Speaking out for Reconciliation

Today's copy of The Church Times carries two interesting articles by Pat Ashworth on African views on the church and schism. (Thank you to The Church Times for not making us wait a week to see these articles posted on their webpage.)

The first article is entitled Listen to the Majority African Voice of Grace. This article reports on an address given by the Rt Revd Musonda Mwamba, Bishop of Botswana to the Ecclesiastical Law Society conference. Ashworth writes:

In an incisive address, the Bishop concluded that the minority of Africans who had “the luxury to think about the issue” did not want to see the Communion disintegrate. They valued the bonds of affection, and would prefer to follow the process recommended by the Windsor report. He rebutted as “simplistic and a distortion of the truth” the belief that the African provinces were a monochrome body.

The second article is entitled Gay question is not central to faith says Tanzanian bishop. Asworth writes:

The Bishop of Central Tanganyika, the Rt Revd Godfrey Mdimi Mhogolo, has dissociated his diocese from the statement issued in December by the House of Bishops of Tanzania, the province where the Primates Meeting is to be held this month.

So much for the idea that "all" African Christians hold the same views on how the church should approach the issue of homosexuality.