Anglican Mainstream

By Trevor Timpson, BBC News

Dear Brothers and Sisters in Reform,

Greetings in the Name of our Risen Lord, Jesus Christ.

The world wide Fellowship of Confessing Anglicans is a cause of great joy to me because it is bringing together Anglicans around the globe in a
common love for each other and the Lord Jesus Christ. This love is the work of the Holy Spirit who is gathering us for clear and confident gospel
witness at a time when there is growing confusion and disorder in our beloved Anglican Communion.

I thank God for the witness of Reform as you hold unswervingly to the faith once for all delivered to the saints despite the severe erosion of
orthodoxy taking place around you. As the Global South Primates acknowledged at our recent meeting in China 'it grieves us deeply to
observe many Anglican churches in the west yielding to secular pressure to allow unacceptable practices in the name of human rights and equality'.

So I would like to assure you of my prayers and necessary support. We are building a truly global fellowship in a partnership inspired by the Holy
Spirit, marked by prayer, generosity, sacrifice and genuine love. I long to see the day when faithful Anglicans can feel at home in any part of the
world and share the joy of true fellowship in the Holy Spirit.

May the favour of the Lord our God be upon us and establish the work of our hands.

The Most Revd Dr Eliud Wabukala, Archbishop, the Anglican Church of Kenya and Chairman of the GAFCON Primates Council

By Charles Raven, SPREAD

By George Conger, CEN

The formation of the Anglican Ordinariate was a natural consequence of the Archbishop of Canterbury’s mismanagement of the crisis facing the Anglican Communion, the leaders of the Gafcon movement said in a statement released on May 10.

In a strongly worded communiqué summarizing the work of their April 25-28 meeting in Nairobi, the archbishops of the Gafcon movement, representing a majority of the church’s members, voiced their displeasure with the usurpation of authority by Dr. Williams and the staff of the Anglican Consultative Council and laid upon their door responsibility for the de facto schism within the communion.

While the 13-point communiqué touched on administrative issues for the Anglican reform movement, including the creation of a Nairobi and London offices, the appointment of Bishop Martyn Minns as Deputy Secretary, and the calling of a second Jerusalem conference in 2013, the heart of the letter came in a sustained attack on the actions taken by London-based instruments of the Anglican Communion.

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GAFCON primates meeting in Africa have announced plans for another international conference as well as opening offices in London and Nairobi.

The council of Anglican leaders was established by the Global Anglican Future Conference in 2008, representing more than 35 million Anglicans.

Now, the Primates are planning for a second GAFCON in 2013 preceded by a leadership conference in New York in 2012.

At the start of their meeting just after Easter, the council elected Archbishop Eliud Wabukala, Primate of the Anglican Church of Kenya, as its new Chairman to replace Archbishop Greg Venables, the Primate of the Southern Cone.

The new Primate of the Southern Cone, Archbishop Hector Zavala, was welcomed to the council, as was the Primate of Rwanda Archbishop Onesphore Rwaje.

The election of Archbishop Wabukala is significant as it marks a transition of the chairmanship to someone other than one of the original GAFCON primates.

Archbishops Zavala and Rwaje are also new Primates.

In a 13 point statement issued after their Nairobi meeting, the Council said “if we are offer adequate support to our member provinces, sustain our various initiatives, and strengthen our communications capabilities we must add capacity to our current secretariat.”

A Chairman’s office would be established in Nairobi, Kenya and a GAFCON Global Coordination office would be established in London under the direction of the Rt. Rev’d Martyn Minns, Missionary Bishop of the Church of Nigeria, serving as Deputy Secretary and Executive Director. Read the rest of this entry »

Statement from the Most Rev’d Eliud Wabukala, Primate of the Anglican Church of Kenya and newly elected Chairman of the GAFCON Primates Council.

Praise the Lord! It is a great joy to greet all of you as we celebrate the Feast of the Resurrection of our Lord Jesus Christ. The resurrection of Christ was an event that changed the course of history for good and as a result, my life and the lives of millions of others have been changed for eternity.

Yesterday I was elected Chairman of the GAFCON Primates Council and I am honored to accept this call to serve the Anglican Communion in this special way. Together with 1200 bishops and leaders from around the Anglican Communion, I was privileged to spend a life- changing week in Jerusalem in 2008 as part of the Global Anglican Future Conference. It reminds me of my roots in the East African Revival when the renewing Spirit of God permeated the Church leading to a confession of sins, a thirst for God’s Word filling the converts with humility, a simple lifestyle and an unquestionable desire for evangelism. It is these qualities that have kept the Church in our region faithful to the Gospel. It is my conviction that this same Spirit is at work in GAFCON.

I am honored, therefore, to join my colleagues in helping lead this movement forward and am humbled by their trust. It is a delight to welcome two new Primates to the Council, the Most Rev’d Tito Zavala, Bishop of Chile and Presiding Bishop of the Southern Cone, and also the Most Rev’d Onesphore Rwaje, Primate of the Anglican Church of Rwanda.

GAFCON is made up of Anglican archbishops, bishops, clergy and laity from around the world. We include Provinces that contain the majority of the active membership of the Anglican Communion. We joyfully acknowledge the Lordship of Jesus Christ, believe in the trustworthiness of God’s Word and the transforming power of God’s Spirit.  Read the rest of this entry »

George Conger  Church of England Newspaper December 3

THE ANGLICAN Covenant is too little and too late, to hold the Anglican Communion together, the leaders of the Gafcon movement said last week. Revisions to the document adopted last December by the Anglican Communion’s Standing Committee were unacceptable, the Gafcon Primates’ council said on November 24, and urged the Communion to adopt “new initiatives to more effectively respond to the crises that confront us all.”

Seven primates along with Archbishops Robert Duncan of the ACNA and Peter Jensen of Sydney acknowledged as “well intentioned” the “efforts to heal our brokenness through the introduction of an Anglican Covenant,” but concluded the “current text is fatally flawed and so support for this initiative is no longer appropriate.” The Primates further rejected Dr Rowan Williams’ plea for business as usual. “We can no longer maintain the illusion of normalcy,” they said, and “join with other Primates from the Global South in declaring that we will not be present at the next Primates’ meeting.”

Questioned about the statement, a spokesman for Lambeth Palace told The Church of England Newspaper ACC Secretary General Kenneth Kearon “has said the following: ‘The decision whether to come remains a matter for the Primates. The meeting is being organised and will be going ahead in Ireland next January. We are still receiving acceptances and hope as many Primates as possible we be able to attend’.” Read the rest of this entry »

By Jenna Lyle, Christian Today

Just as the Church of England General Synod was giving its backing to a mechanism to preserve unity in the Anglican Communion, conservative Primates were issuing a statement declaring that they can no longer give it their support.

In a statement issued by the Primates Council of the Global Anglican Future Conference (GAFCON) today, they said they could no longer accept the Anglican Covenant as a means of resolving disputes within the Anglican Communion despite originally being some of the main drivers behind the measure.

“While we acknowledge that the efforts to heal our brokenness through the introduction of an Anglican Covenant were well intentioned we have come to the conclusion the current text is fatally flawed and so support for this initiative is no longer appropriate,” they said.

The statement was signed by Archbishops from West Africa, North America, Rwanda, Tanzania, Nigeria, Uganda and Kenya.

In it, they also confirm that they will not attend next year’s Primates’ meeting in Ireland. Instead, they plan to hold their own meeting in the latter part of 2011, followed by an international gathering dubbed GAFCON 2 sometime in 2012.

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By Mike Keulemans, New Directions

Like so many other teenagers of my era, I was taught by my school history teacher that in the sixteenth century the ancient Church of our land was transformed into a national institution that was both Catholic and Protestant, or as Professor Diarmaid McCulloch might put it more accurately, both Catholic and Evangelical.

The Evangelical Anglicanism in which I grew up started with a personal relationship with Jesus Christ as Lord and Saviour and then taught me that the ministry of Word and Sacrament within the Book of Common Prayer. As part of this process, I came to value the lives of great Evangelical heroes…

Later on, going to college and living in other parts of the country, I came into contact with many Anglican Catholics, who also believed that we should begin with a personal relationship with Jesus Christ and then go on to develop our Christian character from the Word and Sacrament of the Book of Common Prayer. They also had their heroes… I learnt to value their heroes as much as my own and my Catholic friends were willing to discover the value of my heroes as well.

What I am saying is that, in our heart of hearts, both us Catholics and Evangelicals share a common Anglican heritage. It was the Book of Common Prayer, whether in its 1662 or its 1928 version, that actually secured our common purpose. One of the tragedies of the past half century has been the fact that the long process of liturgical revision has never offered us a modern language BCP.

Now at last the prospect of women in the episcopate and a host of other unbiblical and unhistoric novelties has woken up both our constituencies. Forward in Faith and Reform find themselves locked in a protracted struggle to maintain their very existence as valued members of the Anglican Church. Frankly, I would no longer wish to remain in a Church which had effectively expelled my Catholic brethren, and I suspect that most of my Catholic friends would not wish to stay in a Church without Evangelicals either. So what do we do now?

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The Fourth Blast of the Trumpet

The image of the trumpet blast seems to be an over-dramatic description of the communiqué issued from the latest Global South Encounter. In fact, the response to it has been somewhat muted. But as a guest at the conference, I believe that it fully deserves the title ‘trumpet’ and will in time be regarded as an historic statement.

One reason why it fails to create a strong reaction is that it simply confirms the obvious. The crisis moment has now passed. Many of the Global South provinces have given up on the official North American Anglicans (TEC and the Canadian Church) and regard themselves as being out of communion with them. They renew the call for repentance but can see that, failing something like the Great Awakening, it will not occur. The positive side to this is that they are committed to achieving self-sufficiency so that they will cease to rely on the Western churches for aid. That is something the Global South has been working on for some time, with success.

In my judgment, the assembly was unresponsive to the Archbishop of Canterbury’s video greetings. I don’t think that what he said was obscure. It just seemed to be from another age, another world. His plea for patience misjudged the situation by several years and his talk of the Anglican covenant was not where the actual conference was at. He seemed to suggest that the consecration of a partnered lesbian Bishop will create a crisis. In fact the crisis itself has passed. We are now on the further side of the critical moment; the decisions have all been made; we are already living with the consequences. And it was in working out the consequences that the communiqué may eventually be seen to be historic.

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By Charles Raven, SPREAD

Although not attended by great fanfare and ceremony, something quite remarkable seems to be happening in Singapore at the fourth Global South to South Encounter. We are seeing the emergence of a global Anglicanism of substance, displacing the shadow Anglicanism of institutional pragmatism. Institutions which until recently had the appearance of substance – the Anglican Consultative Council, the Lambeth Conference, the Primates meeting and the Archbishop of Canterbury himself – are now taking on an unreal quality as shadows of a discredited past while the GAFCON movement, dismissed by many at its inception in 2008, is turning out to have foreshadowed a fundamental realignment which is now beginning to express itself in new structures.

The shadow quality of the old order was inescapable in both the medium and the message of Rowan Williams’ address. Due to a ‘full diary’ his was a virtual presence by video and his message amounted to little more than yet another call to continue with ‘careful listening’. So it is not surprising that Dr Williams politely absented himself this time round since it is clear that he has nothing new to say.

At the previous South to South encounter at the Red Sea in 2005, the Global South primates held him to account for his well known sympathy for the homosexual agenda and when a private request to repudiate those views failed to elicit a response, it was reiterated in a public letter which also called on the Archbishop to be more decisive: ‘We are disappointed’ they wrote ‘with your deferring to “process.” You seem to keep saying, “My hands are tied.” We urge you to untie your hands and provide the bold, inclusive leadership the Communion needs at this time of crisis and distrust’. In response, Dr Williams reaffirmed the Covenant process as the only way forward and concluded rather crisply: ‘If this letter is a contribution to that process of debate, then it is to be welcomed, however robust. If it is an attempt to foreclose that debate, it would seem to serve very little purpose indeed.’ Read here

By Pat Ashworth, Church Times

THE Global Anglican Future Conference (GAFCON) Primates Council has bracketed the UK with Kenya and Uganda as nations “where Christian views are marginalised and ignored”.

England is also defined as an “Associate Par­ticipant”, along with Australia, New Zealand, the Anglican Church in North America, and the Communion Partners of the Episcopal Church in the United States, in the “Fourth Global South to South Encounter” to be held in Singapore later this month.

The Council, which constitutes the Primates of Nigeria, West Africa, Rwanda, Tanzania, Kenya, Uganda, and the Southern Cone, to­gether with the Archbishop of Sydney, Dr Peter Jensen, and the leader of the Anglican Church in North America, Archbishop Robert Duncan, was meeting in Bermuda as guests of the American businessman Emmanuel Kam­pouris (News, 9 April).

Absent from the Bermuda meeting was the Archbishop of Uganda, the Most Revd Henry Orombi. He demanded of the Archbishop of Canterbury last week that the Primates of the Anglican Communion should meet urgently, without the American and Canadian Primates, and with an agenda set by the particip­ants.

In a three-page letter sent to Dr Williams last Friday and released to the press, Arch­bishop Orombi hints at a double standard in the treatment of Primates and complains that the responsibility of the Primates is being diminished.

He commends the “clarity and honesty” of the President Bishop in Jerusalem and the Middle East, the Most Revd Mouneer Anis, who resigned in February from what became the Standing Committee of the Anglican Communion (SCAC) (News, 5 February). Archbishop Orombi does not recognise the SCAC, and has not attended meetings since its failure, as he sees it, to uphold the “hard-won agreement” of the Primates at Dar es Salaam in 2007.

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Grateful for the gracious guidance of the Holy Spirit, and the leadership of the Most Reverend Peter J. Akinola, the Primates Council of the Fellowship of Confessing Anglicans (GAFCON/FCA) met in Bermuda from April 5 through 9, 2010.

The Primates Council consists of Primates (Senior Archbishops) of Anglican Provinces who met together in Jerusalem in June 2008 as part of the Global Anglican Future Conference (GAFCON). Their determination to give witness to the life transforming gospel of Jesus Christ and the trustworthiness of the Bible led to the establishment of the Fellowship of Confessing Anglicans (FCA).

FCA is a movement defined by theology that delivers spiritual and practical outcomes to faithful Anglican Christians around the world. Together the Primates Council represents over thirty four million Anglicans more than half of the active membership of the Anglican Communion

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GAFCON website has announced today that the Commentary on the Jerusalem Declaration by its Theology Resource Group is now available for downloading.  The website also gives ways the printed version can be accessed in different parts of the world.

http://www.gafcon.org/news/being_faithful_now_available_for_download/

The Commentary on the landmark Anglican ‘Jerusalem Declaration’ has been released in digital form and is available for immediate download. (Large pdf file)

In June 2008, 1200 Anglican leaders, bishops, clergy and lay people, from 27 provinces of the Anglican Communion met in Jerusalem for the Global Anglican Future Conference.

One of the results was the establishment of the Fellowship of Confessing Anglicans, with the ‘Jerusalem Declaration’ as its foundation.

In 2009, 40 theologians, from 14 countries throughout the Anglican Communion, produced a commentary on this important document called “Being Faithful: The Shape of Historic Anglicanism Today”.

This Gafcon/FCA Primates Council, including leaders from some of the strongest Anglican communities in the world, have urged Anglicans everywhere to read and study this important work.

It has now been made available for download, in special edition along with “The Way, The Truth, and the Life” which was launched at GAFCON.

The complete PDF is available for download here.

From Anglican Samizdat

It is to say, rather, that the GAFCON proposals are not only not needed in England but are positively harmful and indeed offensive. This was more or less what I said on the radio last Thursday, where I distinguished carefully between the American and English situations. AS FAR AS ENGLAND IS CONCERNED, it is damaging, arrogant and irrelevant for GAFCON leaders to say, as they are now doing, ‘choose you this day whom you will serve’, with the implication that there are now only two parties in the church, the orthodox and the liberals, and that to refuse to sign up to GAFCON is to decide for the liberals. Things are just not like that. Certainly not here in England.

A proposal to give the partners of gay priests some of the same rights that are awarded to priests’ spouses is likely to spark a new row over homosexuality.

 

Bishops and senior clergy will debate at next month’s General Synod whether the Church should provide same-sex couples with the same financial benefits as are awarded to married couples.

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Statement from GAFCON/FCA Primates Council

We have received the Archbishop of Canterbury’s letter informing us of the Pope’s offer of an ‘Apostolic Constitution’ for those Anglicans who wish to be received into the Roman Catholic Church.  We believe that this offer is a gracious one and reflects the same commitment to the historic apostolic faith, moral teaching and global mission that we proclaimed in the Jerusalem Declaration on the Global Anglican Future and for this we are profoundly grateful.

We are, however, grieved that the current crisis within our beloved Anglican Communion has made necessary such an unprecedented offer. It represents a grave indictment of the Instruments of Communion whose very purpose is to strengthen and protect our unity in obedience to our Lord’s clear command.  Their failure to fully address the abandonment of biblical faith and practice by The Episcopal Church and the Anglican Church of Canada has now brought shame to the name of Christ and seriously impedes the cause of the Gospel.

The Primates Council of the Fellowship of Confessing Anglicans (GAFCON/FCA) is convinced, however, that Anglicanism has a bright future as long as we remain grounded in the Holy Scriptures and obedient to our Lord Jesus Christ’s call to reach the lost and make disciples of all nations teaching them to observe the whole Gospel.  We also believe that there is room within our Anglican family for all those who hold true to the ‘faith once delivered to the saints’. We would like to encourage those Anglicans who are considering this invitation from the Roman Catholic Church to recognize that Anglican churches are growing throughout the world in strength and offering a vibrant testimony to the transforming work of Christ. 

We are convinced that this is not the time to abandon the Anglican Communion. Our Anglican identity of reformed catholicity, that gives supreme authority to the Holy Scriptures and acknowledgement that our sole representative and advocate before God is the Lord Jesus Christ, stands as a beacon of hope for millions of people.  We remain proud inheritors of the Anglican Reformation. This is a time for all Christians to persevere confident of our Lord’s promise that nothing, not even the gates of hell, will prevail against His Church.

+Peter Abuja,
Chairman,
GAFCON/FCA Primates Council
November 10, 2009

Being Faithful: The Shape of Historic Anglicanism Today

A Commentary on the Jerusalem Declaration supplemented by The Way, the Truth and the Life – Theological Resources for a Global Anglican Future

How did the worldwide Anglican Communion come to the present situation, in which its conflict is a matter of continual public debate, and where it seems no peace-initiatives have been able to succeed? Out of concern for the very future of the Anglican Communion, over 1000 senior leaders from seventeen provinces in the Anglican Communion, representing 35 million church-going Anglicans, met for the Global Anglican Future Conference and Pilgrimage (GAFCON) in Jerusalem in June 2008. They met to seek counsel, to pray, and to return to their biblical and historical roots in the Holy Land, in a coalition of the willing. The GAFCON Statement, which contains the Jerusalem Declaration, is a prophetic response to the current situation of indiscipline. Being Faithful is an exposition of the Jerusalem Declaration, set alongside the theological resource papers drafted for the meeting in Jerusalem, which were previously published as The Way, the Truth and the Life.

Over against the culture of repudiation and innovation, public confession of the apostolic faith is necessary in order to shine the light in a dark place. To identify where orthodox Anglicans stand in response to these powerful cultural influences, it is necessary to confess that which we believe in relation to the current challenges. This is a time-honoured response of the Church to the challenges to its life. More importantly, it is an expression of, and a humble witness to, our orthodoxy and identity as Anglicans, living under the full and complete authority of the Bible. We are not attempting to fix Anglican identity but to reaffirm it, as being anchored in the apostolic faith, and as belonging to a Christian church which is centred on the gospel and bounded by Scripture.

We are using a new Print on Demand publishing partnership in the UK and USA which we hope will make the book more accessible and affordable around the world. Publisher’s price: £7.50, US$10.00 (if bought via US channels). Additional overseas shipping will apply if bought from the UK.

ISBN: 978 0 946307 99 9

First published 2009: 162 pages

International purchasers should note that they may be able to source this book more cheaply via Amazon.com due to local printing.

Read further here
 

By David W Virtue and Mary Ann Mueller, Virtueonline

NASHOTAH, WISCONSIN—In a stunning pronouncement, the American Anglican Council (AAC) announced the launching of the Fellowship of Confessing Anglicans-North America (FCA-NA) this week bringing together individual Anglicans in the great Diaspora who are unable to find an ACNA church near them. Orthodox Episcopalians and Anglicans can join to become ministry partners.

"I am pleased to announce the formation of the Fellowship of Confessing Anglicans – North America as a ministry partner of AC-NA to which you can apply immediately," said the Rev. Phillip Ashey, AAC’s travelling chaplain. He urged Anglicans to go on line and join the FCA -NA apply at: www.fca.net.

FCA-NA joins with FCA in England and South Africa.

This much-awaited announcement was made at the Nashotah House refectory in front of more than 50 members the Southeastern Wisconsin American Anglican Council (SEWAAC) chapter monthly meeting.

GAFCON secretariat and FCA director Anglican Archbishop Peter Jensen charged the ACC to organize the Fellowship of Confessing Anglicans in North America. Since then Fr. Ashey and others, including Nashotah House Dean Robert Munday and Fr. William Beasley – who were both present at this month’s SEWAAC meeting – have been working towards seeing FCA-NA become a reality. As AAC’s Chief Operating Officer, Fr. Ashey has been kept busy with back-to-back meetings while in the Upper Midwest. He will address delegates at a major FCA-NA planning summit in Plano, Texas, this week, along with Dean Munday, Fr. Beasley and others, to hammer out detailed plans for the FCA-NA’s eventual roll out.

FCA has rolled out with great fanfare and success in England and South Africa. The next logical step was North America where the infant Anglican Church in North America is getting a foothold and seeking formal recognition from the rest of the Anglican Communion as the Thirty-Ninth Province. Hopefully, FCA’s American unveiling will take place before the end of the year.

Fr. Ashey explained that ACNA’s focus is to reach North America with the transforming love of Jesus Christ, and with the help of the Fellowship of Confessing Anglicans, which was originally conceived through last summer’s GACFON meeting for the "benefit of the church and the furtherance of its mission".

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Presentation at the launch of the Fellowship of Confessing Anglicans, Southern Africa, Port Elizabeth, September 3 2009

Chris Sugden

Why was it necessary for the Primates of Nigeria, Kenya, Uganda, Rwanda, Tanzania and the Southern Cone to invite Anglicans from around the world to meet with them and their bishops in Jerusalem in June 2008 for the Global Anglican Future Conference? You have with you today three people who were in the room when that decision was taken: Archbishop Benjamin Nzimbi, Canon Vinay Samuel and myself. 

My privilege this morning is to set out why GAFCON Jerusalem 2008 was necessary.

The immediate cause for GAFCON was the invitation from the Archbishop of Canterbury, Rowan Williams to those who had consecrated Gene Robinson as a Bishop to attend the Lambeth Conference.  This invitation was sent in July 2007, and the timing was significant as I will show later.

Following this invitation, Archbishop Peter Akinola made a visit in October 2007 at his own expense to London to meet with Archbishop Rowan Williams to ask him most seriously to delay the Lambeth Conference until the issue of the consecration of Gene Robinson by the Episcopal Church could be resolved.   When Archbishop Williams proved immovable on this certain things became crystal clear to Archbishop Akinola and his colleagues. Read the rest of this entry »