He said yesterday that the continuing conflict over Bishop Robinson’s ordination and concerning same-sex relationships could seriously weaken all the churches in the communion, not only those in Africa and other parts of the developing world that view the ordination as a violation of the Gospel but those U.S. churches that supported the New Hampshire ordination.
“I know there are some clergy who say they don’t care whether the Anglican Communion stays together or not. But they should care,” he said.
“If the Anglican Communion separates, or if the Lambeth Conference [the once-every-10-year gathering of the world’s Anglican bishops, slated for next year] doesn’t happen or happens with a reduced number of bishops,” he said, there will be “a chasm between the developing world, where Christianity is strong and growing, and us on the Western side. That growing church will be weakened because they will not have access to our strength, and West will be weakened because we will not have the exciting stories of their faith and what God is doing.”
I don’t know what Abp. Carey is saying, frankly. Since our parish left TEC, we’ve been blessed with many visitors from our Rwandan province and have sent many missionaries, visitors and infrastructure investment ($450,000 last year alone) in return. Our ties are close, deep and affectionate. We are supporting the huge revival of Christianity in Africa and reaping an enormous harvest of faithful leadership in return. Our sister diocese and we have a very close, mutually-beneficial relationship that, honestly, would likely not exist if we were still in TEC with our dollars being filtered through the sticky-fingered halls of 815.
If you want to see African Anglicanism up-close and personal, go to an AMiA parish.