Global Anglican Future Conference

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The Global Anglican Futures Conference (GAFCON) is a seven day conference of conservative Anglican bishops and leaders which is due to be held in Jerusalem in June 2008. The conference has been planned to occur one month prior to Lambeth 2008, the ten-yearly gathering of Anglican bishops from around the world. It is primarily aimed at Anglican leaders who consider themselves to be in impaired communion with the global church because of the consecration in 2003 of openly homosexual bishop Gene Robinson by the ECUSA in the United States.

The intended leading participants of GAFCON include Archbishops Peter Akinola of Nigeria, Benjamin Nzimbi of Kenya, Donald Mtetemela of Tanzania, Peter Jensen of Sydney, Australia and Presiding Bishop Greg Venables of the Southern Cone; Bishops Don Harvey of Canada, Bob Duncan of USA and Martyn Minns of USA; Canon Vinay Samuel of India and Canon Chris Sugden of England. These leaders claim to represent 30 million of the 55 million "active" Anglicans in the worldwide communion.^[1] However, this figure assumes the support of all Anglicans in the provinces from which the individual participants have come (although in the Province of Kenya, for example, there has been outspoken criticism of the Church leadership [1]) and adopts a low estimate of the numbers of Anglicans in the rest of the world. The official figure for Anglicans worldwide is 80 million.^[2]

1 Reactions
2 See also
3 References
4 External links

[edit] Reactions

The present Archbishop of Canterbury, Dr Rowan Williams, said on 19 December 2007 that plans to hold a pre-Lambeth meeting for conservatives did not signal disloyalty, as such a meeting "would not have any official status as far as the Communion is concerned".^[3]

The intended conference has received significant criticism, even from some conservatives. The previous Archbishop of Canterbury, George Carey, has said: "If the Jerusalem conference is an alternative to the Lambeth Conference, which I perceive it is, then I think it is regrettable. The irony is that all they are going to do is weaken the Lambeth Conference. They are going to give the liberals a more powerful voice because they are absent and they are going to act as if they are schismatics."^[4] Carey has also called for the American House of Bishops to commit itself to the Windsor Covenant, which imposes a moratorium on the consecration of homosexual bishops and blessing of same-sex unions.^[4]

The Bishop of Jerusalem, in whose territory it is to be held, issued a press release saying "I am deeply troubled that this meeting, of which we had no prior knowledge, will import inter-Anglican conflict into our diocese, which seeks to be a place of welcome for all Anglicans. It could also have serious consequences for our ongoing ministry of reconciliation in this divided land. Indeed, it could further inflame tensions here. We who minister here know only too well what happens when two sides cease talking to each other. We do not want to see any further dividing walls!"^[5]

He indicated that the regional primate "is also concerned about this event. His advice to the organisers that this was not the right time or place for such a meeting was ignored."^[5]

On 12 and 15 January 2008 the Bishop of Jerusalem had meetings with the GAFCON organisers, including Archbishops Jensen and Akinola, in which he explained his reasons for objecting to the conference, and the damage it would do to his local ministry of welcome and reconciliation in the Holy Land. He insisted that the Lambeth Conference was the correct venue for internal discussions. However, he proposed as an alternative, "for the sake of making progress in this discussion" that the GAFCON conference should take place in Cyprus, to be followed by a "pure pilgrimage" to the Holy Land. The minutes of the meetings have been published.[2]

The Presiding Bishop of Jersualem and the Middle East, the Right Reverend Mouneer Anis, who is conservative on matters of human sexuality, has publicly announced that he will not attend GAFCON, observing [3] that "the Global South must not be driven by an exclusively Northern agenda or Northern personalities". The leadership team listed by GAFCON on its website consists of 16 men, of whom 9 are from England, North America and Australia, and one other is UK based. [4]

Liberal comment, for example from the Bishop of Newcastle in Australia, has also been critical.^[6]

The conference has, however, been particularly welcomed by bishops in conflict with the Episcopal Church of the USA, such as Bishop David Anderson who said: "The gathering will be in the form of a pilgrimage back to the roots of the Church’s faith: thus this journey begins with a pilgrimage."^[7]