GAFCON: Where do we go from here?
Jun 27th, 2008 by David
From the Church Times blog:
A PAPER recommending a separate Anglican Communion has been presented to participants at GAFCON. The paper, entitled “Where do we go from here?”, recommends that, if the Lambeth Conference fails to adopt a decree endorsed by GAFCON, the GAFCON leadership, at its meeting on 4 January 2009, should take steps to formulate a new body which would be “unattached from the present Anglican Communion” by 2011.
The paper is written by the Rt Revd John Rodgers, one of the bishops, now retired, in the breakaway Anglican Mission in America, working in the United States but overseen by the Archbishop of Rwanda. It therefore reflects a strain in conservative Anglicanism that has experienced a degree of separation from Canterbury (Anglican Mission in America bishops, because of their irregular consecration, are not deemed eligible for an invitation to the Lambeth Conference).
The paper was written a few days before GAFCON, so it is not yet known how many of the participants will wish to adopt its recommendations. None the less, it is another indication that many at GAFCON will push for a hard line in the final communiqué.
He proposed the establishment of what he calls a global Anglican family. More particularly, he talks of an “orthodox province in North America” which would operate independently from existing dioceses.
As a teenager downhill racing on a hill called the Elevator Shaft, I would experience a gripping sensation that was half fear and half delicious anticipation. At the staging line at the top of the hill we would place our ski tips over the edge of the lip and look down. The hill was so steep you couldn’t see it. One push of the poles and it felt just like free fall. I’ve had that sensation at various points in my life.
It looks very much like there are going to be tough initiatives coming out of Gafcon that will reshape our church.
I’m getting the very same feeling today that we are on the edge of that ski hill ready to go!
Peace,
Jim