A Hope and a Future for Anglicans
by Canon Phil Ashey, AAC:
It is an understatement that Anglicanism is not always neat and tidy. The very nature of our decision making in councils, as ancient as it may be, is messy. Things don’t always go as planned. Sometimes people don’t respect what the whole decides together in scripture, prayerful study and discussion, and waiting on the Lord’s timing. Sometimes a part demands that the whole adjust to it and runs ahead rather than waiting on the counsel of the whole church.
That seems to be at the heart Bishop Michael Nazir Ali’s decision to leave the Church of England to join the Anglican Ordinariate in the Roman Catholic Church. “The Anglican Church has become splintered, a loose collection of churches, many of whom have conflicting interpretations of Christianity,” he wrote of his departure . “Even when the Church manages to agree on things, these decisions don’t seem to carry much weight—people go off and do it their own way.” Bishop Michael was a senior leader in the GAFCON movement, and he is a great leader and friend. I couldn’t help but wonder if the GAFCON Primates’ inability to do the hard work of conciliarism committed to in their Interim Report was one factor in his departure.
We have included a few articles in today’s weekly newsletter responding to his departure, but I want to offer some good news with some cautious optimism. On Sunday, October 17, the Global South Fellowship of Anglican Churches (GSFA) issued their Communique (“The Eighth Trumpet”) after a four-day conference on Zoom attended by 90 delegates from 16 Provinces and one diocese (Sydney), including the Anglican Church in North America. In the words of the Communique, the purpose of this GSFA gathering was to “address the unchecked spread of revisionism” among all the Churches of the Anglican Communion by enacting a “covenantal structure” that will “enhance ecclesial responsibility” and mutual accountability among the churches of the GSFA (sec. 9).
See also:
Eighth Trumpet of the Global South Fellowship of Anglican Churches: Communiqué from the 8th Global South Conference, 2021
Global South Conference 2021 – 8th Trumpet – A call to spiritual arms: by David Virtue, VOL: “More than 90 delegates from 16 provinces including primates, archbishops, bishops and clergy sent a resounding message to the Anglican world — they would not tolerate any departure from ‘the faith once for all delivered to the saints.’”
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