Bishop Michael Ingham reporting on our relationship with Canada
MI: Thank you your grace. Grace is a name applied usually to females but in our Anglican churches it has only been applied to men until you came along. And that is wonderful.
Applause
I will tell my own synod what a joy it is to be in a church led largely by women.
In our country, as in yours, we are also struggling with sexuality issues. And like you we have had to develop alternative schemes of care for those who disagree with the positions we have taken on sexuality, although we have not yet made all the decisions we need to make. I believe we will do this at our Synod this year.
We developed a document called: Shared Episcopal Ministry. In this document, we call for the care of all those who feel themselves to be minorities in the national church. The wording speaks of “all” minorities. The wording is important. The Canadian position therefore differs from the primates who have envisioned the care of only “certain” minorities. It seems to us that many will feel disadvantaged and we must care for “all” minorities.
So there are some who are in the minority because of traditional convictions and they must be cared for.
But it is also clear that there are other people, namely sexual minorities, who also need the care and pastoral concern of the church.
As we formulate our response to the Primates, it is important for both of our churches to say to the rest of the Communion that we must be even handed and not selective.
I think you know that our two churches, while we are very different, are being drawn close together by current events.
There is a wonderful photo on the front of the Anglican Journal of ++Andrew and ++KJS standing together in Cuba. It is a great photo. It says many things. But what it seems to portray is our two churches in friendly relationship doing something good in communion, advancing the cause of equality and the fullness of the gospel. We need not forget in the current climate that there are millions of Anglicans around the world who look to us, to our churches, for hope in dark times.
Part of the post Tanzania difficulty is that it feels like our two churches are being forced toward a divisive question: whether we will choose to belong to the Anglican Communion or to choose our gay and lesbian members. That is the wrong question.
One of the things I hope Executive Council can do and your HOB will do is to refocus and reframe the question. I do not see that we need to choose between belonging to the church and protecting and caring for church members. That is not a gospel choice nor is that orthodoxy. Orthodoxy is a wide river not a narrow stream. The genius of orthodoxy is that it has provided space and boundaries for many in different positions to come together and that is not just the genius of Anglican orthodoxy, but it is the genius of the entire Christian tradition.
We are also being forced to choose between conformity and autonomy. This is also a false choice. The Anglican Communion is interdependent. Interdependence is a different matter altogether and it does not force these choices
The draft covenant seeks to move the Anglican Communion from a confederal system where authority is dispersed to a more centralized federalism. This sort of federalism makes the interdependence that characterizes confederation impossible. If this choice is accepted and made, then we will no longer have interdependence in the Anglican Communion.
It seems to me that tradition is very much on the side of those who wish to maintain con-federalism. The orthodoxy here is to preserve the status quo.
Your response to these developments at this meeting and in the HOB and in your meeting in June, all of which take place before the Canadian Synod, will have a huge impact on Canada.
Your response will have not just an impact in Africa but in Canada and England and other provinces that do not wish to be forced into these false dichotomies that are being pushed by political agendas that have nothing to do with the gospel.
I am impressed with your advocacy for the MGDs and your consistent advocacy for mission and your advocacy of Jesus Christ in your tireless efforts for the unfortunate.
You may not know this about yourself but you are a light to the gentiles.
(Standing Ovation)
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Enter by the narrow gate?