuality, and was clearer about the consequence of pressing forward with departures from that teaching. In our view, this indicates a realism about the probability of Bishops and Dioceses moving forward with same-sex blessings in a more concerted manner. Already we are seeing news reports to that effect.
4. We welcome the call for moratoria and the timing of these, as this places the matter firmly before the Communion as a totality.

Read it all.

There is a very troubling spread in the Times today (see the inside piece here)concerning some letters exchanged between ABC Rowan Williams and a Dr. Pitt. This is a tactical move to say the least by some who really seem to not understand the nature of the Church. It’s not the ‘old news’ of the ABC’s views of late that is troubling (not sure what the motive for putting this out now is all about) but the views of the press and the culture that demands the Church to get into line with something completely contrary to its own worldview. We find such comments by some who comment here such as John Realis when he writes,

Newspaper article after newspaper article upbraids C of E Anglicanism for not being liberal enough, for not being more in line with the positive values of British society, among which rejection of grievous past discrimination against homosexuals and joyful acceptance of civil partnerships – otherwise known as marriages – are the most exemplary – and by no means confined to ‘the chattering classes’. Try to get a grip on reality – not self-seeking fantasy.

This only goes to show how much this secularised culture is in the dark about the ways of faithful Catholic Christianity that is counter-cultural to such false ideologies and philosophies that shape a distorted secularised worldview.

Read it all.

As the world has become more global so has the Church. It often does not do us well to try to have relationship in this instantaneous communicative world we live in. One can nary have a fleeting thought before it is posted on the World Wide Web, and this does not help our conversations. I am sure the web is humming already. What we had this last three weeks is real conversation, the face-to-face kind, where memos and e-mails cannot hide the incarnated being right before your eyes. There is no delete button or hiding behind the computer screen here. And there is nothing that can substitute for the experience of the primitive ancient church practice and reality of gathering around the Scripture in a small group, under a tree or around a table.

That is not to say that all the conversations during this time have been chummy, as they might say here in England. No; they were direct, even strident at times, but at least we were in the room together. We had to deal with each other. And on this last day, as we shared our hopes and dreams before we left, especially with those in our Indaba and Bible study groups, we realized we had put ourselves in the hand of God, and with Jesus as our guide, the vast majority had been solidified in one thing even if not changed as far as position or theological stripe: we value each other and we value this communion, even more deeply than when we arrived. Tears were shed, smiles were shared, vows were made to pray for one another and to share and talk, even when the rough times come, and we know they will.

I give great credit to the Archbishop of Canterbury in proposing and following through with an agenda and way of being at this conference that was centered on relationships, not legislation. As he said in one of his speeches, “For those of you who are unhappy or wish to criticize this approach, let me ask you: Have the old ways really been all that effective?” He has a very good point. I know many of you are divided as to trusting him or not. I can only tell you he is human, too; he has his strong desires and he is in a most difficult place. In all Christian charity, for now, I intend to trust the current process and work with our Presiding Bishop and our House of Bishops in working with the communion.

Read it all.

A month ago, the world’s Anglican bishops flew off to London, hoping to do something to keep the world’s third largest Christian family from falling apart over the ordination of an openly gay bishop in New Hampshire.

But as the bishops return to their dioceses around the world, the plight of the Episcopal Church, and its parent Anglican Communion, remains as muddled as ever. With conservatives contending that the denomination is moving toward schism and liberals arguing that the denomination is stabilizing, the path forward is unclear.

Bishop M. Thomas Shaw, head of the Episcopal Diocese of Massachusetts, said in an interview upon his return from London that he will continue to ordain gay clergy, which he called “pastorally important.”

He also said that local priests will continue to bless same-sex marriages, although Shaw said that those priests are doing so on their own and that “I haven’t authorized anybody to do anything.”

As for whether he would follow up on his earlier intention to push for ending the moratorium on gay bishops and allowing church recognition of same-sex marriage when the Episcopal Church meets at its General Convention next year, Shaw said he would now wait until he meets with all the American bishops next month to decide how he will proceed.

Read it all.

Asked about Orombi’s statements, Nzimbi told Ecumenical News International, “I don’t want to comment on that but what I know is the Anglican Communion surrounds the see of Canterbury, and the Canterbury see is respected by all of us, and we would like the Anglican Communion to continue.”

He said, “The archbishop of Canterbury should continue calling [the] Lambeth [Conference] but let us go back to what it used to be.” This was understood to mean that there should be a common understanding that homosexuality is sinful and homosexuals should not be in positions of leadership in the worldwide Anglican Communion.

Nzimbi said Anglican leaders who took part in a gathering in June in Jerusalem of the Global Anglican Future Conference, or GAFCON as it is known, will meet shortly to map a way forward after the Lambeth Conference. GAFCON is widely seen as having been an “alternative” Lambeth Conference that brought together opponents of openly gay bishops and same-sex blessings.

The Kenyan archbishop took issue with remarks by Robinson, according to whom leaders such as Nzimbi are calling for the exclusion from the Anglican Communion of those churches that support the greater inclusion of gay and lesbian people.

Nzimbi said the current problem within the Anglican Communion was not based on who should stay or go, but on compliance to the word of God.

“When you obey the Scriptures you repent of your sins. What is … bringing problems is the interpretation of the Scriptures,” he said. “If we all obey the Scriptures, and what they tell us, I know that inner oneness will make us have the outer form of the Anglican Communion that which we want.”

Read it all

There seems little chance that all Canadian Anglican clergy will honor the moratorium on blessing same-sex unions requested by the worldwide Anglican communion.

Archbishop of Canterbury Rowan Williams, leader of the global Anglican church, warned on Sunday that the 80-million-member church would be “in grave peril” if the U.S. and Canadian branches did not agree to moratoriums on same-sex blessings and on the ordination of gay bishops.

But the head of the Canadian church, Archbishop Fred Hiltz, told Reuters in a phone interview on Wednesday it would be especially tough for Bishop Michael Ingham of the British Columbia diocese of New Westminster to halt the homosexual blessings altogether.

Read the whole article.

The document that came out of the Lambeth Conference, the final draft of which we saw at the last plenary session yesterday, is a distillation of the Indaba Group conversations that have gone on over the length of the conference. All of us were assigned to Bible study groups that met each morning. Five Bible study groups constituted an Indaba Group, which met after the individual study groups.

What has emerged from the extended time in the Bible study and Indaba Groups is relationship. Bishops spoke honestly and deeply. We found places of profound commonality, and we named honestly pain in division that was not erased.

One Sudanese bishop said this, “After 22 years of suffering (civil war) we have learned not to run away based on what we hear, but to come and see, and then decide rather we need to run away. We are not leaving these friendships.”

There was much talk about “What I need to take back to my diocese.” People asked me that quite a lot. Was it moratoria on blessings, on incursions? Was it commitment to the relief of global suffering through the Millennium Development Goals process? An Anglican Covenant?

For me it is the relationships. Unlike most of the other products, the usefulness of the relationships formed at the Lambeth Conference will lie in the extension of the relationships into our diocese, and beyond. As I wrote in an earlier posting, part of the way bishops must now fulfill their ministry of unity is by actively extending the relationships they have to others, and even understanding that these relationships need to develop apart from the bishops themselves. I am coming home to the beautiful Diocese of California knowing that there are great opportunities for becoming a global body that contributes to the healing of the world, and that people in the Bay Area are eager to be part of this. The same Sudanese bishop who spoke so movingly of his province’s brave journey to Lambeth (when significant neighbor provinces stayed away based on what they had “heard”) has asked me whether people in California could help his people with the HIV/AIDS pandemic in Sudan. Who better than we?

As to the other ”˜products’ I mentioned above: the document we produced has real significance as it reflects the searching, prayerful conversations over a two week period of over 600 Anglican bishops. The points of substantial agreement are thus worth our attention. In California we will be seeking ways to utilize the indaba process to consider the contents of the document, absorb and extend its learnings, and contribute back to the whole.

At the same time, the document is not legislation. We will pay close attention to it, but we must not reify the agreement points in it into laws, and we should resist interpretations that seek to employ those agreements as laws.

Read it all.

Two aspects that formed a continuing thread through the Conference were those of mission and support for the Millennium Development Goals. This is what the Anglican Communion does in its day to day life in the wider world. The march down Whitehall past Parliament to Lambeth Palace was deeply impressive. As one policeman said to Sheila and me, it is rare to have a demonstration in favour of something. The significance of the Millennium Development Goals was reinforced at many points in the Conference, and when the Bishops gathered in front of Lambeth Palace, we were addressed by the Prime Minister. It was a remarkable speech, in which he demonstrated his deep concern and great knowledge of these issues; it was greatly appreciated by the Bishops.

As the Conference proceeded, it was impossible not to be aware that we had the privilege of being present at a very significant occasion ”” an occasion at which it can truly be said that the Holy Spirit had led the Church through and around its difficulties into a new place.

Many expected that the Anglican Communion would not survive the Conference, but it was clear that the vast majority were determined that we should stay together within the Communion, and behind the Archbishop’s leadership. Whilst there was no expectation that all the problems would be solved, there was a confidence that a new way of being the Church was emerging, based on a willingness to listen and participate in the struggle to grapple with these issues. This made the absences all the more painful.

Ten years ago, the Conference concluded with three days in which the Resolutions developed by the various Sections were debated in a plenary session and voted on. Hurriedly written and densely worded Resolutions were passed by an assembly of people, many of whom could not have been aware of the implications of the actions, and were unable to follow the proceedings or take part in them. A moment lodged in my memory, is the occasion when a Sudanese Bishop tried to speak about violence and warfare (his wife had been killed a month beforehand), but was prevented from doing so because he had not put his name down to speak two days beforehand. It was the Archbishop’s determination that the end of this Conference should be different that shaped its structure.

The Anglican Covenant, has been developed since the Windsor Report of 2004, and has been refined at various subsequent meetings. This document was examined by the Bishops, they did not vote on it, and the process of refining the Covenant goes on (possibly for some years). It was surprising that there was such broad support for so much of the Covenant, and it is now referred to the Anglican Consultative Council in September, and will be seen by the Provinces and Dioceses after that – so that we will see it in due course.

Read it all.

Robinson’s presence outside the Canterbury meeting didn’t lead to violence. Inside the tent, Williams didn’t challenge the 650 church leaders to vote on any resolutions involving homosexuality, averting a meltdown – for now – but also forestalling a true attempt to wrestle with a problem that seems nearly unsolvable:

Will the liberals acquiesce to Williams’s urging that they reject gay clergy? What if they don’t? Can Anglican leaders persuade the conservatives to stick around? What if they can’t? Will Robinson continue to be treated as a second-class bishop?

Among the Anglicans interviewed by reporters outside the Lambeth conference in recent days were several who expressed frustration with the focus on Robinson and the issue of homosexuality. They said they wished their church leaders could simply settle it once and for all and move on to issues of war and global poverty and environmental degradation.

Chances are, Archbishop Williams would second that sentiment. But the Lambeth Conference brought Anglicans no closer to that day.

Read it all.

The communion’s strength has always been its capacity to fudge difference in the interest of cohesion; to place human relationship before rigidity.

This does not mean Anglicanism is out of the woods on human sexuality issues. The risk of schism remains.

But what it succeeded in doing at Lambeth was to secure more – and very necessary – time. It also allowed those present to gain a deeper understanding of where others are coming from on same-sex issues.

The scale of the differences between liberal and conservative elements within the communion is demonstrated by the fact that approximately a quarter of the communion’s bishops were absent from the conference – in protest at the handling of these same-sex issues by Dr Williams and others.

Read it all.

The final day of the conference and we all anxiously look forward to heading home. One last Bible study. We will miss our time together and appreciate the new friendships. The Archbishop concludes the afternoon with his third address. Though not all are pleased, we manage to survive without any resolutions. Thanks to the hard work of a small but industrious group of listeners and writers, including the leadership of your very own bishop, Neil Alexander, we are given a set of reflections which sums up the conversations of the past three weeks. I think we have had a break through, a serious time together without winners and losers, only brothers and sisters in Christ. In his closing sermon at the Cathedral, the Archbishop challenged us to take our reflections home and put some flesh on them as in “The Word became flesh.” He called us to make this a living document; to continue to work with the same collegiality that marked this conference. Pray God will give us the will and the ability to carry that out.

Read it all.

On the one hand, most of the bishops’ time was taken up with discussion in what were called “Indaba” discussion groups of about 40 bishops each in which the focus was listening and mutual understanding. “It was a great success,” he said.

But there were also presentations made by the Windsor Continuation Group, a committee of three Primates, two other bishops, and a retired Dean, which the Archbishop of Canterbury set up and charged with finding a “way forward” for the Communion based on the 2004 Windsor Report.

Bishop Ingham said he felt the Windsor Continuation Group demonstrated “rigidity and a lack of wisdom.”

“The primary mindset of the Windsor Group is conformity or exclusion. As yet they display no capacity for creating space, only for taking it away.”

Read it all.

The Archbishop of the West Indies, Drexel Gomez, is chairman of the committee working on the covenant.

He claims that although the bishops in Canterbury did not want to adopt a Roman Catholic-style hierarchy, they did now accept the need for some mechanism to hold the Communion together.

“I’ve spoken to several bishops who were opposed to it, and who are now willing to give it a try”, he said.

In the past the centre ground of Anglicanism has seemed paralysed, unable to act decisively for fear of losing the liberal Americans and their allies altogether.

But the aim of the new strategy appears to be to isolate the radical liberal and conservative wings of Anglicanism, and create a new, more organised and directed, Communion with or without them.

The Rev Dr Graham Kings, of the moderate evangelical group Fulcrum, said the strategy was one of “intensification”.

The new Communion would be more active, have a corporate presence around the world, more high-level meetings, and possibly regional representatives among the archbishops.

Read it all.

At Lambeth, TEC’s bishops were (whether deliberately, or negligently—it makes no difference) giving out wrong information about the lawsuits they are involved in with their own parishes. The Bishop of Lichfield, the Rt. Rev. Jonathan Gledhill, in the Province of Canterbury, reports on his Weblog about the meeting of his indaba group on August 2 (Day 18 of the Lambeth Conference):

In the discussion afterwards we are told that the US House of Bishops has regretted for the hurt it has caused and its lack of consultation and has issued a public apology – though no one has the exact wording. We are also told that the Canadians have voted against same-sex blessings – though two dioceses are pressing their bishops to change that. We are told that in the lawsuits in America between parishes and their dioceses it is the dioceses who are the defendants and the conservative parishes who are the accusers.

Since it is well known to many individual Episcopalians who have been involved in the many lawsuits instigated and still pending at all levels here that the statement I have put into boldface type above is simply not the case, it did not take long for a blog reader familiar with the details in Virginia to inform the good Bishop of the facts on the ground there. The Rev. Canon Kendall Harmon put the information up on his site at TitusOneNine, and it elicited this comment from a reader:

In the interest of being scrupulously fair: this just refers to the Virginia situation, is it possible there are other parishes/dioceses where the reasserters are suing?

Well, let us be scrupulously fair, and see just what the facts are. The Episcopal Church and/or one of its Dioceses played the role of plaintiff—the party who initiates a case in court, by filing a complaint—in bringing the pending or former lawsuits I have listed below over Church property and assets in the courts of the United States. This list makes no claim to be complete; it comprises just the ones I have read about (I have listed them alphabetically by State, and not chronologically):

Read it all and, yes, do take the time to look up the references.

But we did listen to each other, and we learned from each other. What I’m beginning to call internet inspired stereotypes, have been, in some cases, challenged, and maybe even in a few, overcome. We who are Bishops in the Episcopal Church, I think, sought to faithfully tell the stories of the people we are blessed to serve among. I remain passionately committed to our being a church that is, as our Lord Jesus Christ said, quoting the ancient prophets, “a house of prayer for all people.”

After attending this Lambeth Conference, I am more convinced than ever of the wisdom of the words of then Archbishop Robin Eames, who said that the Windsor Report was the beginning of a process intended to seek genuine healing and reconciliation among us as the Anglican Family of Jesus. In the weeks to come Bishop Gregg, and I will share our experiences with Bishop Marble,who attended the 1998 Lambeth Conference. The three of us look forward to further dialogue with bishops from across the Communion and many other lay and clergy voices, as we all consider how this conference fits into the great scheme of things. The September issue of the Disciple will share some of our more in depth reflections. Our website (www.episdionc.org) contains links to accurate sources of information.

Read it all.

I write this note as I am preparing to return home from the Lambeth Conference. This experience has been one of the most exhaustingly wonderful experiences of my life. It will take days and weeks to fully emotionally unpack and intellectually process all I have seen and heard during these days. You can be sure you will be hearing more from me about them in the months ahead. Let me begin by sharing some initial observations.

There has been released a 43-page document entitled, “Lambeth Indaba: Capturing Conversations and Reflections from the Lambeth Conference 2008.” The Indaba groups of 40 bishops were designed for “purposeful conversation.” http://www.lambethconference.org/reflections/document.cfm
At the outset the Archbishop of Canterbury had made it known, unlike Lambeth Conferences in the past, which no resolutions would be debated or definitive decisions made. Rather, this was to be a time of sharing where each participant’s voice could be heard.

Each Indaba sent a “Listener” and “Reporter” to share insights from each of the sixteen groups. The Listeners then committed to writing what they heard. A word of caution: this is not an “official” document, but rather a report of our conversations. In my opinion, some parts are well written and thought out. Others, however, read more like minutes of a brainstorming session.

Read it all.

As the Lambeth Conference ends, it remains clear a wide range of opinions exists on its impact, as well as where the Anglican Communion is headed, or where it should be headed.
The Lambeth Conference, held once every 10 years, is a gathering of the leaders of the Anglican Communion for the sake of unity and learning. Over 200 bishops frustrated with deviations from biblical teachings boycotted the conference this year.

The Rev. Edward L. Rix, rector of All Saint’s Church in Wynnewood, said he did not see any substantial conversation occur from Lambeth with the absence of so many significant voices from Africa.
“I don’t think there are substantial discussions going on about homosexuality or authority,” he said. “What is hoped is that some kind of covenant can be created. The problem is that all the instruments of accountability are without teeth. Most of us see it as not having a strong enough footing.”

Read it all.

A 44-page document meant to reflect the experience of the bishops who participated in the 2008 Lambeth Conference is filled with many details from the many conversations that took place during the 18-day gathering in Canterbury — and many important statements about what was discussed.

Yet it admittedly cannot replicate the experience which it describes.

Perth Archbishop Roger Herft, who chaired the document’s writing committee, wrote in the introduction that the end result is a narrative of “our lived experience and the open and honest discussions we have had together.”

Read it all.

Read it all.

With permission–KSH.

At the Lambeth Conference the bishops, but not the journalists had access to an intranet site (a local area network created by the Lambeth Conference) which included a great deal of additional information about the Lambeth Conference. One of the items available on the intranet site was a directory of all the bishops who had registered, but not necessarily paid or showed up.

On the last day Steve Waring working for The Living Church and George Conger working for The Church of England newspaper asked a bishop to access the site and write down a list of all the Anglican bishops on the pre-registration list as well as the name of their province and diocese. That information was then passed along to us at which point the number was then tallied. That is how we arrived at the figure of 617. There were a number of ecumenical bishops present and they were encouraged to be part of the Bible study and indaba discussion groups as full conference participants. The inclusion of all the ecumenical bishops in the attendance figure is how the Lambeth Conference organizers were able to provide a registration number of 670 to the media. The conference organizers repeatedly rebuffed requests for a complete list of bishops present and every time the request was made a different reason was given for why it would not be made public. None of those reasons was really plausible and this aroused our suspicions that there was more to the story than they were telling us.

George Conger has a complete list of everyone who pre-registered and I believe he will be compiling that list and I believe that the Church of England newspaper will be publishing it at a future date. George left the U.K. to return to the U.S. yesterday and when I spoke to him as he was on his way to the airport, he told me that it was his intention to do so, but of course he is free to change his mind. I rather doubt he will, so I think those interested in that information ought to expect it to become public within the next few days. Please be patient and please be charitable with comments and speculation in the meantime and also after it is published.

It is important to note that not every bishop who pre-registered actually showed up. One example is the Bishop from a diocese in the Church of Nigeria. He FAX’d a memo from U.K. on the Saturday before the Lambeth Conference began indicating his intention to attend. However he never showed up. We heard rumors that there were other bishops who didn’t show up either, so the actual number of Anglican bishops who participated in the 2008 Lambeth Conference is probably slightly lower than the number that pre-registered. Keep checking the Church of England website (which also include Religious Intelligence) for more information. This information may also be available through The Living Church as well, but George has all the hard data.

Needless to say the fact that apparently more than 30 percent of the bishops who were invited chose not to attend is information that the conference organizers did not want revealed, especially during the conference itself as it would have caused a number of the bishops themselves to ask hard questions. The bishops also probably would have been less inclined to abide by the strict and frequently repeated warnings they received not to discuss the conference mechanics with the media during the conference. Bishop Keith Ackerman of Quincy was one of the few bishops courageous enough to speak to the media and entertain questions the conference organizers did not want made public. It is important to note that neither George nor I will ever reveal the identity of the courageous bishop who was willing to provide us with this important information, but I will say that Bishop Ackerman was in no way involved in that project and neither George nor I had anything to do with the setting up of Bishop Ackerman’s informal media briefings.

There were many important things that were accomplished at the conference and while the fact that only about 68 percent of all bishops invited appear to have showed up is very significant, it is not the whole story of the conference and I would ask readers and bloggers not to jump to premature conclusions about those facts. Undoubtedly in days, months and years ahead we will begin to get a better perspective on the historical significance of the 2008 Lambeth Conference.

I would like to remind everyone one more time that pointed personal attacks and uncharitable comments shed little light and reveal far more about the person making the comments than they do about the character of the conference organizers, importance of what the conference produced or what is likely to happen to the Anglican Communion in the future. Rather than being the cause for caustic sarcasm and vicious personal attacks this information ought to drive every Christian to their knees in prayer. The body of the third largest branch of Christianity is suffering – every part of it – whether you happen to identify with it, are in communion with it or not. In the name of Christ, I ask all Christians please to think carefully and prayerfully before posting funny songs, analogies to the Titanic (and other famous historical disasters) as well as unrelentingly negative criticism. I assure you that while such things will undoubtedly get a brief laugh they won’t change anything in the long run. This is a time for speaking the truth in love. I was here and I can tell you that there were important things accomplished and it was not a complete failure/disaster/joke or mistake.

May the Risen Christ have mercy on us all,
Steve Waring, news editor
The Living Church magazine