The Lambeth Conference - Update

The Nigerian Bishops have decided not to attend the Anglican Church's 10 yearly conference in Lambeth this year because of their disgust at the ordination of openly Gay U.S. Bishop Gene Robinson in 2003, and the continuing practice of the blessing of same-sex couples in the Anglican Church.

The Archbishop of Sydney, Australia made the same decision earlier this month and the Kenyans followed suit last thursday, followed closely by the Ugandan Bishops. Rwanda had already pledged their alliance to the African Council of Churches and will also not be attending. 

Added to this the American Diocese' that have split from the Anglican Church and allied themselves with the African Churches and it will mean that more than 30 million members, less than 50% of the Anglican Church will be represented.

What does this all mean to me? I hear you ask.

Just this. The Anglican Church is not as showy as the Catholic Church but does have enormous power politically in America (of course) and the emerging countries of West Africa. That this huge organisation is pulling itself apart, and has been doing so for the last 5 years is a sign on the 

wall. Polarisation is inevitable, and apparent.

 

Expect the anti-Gay backlash to come from the church, not the state.

Kenya - Home of Radical Fundamentalists

The consecration by Archbishop Benjamin Nzimbi of the Kenya Anglican Church of two US bishops raises the temperature of the rancorous dispute over acceptance of gay and lesbian people as bishops dividing the two wings of the 70 million-strong Global Anglican Church:

But what Kenya's Archbishop Benjamin Nzimbi has done is not simply about homosexuality.

It goes to the heart of the way the Anglican Church sees itself.
Anglicans, like Catholic and Orthodox Christians, cherish the unity of their Church above almost everything else.
And the focus of unity is the bishop.
A very large part of the reason for having bishops at all is to give physical form to the Church's unity.
Symbolically, emotionally and in most of the ways that matter to believers, bishops are there to show that the Church remains united.
Heading for anarchy?
So when one bishop (in this case Dr Nzimbi) acts in a way that undercuts the authority of another bishop, it is the clearest possible way of emphasising the Church's disunity.

The Radical Fundamentalist Anglican Church in the West is using the Kenyan situation as a springboard towards creating a separate church within a church in the United States and beyond.

A Church with a capital 'C'

'C' as in Conservatism, Class discrimination, Cruelty .... you get the picture.

source BBC