In a move that marks a significant split in the established Church, at least three bishops, including the Rt Rev Michael Nazir-Ali, the Bishop of Rochester, will decline an invitation from Dr Rowan Williams, the Archbishop of Canterbury, to attend the Lambeth Conference.
Up to six more bishops are understood to be considering similar action because of Dr Williams’s decision to allow controversial figures to be at the gathering of worldwide Anglican bishops, which meets only once in 10 years.
The boycott will intensify the row over gay clergy, which was reignited when The Sunday Telegraph disclosed last week that two gay priests had exchanged vows in a version of the marriage service.
I hope that level-headed and orthodox US bishops will follow suit and not lend any legitimacy to this conference and to the members of the HOB who brought this crisis on. that American bishops who installed Gene Robinson are invited, while missionary bishops were snubbed, should be a clear indicator to all where Archbishop Williams puts his sympathies.
Oh dear. Inevitable perhaps given the inexplicable way Williams has gone out on a limb.
One of the problems that I have with Rowan Cantuar is that he KNEW he was going out on that limb before he did it, and he knew what the results would be. He was fine as an academic, but as an archbishop…………?
Filling in the blank. Abysmal Failure
Dr. Rowan Williams was selected intentionally to do what he has done – to act for the agendites. He has done that well.
Though he has acted in sympathy the revisionists, his tactics have, in fact, backfired and caused a ‘great awakening’ in global Anglicanism.
(God works redemptively always when His children seek, pray, repent and return to Him… Romans 8:28)
A distinguished well-placed commentor at MCJ has heard rumblings that there will be an announcement sometime soon, before, during or after Lambeth, suggesting Wms. tenure is about over.
Now, wouldn’t that cause some interesting responses, reshifting, and some heavy blogging for a long time?
++Willams cannot be packed off to a Holyhead cottage fast enough. His tenure has been a catastrophe for the AC. Rarely has a man been so unfit for the time and office.
Even if Rowan were to resign now, I suspect it will be too late. His successor would now have an impossible job to bring back on board everyone who has been alienated. Would a successor actually have the ability, let alone the will, to take disciplinary action against the revisionists? I doubt it. Rowan is merely a symptom of the problem now. Thanks be to God for GAFCON.
#5 GA/FL,
[b][i]”Dr. Rowan Williams was selected intentionally to do what he has done…”[/i][/b]
So was KJS!
Why all this concern about +++ Rowan going out on a limb? After all, he is a Druid.
http://news.bbc.co.uk/1/hi/wales/2172918.stm
#9 justice1
Geesh! No wonder we are in the turmoil we are in! This expalins quite a few things for me! I had no idea and I do not remember reading or hearing anything about this for that past 3 years!
Justice1, there is nothing derogatory in his being a Druid. May I suggest you read the article to which you referred? I say this because this because, like ++Rowan, I too am involved in Welsh cultural activities, but here in the States.
#11: Baah!
If this is true then the COE HOB is publicly disunited for the first time since the early 90s. They’ve worked incredibly hard to act collegially (ie to present a unified face to the church) but are now publicly divided on both this issue and the issue of women bishops.
In the first place, I will believe reports of who is, and is not, going to Lambeth when I see the lists of bishops arriving. News reports have been wrong before.
It will also be interesting to see what message bishops from GAFCON who are going to Lambeth will bring with them.
In earlier stages of this rolling Anglican train wreck preliminary speculation has been wildly off the mark. I’m going to wait and see.
The BIG question is will people be brave enough to be bold when the split comes (as most surely it will) I see two possible outcomes
1) The evangelicals break away with much noise over sexuality but neglect to take with them or consider the orthodox in the prayer book and Catholic tradition. They thus overlook womens ordination etc due to their being too wrapped up and motivated by a single issue.
2) The evangelicals are wise enough to take the Anglo-Catholics and prayer book society with tem in order to forge a truly orthodox church on all theologcial matters. It offers a safe haven to a wide number of doctrinal and scriptural Christians and has an authentic claim to be truly Anglican.
Alas I fear that panic, reactionism and (ever the evangelical curse) failure to see God in any group other than themselves…will lead to number 1 and then the church is truly sunk.
Thanks be to God. It would be pointless to attend the charade.
#15, the continued presence of some Anglo-Catholic American bishops is encouraging in that regard, as are the comments I see on conservative blogs indicating that the evangelicals who are departing TEC are a lot less hard-line about ordaining women than those who are staying. I think they understand that an accommodation like the English flying bishops, which sadly the CofE looks like dropping, is the minimum necessary to maintain the movement they’ve created. I hope so.
#11 thanks for your comment Cennydd. I have read the article. I did not say that there was anything derogatory in being a Druid, although this might be an interesting topic of discussion. I was simply making a connection between “going out on a limb” and the general notion that Druids are of a kind of mystical pagan tree hugger, if I may be so tongue and cheek.
I don’t think that ++Rowan’s time as ABC would ever have been able to change the course of events that has brought us to this point. The forces that have brought us to this moment in the church’s history were already in the making before his tenure as ABC began.
At best any action or inaction by him might have put off for a while, the point we have reached in the AC.
Good point Bill C. And I might add that I don’t really think that no matter who the ABofC would have been if it had not been +Rowan would have made any difference to TEC’s blatant disregard for Scripture and TEC would have still moved forward at arrogant speed to push through their gay bishop, priests & deacons. Not too mention SSU’/SSB’s. It still would have happened.
Pete Broadbent is not giving a public statement concerning the reasons, which are complex, behind his decision not to attetnd the Lambeth Conference.
#17- with all the best intentions in the world this is simply not good enough. Either an emerging church is going to be robust, biblical and orthodox- or it is going to carry the cancer of innovation and relativism in with it. To walk out over homosexual priests- but keep women priests would be ludicrous. The same arguuments were used to justify both.
We must surely make a choice- obedience to scripture and tradition
or it says what i want it to say
#22 rugbyplayingpriest,
Well put and said! Re-doing the plan God put in place of roles in the male and female is a very dangerous thing to mess with. Just look where it has gotten us thus far! Bad move and bad idea.
‘scuse me, but if one is a practising druid, then one is involved in a pagan religion and God forbids dividing our worship with other gods. God wants our whole hearts and we cannot be muslim, hindu, druid, wiccan, etc even palmists or sorcerers, white or black majicians and be true Christians.
Anyone involved in these things, even childhood ouija boards and magic writing needs to renounce them and ask God to forgive them.
Same goes for secret societies that involve secret rituals…you know which ones.
RE: “The same arguuments were used to justify both.”
Not by the evangelicals I know who support WO. Which is the problem for those evangelicals ever being in a church that does not allow WO.
So the split would be:
1) evangelicals who quite forcefully believe that scripture supports WO [and many of those are in leadership in the resistance] and that they will do it
2) evangelicals who believe that scripture does not support WO [me for instance] but who utterly reject the Anglo-Catholic reasons for not supporting WO based on their theology
3) Anglo-Catholics
The three groups won’t end up together unless the solution that Katherine mentions above in comment #17 is used that assures separate ordination tracks — and even then, of course, communion won’t be shared in the specific times when a woman is celebrating.
But as I’ve said for years now . . . the real and very important differences between the varying conservative groupings in TEC [and out, now] are far deeper and more significant than WO, and it is on those that the division will occur should that happen.
GA/FL,
#24 Preach it! I’m right there with ya! My question is why does one feel the need to belong to something other than God and His Church? Why do you need to be a part of something that is contrary to God’s design of Community of believers and being taught and edified in His Word and teachings to be the person He has in mind for you?
The druid thing is a literary society (Welsh, if memory serves) and has no pagan connections. Abp. Rowan certainly has theological issues, but that isn’t one of them.
Of course, any archbishop of Canterbury could resolve the problem by declaring homosexualist bishops (and other heretics) out of Communion with him. That’s the one real “power” he has.
[blockquot]Of course, any archbishop of Canterbury could resolve the problem by declaring homosexualist bishops (and other heretics) out of Communion with him. That’s the one real “power” he has.[/blockquote]
And he chooses not to use it! Thus makes him by default for it!
It, being, blessing, marrying, and ordaining homosexuals! How very sad!