Gay row distorts Bible, says Williams

THE Archbishop of Canterbury has criticised fundamentalists and extremists on both sides of the Anglican Church for distorting the message of the Bible in the debate over homosexuality.

Rowan Williams told members of the Lambeth Commission on homosexuality that a church “faithful to the biblical revelation has to exercise discipline and draw boundaries if it is to proclaim the Gospel of Jesus and not its own concerns”.

Dr Williams said the problem was not simply about “biblical faithfulness versus fashionable relativism”. He said that there were “profound biblical principles involved” and criticised those at both extremes of the debate.

The Archbishop was addressing the first meeting of the commission set up to avert rifts in the Anglican Communion over the ordination of homosexuals and the blessings of same-sex marriage.

The commission was set up after an emergency meeting of the primates of the Anglican church to debate the crisis caused by the election of the openly gay father of two, Gene Robinson, as Bishop of New Hampshire.

The commission, chaired by the Primate of Ireland, Dr Robin Eames, includes members from all sides of the debate. It aims to produce a report early next year.

In a statement, commission members said they were “saddened” that tensions in the Church, exacerbated by the use of strident language, had continued to rise.

The crisis has already prompted the establishment of a new network of conservative Anglicans in the Episcopal Church of the US. The network, which some sources claim intends to supersede the mainstream church, is supported by 13 primates from the Global South.

Dr Williams warned the commission: “You will need to be aware of the danger of those doctrines of the Church which, by isolating one element of the Bible’s teaching, produce distortions — a Church of the perfect or the perfectly unanimous on one side, a Church of general human inspiration or liberation on the other.”

The Archbishop, commissioning members for their task, advised them that the primates “have repeatedly asserted that they wish to remain a Communion, rather than becoming a federation of churches”.

He continued: “The difficult balance in our Communion as it presently exists is between the deep conviction that we should not look for a single executive authority and the equally deep anxiety about the way in which a single local decision can step beyond what the communion as whole is committed to, and create division, embarrassment and evangelistic difficulties in other churches.”

The consultation was opened with prayers by Dr Williams who charged the members to be “diligent in discharging this weighty task” and to work together for the good of “our communion”.

He also urged them to present “a model of cooperation in love and charity” so that Anglicans worldwide could “take heart”.

Mary Tanner, a leading theologian, compared the debate over homosexuality to that over women priests and said that agreement from the Lambeth Conference and the Anglican Consultative Council had been sought before women were first ordained. By comparison, the Episcopal Church of the US went ahead and ordained an openly gay bishop in spite of a resolution to the contrary from the 1998 Lambeth Conference and pleas from the Church’s primates worldwide not to do so.

Dr Tanner said that the crisis was one of “authority and decision-making in communion”. She gave warning that it was clear that the issue of homosexuality “will not go away”.

She acknowledged that it will be hard to find a man for the future to unite “the presently warring groups, some of whom hardly seem able to hear one another, or to want to hear one another”. Dr Paul Avis, General Secretary of the Council for Christian Unity, said it was possible for Anglicans to “passionately and bitterly disagree with one another” without breaking communion.

Dr Chris Sugden, director of the Oxford Centre for Mission Studies, gave warning that the Anglican Communion could be in danger of becoming “an expression of the ethics of western liberal elites”.

He said: “The Anglican Communion is at a crossroads. For some the current crisis has been precipitated by heterodox leadership in the communion in an economically powerful province.”

In the view of some, the US was over-influential in the central structure and bureaucracy of the Church, he said. Referring to declarations by several provinces that they are formally “out of communion” with the American church, Dr Sugden called for the US church to be suspended from the communion, with the goal of eventual reconciliation.

Advocating the evangelical view, he said: “We have to note that the liberal strand in the Anglican tradition is practically absent in the regions where the Church is growing,”

The irony in all of this is that Rowan the fuzzy is in an impossible position - *he* doesn't believe most of Holy Scripture, except when it's convenient to do so, and therefore cannot truly understand those of us on the conservative Christian side - much less argue in Biblical terms. At the same time, even though he would rather just tell us to sit down and shut up, he realizes that any attempt to do so will only widen the schism. Additionally Rowan has been made aware of the fact that HRH Elizabeth II will be highly unamused by any failure to hold the Anglican Communion together. HRH has a reputation for making her displeasure known publicly (though of course politely), which would send the Church of England into an even faster tailspin than it already is exhibitting.

Taking that all into account one has to wonder why Rowan doesn't just resign and move to New Zealand....

Title: THE YEAR OF THE FRENCH

There were several points at which Ireland had real hope of gaining independence from Great Britain. During one notable episode the Irish revolutionaries made an alliance with France in which France pledged to send ships to come to their aid. The revolutionaries made a major push for independence.

The French never arrived. Thousands of Irishmen were slaughtered during the "Year of French" in which they waited for rescue in vain.

We faithful Anglicans in ECUSA have repeatedly been promised that if we are patient, we will be rescued. If we hold on and hold together, Canterbury or the Primates or some happy combination of both will come and save us.

Rowan IS "the Western liberal intellectual elite." I am finally facing it.

The Primates have ALREADY left the Anglican Communion. No one seems to be capable of admitting this very simple, inescapable, totally obvious fact.

Now he is telling us we all have to go to some kind of "Deeper Place" in Biblical understanding.

All he is really concerned with is keeping everybody on the reservation. Well, most of the Africans, Asians and Latins have already gone.

Last week, Archbp Eames said that they couldn't possibly finish their job before Spring 2005 while the Primates clearly said that they need to know how things will be worked out by September. Do they think that the Primates are just going to meekly sit there waiting for answers which are not going to arrive?

The statement that the Primates want a Communion, not a federation comes from Archbp Venables. What he means by this is not that everyone is staying together in hopes of a settlement, but rather that a federation may end up being the best case scenario in terms of the Eames' Commission's work.

Actually, what we have now and are going to continue to have is scattering and chaos. In Minneapolis and Dallas and in press releases Bp Duncan and the AAC keeps on saying that we can't jump ship until the rescue boat arrives. The ship has sunk --- and so has the "rescue boat." Grab a piece of flotsam and try to keep you own head above water.

I am hitting bottom on this thing, gang.

Any responses would be appreciated.

Rowan and Eames (has a ring to it, doesn't it?) are desperately searching for some way to avoid having to support the conservatives. They're starting with the two usual leftist tactics of name calling and stalling for time. I wouldn't put it past them to be hoping for a comet strike or anything else of similar catastrophic nature to make people 'forget' the current issue. What they completely fail to understand is that although *they* don't hold to any non-relativist value system many of the rest of us do, and are not willing to change. That being the case about all they can do is run around in circles waving their arms in the air and making funny noises.

Frank the heretic, being a rather second-rate intellect at best (to put it politely) will take all of this in his usual manner and proceed to persecute the Christians every way possible, while telling us it's our own fault...and wondering why no one believes him.

Bp. Duncan and the Network are biding their time waiting for Frank to begin his pogroms, in order to provide the Global South Primates with the lever they need to finally break with the heretical Global North, at which time the Global South folks will also recognize the Network and probably AMIA as the only 'Anglican Communion' organizations in the United State.

...and then there are the Aussies, but more on them later...

Thanks for the laugh -- I really needed one. I am having a vision of a Monty Python skit with Eric Idle as Eames and John Cleese (with beard) as Rowan in vestments running around in circles waving their hands in the air and going: eek eek-eek-eek eek eek.

Maybe if one of us brings them a shrubbery, it will all get better. :o)

Ultimately, the "rescue" will come not from some political game, but from God. (Remember Him? He does have something to say about all this). Whatever the Church of the future looks like, it will not look like the Church of the recent past, and that is a very good thing.

I completely agree. I simply hit my bottom before you did. The moment for me came when Bill O'Reilly was interviewing an obviously gay "priest" at the ECUSA convention in August last year and asked him how he could reconcile what they were doing with Holy Scripture. The "priest" responded that what they had done was led by the Holy Spirit, not what it says in "A BOOK." I was so stunned I couldn't speak for a moment. If what a church does is not based on Scripture, then all you are literally left with are stoles, incense, pretty buildings, and a meaningless liturgy. When I started posting on FR and said I had left the ECUSA, someone said it would be far better to wait and "see what happens." Well, a year from now, we'll still be waiting for some kind of "resolution." Rowan and the others simply can't conceive of their beloved communion coming apart. We need to do what brave Christians have done before and refuse to just go along as usual. Look at what is happening in San Francisco! Why not polygamy, or marrying your children? Where does it end?

I hope you are able to make whatever decision you need to that will give you peace. As for me, the Sunday following the convention found me in an EPC church.

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