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Gay bishop controversy may spark worldwide (Anglican) schism (Nigerian bishop has had enough)
The Guardian ^ | June 20, 03 | Stephen Bates

Posted on 06/25/2003 10:07:02 PM PDT by churchillbuff

The leader of the biggest church in the worldwide Anglican communion yesterday deepened the crisis over homosexuality when he threatened to split with the Church of England if it proceeds with the consecration of its first gay bishop. Archbishop Peter Akinola, leader of the 17.5 million-strong church in Nigeria, who has declared homosexuality to be an abomination, warned he would precipitate a schism if Canon Jeffrey John becomes suffragan bishop of Reading.

There were fears last night that more than a dozen other churches in developing countries would follow Nigeria's lead if it divides the 70 million-strong worldwide communion between the developed and the developing world.

The Church Mission Society has warned that its missionary work could be threatened in such circumstances.

The prospect of a schism within months of taking office is a huge challenge for Rowan Williams, the Archbishop of Canterbury, who is also head of the worldwide communion.

Known to be personally sympathetic to gays, he is pledged to uphold church rules and has so far kept his head down, apart from issuing a statement three weeks ago regretting the division caused by a decision by the Canadian diocese of New Westminster to authorise a same sex blessing service.

Archbishop Akinola's outburst represents an extraordinary interference in the affairs of a national church by a primate of another country and came despite an assurance from Canon John that, although he remains in a 27-year partnership, he is now celibate.

Archbishop Akinola told BBC radio: "We claim we are Bible-loving Christians. We cannot be seen to be doing things clearly outside the boundaries allowable in the Bible. This is only the beginning. We would sever relationships with anybody, anywhere... anyone who strays over the boundaries we are out with them. It is as simple as that."

Nigeria and 12 other provinces from developing countries have already declared themselves to be in "impaired communion" with the Canadian diocese and they may take similar action against New Hampshire in the US, which elected the first bishop in an openly gay relationship.

The provinces include the West Indies, the Southern Cone (South America), Central Africa, Kenya, India, Papua New Guinea, the Philippines, Uganda, West Africa, the Indian Ocean, Congo and Sudan.

Canon John's declaration wrong-footed his English critics. Nine Church of England diocesan bishops said they would "rejoice" if the canon was merely in a same sex relationship of companionship and sexual abstinence - precisely how he has now described himself. He said of his relationship: "We have been together for 27 years and we will remain together. But the relationship has not been sexually expressed for years."

The vicar of the parish of Pangbourne, outside Reading, where the bishop will have his home, also expressed strong reservations about his arrival. The Rev John Staples told the BBC: "It raises the question of the authority of the church... I think there is a real danger of splitting the communion."

The threat of a split will alarm church leaders who have struggled to retain a facade of unity on the issue of homosexuality.

Archbishop Akinola himself came under fire from the pages of the Church Times newspaper last night when a correspondent with a shared parish in Nigeria pointed out local tribal practices of polygamy and human sacrifice. The Rev Mark Williams wrote: "The archbishop's faithfulness to scripture at home is far more a cause for question and concern than anything going on here or in Canada... We cannot be held hostage to such double standards."

· Jewish Liberal Synagogues have agreed to sanction blessing services for gay Jewish couples. The Jewish Chronicle today says the liberal movement has agreed to sanction synagogue commitment services.


TOPICS: Culture/Society; Foreign Affairs; US: New Hampshire
KEYWORDS: bishop; christianity; churchofengland; gay; homosexualagenda; nigeria; rowanwilliams; schism

1 posted on 06/25/2003 10:07:03 PM PDT by churchillbuff
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To: churchillbuff
Anglican leader raises stakes with new gay outburst

'Homosexuality is so unnatural. Even in the world of dogs, cows and lions, we don't hear of such things' - Archbishop of Nigeria Peter Akinola

Amelia Hill and Cameron Duodo

Sunday June 22, 2003

The Observer

The leader of the world's largest Anglican communion threatened to widen an already bitter rift by declaring yesterday that homosexuality was so unnatural that it was not seen in the world of animals.

Peter Akinola, leader of the 17.5 million-strong church in Nigeria, hit out at the recent election in America of the first openly gay bishop.

'This is an attack on the Church of God - a Satanic attack on God's church,' he told the Lagos-based Guardian newspaper.

'I cannot think of how a man in his senses would be having a sexual relationship with another man. Even in the world of animals, dogs, cows, lions, we don't hear of such things.

'When we sit down globally as a communion, I am going to sit in a meeting with a man who is marrying a fellow man,' he added. 'I mean it's just not possible. I cannot see myself doing it.'

Akinola restated an earlier warning that he will precipitate a split between the Nigerian Church and the Church of England if it consecrates its first gay bishop, the self-avowed chaste homosexual Canon Jeffrey John. His attack sparked a furious response from gay rights campaigners in the Church, who have demanded a full apology before any further debate can take place.

'I see no reason why we should be subjected to such grotesque insults,' said Richard Kirker, of the Lesbian and Gay Christian Movement. 'His words reveal a disgust and contempt for other people that is incompatible with Christianity.

'Unless he withdraws his inflammatory comments and apologises unreservedly, there can be no reconciliation or respect for someone who holds such beliefs.'

Kirker's views were backed by The Rev Richard Thomas, spokesman for the Oxford Diocese whose bishop, The Right Rev Richard Harries, recently sparked the furore over homosexuals in the Church by appointing Canon John as the suffragan bishop of Reading. 'One of the advantages of having the kind of dispute the Church is having in public is that it makes it very clear where people's theology stops and their prejudice begins,' said Thomas.

The Nigerian church has 17 million members, compared with the UK and US's combined congregation of just 2.3 million, with 81 bishops and 10 archbishops.

It severed ties earlier this month with the diocese of New Westminster in British Columbia, on Canada's Pacific coast, for authorising same-sex marriages. 'We hope that what we have done to Westminster will serve as a note of warning to the rest of the world to know that Nigeria will not stomach any such ugly development,' Akinola said.

Reform, the evangelical pressure group, defended Akinola's comments. 'The way people express themselves in their own culture comes across very differently in another culture,' said the Rev Rod Thomas, 'The fact that someone has not been totally careful in their language, shouldn't be allowed to detract from allowing the debate to happen.'

The dispute over the ordination of Canon John is also set to be heightened by the forthcoming publication of new guidelines hardening the Church's already highly conservative attitude towards sexuality.

The Church's current stance on homosexuality, as laid out in its 1991 statement Issues in Human Sexuality, says that although homosexuals - described as 'homophiles' - can be tolerated as church members, members of the clergy can have same-sex relationships only if they remain chaste.

Modernisers have long campaigned to have the report rewritten, claiming that despite its call on Christians to 'reject all forms of hatred of homosexual people', it has perpetuated historic discrimination.

But now the new guidelines are about to be published, a source close to the chair of the working party, The Bishop of Oxford Richard Harries, has told The Observer that it not only fails to offer the long-expected olive branch to modernisers, but it removes some of the few rights the original report conceded.

'When the working party reports later this year, the word is that it's going to be more conservative than the present position,' said the source. 'We will have to wait and see, but the word on the Church's streets is that the report is not going to be more liberal than it currently is and if anything, is going to be even more hardline.'

Although there are no indications as yet which rights could be removed or clamped down on, there are three areas where gay campaigners feel most at risk, namely the current position that allows them to have gay yet chaste relationships, the blessings they can have for their own same-sex relationships and the right to hold so-called 'marriages' for same-sex couples in their congregations. Campaigners for gay rights now believe that the Anglican Church will be signing its final death warrant if the new report attempts to row back on the few hard-won rights it grants.

2 posted on 06/25/2003 10:12:31 PM PDT by churchillbuff
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To: churchillbuff
So the gays will have buried the Church of England.
3 posted on 06/25/2003 10:33:58 PM PDT by RobbyS
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To: churchillbuff
Fools, that pc politics bishop should resign. But his ego will not allow it.
4 posted on 06/25/2003 10:34:56 PM PDT by longtermmemmory
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To: churchillbuff
Let the games begin!!!!!

this is the start perhaps of a return to orthodoxcy..(sp?)

5 posted on 06/25/2003 10:41:04 PM PDT by cherry
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To: cherry
Orthodoxy, Just FYI


Homos should have just formed their own church.
6 posted on 06/25/2003 10:52:38 PM PDT by longtermmemmory
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To: churchillbuff
"'I cannot think of how a man in his senses would be having a sexual relationship with another man"

This would be a better world if more people felt that way.
7 posted on 06/26/2003 3:27:37 AM PDT by Enemy Of The State (If we don't take action now, We settle for nothing later!)
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To: RobbyS
So, that odd man odd, the CoE is finally dead, hoorah! Now perhaps England can become a truly christian nation, hope the Poles will play a part in it's revitalisation.
8 posted on 06/26/2003 3:48:33 AM PDT by Cronos (Mixing Islam with sanity results in serious side effects. Consult your Imam)
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To: Cronos
The break would unite the Anglican churches in the developing world to the Roman Catholic, a good thing!
9 posted on 06/29/2003 4:03:56 AM PDT by Cronos (Mixing Islam with sanity results in serious side effects. Consult your Imam)
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To: longtermmemmory
Homos should have just formed their own church.

You don't get it. The objective is to bag your church.....and take away your moral argument.

They want moral parity -- they've told me so online. Vituperatively. "No more feeling smug in church", they said. A lot of gays feel the moral rebuke of Genesis and Leviticus, even moreso the moral rebuke of believing Christians and Jews. The gay seminarians' cabal is out to remove that moral stigma by conspiracy and concerted action.

10 posted on 06/29/2003 4:07:53 AM PDT by lentulusgracchus
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To: Cronos
The break would unite the Anglican churches in the developing world to the Roman Catholic, a good thing!

Other way around. Severing the conservative Third World congregations would leave the Church of England in the hands of the Pooves' Cabal and the morally temperate American Episcopal congregations dangling. That would forestall any rapprochement with freshly-chastised Rome. The gay Anglicans won't be able to pull the wool over Jesuits' and the Roman Rota's eyes, so the gay Anglicans will abort the ecumenical approach to Rome, IMHO.

11 posted on 06/29/2003 4:18:36 AM PDT by lentulusgracchus
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To: lentulusgracchus
? The third world congregations provide the largest numbers for the Anglican communion. out of 70 million, they must be at least 50 million. And adherents in the developed nations will leave the Anglicans as individuals. I'm not talking about the Anglican church returning to God (I think it's too corrupted) but that it will be dissolved.
12 posted on 06/29/2003 4:38:46 AM PDT by Cronos (Mixing Islam with sanity results in serious side effects. Consult your Imam)
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To: churchillbuff
The Nigerian church has 17 million members, compared with the UK and US's combined congregation of just 2.3 million, with 81 bishops and 10 archbishops.

Can this possibly be correct? The combined congregation of Anglicans in the US and the UK is only 2.3 million?

Current population estimates are England 49,138,831 (83.6 per cent of the total population); Scotland 5,062,011 (8.6 per cent); Wales 2,903,085 (4.9 per cent); and Northern Ireland 1,685,267 (2.9 per cent).

Other sources say that the population in the UK is 46% Anglican.

How can the 2.3 million number possibly be correct or am I missing something here?

13 posted on 06/29/2003 5:07:25 AM PDT by johniegrad
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To: churchillbuff
Archbishop Akinola himself came under fire from the pages of the Church Times newspaper last night when a correspondent with a shared parish in Nigeria pointed out local tribal practices of polygamy and human sacrifice. The Rev Mark Williams wrote: "The archbishop's faithfulness to scripture at home is far more a cause for question and concern than anything going on here or in Canada... We cannot be held hostage to such double standards."


At least, so far, he hasn't ordained any human-sacrificing polygamists.




14 posted on 06/29/2003 4:59:53 PM PDT by happymom
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To: johniegrad
The article failed to mention one key word, ACTIVE in front of members. I've heard estimates that 97% of UK citizens are not active in the Church...defined as attending services at least 1 or more times a month. Though quite powerful and wealthy, episcopaleans in the USA are a very small denomination. That would put the figure of 2.3 million well within reason.

In Africa, by comparison, almost to be called a Christian, is to be an active member of a Church. Nigeria is a huge place--and I wouldn't doubt there are 17 million active Christians in that country.
15 posted on 08/04/2003 5:24:09 AM PDT by AnalogReigns
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To: happymom
You caught that one too! That particular passage was shoddy reporting up and down. The fact that these things HAPPEN in the local area says nothing about whether the Nigerian bishop teaches or ordains such fellows. It simply doesn't follow. If you argued the same thing about the English bishops, you could say that because murders take place in downtown London, then they need to fix their own problems before talking about others. But the whole argument was about ordination and doctrine! Duhh...
16 posted on 08/04/2003 5:32:49 AM PDT by =Intervention= (White devils for Sharpton Central Florida chapter)
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