2018: A year of hope for the Anglican Communion?
by David W Virtue, VOL:
2017 has mercifully come to an end with a communion sadly more divided now than it was under Rowan Williams.
Archbishop Justin Welby has failed miserably to reconcile polarizing forces, with one side determined to keep the communion on the doctrinal straight and narrow while the other side is determined to push progressive views on sexuality that will inevitably lead to schism. His inability to hold divergent forces together despite his secular reconciling skills, (which to some degree got him the job,) has proven less than adequate, perhaps even disastrous.
Within his own Church of England, Evangelical and Anglo-Catholic forces are challenging his leadership paradigm and they are determined to maintain doctrinal orthodoxy or face him with the possibility of schism. Bishop Rod Thomas, a man Welby laid hands on to meet the ecclesiastical needs of evangelicals, said as much on a radio show debate challenging arch lesbian Jayne Ozanne over sexuality issues. Speaking on a late night BBC analysis show Bishop Thomas said: “Whereas with women bishops we decided as part of the negotiations that it was not one that ought to cause disunity, it ought to be one where we could agree to disagree, the issue of sexuality is different. The Bible’s teachings on sexuality seem to be so clear and therefore it becomes a primary and not a secondary issue.
“Because it’s a primary issue it’s got the capacity to split the church.”
Evangelicals could have lived with women bishops, but pansexuality is a bridge too far, as Scripture expressly forbids it, but it would seem that the CofE is determined to follow its American counterparts in trying to make the case. The CofE is oblivious, apparently, to what has happened to the Episcopal Church that ultimately spawned the Anglican Church in North America.
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