Steve Colbert on The Lambeth Conference

Sometimes you just gotta laugh. Hat tip to Ask the Priest

'This year's Lambeth Conference has been steeped in controversy. And, unlike the good old days, it can't be settled by beheading your wife.'

Confessing Anglicanism

Dave Perry writes a helpful post on the subject of GAFCON and the Pilgrimage of Faith. I shall be lazy and leave you to follow the links in that blog article. Dave has some helpful thoughts on how Methodists on both sides of 'the homosexuality debates' might react to what is happening within the Anglican Communion and also what experience and suggestions we might have to offer our Anglican brothers and sisters about respecting different points of view.

I leave you to read his thoughtful piece with respect to the issues surrounding homosexuality and their potential to divide a denomination. For my part, I'm more interested in the fact that GAFCON are declaring a 'confessing movement' within Anglicanism.

Personally speaking, I don't want to be part of a 'confessing denomination'. I grew up in one. Been there, done that, got the tee-shirt. It's a painful place to be, in my view. Also theologically problematic.

I see that The Jerusalem Declaration is starting out with fourteen points in its 'Confession'. My predication is that, within five years, there will be more than fourteen points. Or rather, I predict that there will be many new elaborations to the original fourteen points.  I predict that there be vital interest in, for example, what 'really' constitutes belief in holy scriptures as the word of God, or what is a 'genuine' upholding of the 39 articles or an 'authentic' upholding of Anglican clerical orders or a 'genuine' belief in the creeds.

Why do I think this? Because the underlying assumption in a 'Confessing movement' or a 'Confessing denomination' is that the true Church must identify false believers and separate itself from them. In order to do this the movement will need, over time, to increasingly define its core doctrines in an ever more detailed manner. Every time a new detailed definition is promulgated, someone will find that they cannot accept it. In my opinion, confessing movements are inherently unstable and apt to schism for this reason.

What does a person learn by example about God when they are part of a confessing denomination? In my case, it was that God was a perfectionist who would not have mercy on anyone with imperfect doctrine. The concepts of 'grace' 'mercy' and 'lovingkindness' (chesed) become legal concepts with no soul. The acted-out, lived-out experience is that God is always on the verge of throwing an omnipotent temper-tantrum if a person doesn't hold the right beliefs about the virgin birth or whatever. 

Not for me. Not ever again. God is more merciful and gracious than that - praise the Lord, or I'd be lost.

May God have mercy on his Church Universal and may he bless with much wisdom and patience to key decision-makers at the upcoming Lambeth Conference.

Oversight is Important

I generally try to keep away from commenting on the issue of whether or not homosexual acts are in and of themselves sinful. Mainly because, as I've said before, I don't think that this is a gospel issue that should split the church.

However, I'm getting more and more concerned about the theology of Anglicans who are putting themselves under the oversight of bishops who support the imprisonment of gay people. I don't think that this is a pendantic point in the slightest. How can any Christian support this kind of theology let alone put themself under the oversight of someone who supports it?

Conservative Anglicanism is shooting itself in the foot theologically by - ahem - getting in bed with these bishops; it's indefensible for a Christian to advocate such action. The people in Jesus' time thought that lepers and prostitutes were a dangerous threat to society and Jesus touched them and ate with them. Christians simply cannot hide behind purity laws to justify such beliefs.

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.