Part of me is sorry that the original motion as presented by Mrs Ashworth didn't go to the Synod as first proposed and that it didn't then fail.  We are overdue for a 'testing of the mind' of the Church of England and this would, at least, have provided some clarity.  The background papers provided by the proponents of this motion were disingenuous and highly faulted and worthy of the sort of rebuke and rebuttal provided by Alan Perry.  The motion should have failed on that basis alone.

That the Church of England should have expressed its desire to 'be in communion' with the ACNA would indicate their willingness to be in communion with a body which is more an "aggregate" than a discrete body with recognizable beliefs - a strange collection of cavaliers and roundheads - bodies which were recently part of The Episcopal Church and the Anglican Church of Canada along with those who stumped away from the Anglican Church a long time back over such burning issues as surplices on clergy and candles on the altar.  You'd not have known exactly who is was you were desiring to be in communion with and the motion could have failed on that basis alone.

The Church of Engand is, quite possibly, not minded to wade in on the other side either and to see the headlines tomorrow that its General Synod had endorsed everything that TEC and the ACoC has done over the last 7 years.  While the nugget of opinion on the side of ACNA can, no doubt, be found in the Synod it doesn't exist with sufficient weight to pass such a motion.  But neither is the other nugget of opinion in the majority - that which would have favoured the rejection of this motion as it was originally presented in order to issue a rebuke to secessionists in America and Canada. 

The General Synod of the Church of England did the only thing possible.  It doesn't have its house particularly in order on these issues either and risks tearing itself wide open. 

Raspberry Rabbit

Scotland

To Steve:  Hmmm.  Here I have just been reading *my* old Diocesan newspaper which interestingly is also called the 'Montreal Anglican' and was amazed to see just how frank and furious the debate was (in print - anyway) particularly that between Canon Simons of the Montreal Diocesan Theological College taking one side of things and Professor Ian Henderson taking the other.  Sterling stuff!

The whole idea of an emergence of 'another religion' in the ACofC puts the question on the same level as Godzilla leveling the city.  It's a caricature and does little justice to the situation there.

Right - everybody - on both extremes - seems to think they own Rowan Williams and that he'll do as they say.  Sometimes the fact that everybody is cheesed off with you is an indication that you're doing your job.

RR

There's no question of Rowan's courage and integrity.  There is so much that he has gotten right over the last few years. 

Waffling in the face of the discipline issues surrounding 'irregular ordinations' a while back was not one of those things and it will come back to bite him. 

The desire to 'live and let live' with the Reform group is not a reciprocal arrangement.  To take unity for granted as a good thing is not a wise thing to do with a group which would take rendering and divisions as a sign of God's presence - of the truth 'trying to get out'.

While there may be a history of microphones being turned off and journalists misled you don't need to look very far for a paper trail.  None of this is a surprise.

There ought to be a penalty for wasting people's time at Easter.  The hype was worse than the talk itself.  While that might be the fault of the Telegraph and not Dr Johns, Dr Johns could have done something to stem the hype.  The use of the term psychopath (which started the Telegraph off and gave folks such as Giles Fraser the requisite sound of the starter's pistol) was ill chosen. 

I'd have though that such a talk would be (in Theodore Roosevelt's words) a 'bully pulpit' for enlarging the vocabulary of ordinary Christians who thought that that there was only one way of looking at the work of Christ on the cross - people who might have thought that P.T. Forsyth was the last word on the subject.  A pastor might have taken that approach.  The problem is:  we don't have pastors any more - we have controversialists.  Is Dr Johns is an angry man?  He has, perhaps, good reason to be angry.  Those of us who would quite self consciously preach, teach and sing about Christ's gift of his own Self for the sins of the world might equally be angry at being so badly misrepresented in the press this last few weeks.

I am disturbed by the polarization of the commentary on the events this week in Tanzania.  Fair enough, there are a certain number of conservative "news sources" who are licking their wounds after not receiving the sort of news they wanted from the subcommittee report.  These organizations and this group of 'bloggers' represented - we hope - a relatively narrow slice of Anglican opinion in the U.S. and the UK and it's no great shame that they've been disappointed.  The ill-will which they specialized in was not something that could conceivably have been marshalled on the side of righteousness and their constituencies, in many cases, are rather divided within themselves.  It would have looked like Bosnia within a year had any of their number been supported by the Anglican Communion to represent the Church in the US. 

We then immediately switch to the loud voices on the other side of the spectrum who speak perhaps a little too freely as if they represented everybody *but* the really nasty conservative section of the church.  They don't, in fact.  Few of us are signed up members of Integrity or Inclusivechurch.  Most of (who are clergy) would have the mother of all battles to see same sex relationships blessed in our churches and most of us would probably not feel comfortable leading the charge.

If the meeting ends without a massive dustup and if the interference of overseas provinces in the affairs of TEC is reduced (either because the Primates have said it should or because the wind is no longer in the sails of the American dissidents) then the ball falls into the court of the rest of the church.  Before the pressure groups, the advocacy groups and the host of 'other bloggers' decide that it's their chapter in the life of the Church which is due to begin I think it should be stated that not all of those who have been praying for the best possible outcome in Tanzania are prepared to see the other side make hay out of the defeat of the conservative's game plan. 

We are rather impoverished when it comes to theological discourse within the liberal/progressive/moderate wing of the church.  We are rather lacking in positive statements about human sexuality that aren't simple accomodations to whatever lifestyles happen to be in evidence in our society.  There's an awful lot of understanding to be encouraged here at home before anybody starts flying a "liberal flag" over the local church.

I think that the implication is clear that for the Diocese of New Westminster to be allowed to exercise a 'local option' as to the blessing of gay marriages would be a fairly poor response at this time.  The Canadian General Synod in Winnipeg this year will be rather 'on display' when they meet.  There will be gay candidates for the episcopacy in TEC this year and those elections and the consent procedure which follows will certainly be watched.  For the American bishops to give their consent to another openly gay bishop in a non-celibate relationship would make another meeting like this - with folks checking their computers two or three times a day to find out if the Anglican Communion still existed - pretty well inevitable.  The liberal bloggers have been quick to accuse the conservatives of being obsessed with sex to the detriment of other avenues of mission and evangelism.  The accusation can be tossed both ways, however, and any environment of relative peace which proceeds from this meeting should be protected.  There will always be men and women in a variety of relationships within our parish churches.  The sexual orientation of clergy will no doubt continue to be plotted along a fairly broad graph.  That's not going to change and nobody seems to be prescribing any change. 

Some restraint is in order and would be in order even if the folks across the sea weren't the issue at hand.  Some restraint is demanded even by those of us who live right here.

Does the Bishop of Winchester understand the meaning of the word 'oppression'?  He suggests that TEC is 'oppressing' a quarter (his arithmetic, nobody else's) of its own membership by refusing to allow them to grow and flourish in full relationship with the Anglican Communion.  By which I assume he means that resisting the division of TEC into sundry fiefdoms outside the constitutional authority of the Dioceses and Provincial structures constitutes 'oppression'.  Does he understand that any concession to this sort of ecclesiastical opportunism by Puritans, charismatics or FIFers opens the door to exactly the same sort of whittling away in Australia, New Zealand, Canada, Wales or the CofE?   Personally I'd have said that the world is the sort of place where true oppression needs to be recognized and worked against.  Which means that extending the metaphor to include 'forcing' (poor them!) members of a duly constituted church to abide the presence of people within their Diocese who have divergent opinions on certain issues makes the word 'oppression' essentially meaningless.  <p>

I've actually had my fill of hatred and plotting at this point - The Chris Sugdens and Martyn Minns(es) of this world appear to have little to offer anybody but backroom deals and secrets.  Unless they've pulled off some subtle coup they will return to their constituency as men who cannot be trusted in the dark.  I've also had enough of people making the suggestion that anyone diverging from a particular point of view on sexual ethics clearly no longer believes in the resurrection.  I've had enough of tricky bishops making strategic statements designed to restrict the wiggle room for grace, surprises and novel discussions amongst unlikely allies.  I've had enough of Puritans,  frank Pentecostals and Biblical Inerrantists lecturing the rest of us on Anglican Essentials as if it were something they knew anything about.  All this River, Stream and Rapids stuff is a self serving attempt to stretch the limits of the envelope large enough to create an actual constituency - united not under the banner of Orthodoxy (I'd love to be a fly on the wall at a conference on core theology attended by such a diverse group) but Orthopraxy on a couple of tendentious issues. <p>  When and if this conference in Tanzania ends ( or this day ends ) with something other than 'five easy pieces' there will be much work to do.  Let it, at least, be done in the light and not in some dark alley with a stiletto.

I've always been wary of anybody telling anybody else that they 'have no choice' but to follow this or that course of action.  When uttered at a synod or during labour negotiations such statements are never descriptive.  They are not designed to say how a body of people split (at last count) 18-20 with several of them being relative unknowns and subject to heaven knows what sort of pressure from lobbyists arriving with satchels, satellite phones and 'briefing packets for our African friends' or from pressure groups within their own constituencies.  I'd have put my money on either chaos, nothing much at all, or perhaps something novel - a bit of fun and games with African Primates hiding chairs during the first hour of the meeting - but I would hope for something novel.  I think that pushing the red button on the Windsor Report and watching things unfold as they 'must' would have been the last thing I expected.  I'd have given it slender odds, frankly. 

So when number three bishop and a damned fine New Testament Scholar opines that the Primates and his own friend Rowan 'have no choice but to take a certain course of answer' I can't believe that he's being descriptive.  These are 'prescriptive' statements.  As a politician I suspect that Tom is a very good New Testament Scholar.  The course ahead is one of discovering possible common ground and preventing the worst possible consequences.  It's a time for making sure that if agreement is not possible right now that the field is not muddied too badly by the sheep and that avenues for future work are not closed absolutely.  Unlikely allies will make agreements - some people will need to save face - compromises will have to be made.  All sorts of things that no doubt drive principled people to distraction - any number of leaders have had to square circles in the past - clearly it will have to be done again.  I don't think the reminder that nobody has any choice in the matter is particularly politic at this juncture - in fact it rather runs against the grain of what probably needs to happen at a meeting like this which is precisely that exercise of 'choice' that pulls people back from their respective precipices.

Tony

When Peter stepped off the 'habitual path' in Antioch and enjoyed fellowship with Paul, Barnabas and 'all those Gentiles' he was greeted by the spectre of the 'men from James' coming up from Jerusalem who, I imagine, would have been well-armed with proof texts, with their understanding of the nature of the 'agreements' had been about approaching the Gentiles and with a well-reasoned case that the goings-on in Antioch were putting the Church in Jerusalem at risk from its enemies.  Proof texts would have been on the side of the men from James.  Paul's response - it seems, is both 'biblical' and not.  It is clear and becomes clearer in his own writings that he understands the trajectory of what Jesus taught and did and how the Gentile Mission was there in embryo all along.  The limited concession to those who were outside the fold of the lost sheep of the house of Israel would need to open up and Peter would have to choose whether he was going to be a part of it or whether he would take refuge in the least charitable interpretation of the scope of ministry.  The evidence was clear to him and to Barnabas (and had been to that point to Peter as well)  that God had been gracious to the Gentiles and had poured his Spirit upon them.

We have made plenty of free advances beyond the narrow lines of what women are permitted to do and say within the Church.  I have families in my congregation which are eclectic combinations of individuals with their children from previous marriages.  I have not asked whether each of them falls within the Matthean Exception or not.  Plenty of us have lived with the idea that our bachelor vicar *might* be gay and have even allowed him to go on holiday without questioning him closely about who he will be travelling with. 

So when a dissenting American bishop - with wife number two in tow (a capable woman with uncovered head who makes her views on church life widely known) - attempts to negotiate a relationship with an African Primate who will accept his little gaggle of clergy *including* a couple of female priests since his organization is only a 6.5 on the Conservative Scale and not an 8, what exactly is sticking in his craw (as they say in America). 

Have gay men and women been blessed by God in their ministries or not?  Which of us - faced with a gay young person in our congregation suffering as a result of the sort of profiligacy that can overtake a sexually active person of either persuasion - would not counsel him to seek out something more stable and life giving?  And when we do (and I assume that very few of us would not) - would we have the courage to say that we had?   Some of us find ourselves like Peter at Antioch - caught between what we believe is probably right and what the gatekeepers of our organizations would require us to assent to.