From NT Wright:

In short, my hope and prayer is that the spiritual energy, the sense of celebration, the eagerness for living and preaching the gospel, which were so evident at GAFCON, can and will be brought to the forum where we badly need it, namely, the existing central councils of the Anglican Communion

The problem is the participants HAVE DONE THAT, again and again for 5 years, and they were BETRAYED by those councils. That much should be clear from the GAFCON statement.

There is not the will in the communion to impose discipline. The covenant is dead in the water - every liberal province has rejected it out of hand before Lambeth even starts - there is no way they will sign up to anything that stops them moving their agenda forwards.

At some point you have to accept the inevitable. THERE WILL BE NO DISCIPLINE. Now what?
[reposting under the proper thread - Elves please can you remove the duplicate under the top thread]

A surprisingly muddled response from the great Bishop. At the end he writes that the GAFCON leaders should come “to the larger party where the rest of us are working day and night for the same gospel, the same biblical wisdom, the same Lord.” But earlier he had written, “I have grieved at the muddled teaching which has allowed all kinds of confusions about Christian doctrine, behaviour and even the nature of Anglicanism to abound, with disastrous consequences.” So apparently it’s not “the rest of us [who] are working day and night for the same gospel, the same biblical wisdom, the same Lord”; rather, it’s some of the rest of us. If every leader in the Anglican world shared Bishop Tom’s passion for the Gospel, there would be no GAFCON and no need of it; but he knows and admits that that’s not the case. Many of “the rest of us” — that is, non-GAFCON Anglicans — consider Bishop Tom himself to be outrageously and unforgivably reactionary. And it’s the triumph of those pseudo-Gospels in some parts of the Communion that has made the Jerusalem Declaration, or something like it, necessary — for all its regrettable flaws and obscurities.

I am extremely concerned about these proposals, and urge all those who likewise share that concern to concentrate their prayers and their work on addressing the issues in the way which, remarkably, GAFCON never mentioned, namely, the development of the Anglican Covenant and the fulfilment of the recommendations of the Windsor Report.

Isn’t this the problem?  The recommendations of the Windsor Report weren’t fulfilled, and, apparently, never will be.  And we now know the Covenant is a waste of time, since the Communion won’t enforce the statements to which its provincial representatives are signatories.

Many Anglicans around the world intend to do that in any case, and will not understand why they need to be ‘recognised’ or ‘authenticated’ by a new, self-selected and non-representative body to which they were not invited and which will not itself, it seems be accountable to anyone else.

Does he mean like Rowan Williams, who, with his Lambeth invitations, undercut all the work of the years leading up to Dar es Salaam, and remains unaccountable to any of us for it?  Does he mean the faithful CANA bishops, who wonder “why they need to be ‘recognised’ or ‘authenticated’ by a … non-representative body” in the form of Canterbury?

Rather, GAFCON itself needs to bring its rich experience and gospel-driven exuberance to the larger party where the rest of us are working day and night for the same gospel, the same biblical wisdom, the same Lord.

From my perspective, this is important. I have lamented the propensity of some in the conservative movement toward dismissing all of TEC, all of C of E, etc. as being faithless and in need of GS-style correction.  I have been dismayed, as well, by the refusal of some in the GS to meet with faithful Episcopalians, indeed, people with whom they collaborated over the years.

Lest I be accused of being spurious, I will give y’all an example. When I belonged to the Diocese of West Texas, we faithfully contributed toward and oversaw the building of an education center for women in an African diocese. It was an unqualified success and forged lovely relationships between people in our diocese and those in Africa. Not long after its completion, our diocese was celebrating an anniversary and Bishop Orombi was scheduled to come and join us in fellowship and thanksgiving.

Then, ECUSA decided what it did in 2003. Our diocese voted, across the board, against the decisions. Bishop Orombi canceled his visit, saying it would not be wise for him to come after what our church did. Our diocese had not changed one bit since the time of the project and partnerships and after GC2003 but we were painted with the same brush, apparently, by the GS.

It seems to me that this is precisely the type of thing of which +Dunelm writes here. Let Gafcon inspire the cohesion of faithful bishops, ministers, and laity but let it NOT become some sort of litmus test or inquisitorial board of men who define orthodoxy from only their perspectives, deciding that any outside of their company MUST be in need of reformation. Indeed, if ALL of the faithful do speak out and speak up, joining together without preconceived caricatures of the others, then there won’t be need of formal “discipline.”  The emboldening of dioceses and members will not abide or accept diversions.

Consider how different our present state would be if the Diocese of NH and others would have been evangelized 6 years ago? I still can’t fathom why they put up with a bishop who is more frequently on a “world tour” of himself than serving his people.

RE: “I have shared the frustration of many at the fact that we don’t possess the kind of structures that would enable us to deal straightforwardly and clearly with the complex problems that have faced us. As Archbishop Rowan has said, our present ‘instruments of Communion’ were not designed to meet this kind of problem, and we badly need to find new ways forward.”

Nonsense.  The structures are there.  The problem is that they all run through one man (the ABC) who has decided to work for stasis.  He alone has derailed the Windsor Process, DES, and watered down Lambeth.  The more Wright defends him, the more credibility Wright loses.

I didn’t get invited to GAFCON either.

Presumably GAFCON saw Wright’s previous pronouncements and decided they didn’t want the complication of inviting him?  So, he has only himself to blame.  I suppose we should be glad he is throwing his toys out of the pram in a more measured way this time!

As for what he says, in sales there is a concept called F.U.D.  Fear, Uncertainty and Doubt.  It is used unmercifully against your competitor.
Tom Wright seems to have been to sales school.

I am a fan of N. T. Wright’s teaching.  He is amazing.  I admire his commitment to the Windsor document/process and expect that he is as frustrated by the ABC’s unwillingness to stay on track as any of us.  I can only think as I read this that he believes that this Lambeth Meeting will accomplish what the other instruments of communion have not being able to. 

He raises the question of accountability.  This is helpful indeed, but it cuts two ways.  At this point of the proceedings we need to ask who the ABC is accountable to?  The Primate’s Council where he is first among equals?  This would seem appropriate.  On a team everyone is accountable.  Where is the accountability for failure to follow through on the decisions he made in concert with the other instruments of unity? Anglicanism with our emphasis on interdependence is built upon trust and love.  Trust is earned and nourished.  The ABC’s failure to follow through with previous agreements breaches that trust in the way that ++Griswold breached the trust when he consecrated +Robinson.

Without accountability there can be no trust, no team.  Seen from this perspective, GAFCON is holding the instruments of unity accountable.  I wonder if +++Rowan Williams sees it this way.  His team, the team he should be captain of, is ticked at him for calling one play and executing another.

Excellent piece of writing.  One needs to understand the English idiom to appreciate the pure joy of this piece.

I do think +Wright’s concerns are valid.  Looking closely, however, they seem to be mostly to relate to details which will be worked out over time.  He seems to agree with the general thrust of the proposed movement.

He clearly has not given up on Lambeth and +Williams.  I find this somewhat odd, because +Wright has clearly seen what the Archbishop has not, that there are multiple “pseudo-Gospels” abroad in the land masquerading as the real Gospel.  +Williams statement shows that he is in complete denial about this.  I am not surprised by this.  Most liberals I know believe that their project is orthodox and true to the Gospel.  They would never admit that their gospel is any different.  At best it is blindness, and at worst prevarication.  +Wright sees through this.  +Williams clearly does not. 

+Wright does make an important point, however, that there are faithful, orthodox Christians all over the Communion who have never signed on to any particular protest agenda and have not given up hope in the AC and its instruments.

#9 and 10,
I absolutely agree. Pageantmaster, I was really taken by the joyful tone of the piece. I felt that same joy in reading it, with the happy acknowledgement that, yes, an eminent bishop in England entirely gets it, lives and serves with the joy despite all of the Troubles, and expresses this reality so beautifully to the Communion! And in that vein, I was sorely wishing that a missive of this tone and substance had the signature of Cantuar.

Luther was horrified at the idea of creating a “new church” also.  He simply intended to bring the church he loved back to the Scriptures.

I too am puzzled why Tom Wright thinks a Covenant will address the problem when the clear ruling of Lambeth 1.10 has been so merrily ignored.

Perhaps he thinks that there is a sea-change that will result in those leading the TEC actually meaning “yes” when they say “yes” instead of having a meaning that has only a passing resemblance to the meaning of the word in the dictionary.

Because Lambeth 1.10 is not a ruling in any sense that can be enforced. It has no juridical authority except that which Provinces chose to give it. TEC chose to completely ignore it. Hence the current crisis.

The Covenant will begin to give us, for the first time (at least since the ending of Royal Prerogative over the colonial churches)  mechanisms that make explicit before God what our desires to be together in Christ mean - if that is indeed what we want.

Not only am I new to this site but I am new to Anglicanism.  I attend an Evangelical Episcopalian church in the Twin Cities, MN.  I must admit to being somewhat frustrated at the comments directed negatively toward NTW.  I for one am incredibly grateful for his continual support of the existing structures and of OUR AoC.  When I left the Assemblies of God I did so so as to be plugged into a Communion that was interdependent on one another.  I would hope that most of you, who are much more well educated than I, would be able to recall at least cursory church history.  Heresies weren’t stamped out in five years when the Church had all of the armies of Rome at her side, and you are pissed because it is taking more than five years given the structures in the Communion?  The unilateral action of the TEC in 2003 was wrong, and I see no reason why other unilateral moves are any better.

The establishment are now acting like a weak head teacher who realises that the pupils prefer the disciplined deputy.  They cannot for the lives of them see that it is THEIR deliberate inability to act with clarity that gave life to GAFCON. Slee, Schori etc… can belly ache all they like- sorry guys actions have consequences.

For YEARS the liberal elite have used synods and councils to blow smoke over their agenda of secualr change- and rather successfully. Nothing was doen to discipline ECUSA when they illegally ordained women or homsoexuals….and now the cancer has spread. So much so that the healthy organs can see the need for amputation. But as to fault for damage and an un-anglican practice….liberals look no further than YOURSELVES! Having the power and reigns does not automatically give you the right to set the rules.

driver8—In view of past behaviour,  the covenant will give us another document to reinterpret in the light of the current state of scientific knowledge, and in line with our modern understanding. If those fail to give adequate room for the broad tent of everyone’s views then the words will be reinterpretated so that they no longer have even a passing resemblance to their dictionary meaning.

Leopards don’t change their spots, and I fail to see why the Bishop of Durham thinks that past behaviour will not be a good guide to future behaviour in this case.

One has only to compare Wright’s response and Williams’ response to Jefferts-Schiori’s response to understand what a powerful tool a pen (or word processor) can be in the hands of one who knows how to use it!  Great stuff, Bishop Tom!  I loved his use of the phrase “a suspicious reading.”  That is exactly the problem we are all living in right now, viewing anything from the “other” side with immediate suspicion.

Dear Tom +Wright,
You are a wonderful theologian and defender of the faith and your concerns are valid ones.  However, there can be no question that your concerns would be addressed in a constructive way if they were taken to the GAFCON leadership as one who is part of GAFCON and who is working with GAFCON.  I do not know if you were invited to GAFCON or not, but it seems from your text that perhaps you were not.  If so, then I do not think this is a reflection of how the GAFCON leadership regards your orthodoxy, but rather that they rightly perceived that you have chosen to walk a different path and two do not walk together unless they have agreed to do so.  As Paul and Barnabas had to separate, so it is with us as well.  Minor disagreements can lead each to journey a separate path.  The Windsor Covenant process and the Jersalem Declaration are divergent paths.

You said, “this may lead us to do things in new ways, sometimes setting us free from tired structures and sometimes creating new structures for new gospel purposes. That is precisely what Windsor is proposing, and what Lambeth will be pursuing.” This is certainly the crux of our disagreement.  I am sorry Dr +Wright, but new structures is what GAFCON and the Jerusalem Declaration are about.  I am sorry to inform you, but Windsor is dead.  As the principle author of it I am sure this brings you great pain.  Windsor was a wonderful document and I applaud you for it.  However, through no fault of your own it has been undermined beginning at DES and following by the unilateral actions of +Canterbury.  If the discipline called out for in Windsor and Dromantine were implemented, then I would agree with you, perhaps even on every single point of your letter.  But that is not the landscape that we are presently in.  This is 5 years later.  Windsor, Lambeth and the Covenant have all been undermined and because of this, the very See of Canterbury is now a disgrace.  As much as this hurts, we cannot deny this.
Therefore, I beg of you to stop toying with the old wineskins.  They are utterly useless now.  Dear +Wright, I have immense respect for you, and I am saddened that your talents seem to me to be nothing more than throwing pearls to the swine.  As much as you want to work with these existing structures, only the new wineskins will be of any use to our Communion.

Do two walk together unless they have agreed to do so?  +Wright, I hope that you will soon realize that those with whom you are currently walking do not share a common mind with you and those dear brothers that you reject in this statement are those who are the very ones you do share a common mind with, therefore, I pray that you will realize this and start walking with those that you are in agreement with.  You are in my prayers.  May we walk together.
In Christ,
Spencer

As a great Bible expert and specialist in Paul’s letters perhaps he needs to re-read Pauls comments on false teachers who would attempt to subvert his church plants.

Spencer,  you wrote, “+Wright, I hope that you will soon realize that those with whom you are currently walking do not share a common mind with you and those dear brothers that you reject in this statement are those who are the very ones you do share a common mind with .... “

How do you know this to be true?

WG,
Please note… “I and my colleagues in this diocese, like so many others, share exactly in the sense that we are a fellowship ‘confessing the faith of Christ crucified, standing firm for the gospel in the global and Anglican context’, sharing too the goal ‘to reform, heal and revitalise the Anglican Communion and expand its mission to the world’ and ‘to give clear and certain witness to Jesus Christ’. For this reason, I know that the GAFCON leaders can’t have intended to imply (as a ‘suspicious’ reading of their text might suggest) that they are the only ones who really believe all this, that they and they alone care about such things. The rest of us, no doubt – including several of us who were not invited to GAFCON – are eager to share in any fresh movements of the Spirit that are going ahead.”

*post after post…

Dear Tom Wright,
I know that you have a lifetime of church involvement, several doctorates, a passionate and orthodox faith.  You write profound books academic and popular.  Nonetheless, we the commentators want you to know that you cannot see what is actually in front of you.  You must be truly stupid to think that Windsor, etc… will actually help.
Sincerely post’ers.

Dear Posters,

You are right, how dense I must be.  Of course you laymen on the other side of the ocean know exactly what is going on.  I shall repent and sign up for GAFCON immediately.

Dunelm

#23 Does it help if some non laymen are saying the same thing?

From today’s meeting at All Souls Langham:
http://ugleyvicar.blogspot.com/

Q: What is the relationship between what has come out of GAFCON and the proposed Covenant?

Peter Jensen: Most at GAFCON probably felt the Covenant was not going anywhere. If it would bind people round the gospel it probably wouldn’t be accepted, if it didn’t it wouldn’t work. I am praying for Lambeth. It may be the Covenant that emerges will be suitable, but I doubt it. The Windsor Process was misconceived from the start. It was balanced, but would not say sin was sin. The Covenant may work, but probably not.

Greg Venables: The Covenant was presented to try to find unity because we were ignoring the problem. The Covenant does not address the real problem. People sitting round the same table would say they accepted one thing, then she would go back and say she hadn’t accepted it. So you get people who are devious. It is ignoring the real problem.

AD Hunt,
I sure wish there was a correlation between the number of letters behind one’s name and their ability to lead the church with clarity, but sadly these are two different skills entirely. 

I’m sorry to hear that you are still living under the illusion that the “Windsor Report” is being followed.  I challenge you to go back and read it again, look at what has transpired in the last two years, and then compare and contrast.  I’m being quite serious.  Re-read it.

As a founding member of the Windsor Fellowship of Western Michigan, I once knew the key passages of Windsor by heart.  I did so because, the future of my parish hung on the Windsor Report’s being followed through with.  I can tell ya first hand: we got hung out to dry, so please don’t patronize with the “let’s keep following Windsor” line.  Windsor’s died a long time ago, and the ABC killed it.  We’ve moved on.  We should all move on.

As for Durham, the fact is, he continues to pull the pin on his own credibility, and has only himself to blame for his continuing decline in influence.  Over and over again he shows a willingness to falsify reality (“the communion structures can’t handle the problem”) in an attempt to vindicate Rowan, when it’s clear to see that the ABC has sabotaged each and every structure and process. 

Many folks used to listen when Durham spoke.  Some still do, but I’m not one of them.  Interestingly enough, Williams doesn’t seem to be one of them either.

FF.Andrew,

It would seem that the manner in which I expressed my thought was unduly rude, and if in so commenting I patronized your very real struggle I do sincerely apologize.  Although I did mention Windsor my primary objective was to note that the good Bishop has been more involved than most here, and grieves with those injured, yet he still has hope that the process can still be followed out.  I am re-reading Windsor, and will soon finish “The Way the Truth and the Life”, if perhaps you could tell me what you mean when you say that you were hung out to dry I may better be able to respond and meditate on the current situation.

God Bless

AD Hunt, I don’t think you need to apologize, but I’m happy to share my experience with you.

For what it’s worth, let me start by saying that I really appreciate the scholarship of Wright and hearing his lecture in Grand Rapids back in the winter of 07’ was an important event for my wife and I.  Living in a diocese that was thoroughly revisionist, Wright’s lecture on his book Simply Christian was a breath of fresh air.  Wright (unlike Williams) seems to understand that there are real and serious theological issues at stake in the Communion, and he seems sympathetic to the plight of the orthodox in the US.  However, Wright tirelessly defends Williams; the man who has cut off every potential lifeline for us.

Wright is clearly smarter than most (and way smarter than I), but I really don’t think intellectual acumen in one topic (biblical studies) necessarily transfers to other topics (church politics).  In fact in my educational experience it has always amused me to see an expert in one field try to carry on a conversation in a different field.  They have the PhD, but if you get them off of ‘their’ topic, they aren’t any more advanced than your average student.

Wright’s closeness to the ABC may give him a more informed position than the rest of us, or it may just make him too close to the situation (and too friendly with Williams) to be objective.  I take the latter view.

When I said, “we got hung out to dry by Windsor” here’s what I meant.  In my diocese, I, a few other priests, and a number of laypeople formed the Windsor Fellowship of Western Michigan and worked very hard just to get people in our diocese to discuss the Windsor Report.  This was largely stonewalled (folks in this diocese didn’t even want to talk about Windsor, let alone follow it) , but our group nonetheless went to the Spring 2007 convention of our diocese and put forward a resolution that gave the diocesan delegates the opportunity to take a stand for or against “Windsor Compliance.”

Over and over again we heard folks clearly reject the Windsor Report, and when it came time to vote, the Windsor Resolution was thoroughly defeated.  (Actually it was worse than defeated, it was entirely re-written on the floor of convention to be merely a statement of thanksgiving for Katherine Jefferts Schori ...and then it was passed).  All of this happened immediately following the Dar Es Salaam Primates Meeting, and it was nothing less than a resounding “one finger salute” to the Windsor Report, the Primates, and the Communion at large. 

What happened next in the Windsor Process? Over and against the Windsor Report, Rowan Williams invited the bishop of Western Michigan (and all the TEC bishops except Robinson) to Lambeth. 

Next Williams, over and against the Dar Es Salaam Communique, told TEC that the September 30th deadline wasn’t really a deadline.  He also turned a blind eye to the continued lawsuits that TEC has filed against the orthodox.  DES called for the lawsuits to end.  TEC expanded them. 

Worse of all for us, the Primatial Vicar that was called for by DES, and would have provided a safe haven for persecuted orthodox churches in the US was never enacted by the ABC. 

My former diocese (which had just soundly rejected Windsor) then turned it’s sights on my parish, and we were forced to leave our building.  (Thankfully, the church of Uganda took us in otherwise we would simply be a community church, entirely cut off from our heritage and the rest of the Anglican world.) 

Unfortunately, my new bishop (John Guernsey of Uganda) has not been invited by Williams to Lambeth.  Why?  Williams says it is because border crossing goes against Windsor.  This is nonesense.  The Primates at Dromantine made one change to the original Windsor Report before they accepted it.  The change was to recognize that border crossing in a time of emergency such as we are in, is allowable, and would be continued until the orthodox churches in the US had a safe haven.  Williams knows that change was made…he was there after all… but he nevertheless allows ‘border crossing’ to be labelled as an evil on par with all the innovations that TEC has foisted on the Communion.

Then following TEC’s final act of non-compliance at it’s fall House of Bishops meeting in New Orleans, Williams first tried to get the Joint Standing Committee of the ACC and Primates to give TEC a passing grade.  When this didn’t pass muster, Williams just chose not to call a fall Primates Meeting at all.  (A few days ago, Williams blamed the GAFCON Primates for not “working to renew the current Instruments of Unity.”  The gall of the man.  The GAFCON Primates were more than willing to work within the Primates Meeting.  They begged the ABC to call them together.  He wouldn’t do it.)

So much for following through with Windsor…

So how did we get hung out to dry by Windsor?  The folks in Western Michigan who worked hard, were consistantly ridiculed, but nonetheless stuck their necks out for Windsor compliance have been largely forced out of the diocese or have gone ‘underground.’  Meanwhile the non-windsor-compliant bishop of Western Michigan (who gave the people of my parish all of 10 days to vacate their church building) will be in attendance.  (How exactly folks are supposed to “enjoy fellowship at Lambeth” with bishops who reject Windsor, persecute the orthodox, and drag their churches through courtrooms is beyond me.)

In the midst of all of this Wright has said to folks like myself, “It’s a terrible situation, and I feel your pain,” but then he turns right around and defends Williams AT EVERY TURN. 

Because of his position of power, the ABC has been able to do more to sabotage Windsor than everyone else in the Communion combined, but over and over again Wright goes to bat for Williams.

Because of this, I will always respect Wright for his theological work, but I will not sit quietly by and listen to he and Williams talk about “following through with Windsor.”  If Williams wanted to know which US bishops were Windsor compliant, he could have looked at the record.  Some of us worked hard to make sure that there was a record. 

The truth is that Williams doesn’t care.  He will sit down in an indaba group with the bishop of western michigan who torched the Windsor Report, and at the same time he will blame GAFCONites (the folks who have graciously taken us in) for destroying the communion.  It is the climax of hypocrisy….and Wright defends it.  I can’t tell you why he does, and I don’t have any interest in speculating.  All I can say is what I have said: Windsor is dead and the ABC killed it.

AD, I encourage you to continue your reading of Windsor, Dromantine, Dar Es Salaam, Gafcon, etc.  The ‘archives’ on this site are also well worth your time.  I hope my/our experience can help you sort out where the truth is amidst all of the rhetoric.  If you wanna know more about our church and our story you can go to: http://www.holytrinityanglicansouthhaven.com/

Wow, Fr. Andrew, what a concise timeline summary! Thanks for that.

Jim Elliott <><