At the Press Briefing Friday it was suggested that the seven who did not attend were those whose Provinces had declared their Provinces were not in communion with the Episcopal Church. But they are touted by the Church of Nigeria website as being Global South Primates in either "in broken or impaired" relation to the Episcopal Church. Either way, the Global South is in some disunion on this. The CartoonChurch made note of the fact.
Here is a list of the members of the Global South Steering Committee. I am unclear as to whether Bishop Anis, the newly elected Primate of Jerusalem and the Middle East attended or if the Most Rev. Clive Handford, the outgoing Archbishop is in Dar Es Salaam. The members of that Steering Committee not attending communion on Friday are in red:
President: Most Rev'd Peter J. Akinola, Primate of All Nigeria
General Secretary: The Most Rev'd John Chew, Bishop of Singapore
Treasurer: The Rt. Rev'd Mouneer Anis, Bishop of Diocese of Egypt
Most Rev'd Emmanuel Kolini, Province of Rwanda
Most Rev'd Drexel Gomez, the Province of the West Indies
Most Rev'd Bernard Malango, Province of Central Africa
Most Rev'd Gregory Venables, the Province of the Southern Cone
Additional Archbishops not attending the Eucharist:
The Most Rev'd Benjamin Nzimbi, of Kenya
The Most Rev'd Justice Akrofi, of West Africa
The Most Rev'd Henry Orombi of Uganda.
Seven Archbishops did not attend, of whom three are from the Global South Steering Committee. It would seem then that even the Steering Committee of the Global South group is not of one mind on the matter. Of the group not attending, Chew and Kolini represent Provinces related to AMiA; Venables of the Southern Cone has taken in the deposed bishop of Recife and one of his bishops, Frank Lyons has taken in parishes in the US. Nigeria, of course, has set up shop in the US with Bishop Martyn Minns in charge.
It is significant that Archbishops Gomez and Malango did not join them. Archbishop Gomez is chair of the Covenant Design Group and Archbishop Malango served on the Sub Committee whose report yesterday was presented to the Primates.
Who knows what it means, except that the so called Global South is having a hard time getting out the vote.
It is the end of the day. David Walker of Cartoon Church says it all:
Fr. Mark,
ReplyDeleteDavid Virtue is reporting on his blog that the media spoke-primates were taken aback when they learned of the web posting from the seven who refused to communion (or at least by ++Nigeria.) The response as he portrays it leads me to think that we know at least one topic of their ongoing discussions. ;-)
Of course, that is just like the liberals, not understanding that the rules of conduct, and trivia like keeping an agreement to remain silent, do not apply if one is on the side God would be on, if only he had all the facts. ;;sigh;;
FWIW
jimB
John Chew is the Archbishop of what is technically (by nationality, not by place of confirmation) my home Province ... and he's a bloody disgrace.
ReplyDeleteAnd so is his predecessor, who after +Robinson's consecration said, "As Dr Gene J Robinson is a practising homosexual who had divorced his wife and has for the last 13 years been living with a male partner, the Province cannot and do not recognize his consecration and ministry in the Anglican church.
In view of ECUSA’s action in proceeding with the consecration despite the warnings and pleas of a large majority of Anglican churches worldwide, the Province regrets that communion with the ECUSA as well as those who voted for the consecration and those who participated in the consecration service is now broken.
This means that the Province no longer treats those in ECUSA who carried out and supported the act of consecration as brothers and sisters in Christ until and unless they repent of their action and return to embrace Biblical truths. At the same time, the Province remains in fellowship with the faithful believers within ECUSA who rightly oppose and reject the erroneous actions of their house."