NIGERIA: Bishops urge postponing Lambeth Conference, call for special Primates' Meeting
Episcopal News Service. September 14, 2007 [091407-06]
Matthew Davies
In a September 13 open letter to Archbishop of Canterbury Rowan Williams, the Anglican Church of Nigeria's House of Bishops has urged postponement of the 2008 Lambeth Conference of Bishops, and called for a special session of the Primates' Meeting "as a matter of utmost urgency."
The bishops also expressed support for the proposed Anglican covenant, calling it "one way for us to uphold our common heritage of faith while at the same time holding each other accountable to those teachings that have defined our life together and also guide us into the future."
Postponing current plans for the Lambeth Conference, the bishops said, would "allow the current tensions to subside and leave room for the hard work of reconciliation that is a prerequisite for the fellowship we all desire." It would also be important for those invited to the Lambeth Conference to have already endorsed the Anglican covenant, they said, so that they "are able to come together as witnesses to our common faith."
The Nigerian bishops also raised concerned about "the abuse directed towards those who hold to traditional views on matters of human sexuality," noting that "the spate of hostility in the U.K. is alarming."
The bishops cited as just one example "the presence of placard carrying and leaflets distributing campaigners at the last Lambeth Conference distracting Bishops who traveled thousands of miles for fellowship," adding that "these protesters effectively shifted the focus of the conference to human sexuality - as if that was all that mattered."
"In truth anyone who does not embrace revisionist views is a potential target," they said. "We know it is possible to provide some security to minimize such occurrences but is the additional cost justifiable? Would the resultant atmosphere of fear and uncertainty be conducive to the goals of such a large gathering of bishops?"
"[H]ow can we as bishops in the Church of God gather for a Lambeth Conference when there is such a high level of distrust, dislike and disdain for one another?" the Nigerian bishops meeting in Osogbo, Osun State, said in their letter. "How can we meet as leaders of the Communion when our relationships are so sorely strained and our life together so broken that we cannot even share together in the Lord's Supper? It would be a mockery and bring dishonor to the name of our Lord and Savior Jesus the Christ."
The second proposal the bishops outlined in their letter is for a special session of the Primates' Meeting to be convened to "receive the responses made by The Episcopal Church to the Dromantine and Dar es Salaam Communiqués and determine their adequacy" and "arrive at a consensus for the application of the Windsor Process especially in Provinces whose self-understanding is at odds with the predominant mind of the Communion."
The bishops also opined that a special Primates Meeting would "set in motion an agreed process to finalize the Anglican Covenant Proposal and set a timetable for its ratification by individual provinces. This cannot be done at the Lambeth Conference because it is simply too large and, we all know, the Anglican Covenant requires individual provincial endorsement and signature."
The full text of the open letter to Williams is available here.
Williams called an "extraordinary" meeting of Anglican Primates in August 2003 after the election of New Hampshire Bishop Gene Robinson as the first openly gay bishop in the Anglican Communion. The Primates met at Lambeth Palace in October 2003 to discuss the implications of Robinson's election and subsequent consecration.
In other business, Nigeria's bishops elected four new suffragan bishops September 12 to serve the Convocation of Anglicans in North America (CANA), a conservative breakaway group composed largely of former Episcopalians and some Nigerian expatriates.
The bishops-elect are Roger Ames of Akron, Ohio, rector of St. Luke's Anglican Church; David Anderson of Atlanta, Georgia, president of the American Anglican Council; and Nigerian priests Amos Fagbamiye of Indianapolis, Indiana, vicar of the Anglican Church of the Resurrection; and Nathan Kanu of Oklahoma City, Oklahoma, priest-in-charge of Christ's Ambassadors Church.