It's Sunday evening in England, Sunday afternoon in Lewes, the village by the bay and the big water. There are small rumors scurrying about like mice in the rushes by the dunes. Here, far from the center of Anglican frump and howl the word came that we are about hear something about the petition by the Common Cause Partnership to be recognized as a North American Province by the Primates Council formed following GAFCON (The Global Anglican Future Conference).
We shall see. Of course we are so far from the center and who knows if what made it here was spot on or not. So, this is only notification that the rumor mice are stirring.
Supposedly the announcement of whatever has transpired will be made public tomorrow.
If CCP is recognized and the Moderator, Bishop Duncan, is accorded "primatial" status among the "Primates Council" of GAFCON (and nowhere else I suspect) it certainly will change his future re the Episcopal Church. More it will establish a second Anglican world- made of those connections that hold among the primates of GAFCON and their Provinces.
We shall see.
The thing about rumors is that they often point beyond themselves to an unfolding of events that is sure, even if the time, circumstances and individuals are not all in place as per the rumor.
It's time to stay awake. The scurrying of mice could be a sign that the rushes are on fire. Of course it could also be a sign that mice, who after all have very small brains, have simply gone slightly mad in the heat of the day and are chasing their tails.
7/27/2008
18 comments:
OK... Comments, gripes, etc welcomed, but with some cautions and one rule:
Cautions: Calling people fools, idiots, etc, will be reason to bounce your comment. Keeping in mind that in the struggles it is difficult enough to try to respect opponents, we should at least try.
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please hesitate before lending whatever authority you wield to GAFCON's efforts to inflate Duncan's status. Calling feculence fillet mignon does not make it fillet mignon.
ReplyDeleteanglican scotist...I have hesitated and corrected my blog to reflect your wise comment.
ReplyDeletegreat picture of you...
Tell me again why the loudmouth GAFCON primates' pronouncements mean anything? (Other than assuring Duncan's deposition, which would be a good thing.)
ReplyDeleteIt seems to my memory that this is the second time the wrong wing has attempted to make the soon to be former bishop of Pittsburgh a primate. Dr. Williams and the larger church pretty much ignored the last attempt.
ReplyDeleteI have been thinking away from the center. Like Virginia, Chicago has a history with Sudan. I am rather caught up in it, as an activist for both Sudan and the progressive viewpoint. It is going to be a hard time for a while even here.
FWIW
jimB
Jim's blog
Query. Since when has Rick Warren's Saddleback mega-Church become Anglican? +Duncan appears to claim it as a member of the Anglican Communion Network and Common Cause Partnership.
ReplyDeleteSee here - http://www.united-anglicans.org/parishes/saddleback-valley-community-lake-forest/
Saddleback's website makes no mention - http://www.saddleback.com/flash/default.htm#
Is he thus claiming that Saddleback will be part of the proposed GAFCON-recognized Anglican province?
Those aren't mice--those are Bob Duncan's eyebrows!
ReplyDelete(Sorry, couldn't resist.)
About one-third of the bishops present at GAFFEPRONE have no connection whatever to the Anglican Communion.
ReplyDeleteSir, sometimes you complain about "insulting" comments...and now you liken some people in your church to mice with small brains?
ReplyDeleteAnglican Scotist....I think GAFCON is much more important than you might hope:
http://www.anglican-mainstream.net/2008/07/27/how-many-churchgoing-anglicans-does-lambeth-represent/
dear anonymous...please use a name, any name, so that one anonymous is not confused with another.
ReplyDeleteactually I likened some rumor carriers, reporters, bloggers, etc, to mice with small brains, following up on the notion that the mice are out in the dunes scurring about with tidbits of information. This was mostly poking fun at myself and others in the blogsphere who are not at Lambeth and nibble at whatever crumbs come our way.
Anonymous,
ReplyDeleteI followed your link and the math in the article. That dog wont hunt.
First, I am amused when the wrong wing wants to use size as a measure of truth as they so readily dismiss the measure when it is a majority in the house of bishops or General synod in Canada. You cannot have it both ways.
Second, Nigeria counts people who are also counted by other communions. Drop in, sit down, get counted is the program.
Third, no one has ever asked the Nigerian Anglicans (whomever they may be) if they even begin to care about the gender of the bishop of New Hampshire's partner. In a country where violence is a part of daily life, where government fraud and bribary are the standard, where clean water is almost unknown, and where most could not care where New Hampshire is located, the obsessions of the bishops must seem remote.
It has been said, and I believe it is true, that the face of the Anglican communion is an African 19 year old woman with a child on her hip. She cares about who sleeps with whom in New Hampshire? Oh come now!
This is a fight about power. Every time we blink there is another new true and holy new group. The Anglican spectacle has become a great many male frogs desperately trying to create a pond where they can strut. GaffeCon is just another pond.
FWIW
jimB
Jim's Thoughts
"Anglican Scotist....I think GAFCON is much more important than you might hope:
ReplyDeletehttp://www.anglican-mainstream.net/2008/07/27/how-many-churchgoing-anglicans-does-lambeth-represent/"
Good Lord, again with this numbers game! Once again: the Anglican Communion is a fellowship of equal, autonomous Provinces. Provinces don't get extra points for having X number of people.
Never forget Iona's founder George MacLeod's line about one mouse not being able to do too much but a bunch of mice are able to wreak havoc. (I am not at home so I can't look up the actual cite.)
ReplyDeleteSigh.... The wonderful GAFCONmen and their "numbers game"! To add my two cents (one pence in England) .... Imagine St. Paul's reaction to a Pharisee pointing out to him that the vast majority of Jews don't accept his claims about the crucified builder's son from Nazareth!
ReplyDeleteAs we all know, majorities are always right!
I suspect that Bishop Iker is soon going to test your rather impressive acceptance of minority views . Or, maybe, what will be done with his successor, should he maintain the same theology? I'm not hopeful, nor do I think that he is... but we shall see.
ReplyDeleteJoel
What amuses / disturbs me about the "conservative" math is the utter inconsistency (hence dishonesty) of it.
ReplyDeleteLeaving aside Jim's point about the validity of membership numbers in some parts of the Communion (ie, let's assume everyone's claimed membership numbers are true), the "conservatives" introduce another deliberate and arbitrary distortion. In the provinces they like (Nigeria, Rwanda, Uganda and Kenya) they use the claimed membership number. In the provinces they hate (the US, Canada, England, Scotland, Ireland and Wales) they use average Sunday attendance numbers.
And of course, they simply ignore the missiological failure which is the English Chaplaincy of the Southern Cone of America, where indigenous Anglicans are prevented from becoming bishops for lack of an English public school (which really means private school) education.
The numbers game amuses me, too.
ReplyDeleteIf I remember correctly, the largest break-away Episcopalian group was the Reformed Episcopal Church (REC) in the 19th cent.
And they have what currently ? Roughly 130,000 members nationwide ?
The whole CCP/GAFCON thing, if a split with TEC occurs, will simply result in a flurry of splinter groups & sects. A few of them, like the REC, may survive as small offshoots, while others will die off from insufficient membership + infighting with other groups over purity, "catholic" vs protestant churchmanship, etc...
If the Primates Council really does recognize a new province, they would be guilty of staging a coup, and its members should be excommunicated from the Communion (can that even be done?), or at least defrocked, or something. Whatever is possible.
ReplyDeleteI suspect that Bishop Iker is soon going to test your rather impressive acceptance of minority views . Or, maybe, what will be done with his successor, should he maintain the same theology?
ReplyDeleteIf Bishop Iker is in any difficulty w/ TEC's House of Bishops, it is NOT because of his "views" or "theology", Joel (minority though they both be).
As former Bishop Schofield discovered, it is in the breaking of one's ordination/consecration vows that the cry finally comes "Enough is Enough!"
I pray Iker will relent and refrain from that dangerous path towards canon-breaking. I TRY to be hopeful and, as you said, "we shall see."
Lord have mercy!