Conservative Primates Council elects new leadership, criticizes Episcopal Church
Episcopal News Service. April 13, 2010 [041310-04]
Matthew Davies
A group of conservative Anglican primates, meeting April 5-9 in Bermuda, has criticized the Episcopal Church for the election of a partnered lesbian as a suffragan bishop in Los Angeles and named new leadership for the Global Anglican Future Conference/Fellowship of Confessing Anglicans Primates Council.
The council was formed out of the controversial Global Anglican Future Conference that was held in Jerusalem during June 2008, one month prior to the Lambeth Conference of bishops. Many of the bishops attending GAFCON chose to boycott the Lambeth Conference.
A communiqué issued at the conclusion of the Bermuda meeting described the FCA as "a movement defined by theology that delivers spiritual and practical outcomes to faithful Anglican Christians around the world."
Archbishop Gregory Venables of the Argentina-based Province of the Southern Cone will serve as council chairman, succeeding retired Church of Nigeria Archbishop Peter Akinola. Archbishops Emmanuel Kolini of Rwanda and Eliud Wabukala of Kenya will serve as vice chairmen. Archbishop Peter Jensen of the Diocese of Sydney, in the Anglican Church of Australia, will continue as general secretary.
Also present at the Bermuda meeting were the primates of Nigeria, Tanzania and West Africa, and deposed Episcopal Diocese of Pittsburgh Bishop Robert Duncan, who in 2009 was elected as archbishop of the Anglican Church in North America. The ACNA is a conservative entity made up primarily of individuals and groups that have left the Episcopal Church and the Anglican Church of Canada, as well as those that have never been members of those two provinces.
Archbishop Henry Orombi of Uganda was represented at the meeting by Bishop Nathan Kyamanywa of Bunyoro-Kitara.
Since its formation, the GAFCON/FCA Primates Council has been critical of recent developments in the Episcopal Church concerning human sexuality issues and litigation to retain property of which breakaway Episcopalians have attempted to take ownership. Venables has offered oversight to conservative members of parishes and dioceses breaking away from the Episcopal Church and the Anglican Church of Canada.
The full text of the Bermuda communiqué is available here.
The Primates Council "acknowledged that the issues that divide our beloved communion are far from settled" and that the election of the Rev. Mary Glasspool, a partnered lesbian, as a bishop suffragan in Los Angeles "makes clear to all that the American Episcopal Church leadership has formally committed itself to a pattern of life which is contrary to Scripture."
Glasspool is the second openly gay partnered priest to be elected a bishop in the Episcopal Church. On March 17, Presiding Bishop Katharine Jefferts Schori's office confirmed that Glasspool had received the required number of consents from diocesan standing committees and bishops with jurisdiction to her ordination and consecration as a bishop. Her consecration is set for May 15.
Jefferts Schori also noted in a letter to the communion's primates that Glasspool's consent "is not the decision of one person, or a small group of people. It represents the mind of a majority of the elected leaders in the Episcopal Church, lay, clergy and bishops, who have carefully considered the opinions and feelings of other members of the Anglican Communion as well as the decades-long conversations within this church."
But the Primates Council said the action "makes clear that any pretence that there has been a season of gracious restraint in the communion has come to an end. Now is the time for all orthodox biblical Anglicans, both in the USA and around the world, to demonstrate a clear and unambiguous stand for the historic faith and their refusal to participate in the direction and unbiblical practice and agenda of [the Episcopal Church]."
During a December meeting in London, the Standing Committee of the Anglican Communion passed a resolution calling for "gracious restraint in respect of actions that endanger the unity of the Anglican Communion." Those actions included Glasspool's election and the then-pending consent process, the decisions of some Episcopal Church and Anglican Church of Canada bishops to allow same-gender blessings, and what the resolution called "continuing cross-jurisdictional activity within the communion," such as efforts by the ACNA and Venables to offer oversight to conservative parishes in the U.S.
The Primates Council opined that "the current strategy in the Anglican Communion to strengthen structures by committee and commission has proved ineffective. Indeed we believe that the current structures have lost integrity and relevance … The Anglican Communion will only be able to fulfill its gospel mandate if it understands itself to be a community gathered around a confession of faith rather than an organization that has its primary focus on institutional loyalty."
The council said it is committing itself to "working collaboratively both with our friends in the Global South and throughout the communion" and that it looks forward to the Fourth Global South to South Encounter, set for April 19-23 at St. Andrew's Cathedral in Singapore.
In its conclusion, the communiqué said that the council is "mindful of those who live with the threat of violence because of their Christian faith, such as Nigeria, Iraq and Sudan and those who live in places of deprivation and disaster such as Haiti and Chile."