The Archbishop of Canterbury, the Most Rev. Justin Welby, is travelling to Cairo to meet with the primates of the Global South and GAFCON movements. In a roundtable discussion organized by the Council on Foreign Relations held in Washington on 13 Oct 2015, Archbishop Welby stated he would be flying Cairo to join a meeting of the conservative and center-right primates of the Anglican Communion.
Archbishops from Asia, Africa, North and South America are meeting this week at All Saints Cathedral, Cairo, to discuss a common response to Archbishop Welby’s invitation to attend a primates’ gathering in January in Canterbury. Sources tell Anglican Ink that no decision has yet been reached, but the working understanding among the group is that they will act as a bloc.
The outcome of this meeting in Cairo may be more significant than anything that happens at Lambeth in January (and may well determine if the January meeting even happens).
With the cancellation of the South to South conference in Tunisia due to terror threats, this meeting takes on great significance. While initially billed as a meeting of Gafcon primates, it is clear that it includes a number of others from the Global South (and I wonder if not at least the whole of the GS Steering Committee).
No idea what it is that the ABoC intends to accomplish, but he does deserve credit for changing his own schedule to accommodate a quick trip to Cairo, as he recognizes that this conference is much more important than whatever luncheons he had scheduled (unlike his predecessor, who’s appointment diary had a scriptural importance to the Lambeth staff).
Just to be clear, when I said above that the meeting was originally billed as a Gafcon meeting, I meant by the press, not the participants.
Obviously it includes non-Gafcon GS bishops, since +Mouneer, the convener, is among that group. He has asked for prayer, for the Tunis meeting and now for this one. The intention is that these bishops will act as a united group. May God lead their deliberations.