Breaking: Nigeria to Adhere to “Road to Lambeth”

I urge everyone to at least skim the entire “Road to Lambeth” document at the link above.  It is an aggressively and courageously Scriptural report, and the fact that it has been so generally well-received in CAPA and throughout the Global South somewhat tempers my native pessimism about Tanzania.

Craig:

If it were not for these courageous bishops, we would be doomed to thirty more years of double-speak from those in ECUSA amongst others.  I am so thankful for B. Akinola - know we will get more slander about him from the Left - which is consistent for those who stand in their Faith against ‘principalities and powers of darkness’ - but those of us who have been abandoned by TEC sure appreciate their Faithfulness.

God bless the Southern Cone Bishops.

Thanks be to God for faithful members of the Anglican Communion!

Hmmm.  A special synod was originally scheduled for three days right before the Primates’ meeting.  It meets for only one day and endorses the status quo, commends ++Akinola, and states how pleased they are that he is going to the Primates’ meeting.  One could be forgiven for suspecting that the original agenda might have been more ambitious.  If there was a change of agenda, perhaps it is explained by the remarkably blunt statement today by the Bishop of Winchester, the fifth most senior bishop in the CofE and reputed to be one of Rowan Williams’ key advisors on Communion matters, stating among other things, that Schori should not be seated at the Primates meeting.
http://titusonenine.classicalanglican.net/?p=17628

Yes for a progressive believer who is so clearly pronounced outside the de facto ConsEvs realignment, it may offer relief that we are finally being told where the ConsEvs believers have finally drawn their closed Anglican lines. We would argue to stay open until the last possible moments.  Because that is what Jesus as Risen Lord did and still does to us, keep opening us up, so growthfully.

Leaving is sad of course, and one hopes that we will have some time - official or otherwise, for maybe the best time is the time unofficially given by passing instances of grace and personal moments between and among people - to say goodbyes, to say the many thanks person to person to person, to cast a lingering look at those externals of mysterium in particular times and particular places populated with particular peoples which got us started being Anglican in to begin with. 

All of this I cast deliberately pural because the calls and arrivals into being Anglican were so inevitably diverse, as the leave-takings will needs be.

So far as the high drama, punishment language, and closing down preachments of all the rest of the impending situation - well nobody who has ever departed their upset family - why oh why did we let our son or daughter go off to university in the first place, oh why? - will fail to recall just how that walk goes. 

It is all grist for lifelong spiritual and intellectual and communal pilgrimage, as indeed remaining inside the firmer (less oxygen permeable?) ConsEvs=Anglican lines now redrawn would also have been.  We who leave still take with us all the good lessons of the historic Anglican legacies even while we differ in how we discern this or that theme or topic.  We walk forth, thankfully, into a global village where everybody who dares to follow anything of Jesus of Nazareth has much service to do and much thanks to give for that opportunity of service.  We are all still here, then, just right down the block in so many streets all around the world that who could number them besides God?  To tell the truth I am much more worried in a long-term sense about global warming, ODC’s, and the mass extinction of current species (plant and animal, plus habitats - the two always seem to abide together, don’t they?) than I am about Abuja, Tanzania, York, or Pittsburg, or Canterbury.  If all this could have persuaded me to stop following Jesus of Nazareth, I suppose the condemnation of Rome would have carried even more weight and hindering gravitas.

See you all on Monday morning at the various work settings where we shall no doubt all re-assemble.  God calls us there just as surely as to any other place. Or at least that is still the witness the rest of us will probably discern and pledge, fallibly, provisionally, open-endedly, and hoping to learn further of real world mistakes that we can correct besides all the doctrinal/propositional/presuppositional conformities.  Who knows?  All involved might feel less weighed down by all these and other differences.  ConsEvs Anglicans can feel free to draw upon their Anglican heritage, closing as many doors and windows as they really feel needed.  Nobody need be included that violates or doubts or stays unclosed about anything important to them.  And the rest of us can continue, fallible, open-ended, and still giving thanks to do world service, Tikkun Olam. There can be a blessing in the divides - no matter what curses are also busy being preached.

We who are not conservative or evangelical sort of knew that and suspected that, all along, yet still it was worth as good a try as we could manage.

See you on Monday.  Sundays will not actually separate us as much as some ConsEvs narratives seem to define, pray, and hope.

Hmmmmmmm, ,looks like Tanzania is getting more interesting the closer it gets

drdanfee - question, are you being thrown out, or have you chosen to remove yourself by making changes in doctrine that are contrary to the rest of the AC?  I would say the later, since it is you that have changed, and not the orthodox.  But I guess that is a matter of how you look at it.

DrDan’s farewell:

ConsEvs Anglicans can feel free to draw upon their Anglican heritage, closing as many doors and windows as they really feel needed.  Nobody need be included that violates or doubts or stays unclosed about anything important to them.

And on our part, we sincerely hope and pray that you will come out of the tiny, dark enclosure of your own hopes, desires, and ratiocinations, into the incredible blinding expanse of God’s revelation, to rejoin us and the millions who have gone before us.

Godspeed.

...the increasing number of congregations and clergy who are now part of this important missionary initiative of the Church of Nigeria (Anglican Communion).

Otherwise known as clergy who have abondoned their ordination vows, and an “Anglican” church that blatantly violates one set of rules while condemning others who may or may not have complied with a “Report.”

...We welcome them as full and constituent members of our Anglican Communion family.

Of course, this decision (welcoming them as ‘full and constituent members of the Anglican Communion’ is Rowan’s and not ++Akinola’s.

Tanzania is set up to have virtually nothing to do with glorifying God, and is being structured as nothing more than the O.K. Corral.  Luckily, however, it’s almost time to paraphrase the old Roy Clark song: “Thank God and Greyhound they’re gone.”

Seriously, you’ve got to love the line about Peter Lee persecuting churches and church leaders whose only offense is seeking to follow “the faith once delivered to the saints.”  Peter Lee drew the line, saying no more abusive behavior towards the diocese and loyal members of the same, no more violations of elementary rules of The Episcopal Church, and no more abusive behavior in their communities (what a story that has been).
Then, as we all know, believing only in “the faith once delivered to the saints” puts one way outside orthodoxy. There is no Nicene Creed, no doctrine of the Virgin Birth, no single doctrine of the Resurrection and no Chalcedon.  There is support for slavery and the subjugation of women and a variety of creedal statements that is, indeed, mind-boggling.
Take your pick:  the faith once (when was that and to whom) delivered to the saints (which ones, they all fought like crazy in the early years of the church) without Nicea, Chalcedon or the full New Testament—or that there really is doctrinal development within the councils of the church.
Tighten your seat belts, gang, with Peter Akinola and Martyn Minns as the head of our church, the road is going be worse than rocky. If you are remarried, prepare to “put away” your second spouse and seek remarriage with your first, prepare to defrock those women clergy you have learned to love and trust, and birth control methods and support of relatives or friends who are in a minority currently out of favor—out the window.
As Jesus said to the woman (paraphrased), “The last state of that church will be worse than the first.”  Big Time.

AMEN! Thank God for all the Faithful in Nigeria!

Tanzania will indeed be interesting…

Fr. Tom,
Relax.
I think your attempt to frighten people with your wild rant will backfire.  If you want to make inflammatory charges, at least back them up with something (and I don’t mean a quote from someone who does not represent your worthy opponents.)

Where does Martyn Mims advocate putting away your second spouse for example.  Oh he doesn’t, they your credibility is gone and no one need read any further into your fictional ghost story.

You lost me at “Seriously…”

As Jesus said to the woman (paraphrased), “The last state of that church will be worse than the first.” Big Time.

A very reasonable concern, and one of the dangers of schism –regardless of who the real schismatics are. The times following a separation are indeed perilous, as in the 16th and 17th century, as in the 1780s and ‘90s in the US. Of course, the presence of this danger says nothing as to the importance of the change, and in the example paraphrased, the house truly needed to be cleansed because it was demon-possessed.

TBWSF, do you known anything about classic, orthodox systematic theology?  I have my doubts, as you seem to be crankily unaware of some basic principles of orthodox biblical interpretation and theologizing.

The Creeds, the Chalcedonian formula, and the other statements and developments of the first five centuries of the Church are taken from Scripture, either directly or by necessary inference.  They were implicit, if not explicit, in the Scriptures, and so they were discerned over time.

As for slavery—nothing in the Bible REQUIRES slavery—what is said in Scripture regulates slavery (in the OT, where slavery was more like indentured servitude—and was certainly not race-based chattel slavery) or tells believers how to deal with slavery in a culture where slavery was the foundation of the economy and in which Christians had no political power and little direct influence.  If you read the little letter to Philemon, you will note that Paul quietly but firmly recommends emancipation of the runaway slave.

Divorce is of course a more complex topic—because, while going back to one’s first spouse might seem to be the right thing to do, there is always the question of such a “solution” causing far more problems than it solves.  Whole books have been written on the subject, and I am not going to replicate them here!

We conservatives consider the Bible to be the final authority, as it comes from the heart of God as his revelation of himself and his will to us.  We take it “literally;” meaning that we interpret according to its genre (poetry, story, and exposition all having their own proper way of being understood) and its context.  Taking the Bible literally does not mean taking it woodenly, which you seem to assume it does.

“The faith once delivered” is the faith of the Apostles and the Fathers, and is seen renewed in the Reformers.

The howling and screeching and cries of oppression and sexism and injustice will be positively painful. - Greg Griffith, Fr. Jake Whitles Past the Graveyard

As Greg predicted, drdanfee, Fr. Woodward, and postulant are providing perfect examples of such howling and claims of oppression. How predictable, tiresome and boring.

I am overwhelmed by the love and inclusion expressed in your posts. Words just fail me. Did you honeslly think that the Nigerian Synod would do otherwise? It’s OK for TEC to express its voice by General Convention, but other Provinces in the Communion are not entitled to do so at their own conventions? What a typical Imperialist American viewpoint.

drdanfee:

Your narrative reminds me strongly of the dwarves in the Last Battle - inside the stable and determined to see nothing but darkness and smell nothing but straw and animals.  The drawves may have been for the drawves and, thus, saved themselves to a certain degree, however, they missed the bigger miracle.

Fr Tom:

Yes, I agree I loved this line:  Seriously, you’ve got to love the line about Peter Lee persecuting churches and church leaders whose only offense is seeking to follow “the faith once delivered to the saints.” because that IS the point. 

Once again it makes me think of CS Lewis: 
There is a danger… of the clergy developing a special professional conscience which obscures the very plain moral issue. Men who have passed beyond these boundary lines… are apt to protest that they have come by their unorthodox opinions honestly. In defence of those opnions they are prepared to suffer obloquy and to forfeit professional advancement. They thus come to feel like martyrs. But this simply misses the point which so gravely scandalizes the layman. We never doubted that the unorthodox opinions were honestly held: what we complain of is your continuing your ministry after you have come to hold them. We always knew that a man who makes his living as a paid agent of the Conservative Party may honestly change his views and honestly become a Communist. What we deny is that he can honestly continue to be a Conservative agent to to receive money from one party while he supports the policy of another.

Shori wants to be a ‘Communist’ -that’s great - but quit trying to still be paid as a Conservative.  Couldn’t say it any better myself.

It would appear that there is indeed something SIGNIFICANT about to occur in Dar-Es-Salaam.  Rather than whining, muling, and puking, a graceful exit from the Anglican Communion by TEC would be a classy way for this to mercifully end.  Your expulsion is inevitable. So go with your heads held high, wear your flashy purple clown-miters proudly, process majestically down the middle of the aisle, taking your lawyers with you, right out the door.  If you put on a good enough show, perhaps the people in your pews will not even notice.

I get the sense that, one way or another, this particular phase of our collective journey is coming to an end.

I really yearn for an Anglican Province that is large and stable enough that will give use the opportunity to worship the Lord in our special way and reach out to a particular segment of the US population who that we are uniquely suited to serve an evangelize.  I admit to utter frustration at the institutionalists who know better that continue to fiddle while Rome burns.  Don’t they see what is happening?

But I must admit to the possibility that God may have caused me and others to go through this process simply as a warm up for a more important project in a different mission field.  Whatever happens, He allowed it.

Its time to move on either as part of a new Province in which we are reunited with the “insiders” or permanently pointed in a different direction.

Either way, Tanzania is it. 

I have learned much from the excellent writers in this group, and wish you each all of God’s blessings in the years ahead.

(Hi Mr Edmon, well it is also a matter of life story. )

Somewhere in the heady mix, I accidentally became Anglican/Episcopalian.  Our original tour guide was a very conservative Australian classmate who probably had little or no idea what all was going on with this little band of USA Bible Belt boys she was trotting around the various local parishes so that they could meet and befriend a little bit of her native religious upbringing.

What’s my point? 

I came to TEC just because it was NOT in those days so conformed to the USA Bible Belt ConsEvs milieu, ethos, univalent doctrines, and small God/small path way of understanding and of living.  Could a symbol not have to be something simple and objective and literal, and still be meaningful enough to open people up to love of God and love of neighbor?  Questions were not something embarrasing and unfaithful in those days in TEC, any more than they embarrass the majority of TEC believers now.  Maybe we were wrong to think that asking questions, living with questions – opening up to empirical surprises and dilemmas that didn’t have pat religious answers, was inside worldwide Anglican parameters.  Or at least so it may seem, if the current realignment ConsEvs Anglicanism is indeed all that there is now, and all that there has ever been for anybody, really.

Having walked this way, painstakingly, and having let it structure so much of my serious life development, I am not inclined (for reasons of fear, ignorance, disgust, or unease with tolerance for ambiguities?) to now pronounce so many graceful moments of conversation, change, and abandoning small Gods and small paths and idolatries of so many sorts, as nothing but error.  So.  I see no way back to only, and to nothing but, just what so many on this blog say is the only possible view, doctrinally, empirically, and so forth.

I suspect this: Even if the communion gets realigned and conformed in just the ways that most ConsEvs believers now seem to be saying they so dearly wish, need, desire, and preach - the rest of us cannot go backwards.  We cannot become nothing but ConsEvs, cannot cease being progressive believers who still think that God is still speaking. 

Cannot cease listening for God…..
- in every new lab discovery, …
- in the disconfirmations of so many legacy negative ideas which were supposed to define and comprehensively explain homosexuality while taking heterosexuality so much for granted that its questions could not even arise for study, …
- in multiple ways of investigating scripture and all that empirically is related to scripture, - in responsible comparative hemeneutics and epistemologies.

If the ConsEvs witness is mainly, God has spoken, once and for all through Jesus; then what I will add on purpose is: That same God in Jesus as Risen Lord is speaking to us, now, in everything that we can provisionally regard as accurate and true if we will open ourselves to hear it.  We see through a glass darkly, and the ConsEvs readings of scripture are not other than this, and yet we are still called to follow. 

My job isn’t mostly to figure out in advance just what Jesus will do, think, or say at the Last Judgment, let alone when the new heaven and the new earth descend from God like a bride adorned for her bridegroom.  My job description is more proximate, more provisional, more open-ended, more immediate and human -sized - to love God now as fallible as I am, with all that I can manage; and to extend every means of care and sustenance that I myself would need for thriving life, to my neighbor.

I can no more return to where I once was, than the ConsEvs realignment folks can bring themselves to leave poor Bishop Robinson and the Diocese of New Hampshire in peace so that God may deal with them, probably more generously than most ConsEvs believers say they are inclined to be.

Before things got so pitched and polarized, I could presume that we maturely agreed to disagree. 

So to repeat: Change the Anglican Communion if you really feel you must, by defining away the leeway, flexibility, and inquiry which were my main intellectual paths into this rich way of following Jesus without making doctrines the pat religious answers to all important questions.

The rest of us will not soon forget the leeway, flexibility, and inquiry which we learned from the Anglican example, before it needed to become, only what you now define it to be.

Yes the ball seems now mainly in the return of Akinola and the major ConsEvs leaders.  But we have not quite yet really heard from everybody else around the planet who came to live under the Anglican umbrellas, in Canada, Scotland, New Zealand, ... and even inside CoE itself.  What you promise to do to TEC will shortly have to be done to them also.  I think we do you a passing favor by persisting in leeway until you crank down so firmly via institutional policing and extreme public claims that it is impossible not to leave. 

That way, we know what happend to the leeway and inquiry that is such a grateful aspect of our Anglican heritage, and we know who did what to it in God’s name.

Postulant:

United has some e-savers to Paris for next week.  Why not go, look at the American Cathedral and the C of E churches also in that city, and then tell us what precisely the difference is with the situation here?  American expatriates get to have a nice comfy church but Global South expatriates don’t?  Europe’s big enough for two bishops from different parts of the Communion but poor little Virginia isn’t?  And can we please put a halt to the canard that orthodox clergy have “violated their ordination vows” by maintaining faithfulness to the Christian faith, rather than just picking up the line about obeying TEC?  For 30 years, did the liberal priests and bishops bother one bit about “conforming to the doctrine” of the Episcopal Church—the REAL doctrine, not the one they wanted to have?  Pike, Righter, Spong?  (Oh, right, I forgot—the left claimed there was “no clear doctrine” in the Righter case.  How convenient.  Funny that all this doctrine people are supposed to obey has been discovered now that the other Primates don’t agree with TEC’s innovations.)  Why did we not hear much about violations of ordination vows as TEC was careening leftwards, but now we do?  Would Schori et al believe that the LEFT should have been disciplined back in the 1970s and 1980s?  Why not?—or are they only concerned with the “doctrine of the Episcopal church” now that they get to define what that doctrine is?

I came to TEC just because it was NOT in those days so conformed to the USA Bible Belt ConsEvs milieu, ethos, univalent doctrines, and small God/small path way of understanding and of living.

Dr. Dan, you must be new here.

I’ve heard this line of reasoning many times before by well meaning and not-so-well-meaning folk.  When discussions of Anglican identity come up, and particularly discussions of where TEC stands on the spectrum of American religious praxis, I’m told that, “well, we’re not like those declasse Baptists down the street, with their open Bibles and growth.”

That’s all you’ve got?  “We’re not like those churches that believe in objective truth.”  That’s a bit obvious, don’t you think?  I don’t see many young families with children down at First Episcopal in my town.  Don’t you think that old saw needs to be put out to pasture?  Now would be a perfect time for you to do so…

Oh, one more thing, Dr. Dan.  You said:

The rest of us will not soon forget the leeway, flexibility, and inquiry which we learned from the Anglican example, before it needed to become, only what you now define it to be.

Would that be the Anglican “example” of the Thirty-nine Articles you are referrring to?  Or would that be the classic Anglican Ordinal, the Homilies, or the Lambeth Quadrilateral?  Please do tell.

The kairos moment is almost here for the Anglican Communion. ECUSA has wasted many years in building up to the election of VGR, and then in talking some more about “inclusivity” which is the very opposite of the meaning of the word where TEC is concerned. Two wasted General Conventions have produced more, not less controversy, resulting in internecine conflict, and estrangement from the wider Anglican Communion.

Now it is the turn of the Anglican Communion itself to decide. Does it any longer want a province which is committed to subverting the Christian faith, and exporting its heresies to wherever its dollars will buy it influence? A province which holds sacred not the scriptures but its Canons and Conventions?

ECUSA has long proclaimed its independence. It’s time that became formalised, and now is the moment. It has chosen: so should the Primates.

Well, this announcement does seem to have struck a nerve.  Is anyone else reminded of Mr. Jorkins’s reference to “an orchestra of scorched cats” in ‘A Christmas Carol’?  As often happens, the response seems to be way out of proportion to the original incident (Road to Lambeth is hardly a NEW development) which makes me wonder about the hidden currents roiling the revisionist side.

I think that Abp. Akinola is telling the ABC and the Primates that he will not walk out of the meeting next week. This statement seems to answer the Bp. of Winchester’s piece earlier this week opposing the Presiding Bishop’s being seated as a full primate, and the Bp. of Durham’s statement last week that TEC needs to be “pruned” from the Communion vine. Both of those “opinions” by senior English Bishops seem to hint at where the ABC is going.

The Nigerian statement also reaffirms that Abp. Akinola will not accept a fudge at Lambeth. Overall, excellent work. I am encouraged about what will happen next week.

Timothy said, “I get the sense that, one way or another, this particular phase of our collective journey is coming to an end.”

I get the feeling you are right. I also would like to predict that TEC will miss the more conservative membership. They served as a sort of steering board that provided just enough resistance to keep TEC from spinning into a Unitarian whirlpool. I fear that once the tie to the communion is cut TEC will experience an even further decline and fade into the vasts of marginalization. But as a warning to those that remain in the Communion. Although the foundation will be stronger (based on a more traditional Christian doctrine), you too will have some rats on board. Those who are predisposed to conservative conclusions that did not reach them through scriptural understanding. BUT I must add, almost with a laugh, that the “conservatives” in TEC really are not that conservative. In the body political, I dare say, they are moderate if not liberal (no offense intended).

Anyway, if prognostication hold true, it has been a good fight and one where I think EVERYONE has learned a great deal more. I just hope the next big issue focuses on how to grow the Church and bring God’s saving grace to a world that sorely needs it - and that we all excude the same passion.

I mourn for Dr. Dan’s heartfelt pain, that pain that he was courageous enough to share with us ‘ConsEvs’. I mourn for the flip rejection seen here of the points that he made about his path along the Episcopal way as he found it. Will there indeed be room in the new structures for Dr. Dan and those like him to feel welcomed and loved? Are we indeed ready to listen to honest travail before dispensing them with pat answers? Are we ready to reach out and touch the lepers of our society while they are yet unhealed? I wonder and I mourn.

A glorious day. Praise God for the Nigerians, Muslim and Anglican, who have shown us how to (1.) coexist with very different faith structures and (2.) from the Anglican Nigerians, unaltered devotion to the simple truths of the Gospel. Look, what we have been contesting with our Worthy Opponents are basic, uncomplicated, easy to understand questions of what the Word of God says to us about our behaviour. It is the nature of the revisionist to cast great shadows from clouds of rhetorical dust, obscuring these so clear questions and their so clear answers. Leave it to the much disparaged Africans to cut through the fog and bring the so sophisticated Northern Europeans into the light. How about some humility here my Anglo friends. They have saved our bacon.
My last thought here is a stern warning: IT IS NOT OVER. DO NOT LOWER YOUR GUARD.  That snake can still bite. Now more than at anytime in the last 40 years we must be vigilant. Beers still has a law license. Schori,Mathes, Bennison, Bruno and the rest of the Ministry of Thuggery still have all that dead man’s money with which to harrass us. Some of the toughest fighting in WWII was in the streets of Berlin in April of 45. They were beat, but wouldn’t lie down. 
Pray the Novena of ++Ackerman, now 2 days running. The prayers of the just availeth much. Are we seeing already the movement of the Holy Spirit? Could be, could be.

Teddy mak says, “My last thought here is a stern warning: IT IS NOT OVER. DO NOT LOWER YOUR GUARD.”
You are absolutely right. I hold out hope that this is one of the things we have learned. Not that we should not lower our guard now…but NEVER lower our guard. This type of thing has gone on for thousands of years and will not stop today or ever. I think we all got too complacent because we had no immediate threat - not realizing the slow drip of the current threat. We need to be ever mindful of where arugments TAKE us now and NOT to assume that all have the same goal in mind.

Someone was expressing thanks for the skills of the debaters on this site. I agree. I have learned a lexicon of new and strange words from these brilliant theologists. Being Cajun, I had some trouble getting definitions so I turned to Mr. Hillaire Benoit, noted General Expert for help. I submit the following responses:
ratiocinations:  How ya compare some’ting like whas de ratio good to bad in 20 poun   crawfish.
Theotokos :  A sammich from dat greek on Pinhook road. Lossa olive oil.
Epistomology:  What dat kidney doctah study.
univalent:  A kine a batroom for bot   mens and wimmins.
pluriform:  When you sick in de longs. “I got de pluriform in my chess.”
hemeneutics:  Hien? Lessee..Men lunatics? I don know.
inclusivity:  De opposite from outclusivity. “ I barbeques outclusivity, never in de house.”
ecclesiology:  De scince of makin cle’s to open doors. You learn dat at de hardware stowe.
Any more?

Wyclif—

You have to understand that to DrDan, the dreadful term “ConsEvs”—presumably a compound of “conservative” and “evangelical”, both terrible imprecations—would apply equally to, for example, Pope John Paul II.  Now, Roman Catholic social doctrine is complex and nuanced, but hardly “conservative” in any normal political sense, and applying the term “evangelical” to His Holiness would doubtless have surprised him, particularly given its special meaning in Anglo-American religious contexts.  So the word which he uses for his ideological opponents is essentially devoid of any real meaning—as is typical of the Christian-sounding vocabulary of official ECUSA-speak.

DrDan has been sadly suckered by ECUSA’s Brave New Paganism, and is marching resolutely across the corpse of the dead horse away from the sour grapes.  We can only pray that he and his coreligionists will eventually find the Gospel and return.

lol!
How about obfuscation?

People, people, people.  I’m gratified to see that I am not the only one who has noticed that this article has struck a nerve and called out all of the usual suspects in spite of the fact it is not essential “new news”.

Thanks to Craig for his suggestion to read the entire document; I’m trying to figure out how I’ve missed it before.  I was so moved, convicted and refreshed that I ran a copy of the document and re-read it and highlighted significant sections.

I am not surprised that this article would bring out what some would call “Worthy Opponents” to employ hyperbole, straw man and other forms of arguments to divert the conversation from the topic at hand.
DrDan is hardly new to the board and many of us have heard about his pain.  Please do not be misled.  These are deliberate diversion tactics and once you learn who “the usual suspects” are, pay attention to the thread to which they post most frequently and vociferiously.

Bottomline, what is written in The Road to Lambeth frightens them, as well it should.  And they would be the first to tell us that the typical response to fear is anger…and we have seen that today.

And to those of you, and you know who you are, to whom the listening process (at the least as far as “us” listening to “you”) has become the new sacrament, why don’t you try it.  Come on, prove to us, prove to me that you are not the hypocrites you so quickly fling in the faces of men like ++Akinola.  I heard a very timely message from Alistair Begg this morning on Fellowship in his series about the 7 marks of the Church.  He can be heard online at http://www.truthforlife.org.

Later, when time permits, I will turn for the diversion and post about my reaction to The Road to Lambeth and to the blessing that our God and King has provided, not just the AC, but His blessed Church in the bishops of CAPA.

The Lord, our God is Sovereign, and blessed be His Holy Name.

Dear Mr. Goodrich (CraigG):

In your response to Dr Dan you said

your own ... ratiocinations

Webster’s defines ratiocination thusly:

  1. the process of exact thinking: REASONING
  2. a reasoned train of thought

Forgive me if I am in error, but I believe the word you were looking for was rationalizations, more specifically the usage defined in Webster’s as follows:

(T)o attribute (one’s actions) to rational and creditable motives without analysis of true and especially unconscious motives <rationalized his dislike of his brother>, or more broadly, to create an excuse or more attractive explanation <rationalize the problem>.

Kind regards,

There is additional information about the Nigerian synod available in a second Church of Nigeria news release here:

SOKOTO Second News Release

The first day was devoted to registration and formal meetings with both the governor of Sokoto, Alh. Dr. Attahiru Bafarawa, and the new Sultan of the Caliphate, Alh. Mohammed Sa’ad Abubakar III. These meetings were important and very positive - a full reading of the news release can show how important for future interfaith relationships and practical cooperation they were. Both the Governor and the Sultan play important roles in the life of this section of Nigeria and of Nigeria as a whole.

At the meeting with the Governor, “... it was announced that he would provide a hundred rooms at the premier hotel in town to accommodate some of his honored guests! This remarkable act of generosity set the tone for the rest of the meeting.”
....
“Archbishop Akinola had worked closely with the late Sultan both as joint chair of the Nigerian Inter Religious Council and also the Tsunami Relief fund – a project that raised more one billion Naira (approx seven million dollars) to aid the victims of the Tsunami of 2005.”
....
‘Before his appointment [the new Sultan] was a Colonel in the Nigerian Army and at the time of his election had been studying at the National Institute for Policy and Strategic Studies, Kuru, near Jos. He said that he was about to publish a paper titled, “Religious Extremism and National Security” and he is clearly committed to peaceful existence with people of all faith traditions. Turning to Archbishop Akinola he said, “If somebody tries to hit you because you are a Christian I will place myself in front of you so that they can hit me first!” A remarkable statement from the man who is seen as the “King of Moslems for Nigeria”’

After more greetings and the obligatory photographs, the Primate and his party returned to the hotel to prepare for the meeting of the Synod that would start early the next day. The primary focus of the meeting was to address a number of constitutional issues that would allow the Church of Nigeria to continue its remarkable growth. Two of the key decisions made were that the next Primate would automatically serve as Bishop of Abuja and a Provincial Headquarters and Conference Center would be built in the Federal Capital to provide the necessary infrastructure to sustain the Church’s mission and ministry during the coming years. At the end of the day, however, all of the Synod delegates agreed that nothing was more surprising about this meeting than the warmth of their welcome in Sokoto and the promise of peace in such an unlikely place.

This entire mess is like watching a modern day Reformation through a ‘looking glass’. Everything seems to be in reverse! I may not be the sharpest knife in the drawer, but I do seem to remember reading that when the last Reformation took place, those who wanted change (that would be usn’s) were the folks who left. Those who liked things the way they were stayed.
But, here we are (usn’s again), leaving to start over, and the revisionists are staying put. What is wrong with this picture?
Our little parish in middle Tennessee already made the move, and we have made application to become a parish under the authority of CANA.
The Diocese of Tennessee standing committee, along with breaking numerous other promises that were made when we left, has also refused to transfer our Rector’s papers to a different authority.
Bottom line: I sincerely hope and pray, for the sake of all concerned Christians, whether in revisionist or orthodox parishes/dioceses, that the meeting in Tanzania next week will bring about a final and God-driven ending to this ongoing and fruitless madness. All the words have been spoken. There is nothing left to say. It is time for decision, not more useless rhetoric. Enough is enough. It is long past time we devote our time and energy to building up God’s church. It is long past time we stopped tearing it down. And, it is long past time we returned to the business of saving souls, not instituions.

Hi Wyclif, my mention of the USA Bible Belt believers was not pointing at Southern Baptists in particular, but of course they are representative of the conservative and/or evangelical frames, are they not?  In any case, my growth away from being anywhere near to Southern Baptist conservatism or evangelicalism has little to do with whether somebody else sees them as declasse or not.  The point is religion, spiritual life, commitments, and values.  The point is about following Jesus of Nazareth.

I guess it is difficult for conservative and/or evangelical folks to credit, but let me say it anyways.  The reach or openness to stretching ourselves - and it is a fairly constant process of growth - into liberal or progressive Christian directions is a reach out for values, a widening of core ethical commitments, and learns through enlivening encounters with neighbors as an unavoidable dimension of following Jesus of Nazareth.

So far as my point about TEC, I am simply saying that TEC was yet a further step in my life’s journey - away from being nothing but conservative or evangelical in my beliefs.  I was already a young adult who had already, previously, tried so many aspects of the USA Bible Belt ways of following Jesus and found them wanting.  So to come across Teilhard de Chardin’s work was like discovering that some other, warmer, and intellectually clearer sort of fire existed in church and in world, besides all the lights that seemed to illuminate the USA Bible Belt churches.

I still do not regret starting out there, but camping out there for the rest of my earthly life?  Not nearly so much an occasion of continual adult thanksgiving.

If as Rowan Williams suggested in passing, the new realigned communion will still have room for evangelicals and catholics, but the progressive believers just have to go because; then so be it.  The same Jesus who helped me find TEC in the first place, and believe me, I was not consciously looking that next step so much as it turned out in retrospect that that next TEC step was looking for me as it were, that same Jesus will surely assist the rest of us in all our next steps, beyond the newly realigned conservative and/or evangelical worldwide communion. 

Already I have been finding much unexpected support and encouragement - from of all things my Buddhist friends at work, as well as from many others inside and outside of all the formal insider and outsider designations.  Even the Dalai Lama has recently encouraged Jesus Freaks to keep on following Jesus.  Wow, thanks Dalai Lama. 

I am even heartened by the evangelical believer in southern California’s Yolo County who passes out her home made certificates of inequality, since she is prohibitied by current state laws from enrolling gaymale or lesbian couples in the marriage certificates which are her clerk-recorder office’s reason for being.
(See: http://www.news10.net/display_story.aspx?storyid=24451  )

At least I can still thank God for my evangelical roots.  I think it is still best and probably quite important to leave just those spaces/leeways which evangelicals so often claim - things like a personal relationship with Jesus as Risen Lord, a personal (and usually ongoing?) strain of active metanoia in many domains of their daily lives, witnessing via living as primary - how you live speaks so loud that what you say is second best?, the priesthood of all believers - which TEC proclaims via the notion of our equality as baptised, healing and service without expectations of ulterior motives or rewards (Tikkun Olam?), a personal reading relationship with the Old and New Testaments, and that legacy Protestant habit of questioning any and all received authorities which try to resurrect some element of the divine rights of kings and/or popes.

I cannot claim conservative roots since I am hardly conservative.  I do think it is curious that conservative and/or evangelical believers seek a bell jar separateness, and a clear distancing from the rest of us - just when so many indicators point in the opposite directions. We are all much nearer one another these days as life goes global - socially, economically, institutionally, politically, personally, and on and on and on.  I guess hardening and closing down one’s religious positions is one way to get back some of that distance and that separateness, but it costs a lot from all involved.

Anyways, so Akinola or Duncan or Anderson or Minns or whomever isn’t going to rubber stamp my daily life with Jesus in the conceivable future.  I didn’t get my signals from them anyway, though in the old out of style communion I could have expected not to be nearly so out as I am soon going to be in the realigned communion.  Funny thing.  By going outside, I am suddenly going to be much closer to all the conservative and/or evangelical folks than they will allow or admit me to be inside the communion, because our planet is indeed becoming a global village where none of us is very distant or all that separate from anybody else, no matter what.

PS. Blogging is great except that it leaves out the 90 percent of human communications that is nonverbal, and we have to make do with the remaining 10 percent.

As usual our revisionist acquaintances fill the board with,as the Scripture calls them,empty words(Ephesians 5:6).
According to my Vine’s,these are words which express hollowness,erroneous teaching based in deceit.Thayer’s goes further ,‘empty,vain,devoid of truth’.Also,citing 2 Tim.2:16(empty chatter in NASB)‘empty discussion,discussion of useless matters,babbling’.
But I guess that’s understandable given the trouble the simple question,Who is Jesus?,gives some folks.
Contrast those with the words of The Road To Windsor,not much to compare,huh?