Dear Friends:
Earlier, we circulated reports on the start of the inaugural assembly of the new Anglican Church in North America. Here, for those interested, is a sampling of reports written as the assembly progressed and concluded in Texas on Thursday.
Auburn Traycik
The Foundation for Christian Theology
http://www.washingtontimes.com/news/2009/jun/25/orthodox-leader-opens-a-dialogue/
Dissidents' archbishop anointed
By Julia Duin | Thursday, June 25, 2009
BEDFORD, Texas -- In an ornate ceremony in a Texas megachurch, the Episcopal bishop of Pittsburgh was made archbishop of the 100,000-member Anglican Church of North America on Wednesday night.
The Rt. Rev. Robert W. Duncan was installed as archbishop at Christ Church in the Dallas suburb of Plano, Texas, surrounded by 60 bishops, 323 clergy and 1,500 congregants. Kenya Anglican Archbishop Benjamin Nzimbi anointed the archbishop's hands, lips, and forehead with oil saying, "May your life be filled with the power of the Holy Spirit."
Earlier in the day, the high priest of one of America's three major Orthodox Christian bodies cheered...[the] group of Episcopalians who formed [the new] Anglican province this week, telling a crowd of about 600 that "our arms are wide open to you."
Metropolitan Jonah, the recently elected head of the Orthodox Church in America (OCA), told members of the Anglican Church of North America (ACNA) that he is eager to reopen an ecumenical dialogue that was frozen by the Episcopal ordination of women in the 1970s and by the consecration of an openly gay Episcopal bishop in 2003.
"What will it take for a true ecumenical reconciliation?" he asked. "That's what I am seeking by being here with you today," he added as ACNA delegates jumped to their feet and cheered.
The ACNA, which approved a constitution and canon laws this week, consists of about 100,000 members in 700 churches in 28 dioceses of varying Anglican and former Episcopal groups. It is in direct competition with the U.S. Episcopal Church and the Anglican Church of Canada as the official representative of world Anglicanism on the continent.
It also is looking for recognition from as many other Christian groups as possible. Several were represented Wednesday at the conference and at Archbishop Duncan's installation, including representatives from the National Association of Evangelicals, which represents 45,000 churches, and the 2.5-million-member Lutheran Church-Missouri Synod.
The Roman Catholic bishops of Fort Worth and Pittsburgh also paid visits. Wednesday's endorsement by Metropolitan Jonah marked the second straight day in which a major U.S. religious figure threw his weight behind the new ACNA in a speech to delegates -- the Rev. Rick Warren of California's Saddleback Church gave an endorsement to the new group Tuesday.
Although estimated to number 1 million adherents, Metropolitan Jonah's OCA has about 100,000 active members. It was part of the Russian Orthodox Church until it became its own self-governing body in 1970.
Wearing a long, black robe and a white monastic headdress that flowed part way down his back, the Orthodox prelate said that Anglicans and Orthodox bodies had had a robust dialogue until about the 1920s.
Eighty years later, "we need to pick up where they left off," he said.
The metropolitan's 55-minute speech did contain several conditions that are deal breakers for the ACNA, such as female priests, a practice that the Episcopal Church officially approved in 1976 and that some of the ACNA's groups wish to retain.
"I'm afraid my talk will have something to offend about everybody," he acknowledged. "But we have to speak the truth in love."
For example, "Calvinism is a condemned heresy," he said, which was a direct slap to the Reformed Episcopal Church, an ACNA member group formed in 1873 on principles -- such as predestination -- espoused by French-Swiss Protestant reformer John Calvin.
"There are other heresies that come from the Reformation that must be rejected," the prelate added, "such as the anti-sacramentalism in some forms of evangelicalism. ... When you go into some Protestant churches, you see it's an auditorium and maybe an empty cross."
Then, "the issue of ordination of women has to be resolved," he said to scattered applause.
"I believe in women's ministries. Women have a critical role in the life of the church. I don't believe it's in the presbyterate or the episcopate," alluding to the offices of priest and bishop. The Orthodox do allow women to be deacons.
"Please don't think there is only misogyny there," the prelate added. "Not a bit."
About 36 female priests were at the gathering. Some shrugged off his remarks.
"We know we're called by God, and we're not mistaken about that," said the Rev. Kathryn Jeffrey from North Oaks, Minn.
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Julia Duin of The Washington Times, who wrote the foregoing story, wrote following on her weblog about the service recognizing Robert Duncan as ACNA's Archbishop:
Anglicans end meeting with blow-out service
By Julia Duin on June 25, 2009 into Belief Blog
When it comes to blow-out church services, the Anglicans can sure put on the dog. I've been filing stories for the past three days on the constitutional convention for the Anglican Church of North America, the emerging 39th province of the 77-million-strong Anglican Communion. The big party to end it all was Wednesday night (it's 1:14 a.m. as I type this on Thursday) and it was a splasher.
The site was a Texas megachurch called Christ Church in Plano, a north Dallas suburb. Although I got lost getting there from Fort Worth (first ended up in Garland somehow), I knew when I finally drove up that this was the place. Talk about huge. Buildings everywhere and the sanctuary was cathedral-like in its vastness. All that was missing were side chapels and votive candles. The decor is a bit stark - no Christ on the main cross above the altar which goes along with low-church evangelicalism Texas-style.
Fortunately they got fancy with the music. Some 60 bishops and 323 clergy had to process in, so they needed something sprightly to move these folks in - long robes, mitres and academic hoods and all - rather quickly. What they came up with, composed by trombonist John Wasson, was a variation on the hymn "Praise My Soul the King of Heaven" combined with African march-style music in a 4/4 beat. Sounds awful but it was stunning - and beautiful.
Now before that, there was a ton of intro choral and organ music - the brass quintet and organ were the best in a list of very presentable offerings. I don't think this is ordinarily a church that [does] smells and bells of a more Anglo-Catholic service but they learned fast because of the huge variation of visitors there - people from around the globe coming to celebrate Archbishop Duncan's installation. The haunting "Veni Creator Spiritus" is very rarely done - usually for the consecration of bishops - and often it's played in a deadly fashion. At this church, the organ pounded it out in grand style. And fortunately the music director - Mark Snow - had the sense to choose the lovely "Missa de Sancta Maria Magdelena" for the Communion chants.
I've been doing this religion writer thing for more than 30 years and in the course of my travels, I've done Rome and Canterbury and Jerusalem; ordinations, installations and consecrations of everyone from Washington Archbishop Donald Wuerl to New Hampshire Bishop V. Gene Robinson. I've done papal Masses all over the country with two popes. But I've rarely been in a service where every single piece of music was beautifully done at top level during a 2 hour+ service involving 1,500 people. During Communion, a pianist whipped out a movement of Rachmaninoff's Piano Concerto #2. Even hymns I can't stand, like "Fairest Lord Jesus" got gorgeous arrangements.
I am running out of adjectives here so must go to bed. OK, I do play piano, guitar and harp, but I am no music critic. I was told most of the musicians are home-grown although for big occasions, the music director borrows folks from Dallas symphony and opera orchestras plus a few college music professors. There were other parts to the service that were memorable: the new archbishop joking about his bushy eyebrows; the colliding lines of all the visitors wandering to and from the Communion rail not to mention the party afterward outside in a hot and soupy Texas evening.
Good night.
- Julia Duin, religion editor
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FOR INFORMATION CONTACT:
Steve Yount o. 972.267.1111
c. 469.438.7011
steve@alarryross.com
FOR IMMEDIATE RELEASE
NORTH AMERICAN ANGLICANS REAFFIRM THEIR TRADITIONAL MISSION:
New Group Installs Archbishop Duncan, Emphasizes Evangelism
PLANO, Texas, June 24, 2009 – Orthodox Anglicans from the United States and Canada, meeting Wednesday night at Christ Church in a Dallas suburb, celebrated the creation of a Christ-centered, missionary Church – the Anglican Church in North America (ACNA).
“It is a great day because working together, we have been able, by God’s grace, to reunite a significant portion of our Anglican Church family here in North America,” said Bishop Robert Duncan of Pittsburgh at a news conference before his installation as the ACNA’s first archbishop. “We are uniting 700 congregations, and more importantly, committed Anglican believers in the north and in the south, on the west coast, and the east coast.”
The ACNA held its first Provincial Assembly this week, working to ratify the constitution and canons drafted by their bishops, clergy and lay leaders at a meeting in suburban Chicago last December when they announced they were forming a new “province” – a large regional Anglican jurisdiction in North America.
Mrs. Cheryl Chang, a member of the Governance Task Force that helped draft the constitution and canons, said, “Our task was to ensure that the structure was supporting the mission, not the mission supporting the structure.”
The preamble to the constitution says that orthodox Anglicans are “grieved by the current state of brokenness within the Anglican Communion [Anglicans’ worldwide church] prompted by those who have embraced erroneous teaching and who have rejected a repeated call to repentance.”
During the news briefing, many of the ACNA officials said the formation of a new province was a reaffirmation of the traditional values of the Anglican Communion.
“The teachings we hold to are the teachings that have governed the Anglican branch of Christianity for decades,” said Bishop Martyn Minns of the Convocation of Anglicans in North America. “So, in that sense, we’re not doing anything particularly new, but what we are doing is establishing that we want to stay within the [Christian] mainstream.”
Bishop Jack Iker of Fort Worth said that central theme of this new Provincial Assembly was an emphasis on evangelism and mission. “What I think is significant about that for Anglicans and Episcopalians in North America is that this is the beginning of the recovery of confidence in Anglicanism as a biblical, missionary church,” he said.
ACNA officials said that formal recognition as an Anglican province will take time. Duncan said he is in regular contact with the Archbishop of Canterbury, the principal leader of the Anglican Communion.
Nine Anglican provinces, representing the vast majority of Anglicans from as far away as Africa, Asia and South America, sent official delegations to the ACNA Assembly, indicating their support.
“We are in the process of being recognized by and partnering with churches around the world,” Duncan said. “Just the other day, the Church of Uganda recognized our new province.” Earlier this year, the Anglican Church of Nigeria also recognized the ACNA. Together, these provinces represent the Anglican Communion’s two largest provinces and tens of millions of Anglicans.
Duncan went on to say that Anglicans are part of a worldwide movement. “We are part of something big,” he said. “God isn’t just bringing Anglican Christians together. Across the Church, people are re-embracing Scripture’s authority. Christians are once again discovering the beauty, wisdom and grace of our 2,000-year-old tradition.”
Jurisdictions that have joined together to form the 28 dioceses and dioceses-in-formation of the Anglican Church in North America are: the dioceses of Fort Worth, Pittsburgh, Quincy and San Joaquin; the Anglican Mission in the Americas (including the Anglican Coalition in Canada); the Convocation of Anglicans in North America; the Anglican Network in Canada; the Reformed Episcopal Church; and the missionary initiatives of Kenya, Uganda, and South America’s Southern Cone. The American Anglican Council and Forward in Faith North America also are founding organizations.
The Anglican Church in North America unites some 100,000 Anglicans in 700 parishes into a single church.
“The events of this week and the months leading up to it represent the answers to decades of prayer,” said Dr. Michael Howell, executive director of Forward in Faith North America. ”And, I am fully convinced that only God could have brought this about.”
The Provincial Assembly concludes Thursday at St. Vincent’s Cathedral in Bedford, Texas. For more information, visit www.acnaassembly.org.
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Church of Uganda Declares itself in Full Communion with Anglican Church in North America
The House of Bishops of the Church of Uganda, in its regularly scheduled meeting on 23rd June 2009, made several resolutions concerning the state of the Anglican Communion and the future of global Anglicanism.
The Bishops reaffirmed their commitment to the Anglican Communion and to the GAFCON movement as a force of renewal within the Communion, and pledged to continue to be a voice of orthodox faith, which is the biblical and historic faith of Anglicanism.
The Bishops were deeply concerned that the Anglican Consultative Council (ACC) refused to seat the Church of Uganda’s duly appointed clergy delegate, Rev. Phil Ashey, and deprived the Church of Uganda from the representation to which it is entitled. The Bishops said, “The Church of Uganda’s prerogative to choose who should represent us was abused by the ACC by refusing to seat our delegate. We consider this to be a profound violation of our rights by the Joint Standing Committee and the ACC.”
The House of Bishops also reaffirmed its commitment to not receive funds from the Episcopal Church (TEC) and the Anglican Church of Canada, revisionist TEC and Canadian dioceses and parishes, and funding organs associated with them. The Bishops also chastised and called to account those Bishops among them who have violated this collective and long-standing decision.
Finally, concerning the formation of the Anglican Church in North America, the House of Bishops resolved that it warmly supports the creation of the new Province in North America, the Anglican Church in North America, recognizes Bishop Bob Duncan as its new Archbishop, and declares that it is in full communion with the Anglican Church in North America.
Likewise, the Bishops resolved to release, effective immediately, the Bishops, clergy and churches in America under its ecclesiastical oversight and to transfer them to the Anglican Church in North America. The House of Bishops further resolved to continue its partnership and friendship with them in mission and ministry, extends its hand of fellowship, and wishes them well.
Archbishop Henry Luke Orombi said, “This really is the moment we have been waiting for. We have been longing to be able to repatriate our clergy and congregations to a Biblical and viable ecclesiastical structure in North America, and that day has now come. To God be the glory.”
Communications Department
Church of Uganda
P.O. Box 14123
KAMPALA
+256 782 321 027
COUNews@gmail.com
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http://washingtontimes.com/news/2009/jun/24/breakaway-called-a-historic-event/
Breakaway called a 'historic event'
Rev. Warren shows support
By Julia Duin (Contact) | Wednesday, June 24, 2009
BEDFORD, Texas | The Rev. Rick Warren brought hundreds of former Episcopalians to their feet in applause Tuesday when he called their exodus from the denomination "a historic event" and said God was "calling you out" of the Episcopal Church.
"I jumped at the chance to come here," Mr. Warren, evangelical pastor of the 24,000-member Saddleback Church in Lake Forest, Calif., told delegates to the constitutional convention of the newly created Anglican Church of North America (ACNA). "We will stand with you in solidarity as God does something new in your midst."
The assembly, in its second-day meeting at a school just west of Dallas, is calling itself a new 39th province of the worldwide Anglican Communion. Although not recognized by the archbishop of Canterbury, who heads up the 77 million-member body, the new province has about 100,000 people drawn from the Episcopal Church USA and the Anglican Church of Canada.
"My heart is so full for you today," said Mr. Warren, who has offered the use of his extensive Orange County, Calif., campus as a meeting place for dissident Episcopal groups.
"God has not called the Anglican Church of North America to be a reactionary group," he added. "In the first place, you didn't leave them."
That statement, which got sustained applause, mirrors what ACNA members have said for years: They have continued in the traditions of Anglicanism, which the Episcopal Church left by ordaining practicing gay priests and bishops and taking unorthodox positions on biblical authority.
Organizers for the conference said the ACNA gathering is one of three venues Mr. Warren will attend as a speaker this year. The other two include an Assemblies of God assembly in the fall and the annual convention of the Islamic Society of North America (ISNA) on July 4 in the District.
According to the Indianapolis Star and ISNA Web site, Mr. Warren will speak at the main session alongside ISNA President Ingrid Mattson and Islamic scholar Hamza Yusuf. In December, ISNA leader Sayyid Syeed came to Saddleback's Civil Forum on Public Health.
Mr. Warren said he speaks to groups that differ with him "to build a bridge of love between my heart and theirs so Jesus can walk across."
Mr. Warren refused multiple requests for interviews Tuesday but did meet privately with ACNA leaders after his speech. He has avoided the press since he disavowed support for California's Proposition 8 ballot initiative, saying he never endorsed the marriage amendment even though a video on his church Web site showed him doing so.
"I have no interest in politics - zero," he told the Anglicans on Tuesday. "Why? Jesus didn't die to save America. He died to save Americans. You don't change hearts through politics."
In other business Tuesday afternoon, ACNA approved, with little debate, a 33-page set of canon laws for the new province. They differ from Episcopal Church law in that people who have remarried after a divorce are not allowed into the ranks of clergy unless they get an exception from their bishop. The Episcopal Church repealed a similar law in 1973.
The new province also calls on all members and clergy to oppose abortion and respect the "sanctity of every human life from conception to natural death."
The Episcopal Church had a similar position until 1994 when it passed a resolution opposing anything that would "abridge the right of a woman to reach an informed decision about the termination of her pregnancy or that would limit the access of a woman to a safe means of acting upon her decision." In 1997, it did not condemn partial-birth abortions but expressed concern about the procedure "except in extreme situations."
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http://www.livingchurch.org/news/news-updates/2009/6/24/oca-to-end-dialogue-with-tec-establish-ties-to-acna
OCA To End Relations with TEC, Forge Ties to ACNA
Posted on: June 24, 2009
His Beatitude, the Archbishop of Washington, Metropolitan of All America and Canada of the Orthodox Church in America (OCA) announced recently that his church has ended its ecumenical relations with The Episcopal Church, and will establish instead formal ecumenical relations with the Anglican Church in North America (ACNA).
Metropolitan Jonah of the OCA made the announcement June 24 at a plenary session of the ACNA’s founding convocation at St Vincent’s Cathedral, Bedford, Texas.
An autocephalous Eastern Orthodox Church, the OCA was established by eight Russian monks in 1794 on Kodiak Island, Alaska. Known as the Russian Orthodox Greek Catholic Church in America, it was granted autocephaly, or autonomy, by the Russian Orthodox Church in 1970. The OCA has 700 congregations, monasteries and communities spread across the United States and Canada.
Metropolitan Jonah, 49, was reared in The Episcopal Church, but joined the OCA while a student at the University of California, San Diego, in 1978. He was elected metropolitan last year as a reform candidate, 11 days after he was consecrated Bishop of Fort Worth.
Asked what the OCA’s stance toward ecumenism might be under his tenure, Metropolitan Jonah said, “If the matter concerns The Episcopal Church USA, then this dialogue has stopped.
“We engage in dialogue with Episcopalian traditionalists, many of whom embrace the Orthodox faith,” Jonah told a Moscow-based weblog. “And I personally, and our entire synod, give great attention to bringing these people into the fold of the Orthodox Church in America.”
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Article: http://www.post- gazette.com/ pg/09176/ 979788-84. stm
Orthodox extend hand to Duncan's new Anglican Church
Thursday, June 25, 2009
By Ann Rodgers, Pittsburgh Post-Gazette
BEDFORD, Texas -- The spiritual leader of the Orthodox Church in
America offered to begin talks aimed at full communion with the new
Anglican Church in North America, then named a series of obstacles
whose removal could tear apart the hard-won unity among the 100,000
theological conservatives who broke from the Episcopal Church and the
Anglican Church of Canada.
"What will it take for a true ecumenical reconciliation? Because that
is what I am seeking by being here today," Metropolitan Jonah said to
a standing ovation from 900 people assembled in a tent on the grounds
of St. Vincent Cathedral in Bedford, Texas.
He spoke of St. Tikhon, a 19th-century Russian Orthodox missionary to
the United States who initiated a close relationship with the
Episcopal Church that later cooled.
"We need to pick up where they left off," he said. "I occupy the
throne St. Tikhon held as the leader of the Orthodox Church in
America. Our arms are wide open."
The Anglican Church in North America hopes to be recognized as a new
province of the 80 million-member global Anglican Communion, of which the 2.1 million-member Episcopal Church is the U.S. province.
The new church believes the Episcopal Church failed to uphold biblical
authority and classic doctrines about matters ranging from the
divinity of Jesus to biblical morality, a criticism that the Orthodox share.
The Orthodox Church in America is a self-governing daughter of the
Russian Orthodox Church. Metropolitan Jonah, who was elected last
year in Pittsburgh, is a convert who was raised as an Episcopalian.
He spoke with humor about both traditions, warning, "I'm afraid my
talk will have something to offend just about everybody."
Although there is a global Anglican-Orthodox dialogue with
participants from the Episcopal Church and the Orthodox Church in
America, there is no dialogue or relationship between any Orthodox
jurisdiction in the U.S.. and the Episcopal Church itself, said Bishop
Christopher Epting, ecumenical officer for the Episcopal Church, who
said he has tried and failed to interest the Orthodox in new talks.
He believes that the Orthodox Church in America and the Anglican
Church in North America "would be strange bedfellows ... but that is
their choice to make," he said.
Metropolitan Jonah named several issues that he said the two churches
needed to "face head on" and resolve before they can achieve full
communion. Among the most volatile on his list were the Calvinist
theology taught by many evangelical Anglicans and the ordination of
women as priests, which the new church allows each of its dioceses to
accept or reject.
"Calvinism is a condemned heresy," he said, to a smattering of
applause from some Anglo-Catholics in the new church.
"For ... intercommunion of the Anglican Church and the Orthodox
Church, the issue of ordination of women needs to be resolved," he
said, again to applause from many of the same people.
"I believe women have a critical role to play in the church, but I do
not believe it is in the [priesthood or as bishops]," he said.
"Forgive me if this offends you." He called for an effort to
"creatively come together to find the right context for women's
ministry in the church."
In his response, Archbishop Robert Duncan of Pittsburgh, the leader
of the new church who worked for years to bring Anglo-Catholics and
Calvinists together and to make a place for female priests, accepted
the offer to dialogue.
"We will have much to talk about and we will talk," he said.
In an interview he said, "the non-negotiable [issue] is Jesus Christ.
These conversations have been going on for centuries ... We'll see
what God brings."
The Rev. Mary Hays, a priest who serves as chief of staff to
Archbishop Duncan in the Episcopal Diocese of Pittsburgh (Anglican),
said that some of the metropolitan' s issues would raise even greater
resistance than women's ordination.
"The ordination of women is the least of the things about which we
have division," she said. "Quite a few of our folks have been shaped
by Calvinism. It's one of many issues that divide us. I hope we'll be
able to find our way going forward."
Metropolitan Jonah said he would report on the new church to today's
meeting of the Standing Conference of Orthodox Bishops in America,
which represents all canonical Orthodox jurisdictions. He had not
consulted with leaders of the Russian Orthodox Church about his
offer, he said, though their leaders have showed prior interest in a
relationship with conservative Anglicans.
The assembly also received official greetings from representatives of
the National Association of Evangelicals and the conservative 2.5
million-member Lutheran Church (Missouri Synod).. From Pittsburgh the Rev. Donald Green, executive director of Christian Associates of
Southwestern Pennsylvania, attended on behalf of all regional bishops
of Catholic, Orthodox, mainline Protestant and historically black
churches. Christian Associates includes both the Anglican diocese and
the Episcopal Diocese of Pittsburgh that has remained in the Episcopal Church.
Bishop David Zubik, of the Catholic Diocese of Pittsburgh, was also
slated to attend his friend's installation as archbishop. Bishop
Kevin Vann of the Catholic Diocese of Fort Worth greeted the assembly
on Tuesday.
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"I am Archbishop Robert Duncan of the Anglican Church in North America"
By David W. Virtue in Bedford, Texas
www.virtueonline.org
6/24/2009
Announcing to all the world that he is now the Archbishop of the newly formed Anglican Church in North America, The Most Rev. Robert Duncan told a press conference that the church he...leads will "reunite a significant portion of our Anglican Church family here in North America."
"We are uniting 700 congregations, (and 28 dioceses) and more importantly committed Anglican believers, in the north (Arctic) and in the south, on the west coast and the east coast. We are oriented toward a hopeful future again. We are not turning back to the hurts of our past. We are moving forward together in Christian mission. The main thing is Jesus Christ."
Duncan drew a wide net, saying that God isn't just bringing Anglican Christians together, "across the church people are re-embracing Scripture's authority. Christians are rediscovering the grace of our 2,000 year-old tradition."
Alluding to the Metropolitan Jonah's Orthodox outstretched hand to the newly formed church, Duncan said "that we are not as far apart as we thought."
Earlier the Patriarch of All America and Canada and leader of the Orthodox Church in America (OCA), told the conferees and delegates that he is calling for a "full...intercommunion" with the Anglican Church in North America. "What will it take," he asked, "for a true ecumenical reconciliation? That is what I am seeking by being with you today."
What would it take for this reconciliation to occur? "Full affirmation of the orthodox Faith of the Apostles and Church Fathers, the seven Ecumenical Councils, the Nicene Creed in its original form (without the filioque clause inserted at the Council of Toledo, 589 A.D.), all seven Sacraments and a rejection of 'the heresies of the Reformation."
His Beatitude listed these in a series of 'isms'; Calvinism, anti-sacramentalism, iconoclasm and Gnosticism. The ordination of women to the Presbyterate and their consecration as Bishops has to end, if intercommunion is to occur.
The Russian Orthodox Church broke off ecumenical talks with The Episcopal Church over the consecration of Gene Robinson, an openly non-celibate homosexual to the episcopacy.
Duncan said the desire of the Metropolitan of the Orthodox Church to re-establish the dialogue with Anglicanism was "extraordinary ecumenical news."
Asked by VOL if the new archbishop had received a congratulatory word from the Archbishop of Canterbury, Duncan said he was in regular contact with the Anglican leader, but gave no indication that he had received any particular word from him on this "historic day".
Asked if ACNA could technically be the 39th Province in the Anglican Communion without the approval of the [Archbishop of Canterbury] and the Anglican Consultative Council, Duncan said, "We are a province in [the] process of being recognized. We have been recognized by the provinces of Uganda, Nigeria, Kenya, Southeast Asia, Jerusalem and the Middle East and the Indian Ocean. We have been recognized by unanimous declaration."
Duncan said The Archbishop of Kenya, The Most Rev. Benjamin Nzimbi would be the chief consecrator at the investiture and will do the anointing as a sacramental sign. "This is not just another ordination. It is the giving of another gift."
Questioned on lawsuits and property issues in the Diocese of Pittsburgh, Duncan said that the Roman Catholic Archbishop of Pittsburgh was one of his staunchest allies and that he had called him to assure him that in the [event] of there being a loss of property his people will never be without a place to worship. "We have a great missionary partnership. There is more that unites us than separates us." Some 61 parishes and a Diocesan headquarters in downtown Pittsburgh are at stake [in The Episcopal Church's effort to claim the diocese's property].
Ft. Worth Bishop Jack Leo Iker said the emphasis of ACNA is on evangelism and mission. "This is the beginning and of the recovery of confidence in Anglicanism as a Biblical missionary church. Our desire is to bring the whole gospel to the whole world."
Iker said people wince over the scandals that have taken place over the years in The Episcopal Church. The ACNA gives the mainstream of our clergy a chance to recover the gospel. "We are evangelical and catholic, high church and low church, and this was reflected...this week. We are a Biblical missionary movement."
The Anglo-Catholic bishop disputed that ACNA was a new church. "This is not about change; it is the old historic church. We have not begun something new; we are not innovators. We have the same faith and practice that I have practiced throughout my 35 years." Iker said...
Martyn Minns, missionary bishop of CANA, a missionary initiative of the Anglican Church of Nigeria said that what united this church was "our faith in Christ and our faith in the Anglican way."
Cheryl Chang, an attorney and chancellor [for] the [the group of ex-Anglican Church of Canada members who helped draft] the Canons and Constitutions of the ACNA, said the new structure would support mission, not the other way round. "We will move across geographic boundaries. This is an incredible movement."
Layman Michael Howell, Executive Director of Forward in Faith in North America, said his group will ordain a bishop (William Ilgenfritz) to be a missionary bishop with FIF-NA, echoing other speakers [in] saying that "only God could have brought this about."
"Despite our differences, and there are some significant ones, we will address them as Christians regardless of our differences. We love Jesus Christ and our desire is to spread His gospel. This is not the end but the beginning of a wonderful ministry."
Questioned on the Covenant being circulated around the Anglican Communion, a worldwide effort to hold the communion together, Duncan said ACNA was ready to adopt the Covenant "when it is right to do so. We are communion players and partners with mainstream players."
Duncan said he will serve as archbishop for five years and is "at peace" in his new role.
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The following message has been relayed:
June 25th, 2009
On behalf of the Fellowship of Confessing Anglicans and the Diocese of Sydney I send my warmest greetings and congratulations to the new Anglican Province. We recognise that authentic Anglican brothers and sisters have come together in a wonderful new fellowship in the service of the Lord Jesus. We pray that your faithful witness to the gospel will prosper and that as you live under the authority of God’s word you will maintain the unity of the Spirit in the bond of peace.
Peter Jensen
Archbishop of Sydney and General Secretary FCA
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Archbishop Bob Duncan also informed the assembly on Tuesday that greetings had been received from
the Bishops of Rochester, Winchester, Chester and Chichester
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The Rev. Todd H. Wetzel of Anglicans United, Reporting from the ACNA Provincial Assembly in Bedford, Texas
June 25, 2009
On the afternoon of June 22nd, 2009, in the gymnasium of St. Vincent’s school in Bedford, Texas, the gavel, ably wielded by Bishop Duncan, came down signaling passage of the Constitution of the Anglican Church of North America. With the words, “We are now ‘constituted,'” the new province was born and life among Anglicans on the American shore became more diffuse and confusing.
I rejoiced and wept almost in the same instant. Rejoiced because so many had worked so hard, sacrificed much and prayed without ceasing for this moment. I am among them. Yet it was bittersweet for me. I realized that many of the people now part of this new entity are people with whom I’ve loved and laughed, prayed and commiserated over the years. These people were friends and colleagues. Together we were Episcopalians and now they were rejoicing in being “former Episcopalians.” That bond is now irreparably broken. The distance between us will grow even though we will try not to let it impair our relationships.
The next day canons were put in place and the new entity was not only constituted but now disciplined. It is striking to note that the bishops of this new jurisdiction elect bishops. Laity may nominate, but bishops elect. That, of course, will precipitate a very different set of problems than presently experienced in the Episcopal Church today. But for them no more [of] the ‘dog and pony shows’ of special diocesan conventions and the consequent popularity contest based largely on a person’s ability to sway the voters. Better? Time will tell. Lay prerogatives were clearly protected, but even a cursory reading of these canons leaves little doubt that bishops are in charge. Not much room here for prickly jokes about the “Senior House” of General Convention.
While the Episcopal Church these days seems a sad tale of “breaking apart and away,” this Assembly was clearly about the coming together of fragments some of which broke away from the Episcopal Church as early as 1873 (the Reformed Episcopal Church) while others splintered away in the late 1970’s over the Prayer Book and women’s ordination. Yet more left after the consecration of V. Gene Robinson in 2003. Coming together fosters new ideas and energy. Most Episcopalians would rather not be reminded that division fosters mistrust and drains power and resources.
The newly invested Archbishop, Robert Duncan, ordains women though most of the bishops with whom he’ll be working do not. Can this work? Perhaps; only time will tell. The Service of Investiture displayed an interesting fact. The Most Rev. Leonard Riches served as principal consecrator. He is the Presiding Bishop of the Reformed Episcopal Church and is the spiritual descendent of Bishop Cummins who broke from the Episcopal Church in 1873 over very real evangelical concerns. The Presiding Bishop of the first group to break away served as the principle consecrator for the newest amalgam. Bishop Riches does not, nor does the REC, ordain women. Yes, they ordain women to a special service position of Deaconess, but not as priests. The new Archbishop has and will. Together they embraced and both have worked hard to build this now newly formed entity.
This ACNA will continue to be the bearer of hope and the recipient of prayers beyond its still questionable boundaries. They will receive more attention and scrutiny than its small numbers (between 75,000-100,000) merit. The Anglican Communion, ancient in its origins and global in its reach of some 75 million+ members, needs new vision and renewed enthusiasm for its Christ -given mission.
As Rick Warren pointed out to attendees at the Assembly, asking God to bless our efforts is not what it’s all about, rather it comes down to our being willing to discern what God is Blessing and “go with the flow.” That’s a word both the ACNA and the Episcopal Church need to bear in mind. I wish them Godspeed.
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June 24, 2009
A New American Church Is Born
By Mike McManus
A new American denomination came into being this week, the Anglican Church of North America. It begins with 700 churches and 100,000 people -- roughly equal in size to the Quakers or Mennonites who have been around for three centuries.
Where did ACNA come from?
Across America are small signs, usually faded and rusting, which ironically proclaim, "The Episcopal Church welcomes you." Not if you are an orthodox Bible-believing Christian! The Episcopal Church has filed 58 lawsuits, and is winning most of them, to capture the property of parishes who have voted to leave the denomination to become Anglican.
What about America's historic "freedom of religion?" Haven't we always thought that any individual or group of individuals has the freedom to decide whether to attend religious services, and, if so, which one?
The Episcopal Church no longer believes in such freedom.
In scores of lawsuits, it argues that each Episcopal church is not the property of the congregation which paid for its construction - but of a diocese of the national church. Even if 90 percent of a congregation votes to leave, lawsuits for the property are filed.
This week one of those congregations, St. James Anglican Church of Newport Beach, CA, filed a petition with the U.S. Supreme Court, asking the court to overturn a decision of the California Supreme Court, which ruled in favor of the Episcopal Diocese of Los Angeles taking its property.
It is asking whether the U.S. Constitution allows religious denominations to disregard normal rules of property ownership that apply to everyone else. And whether the California's Supreme Court "has violated the First Amendment of the United States Constitution" which says plainly states: "Congress shall make no law respecting an establishment of religion or prohibiting the free exercise thereof." Courts have held that the Amendment applies to states.
"We will be arguing that denying the local church community their ability to organize and hold title to their own building and conduct their religious services in a manner they see fit, this California decision violates their right to the free exercise of religion," said Dr. John Eastman, a constitutional scholar assisting the church.
What if an entire Episcopal Diocese votes to leave the denomination? Nope, that ain't allowed either. Indeed, Episcopal lawsuits have been filed against four dioceses in all parts of America, where a substantial majority of churches voted to leave the Episcopal Church to become Anglican - in Fort Worth, Pittsburgh, Quincy, IL and San Joaquin, which is based in Fresno, CA.
A similar dispute in Canada, prompted additional churches to leave the Anglican Church of Canada to join the Anglican Church of North America.
Church splintering is as American as apple pie. In the last generation, for example, The Presbyterian Church in America and the Evangelical Presbyterian Church split away from The Presbyterian Church (U.S.A.). There are now 225 national denominations with 166 million members in 330,000 churches and tens of thousands of independent churches with millions more.
Yet never has there been such bitter hostility as in the Episcopal-Anglican split. What has fueled the animosity? The triggering event was the election of an active homosexual as an Episcopal bishop, which orthodox Episcopalians felt was a violation of Scripture. In Romans St. Paul criticized men who "abandoned natural relations with women and were inflamed with lust for one another." V. Eugene Robinson divorced his wife to live with a male lover, yet became an Episcopal bishop.
More than a million people have left the Episcopal Church. David Virtue reports that a third of local Episcopal churches have no full-time clergy and half have fewer than 75 people attending.
Pittsburgh Episcopal Bishop Robert Duncan, who was elected ACNA's Archbishop, led 800 joyous former Episcopalians to "begin a new chapter in our lives as Anglicans," and called for a return to "muscular Christianity" that once reigned. "No cross, no crown. No pain, no gain."
He acknowledged, "Many of us have sacrificed a great deal to follow Jesus to this place. Many of us have lost properties and sacred treasures and incomes and pensions and standing and friends…But we are so much better off than we were before," he said, sparking applause.
"St. Paul's exhortation is intended for this moment precisely: `For freedom, Christ has set you free. Stand fast then, and do not return again to a yoke of slavery.'"
Rick Warren, America's most influential pastor, thrilled the crowd with one-liners: "You may lose the steeple, but you won't lose the people. Christ did not die for property…A great commitment to the great commandment and the great commission will grow a great communion."
This new denomination will grow and the litigious Episcopal Church will shrink.
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http://www.post-gazette.com/pg/09172/978956-455.stm
Bishop Robert Duncan is trading sacred places
After splitting from the Episcopal Church, Robert Duncan is about to become archbishop of another.
Sunday, June 21, 2009
By Ann Rodgers, Pittsburgh Post-Gazette
In his office at the Episcopal Diocese of Pittsburgh (Anglican), Bishop Robert Duncan has mounted a Scottish broadsword, like that of the hero in his favorite movie, "Braveheart." It was a gift from a priest after the Episcopal Church accepted a partnered gay bishop.
The legend of "Braveheart" "is about somebody who rallies people to stand up against what is very wrong," Bishop Duncan said. "It's a two-edged sword, and the holy scriptures describe scripture as sharper than any two-edged sword."
Tomorrow in Texas, he is slated to become archbishop of the new Anglican Church in North America. Its 100,000 members broke with the Episcopal Church and Anglican Church of Canada, believing they failed to uphold biblical authority and classic doctrine about Jesus when they approved the consecration of a partnered gay bishop and failed to discipline another bishop who denied Jesus was God incarnate.
Sexuality was the most obvious issue, but not the most profound, he said.
"This battle right now isn't about sex," he said. "Everybody's got things they deal with. We're fallen. The thing to have battle over is whether the word of God can be trusted."
Some Anglicans see him as Mr. Duncan, a deposed bishop leading a schism against the 2.1 million-member Episcopal Church, one of 38 provinces in the 80 million-member Anglican Communion, a global body of churches that grew out of the Church of England. To others, he is one of the few U.S. bishops with the faith and courage to stand with bishops in the global South against hedonistic heresies of the West.
All agree that he leads a movement that could redefine the centuries-old Anglican movement.
"The Lord has called him to an extraordinary position of leadership and responsibility, one which I think he would much have preferred not to have been called to," said Bishop John Guernsey, an ex-Episcopal priest consecrated by the Anglican Church of Uganda.
But a retired Pittsburgh cathedral dean said Bishop Duncan followed his own agenda. "The only program he has kept to totally for the past 11 years has been developing this parallel universe and his position in it," said the Rev. George Werner.
Robert Duncan's roots
Bishop Duncan, 60, grew up in Bordentown, N.J. His mother was mentally ill and violent, he said, and he was raised mostly by his grandparents. At 11, his parish priest led him to life-changing faith in Jesus.
Two years later, kneeling at Eucharist, "The Lord said very plainly, 'You will be my priest,' " he said -- adding, "He doesn't usually talk to me with that clarity."
He met his future wife, Nara Dewar, at a diocesan youth event when he was 16 and she was 14. They married in 1969.
Five years after his ordination in 1973, he became a chaplain at the University of North Carolina, where he mentored an undergraduate, Jeff Murph, now rector of St. Thomas in Oakmont. The Rev. Murph recalled a Eucharist when the Rev. Duncan invited two men to announce Gay Awareness Week events. "I don't think that the gay issue is the big issue for him," he said.
Bishop Duncan sees no contradiction between his actions then and his stand that the church's approval of a gay bishop in 2003 was a crisis. The latter, he said, was official affirmation of conduct that scripture clearly forbids.
"Ministry with undergraduates is with people who are trying to figure themselves out," he said. "What the church did was to meet them where they were, to love them … believing that, if they knew the love of God, they would become more and more whole."
He disagrees with Christians who argue biblical injunctions against gay sex are cultural, not theological. Asked whether he could accept a gay bishop if other bishops hadn't challenged the divinity of Christ, he can't separate the issues. "The approval of that election is symptomatic of the deep theological distress and disorder in the Episcopal Church," he said. "It's not something that I think could have happened apart from an unraveling of the Christian tradition."
After 10 years as rector of a university parish in Delaware, he came to Pittsburgh in 1992 as "canon to the ordinary" -- the top aide to Bishop Alden Hathaway. The diocese was the center of conservative activism.
He helped each parish write a mission statement, with a five-year list of goals and objectives. He partnered strong parishes with weak ones. He recruited like-minded priests.
The Rev. Jonathan Millard, a priest in England, sent his resume to Pittsburgh in 1993. Canon Duncan called him about a dying parish in Washington, Pa. Five years after the Rev. Millard arrived, attendance had quadrupled and a new church was under construction. Canon Duncan had spent hours in prayer with lay leaders working on the mission statement.
"He listened to the people. He was a mentor to me and helped me pull the pieces together and think strategically," said the Rev. Millard, now rector of Church of the Ascension, Oakland.
In his three years as canon, the diocese grew 4 percent in membership, 11 percent in attendance, 13 percent in giving and 330 percent in money that parishes gave to help non-members. But when a search committee chose candidates for the next bishop, he wasn't on the list. Nominated from the floor, he led on the first ballot and won on the third. The cathedral erupted into a standing ovation.
"It was an extraordinary mandate," he said.
He became the bishop in September 1997. Over the next decade active membership rose from 14,785 to 19,001.
The Rev. Cynthia Bronson Sweigert, who knew him since the 1970s, kept a good relationship with him despite being rector of the Church of the Redeemer in Squirrel Hill, perhaps the most liberal parish in the diocese. He never interfered with her efforts to welcome gay couples, she said.
"He told me once, 'Cynthia, I would really like Redeemer to be Redeemer,' " she said.
The bishop offered to let liberal parishes seek oversight from a liberal bishop. Only one took him up on it. His goal was to bring similar measures to conservative parishes in liberal dioceses, a move many bishops deemed against church law.
The lines are drawn
In 1998, the bishops of the Anglican Communion declared 526-70 that gay sex was "incompatible with scripture"...But the Anglican Communion has no international law or power. Gay ordination and turf wars continued.
The Episcopal Church's 2003 consent to a partnered gay bishop, Gene Robinson of New Hampshire, started a chain reaction. Bishop Duncan immediately led 19 bishops forward and called for the Anglican Communion to intervene in "the pastoral emergency" and help parishes that could not accept bishops who had voted for Bishop Robinson.
The Pittsburgh Diocese asked the Anglican global primates -- or top bishops -- to allow conservative bishops to oversee such parishes. The primates advised provinces to make "adequate provision" for such conservatives. Bishop Duncan was elected moderator of the Anglican Communion Network, an alliance of 200,000 conservative Episcopalians. And 22 of 38 Anglican provinces worldwide declared broken or impaired communion with the Episcopal Church.
Believing that the diocese was preparing for schism, Calvary Episcopal Church in Shadyside sued in 2003 to prevent Bishop Duncan from taking assets out of the Episcopal Church. Bishop Duncan threatened to expel Calvary from the diocese but didn't.
"We were prophetic," Calvary's rector, the Rev. Harold Lewis, said of the lawsuit. "He is a demagogue. People believe he can trump the canons and constitution and traditions of the church."
Those close to Bishop Duncan agree that he gave up on the Episcopal Church after a bishops' meeting in 2007 in Texas. He arrived hoping they would approve a plan he'd earlier persuaded the primates to endorse. That plan called for "alternative primatial oversight" for eight dioceses, including Pittsburgh, that had rejected the new primate of the Episcopal Church, Bishop Katharine Jefferts Schori -- some because of her gender, some because she'd voted for the gay bishop.
But the U.S. bishops rejected the plan. Today Bishop Duncan calls that meeting "battering and hostile to anybody who dared to raise questions." Returning to Pittsburgh, he prayed, then called diocesan leaders together to say he no longer could stay in the Episcopal Church to work for reform.
"He went around the table, asking for our response. Some of us were very much in favor, some sat on the fence, and some said, 'We don't think we can come with you in this," said the Rev. Millard. "It was clear there was no way he could bring 100 percent of the people with him, but he was convicted, and convinced it was the right thing to do."
Pittsburgh diocesan leaders called for the clergy and laity to vote in November 2007 to secede from the Episcopal Church and join a conservative Anglican province in Africa or South America. A second vote was required a year later.
It was a shock to the Rev. Murph, who had stayed close to him for 30 years. Bishop Duncan had taught him that the church was the indivisible body of Christ. He could not follow his friend and mentor.
"I know he sees this in a global way, since he believes he will be connected to other parts of the Anglican Communion, and he may be right about that," the Rev. Murph said. "But within the American context, this still looks an awful lot like a split."
Bishop Jefferts Schori threatened to remove Bishop Duncan from ministry. Just before the first vote Bishop Duncan quoted Martin Luther, the Protestant reformer who refused to recant before a church court in 1521.
"Here I stand. I can do no other," Bishop Duncan said.
The first vote passed overwhelmingly. The Rev. Murph then joined 11 other conservative priests who declared their intention to remain in the Episcopal Church. The bishop wasn't vindictive, but their relationship suffered.
"I still pray for him. Perhaps he feels that I betrayed him, similarly to the way I feel he betrayed me. I don't have any anger about that -- at least most of the time. But I don't know how to put it back together again," the Rev. Murph said.
Two weeks before the final vote in 2008, the Episcopal bishops moved 88-35 to ban Bishop Duncan from all ministry.
"It was my mother rejecting me," he said. "I hadn't changed. It was my church that had been taken over by folks who had a new religion."
After the split
The act had little effect in Pittsburgh. He instantly became a bishop of the Southern Cone, the South American province into which the diocese was about to secede.
On Oct. 4, the laity voted 119-69 and the clergy voted, 121-33, to join the Southern Cone until a new Anglican province could be formed for North America.
Before the split the diocese had 74 parishes. The Anglican diocese now lists 55 and the Episcopal diocese has 28, with some parishes splitting amid the dispute. Calvary's lawsuit to keep him from taking assets roared to life.
"Basically, this is mutiny," said the Rev. Werner.
While founders of the new Anglican Church in North America share a belief that the Episcopal Church has gone astray, they disagree on much else, particularly the ordination of women. But Bishop Duncan had the skills and patience to bring agreement among them, said the Rev. Geoff Chapman of St. Stephen's in Sewickley.
"This is almost unparalleled in the history of Christian splits. It is not the kind of thing that can be achieved by somebody who majors in minors or is running only his own personal agenda."
The mission of his new church, he said, is to "reach out with the transforming love of Jesus Christ," Bishop Duncan said. "[Americans] need what the church did for me when I was a kid. It met me where I was and it loved me into a much better understanding of how to live life."
He will continue as bishop of Pittsburgh while serving a five-year term as archbishop. Then, "God willing, I will have a few more years to conclude my ministry as bishop of Pittsburgh, if that is what they still want."
Ann Rodgers can be reached at arodgers@post-gazette.com or 412-263-1416.
First published on June 20, 2009 at 9:55 pm
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Anglicans in the US: a new Church is born
June 25th, 2009 Posted in News |
From the Anglican Mainstream website
Anglicans in the US: a new Church is born.
Please welcome guest blogger Chris Sugden of Anglican Mainstream, reporting live from Texas on the first assembly of the Anglican Church in North America. For any readers baffled, bewildered or simply bored by Anglicans, Reuters have very helpfully published a Q&A on where we are and how we got here. For Chris, a member of the General Synod which meets in York soon, where traditionalists in England will continue their battle over women bishops, this group is the 39th province of the Anglican Communion. Although formal recognition awaits, new Archbishop Bob Duncan is in regular contact with the Archbishop of Canterbury Dr Rowan Williams. Read about his ‘I am’ statement on VirtueOnline.
Chris writes: ‘Many will be quick to find fault with the launch of the Anglican Church in North America, a church representing a Sunday attendance of 69,000 Anglicans in 23 dioceses across the USA and Canada.
‘It will to all intents and purposes be the 39th province of the Anglican Communion.
‘Already the Anglican Churches of Nigeria, Kenya, Uganda, South East Asia, and Rwanda, representing over 30 million Anglicans have stated that they are in full communion with ACNA. But everyone should have their opportunity to have their say before being undermined without proper review of the evidence. That’s only fair.
‘So what has happened? The Episcopal Church has pursued a determined path to oppose and overturn Christian teaching and practice. An English clergyman now in the USA told me that many TEC clergy and bishops only regard the creeds as purely historical statements of what used to be believed, not statements of Christian truth today that they believe.
‘Many orthodox clergy and congregations who have resisted TEC’s practice and direction have been driven out of their churches and buildings. Some individual church members have been sued for upwards of half a million dollars.
‘What were the faithful bishops and clergy who cared deeply for their people and the teaching of the faith to do?
‘They have formed a new Anglican church and a new Anglicanism in North America. Their leaders are those who experienced the charismatic renewal movement in the 1970s and 1980s. Leaders of the world church here in Bedford, Texas this week have publicly recognized them as upholding the Christian faith as understood by the Church for the last 2000 years.
‘Archbishop John Chew of South East Asia sent a personal representative to present a letter in which he said: “Today you are making a historic and apostolic stand. You have paid a price. Be assured of our deep communion to the Lord. We are right behind you.”
‘Most surprising was that the senior Orthodox Archbishop of the Orthodox Churches in the USA, Metropolitan Jonah, announced that over 30 years after they had broken off dialogue with The Episcopal Church, the Orthodox Churches in America were ready to begin dialogue again, but now with ACNA.
‘ACNA claims that far from promoting division, it is building unity by making it possible for other Churches to recognize in an Anglican Denomination in the USA the marks of a Christian church.
‘Visitors from the Church of England included Bishop John Ellison, assistant bishop in the Diocese of Winchester. Greetings were read from the Bishops of Rochester, Winchester, Chester and Chichester. The three day assembly included sessions to ratify their canons and constitution and inspiring talks on Christian mission by, among others Pastor Rick Warren of Saddleback Church who had offered the prayer at President Obama’s inauguration, inheriting the mantle of Billy Graham as the USA’s chief pastor.
‘The formal canons establishing the Anglican Church in North America were adopted by acclamation over two short plenary sessions. Explaining how these canons differed from those of The Episcopal Church of the United States, one bishop indicated to me that they made it more difficult for bishops to depart from the teachings they were publicly supposed to uphold, while continuing to exercise office and jurisdiction in the church.
“Ways of calling them to account have been instituted”, he said.
‘A strong focus of ACNA is mission. Archbishop Bob Duncan insisted that the structures only existed to support and encourage the mission of the Church to bring the gospel of Jesus Christ to the world. Would the structures of this new church enable mission in ways that their previous jurisdiction had not?
‘Canon John Macdonald, with long experience of overseas mission work and support for it, claimed that their previous jurisdiction had defined mission solely as charitable responses to poverty and hunger, allied with the concept that you did not want to impose your faith on another faith system.
“ What we have seen is an understanding of the whole gospel”, he said. “We have within our intention to reach the lost with the gospel.”
‘The assembly was crowned with a service to install Archbishop Bob Duncan as their Archbishop. His anointing by the Archbishop of Kenya was formally witnessed by primate of West Africa, and representatives of the primates of Uganda, Rwanda, Southern Cone, South East Asia, Myanmar, and Nigeria along with Bishop John Ellison.
‘In his sermon Archbishop Duncan insisted that the past was behind them; they had left behind conflict with TEC ; there should be no bitterness. Their task, like that of John the Baptist, was to prepare the way for Jesus to come to those in the wildernesses of US society who are without any sense of being loved and forgiven. The service demonstrated another difference from the direction of TEC: Jesus Christ was enthusiastically worshipped as the risen Son of God who is ready and able to transform lives and situations.’
END
