Archbishop of Canterbury’s Sermon at the Anglican Consultative Council (A Must Read)

Let me begin by giving you a summary of the sermon that I'm not going to preach. It's very tempting when we hear the New Testament lesson today to use it as a way of thinking about the Church including strangers. The Church moves from one ethnic group to another and proves that it is adaptable for new people. The Church is always changing itself so as to be a welcoming place for the stranger, the unfamiliar neighbour. And that wouldn't be a bad sermon, but I have a suspicion that it's not quite what the Acts of the Apostles wants us to think about. I have a suspicion that the Acts of the Apostles is here telling us something rather deeper and more central about our faith.

The relation between Jews and Gentiles in the Acts is not simply that of one racial group to another. As the story is presented to us, it's a story about a great crisis over what faith really is, and what salvation really is. The strict believers who challenge Paul and Barnabas and have no small dissension and debate with them - one of Luke's wonderfully tactful phrases - those strict believers are in effect saying it is possible to know that you are in the favour of God. Be circumcised, keep the law, and when you are alone in the silence of your room, you will know where to turn to be sure; you will know what your record is. You will know that you have the signs that make you acceptable to God. To which Paul and Barnabas, and the Church ever since have replied, 'There is no sign by which you can tell in and of yourself that you are acceptable to God. There is nothing about you that guarantees love, salvation, healing, and peace. But there is everything about God in Jesus Christ that assures you, and so if you want to know where your certainty lies, look to God, not to yourself.' Don't tick off the conditions that might possible make God love you, scoring highly, perhaps, and thinking, 'So God must love me after all.' Begin rather by looking into the face of the love of God in Jesus Christ, and then, as it were, out of your bewilderment and your speechlessness at that love, thinking, 'And yes, I am loved.' Not just one episode, you see, in the history of the Church, but almost another Pentecost.

About half way through the Acts of the Apostles, here comes this great event in which the Church together, in a difficult and painful discernment, comes to say, 'It is not in us, but in God, that our security lies, because we cannot assure ourselves, and we cannot heal ourselves, and we cannot feed ourselves. We can only come to God empty-handed, looking into his face, depending absolutely on Him.' We believe that we will be saved through the grace of the Lord Jesus, just as they will. The grace of the Lord Jesus, which is what the Gospel story is about today. Once again, the strict make their challenge. What is Jesus doing in the company of tax collectors and sinners? Jesus' reply is wonderfully ironic. 'If you don't think you need me,' he says to the strict believers, 'feel free to go.' And we might think he looks each one of them in the eye and says, 'If you don't think you need, you can go.' And there's our challenge. As Christ looks at each one of us, which of us is able to say, 'All right, I don't need you, I'll go.' 'Those who are well have no need of a physician.' So says Jesus to his critics and to us. 'So if you are healthy, you don't need me. If you are whole, at peace with yourself, satisfied in your skin, happy in the world, you don't need me.' And again, which of us will say, 'I am whole. I have finished my work. I am at peace in the world.'

The difficulty of the Gospel is perhaps this: that it gives comfort neither to the legalist nor to the libertine. It doesn't say, 'You can win the grace of God by being good', and it doesn't say, 'The grace of God makes no difference to you.' It sweeps away the cobwebs and the veils, and makes us face a Jesus who says, 'So, do you need me or not? Are you hungry? Are you sick? Is your work, your life unfinished? Because, if you are whole and not hungry, and finished, go.'

Here we are then, this morning, the people who have not found the nerve to walk away. And is that perhaps the best definition we could have of the Church? We are the people who have not had the nerve to walk away; who have not had the nerve to say in the face of Jesus, 'All right, I'm healthy, I'm not hungry. I've finished, I've done.' We have, thank God, not found it in us to lie to that extent. For all the lies we tell ourselves day after day, that fundamental lie has been impossible for us. Thank God. We're here as hungry people, we are here because we cannot heal and complete ourselves; we're here to eat together at the table of the Lord, as he sits at dinner in this house, and is surrounded by these disreputable, unfinished, unhealthy, hungry, sinful, but at the end of the day almost honest people, gathered with him to find renewal, to be converted, and to change. Because the hard secret of our humanity is that while the body has the capacity to heal itself, the soul it seems doesn't. The soul can only be loved into life - and love is always something that we cannot generate out of our own insides - where we have to come with hands and hearts open to receive.

The people who didn't have the nerve to walk away. And because they didn't have the nerve to walk away, the people who not always in an easy or welcome way, find they have more in common than they might have thought. What do we all have in common this morning in this church? We are hungry for God's love, God's truth, and God's healing, and we have recognised that we cannot heal our own spirits, but must come to one another and to God for that healing. Hungry together, reaching out our empty hands together, we discover something about our humanity that we could in no other way discover, and we as an Anglican Communion, a world-wide fellowship of believers, we are saying that from country to country and language to language, and culture to culture, there is always the hunger, there is always the need for love, and at that level our human solidarity is revealed to us as it is in no other way.

Just theology? Just pulpit talk? No. No, in a world where human solidarity doesn't seem so obvious. Next weekend, and the week after that, the wealthy nations of the world will be considering what particular crumbs from their table might fall somewhere in the direction of the needy of the world. In a world where such a meeting is even necessary, we need witnesses to solidarity. We need to remember that those who starve and struggle in terrible violence and deprivation are us, not them - part of one human community, loved equally with the passion of God, invited equally to the table of Jesus Christ. We are part of the civilisation which has somehow got used to the idea that what is good for us in the wealthy part of the world has no connection with what is good for anyone else. We have somehow got used to this, and we as Christians are all too seldom pained and angered enough by this. I spoke during the meeting last week of the vision of the Church as that of a community where the poverty of one is the poverty of all, where the wealth of one is the wealth of all. Where because we recognise our solidarity as human beings, our active compassion for one another is kindled. And in a civilisation that is deeply sick, we need the Body of Christ to be alive and well. And that too is what we celebrate this morning. Invited into the Body of Christ, into those who recognise together their need and their hunger, we proclaim to the world that it is God's purpose that we should live with and for each other; that it is God's purpose that each of us here to be a gift to the neighbour of whatever background, whatever race. 'Those who are well have no need of a physician, but those who are sick.' And Jesus says to us, not only as individuals, but as a whole civilisation here in the northern world, the western world, 'So, you don't need me; so you are well?' God help us if we try to turn away from that challenge.

So our being together here, at the table of the Lord, recognising that it is not about us but about Him, that our security lies not in the signs of our virtue and achievement, but in God's generosity - being here on that basis is itself a mark of hope. And those of us who care about our Anglican Communion worldwide - its unity, its life, and its peace - care for it not in order to keep an ecclesiastical institution more or less upright, propping it up with more and more crumbling pillars and struts and buttresses. We care about it because we are part of the Body of Christ and the world needs the Body of Christ. It is hungry for truth and for love. We are here to be fed with that truth and that love in the body and the blood of the Lord in His Holy Sacrament. As we open our hands to receive that gift, so we open them to one another and to the world. We do not have the nerve to walk away. So much the better for us. The appetite for truth is still alive. So much the better for us. May truth and love, the truth and love of Jesus as he sits with sinners, be the motive power of all we do and say in our meetings as Church, in our witness to the world, in our protest against division and violence and hunger. May we say to the whole world that we believe that we will be save through the grace of the Lord Jesus, just as they will.

I didn't say that he was in accord with Scripture. I said that what he cited was in fact in Scripture. You neatly evaded my flat statement that IMHO, he misused Scripture.

As your colonial whinge, it's quite old hat. What is now Zimbabwe would still be resolutely Stone Age, whatever the political cost in the interim, had not Cecil Rhodes and his henchmen arrived. That they were likely racist is no surpise, just about everybody was (and, as I repeat, Zimbabweans are even more emphatically are now than Rhodes ever was, just in reverse). So, the net is a great gain for what was Rhodesia. My main concern is that, because of their nativist and resentful approach to anything European, the current rulers are now chewing up their inherited windfall of political and economic capital. Mark my words, central Africans are starving and more will starve while liberals First Worlders hold conservative ones at arm's length unless we pay up in cash (and then we'll be shown the door in any case). This is the legacy of racist Western philosophy being dished up by Anglicans (I'll be charitable and allow that ++Rowan might not be quite so condescending as many theologians are on the subject).

One last thing: you worte the same 'the filter of your own opinions' comment to Petronius. That is not permitted, you are saying? Or shall we only be permitted to filter our comments through YOUR opinions? How is it that your comments are somehow free of bias and peculiarity while ours are rife with them? You are sounding quite ethnocentric. I would be interested to learn from what culture you are instructing us. After all, the value of sound words is that their meaning is proof against particularity or false construction. If both Petronius and I can so easily punch holes in ++Rowan's diction and meaning, then his words are not very sound at all, and being so fragile, have little worth in longer than this week's perspective.

I would have to grant that would be deconstructive, but I can live with that in the present case.

In Christ,
Deacon Paul+

*** No need to play the "open-mouthed amazement at my ignorance" card***

LOL! Hilarious! I'm sorry. I meant no disrespect. Forgive my poorly phrased statement. (I am still laughing at your descriptor).

***That said, I am also familiar with his actions with regard to the current controversies, and he has increasingly sided with the orthodox majority against the revisionists,***

Under no small amount of pressure, no doubt.

***But he's at least doing the right things at the moment,***

The ECUSA and Canadians have been patiently waiting for the "right moment" for decades. They thought they had found the right moment in Rowan, a person in sympathy with their cause, so they moved. It seems they underestimated the Africans - who are TRULY doing the right thing at the moment.

***and it suggests to me that he may in fact be trying to live up to the points he raises in his sermon.***

The points in his sermon are not what you seem to think. If you read it divested of knowlege of the author then the sermon may seem to be Biblical. But if you read it in the knowlege of Rowan's ideology it becomes a very different set of points.

Go read one of Griswald's letters - they are full of "love" and Christian sounding stuff - nothing clearly heretical. But his redefining of the terms makes the letter an epistle for heresy. (As a side note, what is left out of a sermon often defines the message more than what's left in.)

That is not permitted, you are saying?

Quite the contrary -- indeed, you'll note that I said to you in the very same sentence that it's a valid approach. But when using that approach, one must first be honest about the fact, and the fellow who uses it has a responsibility first to ensure that his opinions are worth a damn.

Your argument about Rhodesia boils down to a statement that life was "less bad" under Cecil Rhodes than it would otherwise have been, and as I noted originally, it was certainly better than it is now. But you must ask yourself: would you want to live as one of the folks who were subjected to the minority in Rhodesia? The answer is "no," and you know it. And let's be honset, the rulers of Rhodesia were interested mainly in protecting their own interests, not in doing the right thing. You've set yourself up for a fall by defending people who are doing wrong.

From both a moral and political perspecitve it's unhelpful to defend something because it's "less bad" than the alternative. From a practical standpoint, you've set yourself up as a defender of something you, yourself, could not tolerate. As you should have learned by now, from watching liberals kill us with it year in and year out, this approach is a sure-fire loser. And it's a loser because you've taken the moral low ground, making yourself an easy target for charges of hypocrisy. From a moral perspective, you've put yourself in the position of the Rich Man in the parable to which I pointed you earlier.

Rhodesia needed change -- just not the change it got. The reason things have ended up as they have, is that the only folks who were trying to change Rhodesia were the loony left who handed over the reigns to a madman in the name of "liberty." We "responsible" folks were content to defend the status quo, rather than trying to find a solution to a real problem.

If both Petronius and I can so easily punch holes in ++Rowan's diction and meaning

And here we find ourselves going full circle. You've built yourself a strawman ++Rowan, and are bashing happily away at him, meanwhile somehow forgetting to pay attention to the words he's saying. The words are correct, regardless of how ++Rowan, or you or I, happen to apply them.

They thought they had found the right moment in Rowan, a person in sympathy with their cause, so they moved. It seems they underestimated the Africans - who are TRULY doing the right thing at the moment.

No argument there. But the ABC is using his office properly in response, and directly contrary to his personal beliefs on the matter -- what more can you ask?

Go read one of Griswald's letters - they are full of "love" and Christian sounding stuff - nothing clearly heretical.

That's where you're wrong. Griswold's letters are typically heretical on their face, because they are generally clearly contrary to the plain meaning of Scripture. This sermon, by contrast, is perfectly in accord with the plain meaning of Scripture.

Let me ask you a question: were this sermon to be given by somebody you trusted, would you be yelling as loudly? I rather doubt it. The words themselves are sound, and they ought to give you serious pause.

No, thank you. I thought you didn't need education on these issues, but only had a varying opinion on how they are being applied. Are you now changing the subject?

I'm not changing the subject, but you seem to be avoiding it. You say he's misusing Scripture, and now you refuse to say how. I see the lay of the land now....

I'm not getting into a text-slanging match when I have far more important things to do than parse the musings of an Archbishop

Bull. You started this in the first place by parsing the musings of said Archbishop, and you accusing him of mis-using Scripture, but now refuse to say how.

And you're a deacon in which continuing church...?

Look, I don't know you and so I can't be sure whether you actually are a conservative 'training' me in cyberargument or are a liberal troller just trying to look like a conservative. What I'm not doing is trusting you and every post you've issued has only intensified the mistrust.

So far as actually arguing with liberals, that is over. There is no commonality of language and almost no commonality even of belief and symbol set. Many of your comments have in fact resonated of liberal phraseology and argumentation, which I why my posts have increasingly detached from the discussion. So, your pedogogical intent is being frustrated by your method. Perhaps that needs as much attention as my own dismissive attitudes to the past. The point there being that I'm not buying into the concept that current people owe for past errors and misdeeds, no matter how egregious and there's going to be no ground given on that. Any attempt perceived to open the rhetorical door to such reparations is going to be slammed shut with no apologies, no matter how well meant. I perceive ++Rowan to be trying to open that door. Slam it goes, no matter how pointy his hat.

So I have no concern about convincing a liberal. That has never yet happened and the responses I've gotten in 12 years of online argumentation have grown increasingly alien, implying that not only am I never going to convince one of them unless I unilaterally adopt their rhetorical and philosophic premises, the gap between what they intend and what I intend continues to grow.

That said, I commend that, if you were in fact trying to teach, please be assured that I see what you're saying in that regard. If I did want to actually convince a liberal, I certainly would not take so doctrinaire a tone. Please do understand that there is no compromise possible with those on the other side of these issues, as I see it. The rationales and explications have already been made by people far more informed than I and have been firmly ignored if not derided. That kind of insolence demands that anyone of common sense simply shun those folk until they see the light or simply go away.

IOW, this is not like Evangelicals and Anglo-Catholics arguing over whether vestments should be worn (though that would be exactly how ECUSA would put it, had it occurred to them).

In Christ,
Deacon Paul+

That is EXACTLY right. This struggle with liberals is for the very hear and soul of the church. If they were to win then the CoE would cease to be Christian.

True.

This is a war. It is not some quibble over modes of baptism.

Also true.

The question is: what kind of war do you want to fight? Is it enough simply to win the victory you want to win(as Judas would have had it), regardless of God's desires in the matter? I'm not calling you, or anybody, a Judas -- I'm merely suggesting that we need to be careful not to let our own desires blind us to the possibility that God's idea of victory may be rather different from ours.

On the matter of homosexuality, for example, how precisely would we define "victory?" I find that it's not that easy to do. Sure, there are the obvious points: no same-sex marriage, and no ordination for practicing homosexuals. But beyond that ... what should the church do about people who are homosexuals? What would constitute "victory" there?

Unfortunatley Rowan has let it be know that his sympathies are with the other side. That immediatley nullifies all he has to say - until he says "I repent".

Well, that's precisely the sort of "gotta have it all or we won't take nothin'" mentality that has gotten our side into this mess in the first place.

++Rowan's actions are, at the moment, speaking much louder than his words, and as a result we're gaining serious ground for the first time in quite a while. Is he doing it willingly? I seriously doubt it -- but he is doing it, despite the fact that it runs counter to his stated opinions. Again: what more do you want?

Let me ask you a question. Divested of any knowlege of the speaker, do you find any problem with the following message... "He shall give his angels charge concerning thee: and in their hands they shall bear thee up, lest at any time thou dash thy foot against a stone."

Nope. No problem at all, it being a quote from Psalm 91.

I see where you're going with this. You're no doubt referring to Satan's use of these words as part of his temptation of Jesus. He was challenging Jesus to put God to the test -- his intentions were self-evidently wrong. You're free to argue that ++Rowan is using Scripture in the same way.

But as for the words of Psalm 91 -- I don't have a problem with them, and I certainly hope you don't either.

Nor do I have a problem with the Scriptural interpretations ++Rowan has provided in this sermon. You're certainly free to disagree with how ++Rowan chooses to act on his interpretation of the lessons, but at the same time it cannot be denied that the interpretation of the passage from Luke 5 is sound and (dare I say it) orthodox; and his discussion of the scene in Acts is likewise unobjectionable.

The sermon stands on its own, and need not be read through the lens of one's opinions about ++Rowan's motives in giving it. There's some good stuff there -- let go of your pride for a moment and enjoy it.

*** The question is: what kind of war do you want to fight?***

How about this kind...

"Beloved, when I gave all diligence to write unto you of the common salvation, it was needful for me to write unto you, and exhort you that ye should earnestly contend for the faith which was once delivered unto the saints."

In other words, a fight for the historic faith.

***... what should the church do about people who are homosexuals? What would constitute "victory" there?***

How about repentance? Just like an adulterer.

Know ye not that the unrighteous shall not inherit the kingdom of God? Be not deceived: neither fornicators, nor idolaters, nor adulterers, nor effeminate, nor abusers of themselves with mankind,

Nor thieves, nor covetous, nor drunkards, nor revilers, nor extortioners, shall inherit the kingdom of God.

And such were some of you: but ye are washed, but ye are sanctified, but ye are justified in the name of the Lord Jesus, and by the Spirit of our God."

The victory for these people is for them to be washed, sanctified, justified, born again.

***Well, that's precisely the sort of "gotta have it all or we won't take nothin'" mentality that has gotten our side into this mess in the first place.***

Think about what your are saying! The reason we are in this mess is not because of "our side", it is because theological liberals opened the door to radical homosexualists who desire to remake the church in their own image.

These homosexuals and revisionists are going to spend an eternity separated from God unless they seek forgiveness, turn from their present path and begin to follow the Lord in the true historic faith.

And you seek a compromise with them? You are bidding them Godspeed to hell by your compromise.

*** The sermon stands on its own, and need not be read through the lens of one's opinions about ++Rowan's motives in giving it. There's some good stuff there -- let go of your pride for a moment and enjoy it.***

A sermon on a thread titled "Archbishop of Canterbury’s Sermon at the Anglican Consultative Council" can not stand on it's own any more that a sermon with Frank Griswald's name on it can stand alone.

Is the statement "Jesus love you" the same coming from Frank Griswald as it is coming from Handley Moule?

Of course not! One is a mishmash or radicalism and pantheism and the other is a summation of historic Christianity.

You seem to be arguing both sides at once.

You didn't really answer my question. We agree that it is a fight for the faith once delivered. But the faith once delivered is based on living the spirit, and not simply the letter of the law. The question is, how do you define the terms of victory, when it's a matter of determining the spirit of the law? It's a serious question, and often it's not easy to answer when it comes down to actually doing something.

For example, you speak of "repentence" as being what the church should do about homosexuals. That really has no practical meaning, whether you're talking about the church repenting, or homosexuals doing the same. (One could read your response either way.)

The question is: what would you have the church do with respect to homosexuals? Should the church kick them out? Should the church attempt to reform them, while keeping them within the Body? Should the church overlook their activities? All are possible responses ... and there are a lot more than that. Which is the right thing for the church to do?

Lest we get too haughty here, there's no reason to demand that the church's response to this particular sin should be any different from its response to any other sin. Can you stop all your sinning? I know I can't -- I'm weak. I seem to fail time and again, especially on those things for which I'm most "repentent." Should the church kick me out as well, or is it sufficient for me to acknowledge my sickness?

I confess I don't know what the church should do about homosexuals, beyond enforcing a teaching of the standard of "sex within heterosexual marriage, and celibate outside it," and from that applying the "1 Timothy" standard for clergy.

That's not the "repentence" you're calling for, and yet it seems to be about all the church can (and should?) really do on the matter.

***But the faith once delivered is based on living the spirit, and not simply the letter of the law.***

The words of the NT are spirit. Following the NT's guidance is not legalistic.

*** For example, you speak of "repentence" as being what the church should do about homosexuals***

Let me clarify: homosexuals should be told ny the church that they need to repent.

*** The question is: what would you have the church do with respect to homosexuals?***

What did Paul counsel the Corinthians to do with the man who had taken his father's wife?

*** Lest we get too haughty here, there's no reason to demand that the church's response to this particular sin ***

This is not a "particular sin" like Anglican smoking or cheating on their taxes, (and this highlights why I find your arguments unacceptable). This is a movement, a "sexual heresy" if you will, that is threatening to consume Western Anglicicanism & Protestantism.

*** Nope. You're just so busy pounding the table that you're not listening to what I'm trying to say, ***

I'm pretty calm here.

***as it's entirely possible that our "fixes" to the problems could make things worse for the church. ***

Having a church over run with homosexuals - having a church turned ito some sort of gay dating service as we have seen in churchs where homosexual cliques gain the accendance - I can hardly see how any "fix" could be worse!

*** One thing I am not saying is that we should "compromise" with the likes of Frank Griswold, ***

I don't know you - you may be a stand up guy. But when you say, "that's precisely the sort of "gotta have it all or we won't take nothin'" mentality" does it not imply that some sort of compromise is called for?

The words of the NT are spirit. Following the NT's guidance is not legalistic.

People can screw anything up, even the words of the New Testament. See, e.g., Frank Griswold and Fred Phelps. I've seen plenty of legalistic NT stuff -- the "KJV is the only God-inspired version" folks are a good example.

What did Paul counsel the Corinthians to do with the man who had taken his father's wife?

Good point. The question is, how do you suggest the church should actually do that? Would you institute an inquisition? Would you prefer a "don't ask, don't tell" policy? Or will you simply let the folks come in, and let God deal with it in His good time? How should the church's teaching reflect all of this? Should it never be mentioned from the pulpit, or should it be mentioned at every opportunity? That's the issue here.

What the church's policy ought to be is perfectly clear (we've never disagreed on that). What the church does, however, is another matter entirely. We obviously can't take the Fred Phelps route, and we obviously can't take the Frank Griswold route. The answer is somewhere in between -- clear teaching on sexuality, and yet some sort of pastoral care for a group of folks who desperately need it.

This is a movement, a "sexual heresy" if you will, that is threatening to consume Western Anglicicanism & Protestantism.

It's not the real problem, though -- it's only one aspect of a much larger issue, which is the heresy of placing our will above God's, and replacing God's truth with our desires. Our whole culture is mired in that heresy. As the Pike matter showed in the '60s, our church had begun to lose sight of the truth long before homosexuals began their assault. If we were to encapsulate the whole gamut into individuals, I think one could point to folks like Bill Clinton, Newt Gingrich, or the Enron crowd.

Having a church over run with homosexuals - having a church turned ito some sort of gay dating service as we have seen in churchs where homosexual cliques gain the accendance - I can hardly see how any "fix" could be worse!

Fred Phelps and the Westboro Baptist Church are an excellent example of a "fix" that's worse than the disease.

But when you say, "that's precisely the sort of "gotta have it all or we won't take nothin'" mentality" does it not imply that some sort of compromise is called for?

No. I'm talking strategy -- how do we get where we need to go? The point is that we conservatives are prone to going for the one-shot, instant, big-fix victories, and when we think we've got one, we forget about the whole thing. It kills us every time. The left, meanwhile, has gained ascendancy by patiently accumulating incremental victories over years. Their strategy clearly works far better than ours does, plus which it allows them to adjust their approach to suit the situation as it changes. It requires patience and focus, which we conservatives seem to lack.

In the present situation, we've gotten some significant but incremental victories, beginning even before GC '03. What has the conservative response been? For a lot of folks, it has been to bitch about not getting the utter and complete victory in one swell foop. (See, e.g., the responses to the Windsor Report.) It's "weakness" and "giving in" and other such yapping. Rather than focusing on consolidating our gains and moving ahead, we fall into recriminations, and give the whole damned thing back to the left. That is what I mean by the "gotta have it all or we won't take nothin'" mentality.

What Paul (and you) are suggesting is an active purge of the church. But again ... how would you do propose to do that in a manner acceptable to God? Is it a general purge of homosexuals (and must the church therefore test its members for homosexual tendencies)? Is it a purge only of those who are out of the closet? Is it a purge only of those who are out of the closet and unrepentant? Is it none of the above?

What, precisely, is the goal here? I think a lot of folks have not fully though it through, and thus have not addressed the steps needed to accomplish that goal.

For one very interesting take on the subject, I would recommend to you the booklet "True Union in the Body," published by the Anglican Communion Institute.

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