GAFCON Primates Set to Meet: Mess Follows.

At the close of an article on the Anglican Communion Network (ACN) web pages is the following item:

"The GAFCON primates council will be offering its response to the Lambeth Conference when they gather for the first time in August."

Remembering that the Common Cause Partnership (CCP), of which ACN is a part, has just last month petitioned the GAFCON Primates to be acknowledged by them as the North American province related to their Provinces, we can't help but think this petition will be on the GAFCON Primates agenda.

If the GAFCON Primates (GP) continue in the trajectory outlined by the Jerusalem Statement and continue to believe that the Archbishop of Canterbury and the instruments of communion have failed, they may well use the recognition of the CCP as a means of solidifying their call for an alternative world wide Anglican church.

Recognition of the CCP would also make unnecessary the incursion of Provinces into the Episcopal Church and the Anglican Church of Canada, and in particular the sort of change of venue being considered by Fort Worth and Pittsburgh. Those dioceses might still go forward with the resolutions to join the Southern Cone, however, if the short term sense was to maintain engagement with an already existing Province in order to claim relationship with Canterbury. The fact that Canterbury does not acknowledge those relationships (the diocese of the deposed bishops of Recife and San Joaquin) is basically irrelevant. He does continue to recognize the Province of the Southern Cone as a valid province of the Anglican Commuion in spite of its actions. So there may be advantage to continuing both avenues of action - becoming a province recognized by the GP and becoming part of an already recognized Province of the Anglican Communion. At some point one supposes, one or the other route will be finalized. But meanwhile the amazingly convoluted shell game continues.

August, the quiet month in church and secular circles, will not be too quiet this year. The GAFCON Primates meet, the Archbishop of Canterbury will be following up on enforcement procedures following the "sense" of Lambeth that moratoria rule the day, and the House of Bishops in the Episcopal Church must ready themselves for a September decision regarding the charge of abandonment of communion brought against the Bishop of Pittsburgh.

But first to GAFCON...where and when will the Primates meet? I've seen nothing out about this yet. I am sure readers who know will tell me.