q Gene Robinson was not invited but his consecrators were. Why? I faced that question squarely. Some of his consecrators have expressed sorrow and asked for forgiveness; some have retired. The American church through their house of Bishops asked for forgiveness and I sent their letter to each Primate. Just over 50% felt it was an adequate response, as did the Joint Standing Committee. So, they were invited.

q Follow up question: CAPA bishops said they would not come if the consecrators were invited and their voices represent the majority of Anglicans in the Communion. How did you make that decision? I told each of them that their voice matters and we need to hear from them. I can’t invite the bishops of 70 million and not invite the bishops of 2 million. We don’t have that kind of parity or power politics in the Communion. Every voice counts.

Read it all.

Check it out.

Lambeth resolutions have acquired an influence at times “so close to authority as hardly to be distinguishable from it,” according to Cambridge University historian Owen Chadwick in his introduction to Resolutions of the Twelve Lambeth Conferences.

We come now in our survey to the last of the Sunday bulletin inserts prepared by Episcopal Life from a longer series (Part IV of which is here, with links to the earlier parts) by the Reverend Christopher Webber which appeared on the former Episcopal Majority Website. In many ways, as we shall see, it is the worst of the lot….

The anonymous reductor(s) have let the prescribed Episcopal Life agenda completely dominate the historical reality of what happened at the 1988 and 1998 Lambeth Conferences. In short, what Episcopal Life is offering churchgoers is not history, but undisguised propaganda.

Read it all.

Is there an argument for weakening the authority of Canterbury over Anglican churches in other countries? Theologian Theo Hobson and the Right Reverend Nick Baines, the Bishop of Croydon, discuss the importance of international relations within the Church.

Go here and head down to the segment for 08 40.

Indaba is a method of engagement, said Archbishop of Cape Town Thabo Makgoba, primate of the Anglican Church of Southern Africa, who added that it “comes from where I was born” in Makgoa Kloof in South Africa. Indaba is used by the village chief when he or she perceives a problem in the community and calls the villagers together to seek a solution.

“What needs to happen is not to rush to quick solutions. We need to come together to define what is this that is effecting the village,” he said. “We have borrowed that methodology and process for the Lambeth Conference.”

Makgoba said that the entire conference is an exercise in indaba. “The Bible studies, the walk from your room to the Bible studies, the fellowship when you have meals together — it’s part and parcel of the dialogue and the conversation of wanting to seek who we are and what is God calling us to be at this time,” he said.

He used the example of Jesus’ encounter with the woman at the well during which a conversation that began as a superficial discussion about drinking water became something more profound. “That is our hope that indaba holds for us,” he said.

The Rev. Ian Douglas, a member of the Lambeth Design Group, told the briefing that the aim of the conference is to equip bishops to be better leaders in God’s mission in the world. During this first week of the conference the bishops will to consider Anglican identity, the role of bishops in evangelism and social justice, ecumenical relations, abuse of power, and issues of sustaining the world in which God carries out God’s mission. The second week is meant to “come within the household of the Anglican Communion and deal with more inter-Anglican issues” such as biblical authority, human sexuality, the proposed Anglican covenant and the continuing processes of the Windsor Report.

Read it all.

“I hope they will repent one day,” he said, likening it to a patient seeking the doctor’s help.

Kolini said this while addressing over 200 members of the Anglican Church from Uganda, the Democratic Republic of Congo (DRC) and Rwanda who had come to celebrate the end of 40 days of Purpose Driven life at Presbyterian Church in Kiyovu, Kigali on Thursday.

He further explained that their refusal to attend the conference was a joint resolution of Anglican leaders from Nigeria, Rwanda, Uganda, Kenya and other countries from South America, reached at the Global Anglican Future Conference held in Jerusalem, Israel earlier.

He repeated the early criticisms of the boycotting members against Canterbury for not taking immediate action against gay supporters.

“God can’t accept this because it’s against the Bible. The norms of the Bible have been breached and therefore as a Church of God we can’t allow this,” he said.

He told churches in the region to adhere to the original doctrines of the Bible.

He cited Mathew 28: 19- 20 and said: “Go then to all peoples everywhere and make them my disciples: Baptize them in the name of the Father, the Son, and the Holy Spirit, and teach them to obey everything I have commanded you. And I will be with you always, to the end of the age.”

Read it all.

The TEC memo is in fact proposing a post modern, de-centered church joined not by mutual recognition of belief and practice but by allegiance to a common mission. So the second core message of the memo is “When Anglicans work together through the power of the Holy Spirit, we change the world.” What the memo means by this statement is made clear at several points. In Supporting Idea Three of the first core message we are told, “the reconciling work of Christ is at the heart of our common life.” This statement is absolutely true. However, the supporting point that follows immediately on indicates that reconciliation is adequately described by “justice, love, mercy, the healing of creation, and the end of poverty.” It would appear that Paul’s statement that “in Christ God was reconciling the world to himself” can be adequately rendered by the millennium goals. The memo renders reconciliation in entirely moral terms. The central issue before us is our reconciliation with God from whom we are estranged. This point is utterly missing from the memo’s account of what Anglicans do when they “work together.” Failure to address this point indicates that TEC’s leadership has failed to grasp the primary worry its critics from around the communion have. To be sure, they are offended by the consecration of Gene Robinson and by the increasingly common practice of blessing sexual unions between persons of the same gender. More fundamental, however, is a concern that TEC’s gospel message is not in the first instance one about the saving power of Christ’s death and resurrection but about a moral responsibility for the ills of the world. Their concern is that in TEC’s rendition of the gospel, the tail is wagging the dog and not the dog the tail.

The previous point is crucial to an adequate evaluation both of TEC’s goals at the present gathering of our bishops in Canterbury and the theology that lies at the base of these goals. The memo contends in the last supporting idea it offers, “the church has focused on its mission rather than its disagreements in order to remain faithful.” The implication is that the mission of the church has nothing to do with the matters that now so divide the Communion””that we can do mission while in fundamental disagreement about the content of the Christian gospel. Nothing could be further from the truth! To equate the Christian gospel with the moral agenda of peace and justice is as false as it is to say that the Christian gospel has nothing to do with peace and justice. It is precisely the nature of the church’s mission that lies at the heart of our present distress. To call for the communion to join in common mission and yet pass over divergent views of the gospel is in fact incoherent.

Those of us who look to our bishops to speak truthfully about our real circumstances can only hope and pray that the incoherence of what TEC is proposing will be pointed out in no uncertain terms….

Read it all.

Frankly the significant experiences for such a recently consecrated bishop as I come so fast and feverishly it is hard to keep up with it all””but between my bishop’s journal where I record daily events, and my personal journal reserved for deeper matters of the soul I’ll revisit much of this latter. I’ve met so many possible links that may provide missional relationships for the Diocese of South Carolina that my mind is running along lines of mission, strategy, and theological alignments that I belief will be mutually beneficial to our diocese and parishes and for dioceses in every direction out from South Carolina””Ireland, England, New Zealand, India, North Africa, Southeast Asia, South America, West Africa, East Africa, et al. Some of these bishops bear names you may well recognize and others humble godly servants of God who have faced incredible challenges and have kept the faith in the midst of astonishing hardship. It heartens the soul to walk with them from one venue to another, to worship alongside them, study the scriptures with them, or share a meal in the cafeteria with them.

This morning was the 10th Sunday after Pentecost. The bishops in convocation robes processed to the Choir while the spouses of the bishops along with various dignitaries””former Archbishop Carey to name one””filled much of the Cathedral nave. As we came through the Great West Door of the Canterbury Cathedral two by two, Bishop Jack Iker with whom I was paired whispered to me something to the effect””“You won’t enter through these doors very often.” It hardly needed a response from me. I trembled for a moment. Certainly not everything in the service was to my liking””and some of it more than a little disturbing. But I’ve moved beyond that for now. What lingers is the processing, seeing my wife Allison in the congregation as I processed in, going forward to receive the sacrament for resoluteness of will, and the gospel procession with the Melanesian Brothers and Sisters dressed in tribal garb dancing from the High Altar to the Compass Rose carrying the gold Gospel Book in a coracle or little boat. All I could think of was the joy that came to aboriginal people as the gospel set them free from ancient fears and now carrying the Holy Scripture as if they were carrying Jesus as their Chief and King. That is of course what the gospel did for the early Celts, Picts, Anglo-Saxons and even Vikings on these Isles, and a thousand other tribes, tongues and nations elsewhere. The gospel always needs to be inculturated into every society and every society needs to be evangelized and transformed by gospel””including ours.

Read it all.

Herewith the BBC Blurb:

This weekend the talking starts in earnest at the Lambeth Conference, the global meeting of the Anglican church that takes place once every ten years.

This year’s event is being overshadowed by fears of a split in the church – between liberals who support the ordination of openly gay bishops and clergy, and more traditionalist leaders who say that homosexuality is fundamentally a sin.

Ed Butler examines the theological basis for the rift in the Anglican Communion.

.

Among those heard from are Wallace Benn, Gene Robinson, Benjamin Nzimbi, Graham Kings, Colin Coward and Theo Hobson (Gene Robinson is most unhelpfully referred to as from the see city of “Boston” which will come as news to the diocese of New Hampshire).

Listen to it all (about 9 minutes)

But what of those who had the stamina to make it to both events? The Bishop of Wyoming, the Right Rev Bruce Caldwell, compared the two. “Both were wonderful. Both were delightful in different ways. In the cathedral there was amazing architecture and voices of the choirs and singing. And here we have got a simple field and a simple wooden cross. I think Jesus was at both of them.”

There were some niggles from party-goers, however. The Bishop of Pittsburgh, the Right Rev Bob Duncan, said: “It was a glorious service, it was a gathering of the family, but there were troublesome elements ”“ the Buddhist chant, for example, and the sermon had a few challenges. A number of our brothers didn’t make their Communion.”

One Roman Catholic present, who asked not to be named, told The Times: “It was an extraordinary service, enough to make me consider becoming an Anglican.” How many and who they were may never be known as they were all huddled in the venue’s VIP area, screened off from prying eyes.

Read it all.

Anglican leader Rowan Williams has urged bishops to address the deep divisions in the Church at a summit boycotted by a quarter of them over the ordination of gay clergy.

“We must be honest about how deep some of the hurts and difficulties currently are,” the spiritual leader of the world’s 77 million Anglicans said of the Lambeth conference being staged in the English cathedral city of Canterbury.

Read it all.

For years, worshippers at St. Andrew’s Episcopal Church in Livonia patiently put up with their diocese as it adopted a series of liberal changes that clashed with biblical tradition. But the breaking point came in 2003, when the Episcopal Church — with the approval of the local diocese — consecrated an openly gay bishop in New Hampshire.

After a testy meeting with Episcopal leaders, about two-thirds of the 300-member congregation bolted in 2006, leaving a church many of them grew up in. Two years later, they said they have no regrets.

“It just wasn’t a Christian church anymore,” explained Chris Darnell, 41, of Northville.

Those words reflect a schism playing out within the Anglican Communion — the largest Protestant body in the world — as it faces an identity crisis that threatens to split its 77 million members. Four congregations in Michigan have broken away in recent years from the Episcopal Church, the Anglican body in the United States that has 87 churches in Michigan, with about 24,000 members.

Read it all.

The Archbishop of Canterbury will today spell out how he hopes a new set of rules can solve “one of the most severe challenges” in the history of the Anglican church.

In an impassioned opening speech last night to the 600 bishops gathered for the once-a-decade Lambeth Conference, Dr Rowan Williams criticised both conservatives and liberals for their actions in the crisis over sexuality.

He said the “new doctrine” on homosexuality being adopted by progressive churches in America and Canada, who have elected an openly gay bishop and blessed same-sex unions in defiance of guidelines, was causing “pain and perplexity”.

But Dr Williams claimed the reaction by traditionalists, some of whom have defected from their national churches and who are now planning to create a new church-within-a-church, had also created “pressures”.

Read it all.

This year’s conference will hold no formal plenary debates, and will vote on no resolutions. Working with a “design team” that included at least one representative from the American church, the Rev. Ian T. Douglas from the Episcopal Divinity School in Cambridge, Mass., Archbishop Williams devised a format that allotted three days, beginning last week, for the bishops to go into retreat at the cathedral, meeting in small groups to discuss, pray and listen to five sermons by Archbishop Williams. To limit the risks of discord, conference organizers say they have asked the bishops to take “appropriate care” in anything they say to reporters. In the second week, the bishops move into larger sessions to deal directly with the issue of gay and female clerics, in a session titled “Human Sexuality and the Witness of Scripture.”

The arrangements have led to criticism of Archbishop Williams from liberals and conservatives, who say his “stealth” approach to the most sensitive issues will do nothing to resolve them. The criticism has built on a frequent critique of the straggly-bearded Archbishop Williams, 58, as an other-worldly, Oxford-educated theologian who lacks the political skills, and perhaps the power of personality, to force compromise. His supporters say the divide is so wide that he has little choice but to play for time, and hope that Christian values of tolerance and understanding will foster a spirit of compromise.

Dr. Phillip Aspinall, the Anglican primate of Australia, acting as chief spokesman for the conference, offered a weary prognosis after Sunday’s Eucharist of what the talking might achieve. “The last Lambeth Conference didn’t resolve our differences, the one before that didn’t resolve them, and this one won’t, either,” he said. “That’s the journey of life, until the Lord returns, I’m afraid.”

Read it all.

In no way do I want to under estimate the seriousness of the present situation. Indeed the shocked response from those I would call the ”˜real liberals’ reveals just how nasty the atmosphere was in the General Synod. Though the situation is terrible and does not augur well, I do not believe that it is necessarily the end. There are few advantages in being old but one can remember the past. In 1992 the House of Bishops and the General Synod had on many occasions rejected any provision for us and although the atmosphere was not as unpleasant as that in the present Synod to all appearances everything was lost. In spite of that we ultimately ended up with the Act of Synod and 10 years of reasonable dignified life. To me that suggest that everything is not necessarily lost given that the Archbishops and many others are appalled at the Synod’s decision.

It is quite apparent that we are being subjected to what I would call institutional bullying of a kind that if it were found in the commercial world would be the subject of serious litigation. The atmosphere and the approach of some of those opposed to us reveals that not only are they not very good Christians; they are also not nice human beings.

The other thing that strikes me quite hard is that most of the assets of the Church of England in terms of buildings, schools and other property either come from the pre reformation Catholic Church or as a direct result of the Tractarian and Catholic Revival. This property is very much our heritage and inheritance and to suggest that many wish to steal it from us in a very unpleasant form of legalised theft would not be an understatement. I know that many people will be looking at the legal implications lying behind both these matters.

There is a lot of pressure for rapid decisions and quick answers. I have no desire to be part of either. We need to quietly and prayerfully analyse where we are and wait for the situation to unfold. As someone whose temperament has always been to shoot first and ask questions afterwards, I recognise this will not be easy but there is an enormous amount of literature coming from members of General Synod and others which we need to digest.

There will be an emergency meeting of the Forward in Faith Council here in Canterbury on Monday. We will be grateful for your prayers as we meet to take counsel together.

Every Blessing,

–(The Rt. Rev.) John Broadhurst is Bishop of Fulham

In the subsequent speech, the Archbishop of Canterbury called the current dispute “one of the most severe challenges to face the Anglican family.”

But Dr Williams said: “We need to get beyond the reciprocal impatience that shows itself in the ways in which both liberals and traditionalists are ready ”“ almost eager at times, it appears ”“ to assume the other is not actually listening to Jesus.”

The message came as a senior Archbishop confirmed that doubt felt by bishops about the state of the Communion had been removed by a series of “revelatory” closed-door sermons delivered by Dr Williams last week. Bishops “warmed enormously” to Dr Williams’s message of unity, said the Archbishop of Brisbane and Primate of the Anglican Province of Australia, Phillip Aspinall.

Against the odds, Dr Williams has created a strong sense of unity among the bishops at the University of Kent. Walking a tightrope between liberals and conservatives over sexuality and gender, Dr Williams has focused bishops’ minds on the higher meaning of their mission. Archbishop Aspinall said Dr Williams “put it to us that we must go into this conference confident that a way has been found to the Father through the Cross”.

Read it all.

[color=red][b]Updated: July 21, 12:30 UTC (8:30 a.m. EDT)[/b][/color] **This is sticky — New posts are below**

The amount of Lambeth coverage and commentary is pretty overwhelming. Here are some of the links we have found most helpful so far in following and making sense of what’s going on. We’re emphasizing first-hand coverage in these links. Feel free to post additional links in the comments.

The “Lambeth Daily” page at the official Lambeth site
An index of all the daily stories and photos, etc. by ACNS is here
The Episcopal Church’s “Lambeth Journal” blog (daily reports from various TEC bishops)

Anglican Mainstream — providing firsthand coverage by Canon Chris Sugden and others, as well as excerpts of many others’ commentary

The Rev. George Conger’s blog (George writes for the Living Church, the Church of England News, Religious Intelligence, and other publications). Note especially some of George’s fantastic photos of bishops from around the Communion.

The Living Church’s News page

The Rev. Todd and Cherie Wetzel of Anglicans United. Todd & Cherie are providing daily first-hand reports and commentary.

StandFirm will be sending the Rev. Matt Kennedy and Sarah Hey to cover the conference, and of course they’ve got tons of articles and commentaries about Lambeth in the meantime.

The PrayerBook Society’s Lambeth Commentary

Ruth Gledhill’s blog (Ruth is covering Lambeth for the London Times)

The Church Times blog

BabyBlue (who will be reporting live from Lambeth during the final week of the conference)

Lydia Evan’s very cool “Anglican Feedbag” page with many many RSS feeds of Lambeth news from sources all over.

Prayer for Lambeth:
Pray Lambeth (look for the links to the Daily Prayer Bulletins on the lower left hand side of the home page)
Lent & Beyond’s Lambeth prayers

Coverage from Reappraisers:
Thinking Anglicans (provides thorough roundups of the British Press Coverage)
Episcopal Cafe (Lambeth Category) (Jim Naughton is at Lambeth)
Integrity President Susan Russell’s blog
Integrity’s LGBT Lambeth Portal

Keith Ackerman, bishop of Quincy, Illinois, came because, as he put it: “An empty chair can’t speak”: he thought it important that the conservative view was represented.

He voiced the unease of many traditionalists when he accused liberals, in effect, of trying to rewrite the Bible.

“Why is it that people are determined to change the faith delivered to the saints?”

The conservatives feel the ground shifting beneath them and they find it deeply unsettling.

“The faithful of yesterday have become the dissidents of today,” in the words of Archbishop Greg Venables.

He was one of the 200 Anglican bishops and primates who met in Jerusalem a few weeks ago and founded what is, in effect, a breakaway organisation – the Fellowship of Confessing Anglicans.

Though he came to Canterbury and participated in the service, he was one of several bishops who did not take communion, arguing that he is no longer in communion with many of his colleagues.

Read it all.

The liberal tone of the sermon, and its insistence on inclusivity and equality, upset some in the pews as did the more multicultural, politically correct aspects of the service.

The Right Rev Bob Duncan, the Bishop of Pittsburgh, could be deposed because he is unhappy with the progressive agenda pursued by the US Episcopal Church. He told the Guardian: “You cannot have unity at any price. The obvious divisions are there. When a family is broken it’s because the family has no boundaries. To have a Buddhist chant at an Anglican sermon does not reflect the God we believe in.”

Despite some dissent, most delegates remained upbeat. The presiding bishop of the US Episcopal Church, Katharine Jefferts-Schori, said it was a “wonderful” sermon.

“It’s what the church is today,” she said. “It is inclusive – even those who don’t agree with the message, it includes them too.”

Read it all.

On the opening night Williams said the 14th Lambeth Conference would not settle the disputes dividing the Anglican Communion, but an effort must be made to keep the conversation going to preserve the integrity of the church.

He hoped the conference would eschew a political solution to the theological divisions within the church and focus on “building relationships.” While this would not settle the disputes of doctrine and discipline “it is certain that without the building of relationships the challenges will never be resolved,” Williams said, according to bishops present at the opening session.

“I don’t have great expectations” for Lambeth, Bishop Robert Duncan of Pittsburgh said. It was important to give voice to the views of evangelicals and Anglo-Catholics marginalized by the dominant liberal wing of the Episcopal Church, and he welcomed the opportunity for “strengthening the bonds of relationship” with bishops from the developing world. However, he was “deeply saddened” that the gap between left and right now seemed unbridgeable.

The pleas for dialogue at this stage rang false, Bishop Venables said. “Although much has been said about talking, it seems to me that on one is listening,” he said. “I’m on the telephone,” but “no one has called me to say ”˜let’s talk’ this over,” Bishop Venables said.

Read it all.

Dear Brothers and Sisters,

The Conference has officially begun…with an absolutely spectacular service in the packed Canterbury Cathedral. No greeting from the government this time. (Ten years ago Prince Charles was with us.)

Former Archbishop George and Eileen Carey were in the front row in the Nave.

Canterbury Cathedral is a rather strange building: very long and (proportionally) narrow. It is divided almost in half by a rood screen that is very solid, with a doorway in the middle of it. It is wide enough that the organ console is actually located on top of it! On the East side of the screen is the choir (“quire”), and on the West side is the nave, and the organist can look down, either way, and see what is happening on both sides of the building. Further to the East of the choir seating area is the High Altar of Canterbury, and then a set of steps going up to the ancient stone throne of St. Augustine (the Seat of the Archbishop of Canterbury), and still further to the East are two more chapels.

At great ceremonial services like today’s the preacher uses a pulpit in the middle of the choir area – which means that s/he cannot be seen by anyone in the Nave! (Another pulpit in the Nave cannot be seen by anyone in the choir!)

The acoustics, however, are excellent. Singing resounds without amplification, and the sound system for reading and speaking from lectern, pulpit and altar is excellent.

The sermon was exactly what you would expect on the weeds and wheat passage from Matthew’s Gospel, so I will not try to recount it.

This afternoon we had our first plenary session, and once again, the Archbishop spoke to us; very differently from the meditations in retreat. He outlined four possible futures for the Communion:

1) that we become a loose federation of churches, sharing a common heritage, but increasingly autonomous.

2) that we become a collection of even less connected national churches, each going its own way.

3) that we develop a strong centralized authority that will dictate uniformity in ethics and practice.

He rejected all of these as being “less than a Communion,” and put his hope in the fourth:

4) that we become a Communion of “counsel and consent,” held together by the bonds of affection and an Anglican Covenant.

There will be at least five opportunities during the next two weeks for us to consider the various sections of the proposed Covenant. These will be in “self select” optional sessions, alongside dozens of other options (everything from “Jews and Christians: Are we still getting it wrong?” to “Never Say ‘No’ to Media” to “Microfinance” to “Ethical Issues of Climate Change” to “The Response of Church Leaders to HIV Stigma and Discrimination” to “Towards Peace in Korea” – and those are just a few of the possibilities from the first two
days!)

It is, as I said earlier, only at the end of the Conference will the Covenant will be discussed in Plenary.

But for me, and for many of us, I think, the several sessions devoted to it over the next two weeks will be extremely important.

My sense is that the Archbishop totally underestimates how myopically focused the American House of Bishops is on “the full inclusion of LGBT persons” as a “Gospel imperative.” This is not just a significant PART of the Gospel for most of our Bishops; this IS the Gospel – it is THE great issue of our time: as abolition and civil rights and women’s rights were in their times.

I don’t think our House is prepared to be limited by counsel, consent, or Covenant.

But, to quote him again, “A failure in leadership is a failure to hope in Christ.”

So, we shall see what emerges in the next two weeks.

He spent a fair amount of time defending a very different approach in this Conference from that of any of its antecedents. In previous Conferences there have been heavy-duty scholarly papers produced and distributed for study beforehand, and the Conferences themselves have produced reports and resolutions- hundreds of them.

He commented wryly, that most of the resolutions have never been enforced. (He cited a request from the very first Lambeth Conference in 1867 that an international court be established to settle disputes of doctrine. We are still waiting.)

So, the next two weeks will consist of Bible Studies every morning in groups of eight (these have already been happening every day), and then the “Indaba” groups which will be composed of five Bible Study groups being joined together (in larger groups of 40), where we will talk about such things as “The Bishop and Anglican Identity,” “The Bishop and Evangelism,” “The Bishop and Social Justice, “The Bishop and…Other Churches…the Environment…Human Sexuality…etc.”

This is billed as “an opportunity for every voice to be heard.” How it will all be drawn together as an expression of the “Mind” of the Conference is quite unclear at this point.

And then, in the evenings, all that multiplicity of options I mentioned above.

So, I think we are at a hinge moment in the life of the Communion. No one knows where we will be two weeks from now, but I’m pretty sure that, like Star
Trek, we are headed to some place “where no one has gone before.” Your prayers continue to be much needed and very much appreciated.

Warmest regards to all of you,

–(The Right Rev.) John W. Howe is Bishop of Central Florida

As we begin our work together, we’re bound to be very much aware of people’s eyes upon us. There are expectations among our own people ”“ both hopes and fears. There are expectations among the representatives of the world’s media ”“ and plenty of stories already which seem to know better than any of us what is going to happen. I saw the headline “Is this the end of the Anglican Communion”. No-one has told us here. And there are our eyes on each other ”“ perhaps not quite sure yet how it’s going to feel, who we’re going to be alongside, whether everything will come out right in the sense that after two weeks we shall be able to say something with real integrity that will move us forward in God’s way.

We know all that; but we need also to know what most matters ”“ that God’s eyes are upon us and that God has entrusted something to us. In the last few days, we have had a chance to hold that firmly in mind as we have shared our time of retreat. We have reminded ourselves that God has entrusted something to each one of us as a bishop, the care of his people and the taking forward of his purpose for humankind through our share in God’s mission. We have been caught up in the infinite consequences of Jesus’ life and death and resurrection. We are part of God’s way of making those consequences real and liberating for all humanity. So all that is said and done in our context here is in some way to do with this fundamental agenda, deepening our commitment to God’s own vision of the world’s future in Christ.

Read it carefully and read it all.

Does it bother anyone else that the participants in the conference have so little sense of what the content of the conference itself is actually going to be? Some of you may remember my doctoral supervisor at Oxford, Geoffrey Rowell, now Bishop of Gibraltar in Europe, saying before the conference how little information he actually had (and he was genuinely surprised). Well, yesterday I spoke to a Bishop at the conference, who, having been there now some days, still is quite unsure and unclear as to what will be taking place when exactly.

Why is so little information available at this late stage to actual Lambeth 2008 conference participants? There are only two possibilities. One is less than good administration, and the other is a deliberate attempt at control. I do not have enough evidence to make a judgment either way, so I will keep an open mind. But neither choice is a good one–KSH.

Check out the resources here for one perspective from Western Canada.

This afternoon was a plenary session in the “big top” (a large blue tent used for plenary sessions). This marked a major shift in the life of the conference, moving from retreat and worship to the consultation for the Lambeth Conference.

In his address, the Archbishop of Canterbury talked about a renewed structure for the Lambeth Conference and the Anglican Communion. He said it was time for revival for the Anglican Communion, and we are handing ourselves over God for this process.

The only way forward is to focus on the mission in Christ, he said, and the only way we can do that is by listening to each other.

When he began his address, he was greeted with a standing ovation that expressed the fact as a result of the meditation and his leadership through the retreat and in the worship this morning, there is a trust and a respect for his spiritual leadership. He has earned the pastoral trust in the community of the bishops.

Read it all.

“It is the Spirit, in fact, who guides the Church in the way of all truth and unifies her in communion and in the works of ministry,” the Holy Father said. “Unfortunately, the temptation to ‘go it alone’ persists.

“Some today portray their local community as somehow separate from the so-called institutional Church, by speaking of the former as flexible and open to the Spirit and the latter as rigid and devoid of the Spirit.”

“Be watchful! Listen,” he urged. “Through the dissonance and division of our world, can you hear the concordant voice of humanity? From the forlorn child in a Darfur camp, or a troubled teenager, or an anxious parent in any suburb, or perhaps even now from the depth of your own heart, there emerges the same human cry for recognition, for belonging, for unity.”

The Pontiff reminded the young pilgrims that it is the Holy Spirit “who satisfies that essential human yearning to be one, to be immersed in communion, to be built up, to be led to truth.”

“This is the Spirit’s role,” he continued, “to bring Christ’s work to fulfillment. Enriched with the Spirit’s gifts, you will have the power to move beyond the piecemeal, the hollow utopia, the fleeting, to offer the consistency and certainty of Christian witness!”

Read it all.

Whether the Anglican Communion’s dialogue partners will have the patience to wait while this journey unfolds is also unclear. In a letter of greetings to the conference, Cardinal Tarcisio Bertone, the Vatican Secretary of State wrote the “ecclesiological questions which form the framework of your deliberations are a reminder that ministry conferred by ordination is bound by the apostolic faith handed down from the beginning and by the ‘regula fidei’ faithfully transmitted, under the guidance of the Holy Spirit, through the ages.”

In a carefully phrased critique of recent theological innovations and ecclesial practices within the Communion, Cardinal Bertone said: “Our different understanding of the divine plan for this ministry in the Church is one of the issues which the Anglican-Roman Catholic International Commission has been addressing for the past 40 years. New issues that have arisen in our relationship pose a further and grave challenge to the hope for full and visible unity that has been the long-standing goal of our joint ecumenical endeavour.”

Alexy, the Patriarch of Moscow and All Russia was blunt. “The topic of Christian morality, linked with that of gender, is high on the agenda of the present Lambeth Conference,” he wrote.

“There is intense debate about these issues among Anglican bishops, clergy and laity. It seems to me that members of the conference have a very serious task: they have to choose between the traditional, biblical norms of morality and tendencies which consider sin and general permissiveness as manifestations of love and tolerance. That is why there is laid on members of the conference such a great, historic responsibility.”

Read it all.

It is a long pdf file, but there is much material of interest.