Legal loophole allows Texas diocese to escape liability for abuse: The Church of England Newspaper, June 25, 2010 p 7. June 30, 2010
Posted by geoconger in Abuse, Church of England Newspaper, Texas.comments closed
The Rev James Tucker, circa 1968
First published in The Church of England Newspaper.
The Episcopal Diocese of Texas has escaped legal and financial liability for the child abuse committed by a former priest after the US Court of Appeal held that the state’s five year statute of limitations on sexual assault shielded the diocese from culpability.
As of 2009, the Roman Catholic Church in the United States has paid out more than $2.6 billion in abuse-related costs since 1950 the US Conference of Roman Catholic Bishops reported last year. At least six catholic US dioceses have been forced into bankruptcy by judgments or the threat of judgments from abuse victims.
The Episcopal Church has so far escaped the massive financial and legal liability stemming from clergy abuse cases, however, lawyers in Texas had hoped to breach the church’s defences in the case of John Doe v. St Stephens Episcopal School and the Diocese of Texas.
On June 18, the Fifth US Circuit Court of Appeals upheld a lower court ruling dismissing a lawsuit filed by three men that charged the church-affiliated boy’s boarding school and the diocese with breach of fiduciary duty, civil conspiracy, fraud and fraud concealment, negligence and negligent misrepresentation, and vicarious liability as time-barred.
The appeals court held that the three men, former school boys designated as John Doe I, John Doe II and John Doe III, could not hold the school and the diocese responsible for the actions of the school chaplain as more than five years had passed since the abuse took place.
The court stated that the Rev. James Lydell Tucker “sexually abused Plaintiffs between 1964 and 1968 while they were students at St. Stephen’s. At the time, Tucker was the chaplain and a member of the faculty at the school.”
The court further stated that in 1968 two of the boys “notified then-headmaster Dr. Allen Becker of the abuse. He instructed them not to tell anyone, including their parents.”
In 2006 the Diocese of Texas began an investigation into Tucker’s actions after the plaintiffs made their story known to classmates at a school reunion. In 2008 the three men filed lawsuits seeking damages against the school and the diocese for the trauma they suffered at the hands of Fr. Tucker.
Under Texas law the statute of limitations for personal injury in sexual assault cases is five years after the crime takes place. However, if the victim is a child, the five year period begins when the child turns eighteen.
In its defence, the Diocese argued that all of the plaintiffs had turned 18 by 1969 and the statute of limitations prevented suit after 1974. The three plaintiffs responded that the state’s delayed discovery rule should apply. It holds that the statute of limitations should not begin to run when “the alleged wrongful act and resulting injury are inherently undiscoverable at the time they occurred” but only begin when the abuse “may be objectively verified” should apply in this case.
The three plaintiffs argued that this rule should apply because their “suppression and repression” of their ordeal prevented them from understanding the extent and ramifications of the abuse.
However, the court found that all three men had mentioned to other people at least five years prior to their filing of a lawsuit that they had been “molested and that they have been aware, at least periodically, of the molestation since they turned eighteen.”
“Although Plaintiffs present affidavits from a psychiatrist asserting they have suppressed and repressed the abuse, we find the facts of this case insufficient to show that the sexual abuse was inherently undiscoverable,” the courts held, adding that while the three men did “engage in psychological coping mechanisms,” these mechanisms did not completely “block all memory of the abuse, as demonstrated by Plaintiffs’ comments about the abuse to others.”
The appeals court upheld the lower court’s judgment order dismissing the lawsuit against the diocese and school.
New terror warning from Pakistani bishop: The Church of England Newspaper, June 18, 2010 p 6. June 25, 2010
Posted by geoconger in Al Qaeda, Church of England Newspaper, Church of Pakistan, Terrorism.comments closed
The Rt. Rev. Ijaz Inayat
First published in The Church of England Newspaper.
The Bishop of Karachi reports that Islamic Jihadist groups in Pakistan are attempting to recruit poor Christians for use in terror attacks.
On June 12, the Rt. Rev. Ijaz Inayat wrote to supporters in the West that “Jihadist militant organizations” acting in concert with rogue elements of the Pakistani government were “recruiting poverty stricken Christians to be trained and used as Militants.”
Jihadists have “previously recruited, trained and used such poor people from the Muslim back grounds from the slums of Pakistan” for use as suicide bombers. However these “Christians converted to Islam will be used to target the Churches” and Pakistani Christians, he said.
The use of financial incentives to recruit then radicalize Christian converts to Islam will serve as a propaganda tool for the Jihadists, Bishop Inayat said. “Since their identity will not be altered in documents it is feared that some of them will be apprehended and presented in the world media to nullify the impression that Muslim militants are not the only source of militancy,” he said.
He urged the security services in Pakistan and the West to be on the lookout for this new breed of terrorist.
Violence against Pakistan’s religious minorities has focused not only on Christians, but on Hindus, Sikhs and members of minority Muslim groups. On May 28, Jihadists attacked two mosques in Lahore during Friday prayers, killing 94 members of the Ahmadi community.
The Pakistani government considers members of the Ahmadi sect to be heretics, and forbids the country’s four million Ahmadis from holding themselves out as Muslims or calling their worship places ‘mosques’. Ahmadis believe that Mirza Ghulam Ahmad, a 19th century Punjabi cleric, was the second coming of the Messiah.
The Bishop of Lahore, the Rt. Rev. Alexander Malik condemned the “murderous attacks” on the “worship places of a minority community.”
Bishop Malik said “such terrorism is a heinous crime against humanity and a serious conspiracy against Pakistan. We, as a nation, should unite together to defend our beloved country Pakistan and the defeat of all kinds of terrorism.”
People may leave, but congregations may not quit the Church of Nigeria, bishop says: The Church of England Newspaper, June 25, 2010 p 8. June 25, 2010
Posted by geoconger in Church of England Newspaper, Church of Nigeria, Property Litigation.comments closed
Bishop Adebiyi
First published in The Church of England Newspaper.
The Bishop of Lagos West was turned away by the congregation of one his churches during a parochial visitation this past Sunday, and was forced to beat a hasty retreat from the pulpit after being jeered by members of a breakaway Nigerian congregation.
The ejection of the Rt. Rev. Peter Adebiyi from St Paul’s Anglican Church comes amidst simmering tribal tensions across Nigeria. However, the bishop states that the charge of ethnic bias leveled against him is a smoke screen raised by the church’s former vicar to cover-up misconduct. Pleading tribal prejudice in order to quit the diocese was no remedy, the bishop said, as it is not possible for a congregation to quit its diocese without the permission of its bishop.
On June 21 Bishop Adebiyi went to St Paul’s, an Igbo-speaking congregation, with a number of clergy to celebrate the Eucharist and to resolve a dispute between the parish and the majority Yoruba-speaking diocese.
When he arrived at 7:00 am, the congregation at first refused to allow him to enter the church. After he succeeded in gaining entry and began the worship service, the vestry cut the power to the pulpit microphone and turned off the lights. The congregation then began to sing songs vilifying the bishop. After five hours, the bishop departed.
The immediate cause of the dispute, the Lagos newspapers have claimed, was over the timing of the bishop’s visit. The congregation had planned a father’s day celebration, but the bishop announced that he would visit that day to celebrate—prompting the riot. However, the dispute has been simmering for several years, prompting the bishop to dismiss the vicar in 2009 and dissolve the parish council after the congregation attempted to quit the diocese.
The congregation responded by filed a petition with the outgoing Archbishop of Nigeria Peter Akinola asking him to investigate and on Jan 30 released a statement denouncing the bishop.
“Within the past eight years, we as a congregation have suffered silently and borne the weight of concealed hate, tribalism and unguarded discriminatory attitude and utterances of this bishop, who has roundly failed us both as a bishop and father. Bishop Adebiyi has at every opportunity demonstrated dictatorial nepotism and characteristic tribalism in handling affairs that impact our congregation at St Paul’s Church, Mushin.”
Archbishop Akinola empowered a committee comprised of the Archbishops of Lokoja, Enugu and Kwara to investigate the parish’s claims. In its report, the committee found that that the dispute was essentially a clash of personalities between the former vicar, the Rev. Canon Edison Mgbeokwere and the bishop. The committee recommended that Canon Mgbeokwere be transferred to his native Diocese of Owerri in the Niger Delta and backed the bishop.
However, the parish council rejected the committee findings and accused their bishop of favoring Yoruba congregations and clergy over Igbo ones. They claimed that two of the eight archdeacons in the Diocese of Lagos Mainland were Igbo, and one of nine archdeacons in the Diocese of Lagos were Igbo. But among the twenty two archdeacons in Lagos West, none were Igbo.
Speaking to the Lagos Sun, Bishop Adebiyi stated that Canon Mgbeokwere was not licenced in the diocese, and was serving as a non-stipendiary priest while attending law school in Lagos. However, Canon Mgbeokwere began to collect fees from members of his congregation for services, and performed over 50 weddings, even though he was not licenced to do so.
The bishop said the former vicar was “extorting the members of St. Paul of their hard earned income” through various schemes, all the while telling his Igbo parishioners “he had the backing of his bishop and some other bishops because he is fighting the Igbo cause in the Anglican churches in Nigeria.”
While people could leave the Church of Nigeria, congregations could not, the bishop said. “By the law that established my diocese, they cannot move out of the diocese except I allow it. If I don’t allow it, there is nothing they can do; the best they can do is to leave the church. That church is entrusted unto us”
He told the Sun that in the Anglican church, “if I come to your house and you give me a piece of land at the back of your compound and I accept, thank you, build a church and you are a member of the church, from that day you have automatically lost ownership of the land. If you are aggrieved and you want your land back, you have to go to court. If the court says the land should be given back to you, so be it, otherwise the land belongs to the church.”
California Episcopal Church cases back before State Supreme Court: The Church of England Newspaper, June 18, 2010 p 6. June 25, 2010
Posted by geoconger in Church of England Newspaper, Los Angeles, Property Litigation.comments closed
First published in The Church of England Newspaper.
The California Supreme Court has agreed to review a March 26 decision by the state’s Fourth Appellate Court of Appeals that held the congregation of St James in Newport Beach was not entitled to present a defence to the Diocese of Los Angeles’ allegations that it was the rightful owner of the sea-side parish properties.
The unanimous June 9 decision by the Supreme Court to examine the lower’ court ruling will likely add several more years and millions of dollars in the six-year-old battle between the breakaway congregation and the diocese.
Although the California Supreme Court agrees to hear only five per cent of the petitions submitted for its review, the decision to hear the Episcopal Church case was not unexpected, as the dissenting judge, the Hon Richard Fybel stated that his two appellate colleagues’ decision in favour of the diocese was “unprecedented and without any basis in law.”
The decision by the court to impose a sentence before a trial was conducted was “revolutionary,” he said, adding that “I can write with certainty that this is the only case in the history of California where entry of judgment has been ordered upon overruling” a defendant’s challenge to the legal sufficiency of a plaintiff’s pleading.
Judge Fybel stated the ruling was so outrageous that it “can best be resolved by a grant of review” by the state’s highest court. The majority decision noted “we have no doubt, of course, that if we are incorrect in relying on the plain language of the Supreme Court’s opinion in granting the general church’s petition for writ of mandate, the high court will correct our error.”
The chancellor for the Los Angeles diocese, John Shiner told the Episcopal News Service the Supreme Court’s decision was merely a “procedural issue.”
“We believe that the decision was clear and the California Supreme Court concluded that the property should be returned to us. We asked the trial court to enter judgment in our favour. The other side disagrees and believes they should be able to pursue the matter further.
“We went to the Court of Appeal and the Court of Appeal agreed with us that a judgment should be entered now. So they went to the Supreme Court, the higher court and asked them to review whether or not the judgment should be entered at this point,” Mr Shiner said.
St James’s lead attorney, Eric Sohlgren, said his client was “extremely pleased that the California Supreme Court has heard our plea to restore justice and fairness to this case.”
In a statement sent to The Church of England Newspaper, Mr Sohlgren said “St James will now have an opportunity to argue on behalf of all Californians that people should not be deprived of their property without getting the opportunity to defend their case in a court of law. These principles go to the very heart of what Americans hold dear under our Constitution.”
Australian cathedral saved by government grant: The Church of England Newspaper, June 18, 2010 p 6. June 24, 2010
Posted by geoconger in Anglican Church of Australia, Church of England Newspaper.comments closed
St Paul's Cathedral, Bendigo
First published in The Church of England Newspaper.
The Australian state of Victoria has agreed to contribute approximately £450,000 towards the costs of repairs to help re-open St Paul’s Anglican Cathedral in Bendigo.
In January 2008 the Diocese of Bendigo’s cathedral was closed as a public safety hazard. A fence was erected around its perimeter after a slab of concrete sheeting fell from the roof during a windstorm. A survey of the 140-year-old building found it needed almost £2.6 million in repairs, and over £500,000 to be made safe for services.
“The inside of the bell tower is unsafe and even if we were back in the building, we can’t ring the bells again,” Dean Peta Sherlock said after the building was closed, as “every piece of adornment on the roof needs to be removed, that includes all cement crosses, towers and pinnacles.”
The cathedral’s website reported that in addition to the roof repairs “all our stained glass windows will need restorative work and the pinnacles on the tower need to be removed because their mortar has almost entirely eroded.”
Requests for assistance from the Australian Federal government were turned down, but last week Victoria Premier John Brumby said his government would invest in the future of the cathedral given its significance to the Bendigo community.
“St Paul’s is an important part of Bendigo’s history and we want to see it able to be used by the community once again,” Mr Brumby said.
“This funding will help kick-start the repair works needed to get the cathedral open again so that everyone in the Bendigo community will benefit from it.”
“We wanted to contribute to this important initiative because St Paul’s Cathedral is such an important part of Bendigo’s history. We want it to be an important part of its future.”
“Our government worked closely with St Paul’s to identify how we can assist and I believe our contribution is a significant one that will mean the community will see tangible progress on the project to re-open the cathedral doors once again,” Mr Brumby said.
US and South African church leaders call for an end to Israel’s blockade of Gaza: The Church of England Newspaper, June 18, 2010 p 6. June 24, 2010
Posted by geoconger in Anglican Church of Southern Africa, Church of England Newspaper, Israel, The Episcopal Church.comments closed
Bishop Jefferts Schori and Archbishop Makgoba at Lambeth 2008
First published in The Church of England Newspaper.
The Presiding Bishop of the Episcopal Church has urged US President Barack Obama to press Israel to end its blockade of Gaza.
In a statement released in the wake of the deaths of ten Islamist militants in a confrontation with Israeli commandos aboard the Turkish flagged Mavi Marmara on May 31, Bishop Katharine Jefferts Schori said the naval blockade was not serving Israel’s goals of ending rocket attacks of Israel, destabilizing Hamas, and freeing kidnapped soldier Gilad Shalit.
The Archbishop of Cape Town also released a statement calling for an international investigation of the incident, which he described as an “attack by Israeli commandos on the humanitarian aid shipments headed for Gaza.”
Middle East experts have rejected claims that the naval blockade of Gaza was illegal. On May 31, Leslie Gelb, president emeritus of the Council on Foreign Relations in New York, commented that “Israel had every right under international law to stop and board ships bound for the Gaza war zone late Sunday. Only knee-jerk left-wingers and the usual legion of poseurs around the world would dispute this.”
On June 4, Archbishop Makgoba stated that he wished to express his “dismay and distress at the Israeli military assault on the humanitarian convoy in the international waters of the Mediterranean, and my condemnation of the needless loss of life.”
The archbishop hoped the clash would not harm inter-faith relations in South Africa, and rejected “any attempt to use this incident to damage our hard earned mutual respect among our communities of faith in the Western Cape.”
He urged the international community to “press for a full and transparent investigation; as well as to redouble their efforts to support a just and lasting solution in the region in line with international norms.”
Bishop Jefferts Schori wrote to President Obama that “on behalf of the Episcopal Church, I write to express deep concern for the circumstances surrounding Israeli forces’ interception of a flotilla of ships bound for the Gaza Strip earlier this week,” and urged the president to use his powers to end “blockade of Gaza” and to press “toward a two-state solution.”
“The deaths of civilians working to deliver humanitarian aid could not have happened absent the counterproductive Israeli blockade of Gaza,” Bishop Jefferts Schori said, adding that the “Episcopal Church strongly supports American leadership toward ending the blockade. There are far better ways to protect Israel’s security and promote moderate political leadership in Gaza than a blockade that intensifies human suffering and perpetuates regional insecurity.”
Critiques of President Obama have argued that the reduction of the US Sixth Fleet in the Eastern Mediterranean from forty ships in 2003 to one today precipitated the crisis. President Obama has drawn down the fleet in order to avoid provocations, however the “projection of American naval power isn’t the world’s problem; it’s the world’s one working solution” to international insecurity Arthur Herman argued in the New York Post.
“If the carrier USS Harry S Truman had been on patrol in the Aegean instead of the Atlantic — or if a pair of destroyers had been holding station off the Israeli coast with Sea Knight helicopters and P-3 Orion patrol planes circling overhead — would that Israeli raid have been necessary? Would the flotilla have even dared to set sail on its mission of provocation?,” Dr. Herman wrote in on May 4.
Writing in the Daily Beast, Mr. Gelb stated Israeli commandos “badly mishandled the situation. But theirs was a mistake in pursuit of a legal goal, not a war crime. And as for calls for international investigations, they represent the usual hypocritical nonsense that will go nowhere. Except for those who routinely fool themselves about the judiciousness and effectiveness of action by the United Nations or the European Union, everyone understands their ‘investigations’ will amount to nothing.”
Blockades are quite legal in time of war, he added, it would only have been illegal “if the hostile actions against the ships took place in waters under the jurisdiction of another sovereign state.”
However, the presiding bishop urged the president to use his powers to “shift our nation’s posture toward the Gaza blockade and make clear to Israel that its own interests, as well as our nation’s and those of the Palestinian people, would be well served by lifting the blockade.”
Irish bishop calls for a rethink of abortion laws: The Church of England Newspaper, June 18, 2010 p 5. June 23, 2010
Posted by geoconger in Abortion/Euthanasia/Biotechnology, Church of England Newspaper, Church of Ireland, Human Sexuality --- The gay issue.comments closed
Bishop Michael Burrows
First published in The Church of England Newspaper.
The Church of Ireland’s Bishop of Cashel and Ossory, the Rt Rev Michael Burrows, has urged Anglicans to rethink their stance on abortion and gay unions, writing in his diocesan newspaper it was time for Ireland to “come of age.”
The Government of the Republic of Ireland on June 26, 2009, introduced a Civil Partnership Bill in the Dáil that if adopted would recognise same-sex civil partnerships, but stops short of gay marriage. On May 27, 2010 the Bill was released from committee and is scheduled to pass to the report stage this month. If adopted by the Irish Parliament, it would likely be enacted by October 2010.
In his June diocesan newspaper, Bishop Burrows said “civil partnership legislation is certainly not perfect but it deserves to be welcomed and to be given time.”
The Republic of Ireland was about to “embark upon something of a new social order” by adopting civil unions, he said, adding “I dare to hope that those who choose civil partnership will find it gives them some deep sense of peace and acceptance.”
The bishop also said that it was time for a rethink of Irish abortion laws. Over 18 years had passed since the infamous “X case”, where the Attorney General filed an injunction to prevent a 14-year-old girl from travelling to Britain to have an abortion after having been raped.
On appeal, the Irish Supreme Court held that if there was a real and substantial risk to the life, as distinct from the health, of the mother, and this could be averted only by the termination of her pregnancy, then abortion was lawful. However, the court also found that if there was no such threat to her life, the constitutional right to travel could be restrained if the trip were for the purpose of obtaining an abortion.
Bishop Burrows wrote that “18 years is a long time; it is the time it takes individual humans to ‘come of age’. As a society, however, we have failed dismally to come of age in relation to matters at the heart of the X case.”
“We still remain hypocritical and incapable of engaging with the truth about ourselves at a legislative level – despite successive referenda on these matters, tragic individual human stories are dragged all the way to the Supreme Court in the absence of legislation,” the bishop said.
While not actively calling for the legalisation of abortion, Bishop Burrows noted that he had a “high view of politics and parliament, yet elsewhere I have had occasion to condemn what I term the ‘systematic spinelessness’ of the Legislature when it comes to a range of ethical issues surrounding the beginning of human life.”
DNA test clears bishop-elect of fathering two children out of wedlock: The Church of England Newspaper, June 18, 2010 p 5. June 23, 2010
Posted by geoconger in Church of England Newspaper, Church of the Province of Uganda.comments closed
Bishop-elect Bernard Bagaba
First published in The Church of England Newspaper.
A Ugandan bishop-elect accused of fathering two children out of wedlock has been cleared of misconduct following a DNA test. The Church of Uganda reported on June 15 that the Rev. Canon Bernard Bagaba “is not the father of two children belonging to Annet Tugumisirize, as previously alleged.”
In December, the House of Bishops elected Canon Bagaba to succeed Bishop John Wilson Ntegyereize as Bishop of Kinkiizi, a rural diocese located along the southwest border with Rwanda.
However, on Feb 18 a complaint by two diocesan clergy was lodged with the Ugandan bishops charged the former diocesan secretary with bastardy and adultery with a former maid in his employee. Canon Bagaba had admitted to employing the women as a servant, but denied any impropriety, stating “those people are trying to concoct things for their own benefit.”
The Easter meeting of the House of Bishops put the new bishop’s May consecration on hold, and took up Ms. Tugumisirize’s offer to have a paternity test taken of the children. The results reported back to the church last week proved the bishop was not the father.
“The House of Bishops will discuss the implications of these test results at their next regularly scheduled meeting on 2nd July and will communicate the way forward at that time,” a provincial spokesman said.
Archbishop expels Americans from ecumenical groups: The Church of England Newspaper, June 11, 2010 p 3. June 22, 2010
Posted by geoconger in Anglican Consultative Council, Church of England Newspaper, The Episcopal Church.comments closed
The Rev Canon Kenneth Kearon
First published in The Church of England Newspaper.
Five American Episcopalians have been expelled from the Anglican Communion’s ecumenical dialogue commissions, and its representative to the Inter-Anglican Standing Commission on Unity, Faith and Order (UFO) has been demoted from member to consultant, the Secretary General of the Anglican Consultative Council has announced.
The expulsions come in response to the Archbishop of Canterbury’s May 28 Pentecost letter to the Anglican Communion, which said that some “public marks of distance,” of discipline of those who defy the wider Church, “are unavoidable if our Communion bodies are not to be stripped of credibility and effectiveness.”
Dr Rowan Williams singled out the consecration of a ‘gay’ suffragan bishop in Los Angeles, and the promulgation of public same-sex blessings rites in the US and Canada, as well as the cross-border interventions in response to these innovations made by some Global South provinces for possible sanctions, including removal from the communion’s ecumenical dialogue teams and a reduced states on the UFO.
On June 7, the Rev. Canon Kenneth Kearon announced that he had written to the American participants on the Anglican ecumenical dialogues on behalf of Dr Williams “informing them that their membership of these [ecumenical] dialogues has been discontinued.”
The Rev. Dr. Thomas Ferguson, the Episcopal Church’s interim deputy for ecumenical and interreligious relations and the Assistant Bishop of North Carolina, the Rt. Rev. William Gregg, were removed from the Anglican-Orthodox Theological Dialogue; the Bishop of Montana, the Rt. Rev. C. Franklin Brookhart was removed from the Anglican-Methodist International Commission for Unity in Mission; the Very Rev. William Petersen, professor of ecclesiastical and history at Bexley Hall seminary in Columbus, Ohio was removed from the Anglican-Lutheran International Commission; and the Rev. Carola von Wrangel, rector of Christ-the-King in Frankfurt, Germany, was removed from the Anglican-Old Catholic International Co-ordinating Council (AOCICC)
Canon Kearon stated that he had also written to the Rev. Dr. Katherine Grieb, professor of New Testament at Virginia Theological Seminary, “withdrawing that person’s membership and inviting her to serve as a Consultant to that body.”
He further stated that he had written to Archbishop Fred Hiltz of Canada asking “whether its General Synod or House of Bishops has formally adopted policies that breach the second moratorium in the Windsor Report, authorising public rites of same-sex blessing.” While a number of dioceses have authorized gay blessings, the Canadian church as a whole, has not.
In a surprise move, Canon Kearon said he had written only to the Primate of the Southern Cone, Presiding Bishop Gregory Venables of Argentina, “asking him for clarification as to the current state of his interventions into other provinces.”
The Southern Cone had accepted temporary provincial oversight of the Dioceses of Recife in Brazil and the breakaway American dioceses of Quincy, San Joaquin, Fort Worth and Pittsburgh. The American dioceses have since moved into the Anglican Church in North America (ACNA) but retain varying degrees of membership in the Southern Cone, while Recife remains under the oversight of Bishop Venables. The Bishop of Chile, the Rt. Rev. Tito Zavala is a member of the UFO.
Nigeria, Kenya and Uganda have members on the communion’s ecumenical dialogue commissions and the UFO and have also sponsored breakaway groups in the US. However, Canon Kearon’s letter appears to indicate that he has accepted their statements that they have turned over their American missions to the oversight of the ACNA and are not currently crossing provincial lines to support breakaway groups.
The Province of Rwanda has retained ecclesiastical oversight of its American churches, the Anglican Mission in America (AMiA), but as it has no members on the UFO commission or on the dialogue groups, the Archbishop of Canterbury’s warnings of consequences for violating the moratoria on gay bishop and blessings, and cross border violations will have no affect on that church.
Church concern over Australian refugee policy: The Church of England Newspaper, June 11, 2010 p 6. June 22, 2010
Posted by geoconger in Anglican Church of Australia, Church of England Newspaper, Immigration.comments closed
Archbishop Phillip Aspinall
First published in The Church of England Newspaper.
Church leaders in Australia have denounced government plans to tighten the nation’s borders and suspend asylum applications from Sri Lanka and Afghanistan for three and six months respectively.
Last week the Primate of Australia, Archbishop Phillip Aspinall of Brisbane wrote to Prime Minister Kevin Rudd asking that he not politicize immigration. However the decision of the Labor government to toughen its stance on immigration has strong popular support from voters, and may bolster the government’s sagging fortunes.
“The Australian Government says asylum seekers should only be granted the right to live in Australia if they are genuinely in need of protection,” Dr Aspinall said. “I agree that this is a complex issue, but genuine asylum seekers are deeply distressed when forced to flee their homeland. They should be treated with compassion and dignity.”
He charged the government with violating the UN Convention on Refugees, which bans discrimination in the treatment of asylum seekers based on country of origin.
“Given that this decision appears related specifically to asylum seekers from particular countries, I believe that it is at odds with that Convention,” he said.
However 62 per cent of Australians backed the return to tougher immigration policies espoused by former Prime Minister John Howard and his Liberal Party, a Herald/Nielsen poll found. ”A majority of Australians are likely to support policies presented as tough and uncompromising and are less likely to support policies perceived as soft,” said a Nielsen pollster, John Stirton.
Opposition immigration spokesman Scott Morrison said that a coalition government of the Liberals and the National Party would limit a refugee’s stay in Australia to three years, and would require refugees to work for their welfare benefits.
The government has also been attacked from the left by the Green Party which accused it of ignoring the root causes that led to the refugee problem. Green immigration spokeswoman Sarah Hanson-Young told Sky News that asylum seekers “don’t jump on these boats because they like Australian beaches.”
“They jump on these boats because they need protection and help,” she said, but “we are treating them as if they criminals.”
However, conservative claims that an soft government policy towards refugees was compounding the problem was strengthened when Prabath Aluthge, the chief of Sri Lanka’s National Counter Human Trafficking Resource Centre, told The Australian that he believes Australia’s “lenient” asylum policy, easy access to citizenship and generous welfare benefits are drawing asylum-seekers “to stake their lives on the high seas.”
Politics aside, Dr. Aspinall said the priority for Christians was to show compassion to the “strangers in our land” and to “love the alien as yourself”.
“This issue is above politics,” the primate said. “This is about human dignity and compassion for fellow human beings.”
Ugandan president denounces pro-gay lobbying by Europe in Africa: The Church of England Newspaper, June 11, 2010 p 6. June 21, 2010
Posted by geoconger in Church of England Newspaper, Church of the Province of Uganda, Human Sexuality --- The gay issue, Politics.comments closed
First published in The Church of England Newspaper.
The President of Uganda, Mr. Yoweri Museveni has dismissed Western claims that conservative American evangelicals are manipulating Africans into adopting an ‘anti-gay’ agenda, saying homosexuality was un-African and contrary to the continent’s moral scruples.
The Ugandan president was joined by the Bishop of Harare, Dr. Chad Gandiya at the Anglican Shrine to the Uganda Martyrs in Namugongo outside Kampala on June 3, in denouncing homosexuality as un-Christian and un-African.
The president denounced Western pressure on Uganda to conform to European views on morality. “Europeans are putting pressure on us because of homosexuality. They say it is the religious groups which are against the practice but this is not true. Even before we got religion, our culture was against homosexuality just like it was against girls getting pregnant before marriage,” the president said on the feast day of the Anglican martyrs.
Upholding traditional moral standards was a “way of bringing discipline in our society. Bad things must be done away with and we only retain and improve the good ones. Uganda is one of the few countries standing against such decadence,” he said.
The president said that Europe was washed up. “Europeans are falling, if we follow them, they will lead us to Sodom and Gomorrah. I salute the martyrs who stood against homosexuality. They stood for what they believed in with cleanliness on Christianity and our heritage,” President Museveni said.
A statement released by the president’s office said that the King of the Buganda, Kabaka Mwanga “had learned the practice of homosexuality from Arab traders and used it against his subjects. When the Christians refused he ordered their killings. The martyrs were killed between 1885 and 1887, many of them burnt to death at Namugongo.”
The Ugandan martyrs were beatified by Pope Benedict XV in 1920 and canonized by Pope Paul VI in 1964. Their feast day of June 3 is a major event for the Catholic and Anglican churches of Uganda with an estimated one million pilgrims from Uganda, Kenya, Tanzania, Rwanda, Burundi, and the Congo visiting the shrines.
Pro-gay pressure groups in the US, UK and Europe have claimed that conservative Americans are the driving force behind Africa’s repulsion of homosexuality, while a number of newspapers have editorialized against African laws on these issues.
The guest speaker at the ceremony, Bishop Gandiya of Harare bewailed the assertiveness of the gay movement. “We are living in a world which is upside down. Some people talk about wicked things as if they are good. We need people to stand up for the truth and reject homosexuality,” Bishop Gandiya said, according to the Kampala Monitor.
The confusion of “right with wrong” has “destroyed the morals in the young population,” Bishop Gandiya said.
The Primate of Uganda, Archbishop Henry Orombi of Kampala applauded President Museveni’s stance of placing principle before political expediency, and urged Anglicans to model their behavior on the Uganda Martyrs and commit themselves to service to God, their family and Uganda.
Church leaders call for war crimes investigations of Ugandan army: The Church of England Newspaper, June 11, 2010 p 6. June 21, 2010
Posted by geoconger in Church of England Newspaper, Church of the Province of Uganda, Terrorism.comments closed
Joseph Kony
First published in The Church of England Newspaper.
The Chief Prosecutor of the International Criminal Court (ICC), Luis Moreno-Ocampo, has announced an investigation of the Uganda Peoples Defence Forces for war crimes committed in its 20-year long campaign against the Lord’s Resistance Army (LRA).
Ugandan opposition leaders and the former Bishop of Kitgum, the Rt. Rev. Baker Ochola had urged the ICC to investigate atrocities allegedly committed by the UPDF during an ICC review conference held in Kampala.
Mr. Moreno-Ocampo told reporters that there were “complaints” and the ICC was “analyzing them. There are cases of torture and mass displacement though some are outside our mandate that started in 2002.”
The ICC would investigate all complaints committed after July 2002—the date the ICC statute came in force—brought to its attention, he said. However, the vast majority of complaints before the ICC were against the LRA and its leader, Joseph Kony. The ICC has indicted Kony and four of his lieutenants for war crimes and crimes against humanity.
The leader of the opposition Uganda People’s Congress (UPC) party, Mr. Olara Otunnu, asked the ICC to investigate the UPDF and indict President Yoweri Museveni.
The UPC would provided “tonnes and tonnes” of “information regarding genocide and crimes against humanity” committed by the UPDF, he said.
Bishop Ochola said an ICC investigation of the UPDF was necessary as the Ugandan judiciary had so far failed to respond to request for action.
Ugandan Deputy Attorney General, Fred Ruhindi, told reporters Mr. Otunnu was playing politics with the court. He urged the UPC leader to use “proper procedures” under Ugandan law to prove his claims.
Ballarat bishop on the way out: The Church of England Newspaper, June 11, 2010 p 6. June 20, 2010
Posted by geoconger in Anglican Church of Australia, Church of England Newspaper.comments closed
Bishop Michael Hough of Ballarat
First published in The Church of England Newspaper.
The embattled Bishop of Ballarat has taken sick leave and has appointed an assistant bishop to oversee the diocese in his absence.
The announcement by Bishop Michael Hough comes shortly before this month’s diocesan synod where a no confidence motion will be presented calling for the bishop to resign and as the Anglican Church of Australia’s Episcopal Standards Commission reviews charges of misconduct leveled against him.
On June 4, Bishop Michael Hough appointed the Rt. Rev. Philip Huggins, Assistant Bishop for the North and West regions of Melbourne, to serve as vicar-general of the diocese.
At the 2009 diocesan synod Michael Shand QC, chancellor of the Dioceses of Ballarat and Melbourne, stated that 13 priests, along with a number of lay leaders and retired clergy had requested an investigation of the bishop by Episcopal Standards Commission.
Under Australian canon law details of the complaint are not to be disclosed while the investigation is underway. However, members of the diocese told The Church of England Newspaper the disputes centered round the bishop’s “prickly” management style and his pastoral skills, and were unrelated to the wider disputes over doctrine and discipline within the Anglican Communion.
The Special Tribunal Canon passed at the 2007 General Synod enumerates crimes for which a bishop may be investigated. Breaches of faith, ritual or ceremony, drunkenness, failure to honour lawful debts, unchastity, violation of the constitution, canons and ordinances of the Anglican Church of Australia and violation of a bishop’s consecrations vows are grounds for review.
Bishop Hough has been charged under an additional catch-all category of conduct unbecoming a member of the clergy.
Last month Mr. Euan Thompson, a member of the Ballarat Cathedral chapter launched a petition drive calling for the ouster of Bishop Hough. He told The Age that he had so far collected 700 signatures in support of the motion to be presented to synod. The rural diocese northwest of Melbourne is one of Australia’s smallest, with 22 congregations and 2000 active members.
Former Welsh bishop buys house with ex-chaplain: The Church of England Newspaper, June 11, 2010 p June 20, 2010
Posted by geoconger in Church in Wales, Church of England Newspaper.comments closed
First published in The Church of England Newspaper.
The Welsh bishop who resigned in 2008 after denying allegations that he was engaged in an adulterous relationship with his female chaplain, is now living with his former chaplain in a home the two purchased in January.
The Western Mail reported last week that property records have confirmed that the former Bishop of St. David’s, the Rt. Rev. Carl Cooper and his chaplain, the Rev. Mandy Williams-Potter had purchased a home in January in Llandeilo.
In 2008, 23 clergy in the Diocese of St David’s requested the Archbishop of Wales, Dr. Barry Morgan, investigate Bishop Cooper for “conduct giving just cause for scandal and offence.” Their request came after Bishop Cooper and his wife Joy announced in February that they were separating after 25 years of marriage.
Bishop Cooper and his wife stated at that time that “difficulties in our relationship” led to the break up, and that “there is no- one else involved on either side.”
Mrs. Williams-Potter then issued a statement announcing her separation from her husband and denying an “inappropriate relationship with Bishop Carl,” adding that “there is no-one else involved in the break-up of our marriage. The two marital breakdowns are tragically coincidental and not connected in any way.”
On May 1, Bishop Cooper wrote to the diocese announcing his resignation, six weeks after being placed on a leave of absence while the Church in Wales investigated the circumstances of the breakdown of his marriage.
The “current situation has made it impossible for me to continue as your Bishop,” he said, offering his apologies for “any of my actions” that might have caused offence. Mrs. Williams-Potter also resigned as bishop’s chaplain and diocesan communications officer. Both have since left the ordained ministry.
Mr. Cooper and Mrs. Williams-Potter have declined to respond to press queries. The former bishop presently serves as chief executive of Powys Association of Voluntary Organisations (PAVO), while his former chaplain is a project manager for the trade union Unison.
Bishop Jefferts Schori rebuffs Dr. Williams’ call for restraint: The Church of England Newspaper, June 18, 2010 p 1. June 18, 2010
Posted by geoconger in Archbishop of Canterbury, Church of England Newspaper, The Episcopal Church.comments closed
Dr Williams and Bishop Jefferts Schori in New Orleans
First published in The Church of England Newspaper.
The Presiding Bishop of the Episcopal Church has offered a scriptural defence for her church’s embrace of gay bishops and blessings. Writing in response to the Archbishop of Canterbury’s Pentecost letter, on June 2 Bishop Katharine Jefferts Schori asked the Anglican Communion to engage in dialogue with the leaders of the Episcopal Church as “we believe that the Spirit is always calling us to greater understanding.”
The June 2 public letter follows upon private communications between Bishop Jefferts Schori and Dr. Rowan Williams about her continuing role in the councils of the Anglican Communion.
The press officer to the Secretary General of the Anglican Consultative Council has confirmed to The Church of England Newspaper that Canon Kenneth Kearon hand delivered a letter from Dr. Williams to Bishop Jefferts Schori at the April 17 consecration ceremony of Bishop Ian Douglas of Connecticut.
The chancellor to the Presiding Bishop, David Booth Beers, told bishops attending the May 24 to 28 Living Our Vows bishops’ training programme at the Lake Logan Episcopal Center in North Carolina that in this letter Dr. Williams had asked the Presiding Bishop to consider absenting herself from meetings of the Anglican Communion’s Standing Committee and the Primates Meeting in light of the Episcopal Church’s violation of the moratoria on gay bishops and blessings, those present tell CEN.
Speaking to a group of bishops during an informal after dinner session, Mr. Beers stated the Presiding Bishop had rejected the Archbishop of Canterbury’s suggestion, observing that he had no authority to remove her from the Primates Standing Committee as she had been elected by the North and South American primates. She also objected to Dr. Williams’ claim to have the authority to ban her from the councils of the church.
One of the bishops at the evening encounter told CEN that speculation on the future structures of the Communion was also shared by Mr. Beers with the bishops. The Archbishop of Canterbury’s press office did not respond to requests for clarification on Mr. Beers’ comments, while a spokesman for the Presiding Bishop declined to comment on “speculation and conjecture.”
The Presiding Bishop’s press officer Neva Rae Fox stated she was “not confirming the existence of a letter,” but “if there was a letter, then it was a private correspondence and I will not address anything that is private, because that is what it is – private.”
In her public response to the archbishop’s Pentecost letter, Bishop Jefferts Schori said Dr. Williams’ understanding of Acts 2 and Pentecost was insufficient. “Pentecost is most fundamentally a continuing gift of the Spirit, rather than a limitation or quenching of that Spirit.”
“The recent statement by the Archbishop of Canterbury about the struggles within the Anglican Communion seems to equate Pentecost with a single understanding of gospel realities. Those who received the gift of the Spirit on that day all heard good news. The crowd reported, ‘in our own languages we hear them speaking about God’s deeds of power’ (Acts 2:11),” she said.
Bishop Jefferts Schori stated “the Spirit does seem to be saying to many within the Episcopal Church that gay and lesbian persons are God’s good creation, that an aspect of good creation is the possibility of lifelong, faithful partnership, and that such persons may indeed be good and healthy exemplars of gifted leadership within the Church, as baptized leaders and ordained ones.”
She conceded that this “growing awareness does not deny the reality that many Anglicans and not a few Episcopalians still fervently hold traditional views about human sexuality. This Episcopal Church is a broad and inclusive enough tent to hold that variety.”
For the past “50 years” the Episcopal Church has been “listening to and for the Spirit” to guide it on issues of human sexuality. Not all were agreed on what the Spirit was saying, but the “willingness to live in tension is a hallmark of Anglicanism” she said and “diversity in community” was a hallmark of the Anglican ethos.
American Anglicanism “recognizes that the Spirit may be speaking to all of us, in ways that do not at present seem to cohere or agree. It also recognizes what Jesus says about the Spirit to his followers, ‘I still have many things to say to you, but you cannot bear them now. When the Spirit of truth comes, he will guide you into all the truth; for he will not speak on his own, but will speak whatever he hears, and he will declare to you the things that are to come’ (John 16:12-13).”
Dr. Williams’ efforts to dictate uniformity of belief was un-Anglican, Bishop Jefferts Schori said. “We live in great concern that colonial attitudes continue, particularly in attempts to impose a single understanding across widely varying contexts and cultures.”
She also noted the “troubling push toward centralized authority” by Dr. Williams, adding that the Church of England and the Episcopal Church had both arisen from “concerns over self-determination in the face of colonial control.”
The presiding bishop objected to the sanctions proposed by Dr. Williams and accused him of a “failure of nerve” and “double-mindedness” by holding private opinions at variance with his public stance. She also gave an oblique criticism to the Church of England’s tolerance of unofficial gay blessings saying “we are further distressed that such sanctions do not, apparently, apply to those parts of the Communion that continue to hold one view in public and exhibit other behaviors in private. Why is there no sanction on those who continue with a double standard?”
The Episcopal Church believed that “with sufficient humility that we can affirm the image of God in the person who disagrees with us. We believe that the Body of Christ is only found when such diversity is welcomed with abundant and radical hospitality,” Bishop Jefferts Schori said.
Conservatives in the United States have welcomed the presiding bishop’s robust defence of her views, but are un-persuaded by her arguments. In a 3100-word response, Prof. Christopher Seitz of the Anglican Communion Institute stated Bishop Jeffert Schori’s “account of the Spirit as bringing a truth without prior testimony or dominical warrant, which at the same time gives rise to diversity as a pentecostal gift, diverges in extreme ways from the Gospel of John and the Acts of the Apostles.”
“It is a teaching lacking continuity and agreement with the witness of Christians in our present day, in the worldwide body, and because without biblical warrant, it is also nowhere attested in the history of the church’s teaching,” he said, adding that this “teaching comes from a conviction already held, independently of what is customarily sought in respect of a warrant of God the Holy Spirit because of cultural assumptions about the intentions of sexual activity in our age and because [the Episcopal Church] has already acted on these.”
While applauding the presiding bishop’s decision to “to defend her views by recourse to Christian Scripture” and to clarify “what she understands to be the biblical warrant for her view of the Holy Spirit as an agent of new truth,” such a view is “not consistent” with the witness of Scripture and the “church would be in error should it follow her novel reading,” Prof. Seitz said.
Cool response to the Saville Report from the Church of Ireland: The Church of England Newspaper, June 16, 2010 June 18, 2010
Posted by geoconger in Church of England Newspaper, Church of Ireland, Politics, Terrorism.comments closed
Dr Alan Harper
First published in The Church of England Newspaper.
The Archbishop of Armagh has called for a careful reading of Lord Saville’s report on Bloody Sunday, and called for a balanced view of the history of the ‘Troubles’ in Northern Ireland.
In a statement issued on June 15, Dr. Alan Harper said Lord Saville’s report will be “painful for many people,” citing the “families of those killed, those injured and those present on the day,” and the “soldiers involved on that day.”
He added that the report’s “conclusions and recommendations may meet with limited acceptance by some people” in Ulster.
Over 12 years in the making at a cost of £195 million, the Saville Report was presented to Parliament by the prime minister on June 15. Mr. David Cameron said the findings were “shocking” and he was “deeply sorry” that thirteen marchers were shot dead on Jan 30, 1972 by British paratroopers in Londonderry. Fourteen other marchers were wounded and one later died. The Saville Report concluded the paras fired the first shot.
Mr. Cameron told Parliament the key findings of the report were that no warnings were given before the army opened fire; none of soldiers fired in response to attacks by petrol bombers; some of those killed were fleeing when struck down; none of those killed or wounded were a threat when the firing commenced; a number of soldiers lied about their actions; and that the events of the day were not premeditated.
Dr. Harper said the Saville Report was “5,000 pages long with a substantial additional executive summary. It deserves and will require careful reflection rather than instant reaction. Christian people will also want to ensure that their reflection is the subject of humble prayer.”
He added that it was a mistake to focus too much attention on Bloody Sunday at the expense of the other incidents. “We know only too well that history cannot be rewritten and that although this tragic and devastating episode in our troubled past has received exhaustive (and yet incomplete) scrutiny, many others have not, will not and cannot. Therefore, as we hold the victims of Bloody Sunday in our prayers let us continue also to remember the thousands of others whose suffering continues and whose memories may have been reawakened by today’s publication and the media attention it will evoke.”
The Bishop of Derry and Raphoe, the Rt. Rev. Ken Good, said the Saville Report presents an opportunity for the people of Londonderry to move on from its past. “The ways in which people on different sides of the community have viewed the events of Bloody Sunday, and have interpreted their significance, has been a source of pain and tension over the past three decades,” he said.
However, the “publication of this Report now presents us with the possibility of some healing of those differences.”
Bishop Good said that at the “heart of this Inquiry there is a pastoral and a human dimension which must be taken seriously by us all, primarily for reasons of justice, but also because of the potential for a significant step forward in our dealings with one another which this Report now offers.
As a consequence of this Report and of what will flow from it, we all now have the possibility of moving forward together with a more accurate and shared appreciation of one of the key moments of our turbulent and troubled shared history,” he said.
Archbishop Tutu attacks UN collusion with African dictator: The Church of England Newspaper, June 17, 2010 June 18, 2010
Posted by geoconger in Church of England Newspaper, Church of the Province of West Africa, Corruption, UN.comments closed
President Teodoro Obiang of Equitorial Guinea
First published in The Church of England Newspaper.
Nobel laureate and former Archbishop of Cape Town Desmond Tutu has criticized UNESCO, the United Nations Educational Scientific and Cultural Organization, for agreeing to sponsor a prize named in honour of the dictator of Equatorial Guinea, President Teodoro Obiang Nguema Mbasogo.
On June 11 Archbishop Tutu released an open letter to UNESCO saying he was “appalled” that the UN was “allowing itself to burnish the unsavory reputation of a dictator.”
The UNESCO-Obiang Nguema Mbasogo International Prize for Research in the Life Sciences was created to recognize “scientific achievements that improve the quality of human life” and the first award is expected to be made this month.
Human Rights groups and anti-corruption campaigners have accused Mr. Obiang of embezzling hundreds of millions of dollars from the treasury of his oil-rich West African state, while the majority of its people live in abject poverty. Mr. Obiang seized power from his uncle in 1979 and was re-elected last year with 95 per cent of the vote.
“The rule of President Obiang,” Archbishop Tutu said, “has been marked by corruption and abuse.”
He called upon UNESCO to use the Obiang prize’s £2 million endowment “to benefit the people of Equatorial Guinea—from whom these funds have been taken—rather than to glorify their president.”
“The people of Equatorial Guinea should share in the wealth generated by their country’s huge oil reserves. Instead, they endure poverty and oppression. Their president and his associates enjoy lavish homes and trips abroad, and money that should go to the people winds its way to private bank accounts,” the former archbishop said.
The American ambassador to UNESCO on June 14 sent a letter to the organization’s director general backing Archbishop Tutu’s call to suspend the Obiang prize. Ambassador David T. Killion said that a suspension would give time “for quiet consultations among member states to find a way forward,” consistent with UNESCO’s “basic values.”
Nigerian church criticized over the Glasspool election: The Church of England Newspaper, June 4, 2010 June 17, 2010
Posted by geoconger in Church of England Newspaper, Church of Nigeria, Los Angeles.comments closed
Archbishop Nicholas Okoh
Government leaders in Nigeria have chastised Archbishop Nicholas Okoh and the Church of Nigeria over the consecration of Mary Glasspool in Los Angeles.
The Governor of the Rivers State in the Niger Delta this week told the Archbishop that the consecration of a lesbian bishop by the Anglican Communion diminished the moral authority of the Church in Africa and weakened its spiritual and social witness.
Enthroned as Archbishop and Primate of the Anglican Communion’s largest province earlier this year, Archbishop Okoh has begun a tour of the national Church, meeting with Diocesan leaders and local officials. During the Archbishop’s meeting in Port Harcount with government officials a spokesman for Governor Rotimi Amaechi said the Glasspool consecration was a symbol of western moral decadence.
The governor told the new Archbishop, “Primate, you have a lot in your hands; the times are not good and the challenges are daunting.” By adopting the standards of the world and turning a blind eye to “moral laxity” the church was in danger of losing its prophetic voice, he said.
Archbishop Okoh has taken a high profile since assuming office as leader of the country’s largest Protestant denomination. At his diocesan synod last month, the Archbishop attacked the country’s culture of corruption, saying Nigeria was committing “suicide by instalment.”
Speaking with reporters after his meeting with the governor, Archbishop Okoh urged President Goodluck Jonathan to press on with his predecessor’s plans for ending the guerrilla insurgency in the Nigerian Delta. He encouraged President Jonathan, a native of the region to offer amnesty to the militants under the programme initiated by the late President Umaru Yar’Adua.
“A Niger Delta son is now in charge and it is proper that he implements the amnesty programme to a logical conclusion,” he said on May 31.
He urged all Anglicans to participate in the 2011 General Elections. The country’s elections must be “free and fair,” he said, “otherwise we will make ourselves an object of ridicule to the rest of the world.”
Nigeria was “lagging behind in many things,” he said, but in “the area of democracy, we should be seen to be enthroning a credible government at local, state and federal levels,” he said.
Last week the Archbishop told the church leaders in Lagos that Nigeria must protect its fledgling democracy from both internal and external foes. The push by some agencies of the United Nations to normalise homosexuality was an affront to Nigerian democracy, he told church leaders at Christ Church Cathedral on Lagos Island.
“If the UN has made itself an agent for the propagation of homosexuality globally, then it is time for us to pull out of the organisation,” he said, according to the News Agency of Nigeria.
“This is because the UN has no right to determine for or impose moral standards on us (Nigeria). Let us stand firm and refuse to be bought over by the West,’’ he said.
The gay agenda being forced upon Africa was un-Biblical and un-African, he said, and was a sign of a fallen world’s rebellion against God.
Ousted Mugabe bishop appeals to supreme court: The Church of England Newspaper, June 4, 2010 p 8. June 16, 2010
Posted by geoconger in Church of England Newspaper, Property Litigation, Zimbabwe.comments closed
First published in The Church of England Newspaper.
The former Bishop of Manicaland, the Rt. Rev. Elson Jakazi, has filed an appeal to Zimbabwe’s Supreme Court, asking it to overturn a lower court ruling that ousted him as diocesan bishop. The May 19 court ruling effectively turned over control of the diocese’s property to the Church of the Province of Central Africa (CPCA) and the new bishop of Manicaland, Dr. Julius Makoni.
On May 21 Bishop Jakazi, an ally of President Robert Mugabe and his ZANU-PF party, lodged an appeal of High Court Judge Chinembiri Bhunu’s decision that Bishop Jakazi forfeited his right to oversee diocesan property when he quit the CPCA church to join Dr. Nolbert Kunonga’s Anglican Church of Zimbabwe. On Sept 23, 2007 Bishop Jakazi joined Dr. Kunonga in pulling their dioceses out of the CPCA in protest to what they alleged were pro-gay bias in the Province.
The dean of Central Africa, Bishop Albert Chama of Northern Zambia responded that it “was impossible for them to withdraw the dioceses” and on Oct 19, 2007 the Central African bishops declared the two “were no longer bishops” of the CPCA.
In his decision Judge Bhunu rejected the bishop’s plea that he retain his post. Bishop Jakazi “can hardly be heard to complain or cry foul. Any appeal or review which he may launch means he is appealing or seeking a review of his own conduct. This is wholly untenable and illogical such that it must be incompetent at law,” the judge said.
However, Bishop Jakazi has alleged the judge’s ruling misapplied the law and distorted the facts and has asked the Supreme Court to restore him as bishop. The petition and accompanying bond temporarily stay his ejection, pending the court’s review. “I remain the legally enthroned bishop of the Diocese of Manicaland,” Bishop Jakazi claimed.
Tutu condemns Gaza flotilla deaths as ‘inexcusable’: The Church of England Newspaper, June 4, 2010 p 3. June 16, 2010
Posted by geoconger in Church of England Newspaper, Israel, Turkey.comments closed
First published in The Church of England Newspaper.
The deaths of nine pro-Palestinian activists aboard the Turkish flagged motor vessel Mavi Marmara in a clash with the Israeli navy was “inexcusable” the former Archbishop of Cape Town Desmond Tutu said on May 31.
Nine civilians died on May 31 when Israel Defence Forces marines boarded the Mavi Marmara and attempted to re-direct a flotilla of Gaza-bound ships that were seeking to break the blockade of the Hamas-controlled territory.
Videos released by the IDF show masked activists attacking the IDF, who were armed with non-lethal crowd control weapons when they boarded the ship to search for weapons. After several IDF marines were attacked and the side arm wrestled away from one, the IDF was given permission to return fire.
Pro-Palestinian activists have denied this account and have accused Israel of piracy and breaching international law. Human Rights Watch released a statement on May 31 saying it had not been able “to conduct its own investigation to determine which account is accurate,” but reiterated its call for a lifting of the blockade, calling it an “unlawful collective punishment.”
On May 31 a spokesman for the Prime Minister said Mr Cameron “deplored the heavy loss of life off the coast of Gaza earlier today. He reiterated the UK’s strong commitment to Israel’s security, but urged Israel to respond constructively to legitimate criticism of its actions, and to do everything possible to avoid a repeat of this unacceptable situation.”
After a prolonged debate the United Nations Security Council on June 1 condemned the “acts” that led to the deaths of the nine activists, but under pressure from the United States, did not exclusively condemn Israel. The UN called for an impartial investigation of the incident and added that it believed the blockade of Gaza was “unsustainable.”
Archbishop Tutu, joined by former US President Jimmy Carter and former Irish President Mary Robinson, condemned “Israel’s attack on the aid shipment and the resulting killings and injuries as completely inexcusable.”
They called for a “full investigation of [the] incident and urged the UN Security Council to debate the situation with a view to mandating action to end the closure of the Gaza strip.”
Vatican spokesman Fr Federico Lombardi said the raid was an “unnecessary loss of human life,” and reiterated the Vatican’s concern over the situation.
“It’s a very painful fact, especially for the unnecessary loss of human life,” Fr Lombardi told reporters on June 1. “The situation is being followed in the Vatican with great attention and concern.”
Ecumenical News International reported the East Jerusalem YMCA and YWCA “strongly condemns this massacre against unarmed civilians which visibly violates international law and human rights.”
Pro-Palestinian NGOs also denounced Israel for its lethal response to the attack. War on Want released a statement saying that “for too long the international community has ignored international law over Israel’s crimes against Palestinians and allowed its government to act with complete impunity. Now Israel has turned its fire on international human rights activists, the world must finally say enough is enough.”
However, NGO Monitor, a Jerusalem-based think tank, criticised as inaccurate and intemperate these claims saying they displayed a “façade of morality exploited for … political warfare.”
They argue the flotilla was a deliberate provocation that was designed to create an incident. The flotilla was funded in part by the Turkish Islamist group, the IHH (Insani Yardim Vakfi) a member of the Union of the Good, an umbrella group of Islamic organisations that channels money to Hamas, NGO Monitor reported.
It further stated that French analyst Jean-Louis Bruguiere “claimed that IHH maintained contacts with al-Qaeda in Milan and Algerian terrorists in Europe; recruited militants for fighting in Bosnia, Chechnya and Afghanistan, and planed a ‘central role’ in the al-Qaeda bomb plot targeting the Los Angeles airport.”
In 2008 Israeli Defence Minister Ehud Barak banned IHH for its links to Hamas, and deported its agents to Turkey.
Church call for government action on Maoist terror in India: The Church of England Newspaper, June 4, 2010 p 6. June 15, 2010
Posted by geoconger in Church of England Newspaper, Church of North India, Terrorism.comments closed
Naxalite guerrillas
First published in The Church of England Newspaper.
Church leaders in India have condemned last week’s terrorist attack on a Calcutta to Bombay express train that has left 148 dead.
On May 28 at 0130 hours, Maoist guerrillas derailed the Bombay bound Gyaneswari Express. Railway officials initially reported a bomb had been detonated under the tracks, but subsequent press reports state that a 1.5-foot section of track was missing. Railway spokesman Soumitra Majumdar said five coaches of the eastbound night train to Calcutta train jumped the track and were crushed by an on-coming goods train on the westbound track.
There were 13 carriages – including 10 sleeper coaches and a second-class coach – on the express, the Times of India reported.
Police have confirmed that 148 have died, approximately 150 are in hospital and 25 people are missing in the attack in the West Midnapore district of West Bengal, some 80 miles from Calcutta. Posters found near the scene, point to a guerrilla attack, government officials have reported.
The Rev Asir Ebenezer, general secretary of the National Council of Churches in India, urged the government to act. “In the last few weeks the country has seen a spate of unabated violence and bloodshed,” he said.
“While the leaders of the Maoist outfits and the state battle it out, the people bear the brunt of the attacks from both sides,” he said.
“We express our condolences for those who are killed. One should understand that by killing people nobody can achieve their goal,” the Rev Enos Das Pradhan, general secretary of the Church of North India, told UCA news, urging the government to safeguard civilians and restore order.
However, Maoist leaders have denied responsibility for the attack, telling the BBC they were not responsible for the derailment.
The Maoist or Naxalite uprising began in 1967 in the West Bengal village of Naxalbari. While the original peasant rising was crushed by police, the Maoist-inspired rebellion has spread across rural and jungle areas of Central and Eastern India’s Jharkand, West Bengal, Orissa, Bihar, Chhattisgarh and Andhra Pradesh states, creating a “red corridor” controlled by the insurgents.
Over 6,000 people have died in the fighting over the past 45 years. Friday’s attack saw the single highest day’s death toll in the low-level war, topping the April 2010 ambush of a police patrol that killed 76 in the dense jungle of Central India’s Chhattisgarh state, and a 2007 attack on a police barracks that killed 55.
Naxalite leader Koteshwar Rao is believed to field a force of 10,000 to 20,000 guerrillas and they faced off against 50,000 federal paramilitary troops and tens of thousands of local policemen.
In 2008 the government conceded that the Naxalite rebellion was growing. Prime Minister Manmohan Singh stated the Maoists were “targeting all aspects of economic activity, [including] vital infrastructure so as to cripple transport and logistical capabilities and slow down any development. [India] cannot rest in peace until we have eliminated this virus,” he said.
The longevity of the rebellion, analysts note, lies in the support given to the guerrillas by India’s rural poor and hill tribesmen. The Maoists have pledged to over throw India’s semi-feudal land holding system, giving the poor control of land owned by absentee landlords.
Mr Ebenezer of the National Council of Churches urged the government to address the root causes of the rebellion and address the “issues and contexts that give rise to these conflicts.” Only by cutting off the oxygen of peasant support could the rebellion be put down, he said.
Bowleg quits: The Church of England Newspaper, June 4, 2010 p 6. June 15, 2010
Posted by geoconger in Church of England Newspaper, Church of the Province of the West Indies.comments closed
The Ven Etienne Bowleg
First published in The Church of England Newspaper.
The priest behind the court challenge to the Church of the West Indies mandatory retirement canon has quit the Diocese of the Bahamas and Turks and Caicos Islands to form an independent church.
Last week the Bishop of the Bahamas, the Rt Rev Laish Boyd announced the Ven Etienne Bowleg had renounced his orders. The Bahamas Press newspaper also reported that an investigation has now also been launched into allegations that Archdeacon Bowleg embezzled funds from his parish, Holy Trinity Church in Nassau.
On March 3 the Bahamian Supreme Court discharged an injunction that had prevented Bishop Boyd from removing 72-year-old archdeacon from Holy Trinity’s helm and dismissed the archdeacon’s appeal.
In his petition Archdeacon Bowleg argued the failure of the diocese to gazette, or give formal legal notice by publishing the canons in a journal of legal record, of the changes to its canons providing for mandatory retirement, rendered it void.
A similar case had been brought against the Diocese of Barbados by the Rev Edward Gatherer who argued that when the Church of England was disestablished in 1969, the reorganised diocese failed to gazette its new retirement canons making them void.
The case of Gomez v Gatherer eventually came before the Ecclesiastical Committee of the Privy Council which in 1992 held the diocese had failed to follow its rules of procedure and was barred from enforcing canons not properly enacted. Fr Gatherer, now 87, currently remains in office as priest in charge of St Andrew’s parish in Barbados.
In the Bowleg case, the Supreme Court held that under the terms of the Deed of Institution as rector of Holy Trinity, Bowleg “served at the pleasure of the bishop” and could be dismissed “at will.”
In his letter to the Bahamian clergy, Bishop Boyd stated that Etienne Bowleg wishes “to renounce all allegiance as a priest of the Diocese of the Bahamas and The Turks and Caicos Islands within the Province of the West Indies, with immediate effect.”
“This means that by his choice, intent and assertion Fr Etienne Bowleg no longer holds a licence to function in this Diocese. As clergy of the Diocese all of you need to be aware of how serious this matter is and what its implications are.
“The lack of a General Licence means that Fr Bowleg is not allowed to function (officiate, celebrate, preach, vest, process, sit in the chancel or sit in the sanctuary) at any service or event of the Diocese or the Province, or under the auspices of the Diocese or the Province,” the bishop said.
Weak nuclear Non-Proliferation Treaty disappoints church leaders: The Church of England Newspaper, June 4, 2010 p 7. June 15, 2010
Posted by geoconger in Arms Control/Defense/Peace Issues, Church of England, Church of England Newspaper.comments closed
The Rt Rev Stephen Cottrell
First published in The Church of England Newspaper.
Church leaders in England and Wales have responded with disappointment to last week’s nuclear Non-Proliferation Treaty (NPT) saying it fails to set a time table for eliminating nuclear weapons.
The 28-page declaration adopted on May 28 by 189 nations following a month long review at the United Nations calls for a summit in 2012 to work towards banning nuclear weapons in the Middle East and asks Britain, China, France, Russia and the United States to speed up the demobilization of their nuclear arsenals. However the five nuclear powers have not agreed to a time line for disarmament.
The agreement has angered conservatives in the United States and the Israeli government for singling out the Jewish state for opprobrium while also calling for it to join the NPT, while making no mention of Iran; the only NPT member nation that has been found to be in noncompliance with its UN nuclear safeguards obligations.
The Rt. Rev. Stephen Cottrell, Bishop of Reading, who joined members of the ‘Now is the Time’ coalition in presenting a petition to the prime minister on May 26, stated “nuclear weapons are a legacy of the cold war era and have little relevance to the threats that we face today.”
“There is a growing recognition that having one set of rules for some nations, and a different set of rules for everyone else is unsustainable,” the bishop said, noting that “moving towards the elimination of nuclear weapons is not only morally right but the best possible guarantee for our nation’s security.”
In a joint statement released on May 29, the Archbishop of Wales, Dr Barry Morgan and the President of the Free Church Council of Wales, Rev Martin Spain, voiced their disappointment with the treaty.
“In failing to agree to a timeframe for further discussions, world leaders appear simply to be paying lip service to the concept of nuclear disarmament. We didn’t expect the conference to produce a detailed plan for banning nuclear weapons, but we were looking for a commitment to move forward on the issue,” they said.
“If the nuclear armed powers do not go further to demonstrate that they are prepared to relinquish nuclear weapons, then the existing international commitments on non-proliferation could unravel, leaving us all in a much more dangerous and insecure situation. The call to work towards a world free of nuclear weapons comes not only from the majority of the world’s governments but also overwhelmingly from people of all nations,” the Welsh clerics said.
US President Barack Obama welcomed the NPT agreement but also voiced his objections to its singling out Israel. The new agreement “includes balanced and practical steps that will advance non-proliferation, nuclear disarmament, and peaceful uses of nuclear energy, which are critical pillars of the global non-proliferation regime,” President Obama said.
However, “we strongly oppose efforts to single out Israel, and will oppose actions that jeopardize Israel’s national security,” the president said, while his national security advisor General James Jones said the Obama administration “deplores the decision to single out Israel in the Middle East section of the NPT document.”
“The failure of the resolution to mention Iran, a nation in longstanding violation of the NPT and UN Security Council Resolutions which poses the greatest threat of nuclear proliferation in the region and to the integrity of the NPT, is also deplorable,” General Jones said.
Writing in the National Review, Henry Sokolski, executive director of the Nonproliferation Policy Education Center, a Washington think-tank said the president’s support for the “thin” NPT treaty will “incense Israel”, while his simultaneous support for Israel will “disappoint the Arabs who expect a 2012 conference.”
“With the possible exception of Iran, it is difficult to see how Obama or anyone got anything out of this exercise but regret,” Mr. Sokolski said.
AMiA pulls back from joining third province movement in North America: The Church of England Newspaper, June 4, 2010 p 6. June 14, 2010
Posted by geoconger in Anglican Church of North America, Church of England Newspaper.comments closed
The ACNA College of Bishop
First published in The Church of England Newspaper.
The Anglican Mission in America (AMiA) has pulled back from full membership in the Anglican Church in North America (ACNA) and has asked to be affiliated with the breakaway province in formation as an ACNA “Ministry Partner.” The announcement weakens the third province movement in the United States and Canada, but will not likely prove to be fatal its supporters say.
On May 18 Archbishop Robert Duncan of the ACNA and Bishop Chuck Murphy of the AMiA, also known as the Anglican Mission, released separate statements saying the downgrading of the AMiA’s relationship with the ACNA would take affect following the group’s June bishops meeting.
Bishop Don Harvey of the Anglican Network in Canada, a diocese of the ACNA, stated that he did “not see this as good news, in fact it is a sad development in many ways.”
However, the assumption of Ministry Partner status “seems to be the best solution for now given the relationship” between the AMiA and the Province of Rwanda, he said.
Formed in 2000 with the consecration of Bishops Chuck Murphy and John Rodgers in Singapore by the Primates of Southeast Asia and Rwanda, the AMiA has grown to 156 congregations in ten years and comprises nine of the twenty nine dioceses of the ACNA.
In his letter to the ACNA, Archbishop Duncan stated the decision to pull back from the ACNA was due to a “January resolution by the Rwandan House of Bishops objecting to the dual membership of Rwanda’s missionary bishops in the [ACNA] North American College of Bishops.”
Archbishop Duncan stated the constitution of the ACNA was written to permit the AMiA to be a member of the North American third province while “sustaining [its] identity as a missionary outreach of Rwanda.” However, “The jurisdictional approach has led to a number of areas of confusion for bishops and congregations of the Anglican Mission,” he said.
The AMiA stated the “dual citizenship” was not working, and was inconsistent with the constitution of the Church of Rwanda. “Practically speaking, this jurisdictional/membership status became untenable and non-sustainable.”
The immediate effect of the downgrading of status for the AMiA will be that its bishops will lose their seats in the ACNA’s college of bishops. However, local congregations will be free to transfer between the AMiA and the ACNA with the permission of their bishops, and allows clergy to move between the two groups.
The structural differences between the AMiA and the ACNA made the separation likely, commentator Robin Jordan noted on his website as the “current structure and form of governance it would be very difficult for the AMiA to integrate into the ACNA and Ministry Partnership status may be the best way of maintaining a relationship with the ACNA”
The AMiA is “structured more like Roman Catholic archdiocese” than an Anglican ecclesiastical entity while the “canon governing the relationship of the Primate of the Rwanda to the Primatial Vicar[Bishop Murphy] is based upon the canon of the Roman Catholic Church governing the relationship of the Pope to that church,” Mr. Jordan noted.
“To fully integrate into the ACNA, the AMiA would have to dismantle its existing structure and form of governance and disrupt the existing lines of authority and relationships of power in the organization,” he said as the ACNA has adopted the “conventional” Anglican “diocesan structure and form of church governance”
Archbishop Duncan stated “the vision of a biblical, missionary and united Anglicanism in North America remains the vision of every North American Anglican. Jurisdictional integration also remains a future hope as Rwandan canons do provide for the transfer of the Anglican Mission to the Anglican Church in North America when the time seems right.”
Bishop Harvey observed that “the good news” was that this “change will not hinder our working together both to bring the Gospel of Jesus Christ to people who desperately need our Saviour and to plant churches in Canada and the US.”
Malawi bishop’s election overturned: The Church of England Newspaper, June 4, 2010 p 8. June 14, 2010
Posted by geoconger in Church of England Newspaper, Church of the Province of Central Africa.comments closed
The Rt Rev Christopher Boyle of Northern Malawi
First published in The Church of England Newspaper.
The Court of Confirmation of the Church of the Province of Central Africa has rejected the election of the Rev Leslie Mtekateka as Bishop of Northern Malawi. A new election to succeed the Rt Rev Christopher Boyle, who has returned to England to serve as Assistant Bishop of Leicester, has been scheduled for June 26.
Rector of St Timothy’s, Chitipa, Fr Mtekateka was the sole candidate on the ballot in Northern Malawi, and is the son of the Rt Rev Josiah Mtekateka, the first African bishop of Malawi, who was consecrated in 1965 as Suffragan Bishop of Nyasaland, and in 1971 as the first Bishop of Lake Malawi.
Shortly after Fr Mtekateka’s election on Aug 1, 2009, a petition was lodged with the bishops of the province charging the bishop-elect with moral turpitude. A September 2009 meeting to hear charges brought against Fr Mtekateka was postponed to November after the petitioners were unable to attend the gathering.
The bishop-elect responded to the charges at a February meeting of the court and in April the bishops announced there was sufficient cause to nullify the Aug 1 vote and sent it back to the diocese for a new election.
Fr Mtekateka was the first Malawian elected as Bishop of Northern Malawi. His predecessors were British, Bishop Boyle, and American, the Rt Rev Jackson Biggers. In June 2006, the Rev J Scott Wilson SSC of the Diocese of Fort Worth withdrew as sole candidate in Northern Malawi, prompting the diocese to conduct an abbreviated internal search that produced Fr Mtekateka.
Delegates from the five archdeaconries in Northern Malawi will meet in the Diocese of Lake Malawi with representatives from the province and are expected to choose an indigenous priest to serve as its next bishop.
Woman bishop for Helsinki: The Church of England Newspaper, June 12, 2010 June 12, 2010
Posted by geoconger in Church of England Newspaper, Church of Finland, Women Priests.comments closed
Bishop Irja Askola of Helsinki
The Church of Finland has elected is first female bishop. On June 3 Pastor Irja Askola was elected Bishop of Helsinki of the Evangelical Lutheran Church of Finland.
A member of the Porvoo Group of churches in Communion with the Church of England, Finland now joins Norway, Sweden and Denmark in appointing women bishops. However, the election of Pastor Askola will likely cause difficulty for some of the diocese’s clergy, members of the traditionalist Finnish Lutheran Gospel Association.
In September 2006 a committee of the Finnish House of Bishops chaired by the Bishop of Espoo, the Rt. Rev. Mikko Heikka recommended that congregations no longer be permitted to allow ministers to absent themselves from services where they would have to serve with a female priest, nor would the parish be permitted to accommodate traditionalist clergy by scheduling male clergy only services.
In 2008 a court convicted the Rev. Ari Norro of “criminal discrimination” under the country’s human rights laws for refusing to concelebrate the Eucharist with a female minister. Mr. Norro, a member of the Lutheran Gospel Association, was fined 20-days pay by the Hyvinkää District Court, which held that religious convictions cannot trump sexual discrimination laws.
In the second round of voting, held in each of Helsinki’s deaneries, Pastor Askola received 591 votes against the 567 polled by the Dean of Helsinki Cathedral, Pastor Matti Poutiainen. The new bishop will take office Sept 1, and will be consecrated on Sept 12 at Helsinki Cathedral.
Bishop-elect Askola received her divinity degree in 1975 and was ordained in 1988. From 1991 to 1999 she worked for the Conference of European Churches and at the time of her election was the Special Assistant in Theological Affairs for Bishop Heikka.
Conform or face the consequences, Archbishop says: The Church of England Newspaper, June 4, 2010 p 1 June 10, 2010
Posted by geoconger in Anglican Consultative Council, Archbishop of Canterbury, Church of England Newspaper, The Episcopal Church.comments closed
Dr. Rowan Williams
First published in The Church of England Newspaper.
The Archbishop of Canterbury has asked Provinces who have violated the Communion’s moratoria on gay bishops and blessings, along with those who cross provincial borders in response to these actions, to withdraw their representatives from the Communion’s official ecumenical bodies and from the newly formed Inter-Anglican Standing Commission on Unity, Faith and Order (UFO).
“Some public marks of distance,” or discipline of those who defy the wider Church, “are unavoidable if our Communion bodies are not to be stripped of credibility and effectiveness,” Dr Rowan Williams said.
In a letter dated May 28, the Archbishop stated that the participation of representatives from the Episcopal Church and other offenders created an “obvious problem” by having those “consciously at odds with what the Communion has formally requested or stipulated” serve as representatives of the Communion.
Dr Williams’ Pentecost letter entitled “Renewal in the Spirit” represents a shift in the Archbishop’s agenda, as it calls for a return of a regime of substantive meetings to address the issues dividing the Church. And in light of criticisms made by the Global South primates and leaders of the Episcopal Church that he has arrogated to himself powers he does not rightfully possess, the Archbishop also appears to have backtracked and conceded that authority also resides with the Primates and the individual Provinces.
The Archbishop’s Pentecost letter is the public half of a campaign to rein in the Episcopal Church, The Church of England Newspaper has learned, and follows a private letter delivered to Presiding Bishop Katharine Jefferts Schori asking her to consider withdrawing from active participation on the Standing Committee of the Anglican Communion.
A letter from the Archbishop is believed to have been given to Bishop Jefferts Schori at the April 17 consecration of the Bishop of Connecticut, Dr Ian Douglas. Neva Rae Fox, a spokesman for the Presiding Bishop said she could not comment as she was not present at the Connecticut consecration. Dr Williams’ office would neither confirm nor deny the story, citing its policy of not commenting on the Archbishop’s private correspondence.
Dr Williams’ Pentecost letter asking for offending Provinces to remove their representatives is unclear as to which Provinces are under scrutiny. While he raised the issue of the Glasspool consecration in the US as an example of a Province declining to “accept requests or advice from the consultative organs of the Communion,” Dr Williams also lauded the Communion Partners group within the Episcopal Church for their loyalty to the Communion.
Two Americans, Dr Thomas Ferguson and Bishop William Gregg serve on the Anglican-Orthodox Theological Dialogue, and Dr Katherine Grieb is a member of the UFO committee. Dr Williams’ letter is unclear whether they will be asked to accept a reduced status as Americans on the committee, or if they will be allowed to remain on the committee if they support the Communion Partners group.
Canada has two representatives on the Orthodox dialogue and two UFO members. However, a spokesman for Lambeth Palace said Dr Alyson Barnett-Cowan would not be asked to step aside from the UFO committee as she was a staffer of the ACC. The status of Dr John Gibaut, a Canadian priest serving with the World Council of Churches on the UFO committee, is unclear, however, as to whether he is counted as a Canadian or a WCC representative.
A spokesman for the Church of Uganda, who asked not to be identified as he had not been given permission to speak on behalf of the Church, said that Dr Williams’ letter would not appear to affect the membership of Ugandan Dr Edison Muhindo on the UFO, as his Church had turned over its American churches to the Anglican Church in North America and was no longer involved in cross-border interventions.
The status of the Rev Joseph Wandera of Kenya on the Orthodox dialogue and Professor Dapo Asaju of Nigeria on the UFO are unclear as those Churches have also turned over their American missions to the ACNA. Bishop Tito Zavela of Chile, a member of the UFO, is expected to be asked to accept a reduced role as the Province of the Southern Cone continues to oversee dioceses in Brazil and America.
A spokesman for Dr Williams told CEN a “letter will be going out shortly to those Provinces affected” clarifying these questions.
The Archbishop of Canterbury opened his letter with a summary of his theological position on the necessity of unity. Drawing from the feast of Pentecost and the outpouring of the Holy Spirit upon the Church, Dr Williams wrote of the communitarian nature of the Christian life. “The Good News we share is not just a story about Jesus but the possibility of living in and through the life of Jesus and praying his prayer to the Father.”
“The Holy Spirit is also the Spirit of ‘communion’ or fellowship,” he stated, and “the Spirit allows us to recognise each other as part of the Body of Christ because we can hear in each other the voice of Jesus praying to the Father.”
He conceded that “our Anglican fellowship continues to experience painful division, and the events of recent months have not brought us nearer to full reconciliation,” and “all are agreed that the disputes arising around these matters threaten to distract us from our main calling as Christ’s Church.”
However, it is “my own passionate hope that our discussion of the Anglican Covenant in its entirety will help us focus on that priority,” he said.
Dr Williams defended the Covenant saying it was “not envisaged as an instrument of control,” and added that the “place given in the final text to the Standing Committee of the Communion introduces no novelty.”
The Standing Committee would be “fully answerable in all matters to the ACC and the Primates,” he said, adding that there was no “intention to prevent the Primates in the group from meeting separately.”
The 2011 Primates’ Meeting would also be asked to review the “responsibilities in questions concerned with faith and order” of the Primates’ Meeting, the ACC and the Standing Committee, Dr Williams said.
“Some complain that we are condemned to endless meetings that achieve nothing,” he said, however, “I believe that in fact we have too few meetings that allow proper mutual exploration,” the Archbishop said.
While liberal and conservative commentators have responded to the Archbishop’s letter, the leaders of the Communion have been quiet. A spokesman for Bishop Jefferts Schori told CEN that “we do not anticipate any response at this time.”
A spokesman for the Global South Primates said they were reviewing the letter and had no initial comment.
President of Malawi pardons gay couple: The Church of England Newspaper, June 4, 2010 p 8. June 10, 2010
Posted by geoconger in Church of England Newspaper, Church of the Province of Central Africa, Human Sexuality --- The gay issue.comments closed
President Bingu wa Mutharika of Malawi
First published in The Church of England Newspaper.
The President of Malawi has pardoned two men sentenced last month to 14 years imprisonment for sodomy following pleas for clemency from world political and religious leaders.
On May 20 Steven Monjeza and Tiwonge Chimbalanga were convicted of “indecent practices between males” and “unnatural offences.” They were arrested following a Dec 28 engagement ceremony that sought to test Malawi’s colonial era sodomy laws and provoke debate over homosexuality in the conservative Central African nation.
The convictions had sparked concern from overseas leaders and churchmen. On May 26 the bishops of the Anglican Church of Southern Africa released a statement urging South African President Jacob Zuma to intercede for the two men with the government of President Bingu wa Mutharika, while Archbishop Rowan Williams on May 27 said he welcomed the South African bishops’ statement in support of clemency.
President Mutharika pardoned the two men on May 28 following a meeting with UN Secretary-General Ban Ki-moon. The UN leader urged the President to reform Malawi’s vice code and asked Parliament to “take appropriate steps to update laws discriminating based on sexual orientation in line with international standards.”
The president said “these boys committed a crime against our culture, our religion and our laws.
“However, as the head of state I hereby pardon them and therefore ask for their immediate release with no conditions,” he told reporters, adding that “I have done this on humanitarian grounds but this does not mean that I support this.”
On Dec 28 Chimbalanga (20) and Monjeza (26) participated in an engagement ceremony at Mankhoma Lodge in Malawi’s commercial capital, Blantyre. Dressed in traditional Malawian attire, the couple exchanged presents and announced their intent to marry. The ceremony did not go off as planned, however, as power cuts interrupted the proceedings and on-lookers voiced disapproval after Chimbalanga’s gender — he was dressed as a woman — was made known to patrons of the lodge. The couple’s actions were reported to the police, who took them into custody later that day for violating “offences against morality” under sections 153 and 156 of the penal code.
After the pair’s conviction, the South African bishops stated that though there was a “breadth of theological views among us on matters of human sexuality, we are united in opposing the criminalisation of homosexual people.”
The sentence of 14 years hard labour was a “gross violation of human rights” the bishops said, and urged the South African government to lobby for “the swift release of these two individuals, who have committed no act of violence or harm against anyone; for the quashing of the sentence against them; and for the repeal of this repressive legislation.”
However, Malawian government and church leaders have supported the prosecution of the two men and a reform of Malawian laws is unlikely. During the trial, President Mutharika had called homosexuality “evil and very bad before the eyes of God,” while Anthony Kamanga, Malawi’s solicitor general and secretary for justice and constitutional affairs, told CNN that the country’s vice laws do not conflict with the constitution.
The Minister of Gender and Children, Patricia Kaliati told the BBC the two men would be rearrested if they reoffended.
The president’s pardon does not “mean that now they are free people, [and] can keep doing whatever you keep doing,” she said.
A Foreign Office spokesman said Britain welcomed “the announcement by President Mutharika to pardon Mr Tiwonge Chimbalanga and Mr Steven Monjeza. Britain has a close and strong partnership with Malawi and it is in this spirit that we raised our concerns about these convictions with the government of Malawi.”
“The UK believes that human rights apply to everyone regardless of their sexual orientation or gender identity.”
White House Press Secretary Robert Gibbs said: “These individuals were not criminals and their struggle is not unique. We must all recommit ourselves to ending the persecution and criminalisation of sexual orientation and gender identity.
“We hope that President Mutharika’s pardon marks the beginning of a new dialogue which reflects the country’s history of tolerance and a new day for lesbian, gay, bisexual, and transgender rights in Malawi and around the globe,” Mr Gibbs said.
Cholera fears close church orphanage in India: The Church of England Newspaper, June 9, 2010 June 10, 2010
Posted by geoconger in Church of England Newspaper, Church of South India.comments closed
Cholera patients in Orissa
First published in The Church of England Newspaper.
Child welfare officers in Bangalore have raided an orphanage run by the wife of the moderator of the Church of South India (CSI), removing most of the children from the New Life Centre at Bharathinagar after 23 were taken to hospital for treatment for cholera.
Home to sixty children, the orphanage was not licenced by the government but is aided by the CSI’s diocese of Karnataka Central. It is operated by the Rev. Nirmala Vasantha Kumar, the wife of the bishop in Karnataka Central and moderator of the CSI, the Rt. Rev. Suputhrappa Vasantha Kumar.
The raid by the Department of Women and Child Development on June 2 comes as Bishop Vasantha Kumar battles allegations that he had embezzled £6000 and sold places for admission to the “Eton of the East,” Bishop Cotton Boys School and its sister school, Bishop Cotton Girls School.
Responding to complaints made in March of “unhealthy living conditions” by the Karnataka State Human Rights Committee, the government inspected the orphanage after the 23 children were hospitalized on June 2. They found the orphanage was being operated without a licence and that the state’s Child Welfare Committee had no records on its residents.
Salesian sisters operating a shelter for street children were given temporary custody of 18 girls, who were found to be from Assam in Northeast India. Forty-two other children were found to be from the Karnataka area. A number were found to have parents and have been returned to their homes, Gnana Prakash, coordinator of Bosco ChildLine, told ucanews.com on June 2.
A sewage pipe that ran next to the orphanage’s drinking water pump was leaking, Mrs. Vasantha Kumar told the Times of India, and would be repaired shortly. She added that steps would be taken to register the orphanage with the state. The New Life Centre has been the subject of appeals for aid in the Church of England. The Diocese of Gloucester included the orphanage on its prayer list for June 8, 2008, asking for its members’ intercessions on behalf of its work.
On May 4 a magistrate’s court instructed the police to investigate allegations that Bishop Vasantha Kumar had diverted funds belonging to two schools to his private bank account. On May 6, the bishop convened a meeting of the diocese’s education commission and ordered the headmasters of the Bishop Cotton schools be transferred from their posts.
The two head teachers, with the backing of parents from the schools, filed a lawsuit seeking to block their transfers. However, on June 5 a judge dismissed the lawsuit saying the bishop and the diocesan board of education had the power to reassign its headmasters at will. The diocese has denied the allegations of wrong-doing in the Bishop Cotton schools case, and the police have declined to comment on their on-going investigation.
New charges laid against Indian bishop: The Church of England Newspaper, June 4, 2010 p 7. June 9, 2010
Posted by geoconger in Church of England Newspaper, Church of South India, Corruption.comments closed
Bishop Dorai (center)
First published in The Church of England Newspaper.
Allegations of fraud and kickbacks in the letting of a school building contract have been laid against the Bishop in Coimbatore, Dr Manickam Dorai.
The new charges of malfeasance follow upon the April decision by the standing committee of the Church of South India, (CSI) to suspend Bishop Dorai pending the outcome of a criminal investigation into allegations of theft of diocesan funds. A warrant was also issued for his arrest on May 8 after he failed to appear before a magistrate to answer charges he threatened bodily harm to one of the priests in his diocese.
Bishop Dorai was granted bail on the menacing charge on May 10 and is currently under doctor’s care. However, the Express newspaper has reported that additional charges of theft by the bishop have been brought to the attention of church authorities.
A lay member of the diocese, Mr Prem Kumar has charged the bishop and six co-conspirators with milking the diocese out of almost £275,000. The Express alleges that on Dec 19, 2006 a contract for £385,000 was signed by the bishop to construct a building at the CSI’s College of Engineering at Ketti. Mr Kumar’s suspicions were raised as the date the contract was let according to the diocese was not until March 2007, and at a higher price.
The diocese reported paying £660,000 for the new building at the Engineering School, yet the December 2006 contract was on a fixed costs basis. Mr Kumar has charged the bishop and his associates with pocketing the difference between the public cost and the private cost — some £275,000. His complaint has been forwarded to the CSI’s executive committee for review.
Bishop Dorai could not be reached for comment about these latest allegations, but the acting Bishop in Coimbatore, the Rt Rev Paul Vasantha Kumar, has asked that members of the church withhold judgment until the investigative process had run its course.
China opens to the Global South: The Church of England Newspaper, June 4, 2010 June 9, 2010
Posted by geoconger in China, Church of England Newspaper, Global South.comments closed
Elder Fu Xianwei
First published in The Church of England Newspaper.
The Three Self Patriotic Movement (TSPM) has opened relations with the Global South and declared a willingness to learn and share experiences with the growing Churches of the Anglican Communion.
While China’s state Protestant Church, the TSPM and the China Christian Council, will continue to forge ties with the Church of England and the Episcopal Church in the areas of theological education, the leader of the TSPM has indicated his Church would like to pursue deeper ties with Asian and African Anglicans, with whom they share common cultural and moral values, as well as the problem of dealing with rapid church growth.
Cut off from missionary support by the Chinese Revolution, since 1949 the Church in China has grown rapidly and is believed to number over 100 million members in the official state Protestant and Catholic Churches as well as in the underground Catholic Church and in the Protestant House Church movement.
“I hope that the Chinese Church and the Anglican Global South can expand their cooperation,” said Elder Fu Xianwei, the general secretary of the national committee of the TSPM in an address to participants at the Fourth Global South to South Encounter in Singapore on April 22, and said the Church in China was ready to learn from their experiences.
The Church in China has been a topic of special interest for the Archbishop of Canterbury, who visited China in 2006 as a guest of the TSPM. The Rt Rev David Urquhart, Bishop of Birmingham, told The Church of England Newspaper that he was “delighted that Elder Fu” was able to attend the Singapore gathering.
As Dr Williams’ point man for China he said he had witnessed a “developing friendship, dialogue and exchange of mutual concerns as the Church in China grows.” Chinese and British scholars have held two seminars at Lambeth Palace, he noted and a third is scheduled for 2011.
In an interview with AnglicanTV at the close of the conference, Elder Fu indicated the Chinese Church was moving away from its government-imposed isolation and seeking partners in mission.
He told AnglicanTV he attended the South to South conference because “Archbishop John Chew told me that there were many Archbishops from African Churches coming here. I thought it was a good opportunity for me to share with the African bishops about our church ministries and how we run our Church.”
“Also, I want to learn something from the church leaders who attended this conference, through their good experience and good witness from spreading the gospel,” he said, adding that Africa and China were facing “similar issues, problems and challenges. We need to sit down to dialogue with each other to resolve these issues,” Elder Fu said.
The challenges of globalisation and urbanisation faced by the Global South Churches were live issues in China, he said. He came to Singapore “to get some useful and helpful message for me so that I can run the Chinese Church well. At the same time I would like the Archbishops and Bishops of Global South to gain awareness and to understand the situation of the Chinese Church.”
The move away from an Anglo-centric communion sought by the Global South leaders was also attractive to the Chinese Church. “Authority for the Chinese Church should be in the hands of the Chinese Christians and the Three – Self Principle is good for the development and growth of the Chinese Church. I have learnt from the African leaders the need for self-support and self-reliance,” he said.
“In the Bible, we can see that whenever Paul planted a church, he let the church be run by local elders, allowing them to be independent. From history we learn the lesson that only the local Christians can run a local church that is sustainable.”
The Church in China can help the Global South by “sharing how we run our Church, as we run it well. We can also share on how we do evangelism, and how we attract more and more people in China to come and hear the Gospel. This can be the contribution of the Chinese Church to the Church as a whole,” Elder Fu said.
Sharia law unconstitutional, Kenyan court finds: The Church of England Newspaper, May 28, 2010 p 6. June 7, 2010
Posted by geoconger in Anglican Church of Kenya, Church of England Newspaper, Islam.comments closed
The Nairobi Law Courts
First published in The Church of England Newspaper.
A three judge panel in Kenya has ruled that government funded Shariah law courts violates the constitution by giving Islam a privileged status under law.
Sitting as a Constitutional Court the judges held in a 114-page decision that government funding of kadhi courts, which adjudicate marriage, divorce and inheritance laws for Muslims, amounted to the privileging of one religion above all others, and was contrary to Sections 70, 78 and 82 of the Constitution.
While the May 24 ruling by Justices Joseph Nyamu, Anyara Emukule and Roselyn Wendoh comes in response to a 2004 lawsuit by Christian leaders, this week’s ruling backs the “no” campaign mounted by church leaders against the latest draft of the constitution that will be put before the country in a referendum in July.
In 2004, 26 church leaders filed suit over the Bomas Draft of the constitution, asking the court to block any form of religious courts, arguing that special Muslim courts violated the constitutional doctrine of separation of Church and State.
Under Kenya’s present Constitution, kadhi courts are permitted in ten-mile coastal strip in territory annexed by Britain from the Sultanate of Zanzibar. The Bomas draft of the constitution sought to extend the reach of kadhi courts beyond the coastal strip to serve Muslims across Kenya.
The judges ruled that the “financial maintenance and support of the kadhi courts from public coffers amounts to segregation, is sectarian, discriminatory and unjust against the applicants and others… it amounts to separate development of one religion and religious practice contrary to the principle of separation of state and religion.
They further held that that Section 66 of the Constitution, which creates the office of the Chief Kadhi was inconsistent with the constitutional right of equal protection of the law. The courts held that this section was discriminatory and unconstitutional and “should be expunged in its entirety from the said Constitution.”
Church leaders applauded the decision, saying it upheld their concerns over the plans to create a Sharia law court system and called upon the government to cancel the constitutional referendum.
The Chairman of Supreme Council of Kenya Muslims Abdulghafur Al-Busaidy said his group would study the ruling. He told a news conference “we will have Muslim lawyers, MPs and religious scholars study the document and inform Kenyans on the way forward. We take this matter very seriously.”
However the secretary general of Kenya’s National Council of Churches Canon Peter Karanja urged the government to abide by the ruling.
“The government is the custodian of law and therefore we urge them to quickly implement the three judge bench ruling on the kadhi courts,’’ said Canon Karanja at a Nairobi news conference on May 25.
Primus urges dialogue of science and ethics over synthetic biology: The Church of England Newspaper, May 28, 2010 p 5. June 7, 2010
Posted by geoconger in Abortion/Euthanasia/Biotechnology, Church of England Newspaper, Scottish Episcopal Church.comments closed
The Most Rev David Chillingworth
First published in The Church of England Newspaper.
The Primus of the Scottish Episcopal Church has urged geneticists and their critics in the environmental movement not to talk past each other in light of last week’s announcement of the creation of a synthetic cell by a US genetic engineering firm, but to engage in a dialogue that allows science and ethics to find the best way forward for the new technology.
On May 20, the magazine Science reported that a team led by US geneticists led by Dr. Craig Venter had synthesized a bacterium that causes mastitis in goats, but was constructed from laboratory chemicals. The single-celled organism has four “watermarks” written into its DNA to identify it as an artificial creation.
“This is an important step both scientifically and philosophically,” Dr Venter told Science. “It has certainly changed my views of definitions of life and how life works.”
Julian Savulescu, professor of practical ethics at Oxford University, told the Guardian that Dr. Venter was “creaking open the most profound door in humanity’s history, potentially peeking into its destiny. He is not merely copying life artificially … or modifying it radically by genetic engineering. He is going towards the role of a god: creating artificial life that could never have existed naturally.”
The Canadian environmental organization the Etc Group has called upon governments to block further development of synthetic life. Jim Thomas of Etc told the Independent that “synthetic biology is a high-risk, profit-driven field, building organisms out of parts that are still poorly understood” that could have harmful consequences for the environment.
Other geneticists have urged calm saying the results produced by Venter were being hyped by the media. Writing in the Atlantic, Dr. William Haseltine stated “has man indeed made life? I think not. The replica is indistinguishable in form and function from the original. … It is as if one were to create a copy of Michelangelo’s David, accurate down to the last crack and imperfection except for the signature, and call it new.”
However, the Most Rev. David Chillingworth, Bishop of St Andrews, Dunkeld & Dunblane and Primus of the Scottish Episcopal Church observed that the creation of the synthetic cell promised an “enticing range of possible outcomes,” including new bio-fuels, clean water, new ways of cleaning up pollution, new vaccines and drugs, new sources of food.”
It is all too easy either to over-hype the possibilities or to reach for doom-laden language about scientists ‘playing God’,” he said on May 24.
However, the creation of the synthetic cell “raises difficulties and dilemmas.” Those raising “ethical and other questions have difficulty grasping the complexity of the science,” Bishop Chillingworth said, while “those who lack expert scientific knowledge find it difficult to arrive at a measured understanding of both the possibilities and the dangers of what is on offer.”
Scientists risk becoming “intoxicated by their achievements,” he noted, and are often “less willing to engage whole-heartedly in moral and ethical questioning.”
“What is needed now is a period in which, as the research develops, it is possible to take a measured view both of the possible applications and their benefits for human society and of the potential dangers,” the Primus said.
“Only as a result of that dialogue will the true and long term benefits for humanity become evident and be developed in such a way as to ensure the maximum benefit for the whole of humanity while avoiding the dangers,” Bishop Chillingworth said.
Martial law in Kingston: The Church of England Newspaper, May 28, 2010 p 6. June 6, 2010
Posted by geoconger in Church of England Newspaper, Church of the Province of the West Indies, Crime.comments closed
The Rt Rev & Hon Alfred Reid, Bishop of Jamaica
First published in The Church of England Newspaper.
Jamaica has descended into lawlessness and moral anarchy, the Bishop of Jamaica, Dr. Alfred Reid told his diocesan synod last month, with social distress greater today than during the “worse days of slavery.”
Jamaica has had a “long history of violence and terrorism beginning with the holocaust of chattel slavery and the limbo existence of colonialism,” Dr. Reid said on April 30, but “never before has people’s social distress been as extreme as it is now.
“Poverty, sickness, criminality and social chaos have reached unheard of proportions,” the bishop said, and has left people without hope.
“Even at the worse of time, the slaves lived in hope of a new day and they endured with the conviction that even if they themselves did not live to see that new day, their children would,” the bishops said, but the “present generation” has “surrendered to a terrible fatalism that does not envisage any other scenario and feel that we will always be at the mercy of merciless might.”
The bishop’s warning comes amidst a breakdown of law and order in Kingston. On May 23 the government declared a state of emergency in two west Kingston parishes after gunmen supporting alleged narcotics kingpin Christopher Coke firebombed a police station and exchanged gun fire with police.
Barricades were erected in Hannah Town and Tivoli Gardens in West Kingston by gunmen loyal to Coke, as smoke from burning cars rose above the city’s slums. Police withdrew from the torched police station and took up defensive positions in four other stations that were sprayed with bullets from roaming bands of gunmen carrying assault weapons.
Police Commissioner Owen Ellington said “scores of criminals” from gangs across Jamaica had traveled to West Kingston to join the fight. “It is now clear that criminal elements are determined to launch coordinated attacks on the security forces,” he told a press conference over the weekend.
Coke has been indicted on drugs trafficking charges in New York, but Prime Minister Bruce Golding has refused extradition requests for the past nine months. However, in the wake of intense pressure from Washington, Mr. Golding relented, and authorized the extradition of Coke last week—sparking the riots.
In a national address broadcast on May 23, Mr. Golding said martial law had been declared in West Kingston, allowing the army to search and detain suspects without warrants. The city “is not being shut down,” he said, and schools and businesses outside the two parishes remained open.
Labeled one of the world’s major crime figures by the US Justice Department, Coke has close ties with the governing Jamaica Labour Party, and has had de facto control over West Kingston—an area represented in parliament by Mr. Golding.
Bishop Reid told synod that Jamaica was being “held hostage by hoodlums.” The “myth of Robin Hood cannot redeem the ugly and nasty reality of crooks being held up to our children as benefactors and heroes.”
“If these are the models of aspiration and the ideal of success that we present to the next generation, then we have de-futurized our children and our country,” he said, noting that it was “pure hypocrisy and a cruel deception to say that these people rob the rich to support the poor.”
Those “affected by extortion and violent exploitation are the hard working Jamaicans seeking to overcome poverty by dint of industry and effort, and the “so called” beneficiaries are still poor and, in fact, made more pauperized and dependent on a few heartless, soulless brutes who buy out their freedom, their dignity, their minds and souls for a mess of pottage,” Dr. Reid said.
The real agents of change, those “who are the real hope for national development and wealth creation are being ruthlessly destroyed” by criminals, while the government has been made “irrelevant” and “real power is ceded to criminals. The situation is compounded when officials, businessmen and ordinary citizens meekly or willingly accept that the only way to do business is to get involved in bribery and corruption.”
In the midst of this chaos it was the Christian’s responsibility to rekindle hope and by showing that through Christ “a victim mentality, a horrible psychology of hopelessness and helplessness” can be overcome.
“We must be prepared to be the voice of the voiceless and the public face of those who are invisible,” Dr Reid declared.
Zimbabwe court ejects breakaway bishop from church property: The Church of England Newspaper, May 28, 2010 p 8 June 6, 2010
Posted by geoconger in Church of England Newspaper, Property Litigation, Zimbabwe.comments closed
First printed in The Church of England Newspaper.
The Church of the Province of Central Africa won a major legal victory last week in its fight to regain property held by the breakaway bishop Dr. Nolbert Kunonga and his allies, when a Harare court held that all church property of the Diocese of Manicaland belonged to the province, and not to Dr. Kunonga’s ally Bishop Elson Jakazi.
In a ruling handed down on May 19, High Court Judge Chinembiri Bhunu ruled that Bishop Jakazi lost his claim to oversee diocesan property when he quit the church to join Dr. Kunonga’s Anglican Church of Zimbabwe. An ally of former Harare Bishop, on Sept 23, 2007 Bishop Jakazi joined Dr. Nolbert Kunonga in writing to Archbishop Bernard Malango saying their dioceses had withdrawn from Central Africa in protest to what they alleged was a pro-gay bias in the Province.
The dean of Central Africa, Bishop Albert Chama of Northern Zambia responded that it “was impossible for them to withdraw the dioceses” and on Oct 19, 2007 the Central African bishops declared the two “were no longer bishops” of the CPCA.
In April 2008 the former Bishop of Harare, the Rt. Rev. Peter Hatendi was appointed interim bishop of Manicaland, and on July 24, 2009 the diocesan synod elected Dr. Julius Makoni as bishop. However, Bishop Jakazi in 2008 retracted his declaration of independence from the CPCA and had sought to block the election of a successor through the courts. When that stratagem failed, he asked a court to declare him the trustee of the property as Bishop of Manicaland for Dr. Kunonga’s new province.
In his decision, Judge Bhunu wrote that “Once [Bishop Jakazi’s] resignation letter was received by the Archbishop of the Anglican Church of the Central Africa the first applicant automatically ceased to be an employee or member of that church organisation without any further formalities.
“Having ceased to be an employee of the church organization he automatically stripped himself of any rights and privileges arising from the contract of employment, membership or his status as a bishop of that church organization,” the court held, dismissing Bishop Jakazi’s application with costs.
The judge held that Bishop Jakazi was not dismissed but voluntarily withdrew from the CPCA. “That being the case, he can hardly be heard to complain or cry foul. Any appeal or review which he may launch means he is appealing or seeking a review of his own conduct. This is wholly untenable and illogical such that it must be incompetent at law,” the judge said.
Judge Bhunu’s decision will likely have an impact on the pending litigation between Dr. Kunonga and the CPCA’s Diocese of Harare over the control of diocesan property. The Diocese has advanced similar legal arguments against Dr. Kunonga that were offered in the Jakazi case. While the Supreme Court dismissed an appeal earlier this month of the dicoese’s case, this was over technical irregularities in its pleading, rather than in the substance of its arguments, lawyers for the province note.
Judge Bhunu has shown an independent spirit in recent weeks, ruling against cronies of the Mugabe regime like Bishop Jakazi, as well as against the government in a highly politicized “show trial.” On May 10, the Judge dismissed charges of insurgency, banditry, terrorism and sabotage leveled by the government against Deputy Agriculture Minister-Designate and Movement for Democratic Change (MDC) Treasurer-General, Senator Roy Bennett.
Church attendance helps combat depression study finds: The Church of England Newspaper, May 28, 2010 p 7. June 6, 2010
Posted by geoconger in Church of England Newspaper, Health/HIV-AIDS.comments closed
First published in The Church of England Newspaper.
There is no scientific evidence that Alzheimer’s disease can be prevented or its onset slowed down, an independent panel of scientists convened by the US National Institute of Health (NIH) has determined. However, an active church life and keeping physically and mentally fit were consistent with a decreased risk of the disease, the report found.
The study released by the NIH’s Office of Medical Applications of Research (OMAR) state-of-the-science conference program found that exercise, social interaction, brain puzzles, fish oil, nutritional supplements, or medications did not prevent the disease. According to the Alzheimer’s Association’s report, Alzheimer’s Facts and Figures, 2010, there are over 5 million Americans living with the disease today.
The Alzheimer’s Research Trust Dementia 2010 reported that in Britain there were 822,000 people living with the disease. This number is expected to pass the one million mark by 2025 the report found. “People who reach the age of 65 have a one in three chance of having dementia before they die,” said the report’s author, Professor Alastair Gray of Oxford University’s Health Economic Research Centre in February.
The US panel reviewed 25 systematic reviews and 250 primary research studies, lead researcher Dr Martha Daviglus of Northwestern University said, and found that most studies could only show links, and did not prove cause and effect between a factor and disease prevention.
“We wish we could tell people that taking a pill or doing a puzzle every day would prevent this terrible disease, but current evidence doesn’t support this,” said Dr. Daviglus.
The panel examined scientific studies that took into account “nutrition, medical conditions, prescription and non-prescription medications, social/economic/behavioral factors, toxic environmental factors, and genetics.”
Only a few factors showed a “consistent link” with Alzheimer’s disease: diabetes, genetic predisposition, smoking, and depression.
Factors showing a “fairly consistent association” with decreased risk of the disease and a cognitive decline were: cognitive engagement and physical activities. However the “modification to risk” was “small to moderate” for Alzheimer’s and “small” for cognitive decline.
The current state of scientific evidence was not “enough to enable a confident assessment of links with [Alzheimer’s] or cognitive decline,” the report said, and “further research that addresses the limitations of existing studies is needed prior to be able to make recommendations on interventions.”
However, one of the studies reviewed found that regular church attendance was associated with less cognitive decline. A 2003 paper published in The Journals of Gerontology, Series B: Psychological Sciences entitled “Religion and cognitive dysfunction in an elderly cohort,” cited in the US NIH study concluded that “religious attendance may offer mental stimulation that helps to maintain cognitive functioning in later life, particularly among older depressed women.”
The paper concluded that doctors should prescribe church attendance in certain situations.
“Given the possible benefits religious attendance may have on cognitive functioning, it may be appropriate in certain instances for clinicians to recommend that clients reengage in religious activities they may have given up as a result of their depression,” the 2003 paper concluded.
Corruption is causing Nigeria to commit “suicide by installment” archbishop says: The Church of England Newspaper, May 28, 2010 p 8 June 5, 2010
Posted by geoconger in Church of England Newspaper, Church of Nigeria, Corruption.comments closed
The Primate of Nigeria, Archbishop Nicholas Okoh
First published in The Church of England Newspaper.
Corruption is sapping the energy and exacerbating the country’s myriad social ills, the Primate of the Anglican Church of Nigeria said last week in his first presidential address to the Diocese of Abuja synod.
Corruption “is about a nation committing suicide by installment,” Archbishop Nicholas Okoh said on May 21 to the third session of the seventh synod of the Diocese of Abuja meeting the Cathedral Church of the Advent.
“With less corruption, many infrastructures will function and budgeted funds will be spent for the real purpose. In the course of time, there will be noticeable improvement,” he said. However, if corruption is tackled head on, “it will eventually consume everyone, including the perpetrators,’’ the archbishop said, drawing upon the theme “In times like this‘’ drawn from Esther 4:14.
Nigeria ranked 130th among 180 countries measured in the global Corruption Perceptions Index (CPI) 2009 conducted by Transparency International (TI), a global anti-corruption watchdog.
In the CPI 2009 report Nigeria received 2.5 out of a possible 10 marks, emerged 27th out of the surveyed 47 nations in sub-Saharan Africa, and 33rd out of the 53 countries in Africa. New Zealand came in first with a score of 9.4, while Somalia came in last at 1.1.
According to the detailed Index, New Zealand edged Denmark to emerge the top perceived corruption-free nation at 9.4 and 9.3 respectively, while Somalia came last out of the 180 countries surveyed, the same position as in the 2008 CPI.
In Africa Botswana scored highest, ranking as number 37 with a score of 5.6, while Cape Verde came in first in West Africa with a score of 5.1—tied with Taiwan and ranking higher than Italy and most Eastern European nations. The UK came in at 17 with a score of 7.7 followed by the US with a score of 7.9. Chad (175) with 1.6 points; Sudan (176) with 1.5 points; and Somalia (180) with 1.1 points came in last among African nations.
Corruption was found in all sectors of the nation and was made worse by ethnic, religious and tribal loyalties, the archbishop told synod. “It is undeniable that corruption exists in the politics, economic transactions, among those who run the bureaucracy of government, the police, the customs, the military, the church, education and banking,’’ he said.
The country’s political and civic culture turned a blind eye to corruption due to self-interest. “Due to the heightened tribal sensitivity, whoever is able to steal from any source returns to a hero’s welcome in his tribal enclave where he is hailed as an ‘illustrious son or daughter’ of the land. “This is why efforts to combat it have ended up being discredited by those whose sons and interests have been stepped upon. This is even so with electoral fraud,’’ the archbishop said.
He also encouraged the new government of President Goodluck Jonathan to break the cycle of corrupt political and economic dealings that had wasted so much of the country’s natural wealth.
In a May 6 letter to the new president, Archbishop Okoh congratulated Goodluck Jonathan upon his assumption of the office of president following the death of President Umaru Yar’Adua.
“We are aware of the great tasks and challenges before you and the high expectation of the citizenry from Your Excellency and this new Administration,” the archbishop wrote.
However, this unexpected political development was an opportunity for reform. “We are convinced that your coming to power at a time like this, in the annals of our nation, is divine,” the archbishop told the new president, an Anglican.
“Please be assured that we shall not relent in our responsibility to uphold you in our prayers always and give you necessary support at all times as you steer the ship of our great and beloved nation, Nigeria,” the archbishop said.
The crisis over homosexuality has passed, Jefferts Schori says: The Church of England Newspaper, May 28, 2010 p 7. June 5, 2010
Posted by geoconger in Church of England Newspaper, Human Sexuality --- The gay issue, The Episcopal Church.comments closed
Presiding Bishop Katharine Jefferts Schori
First published in The Church of England Newspaper.
The crisis in the Anglican Communion over homosexuality has passed the US Presiding Bishop told a South Carolina newspaper last week, as the Episcopal Church has come around to accepting the normalcy of ‘gay’ bishops.
Bishop Katharine Jefferts Schori’s statement to the Greenville News follows upon similar remarks made by the Archbishop of Sydney earlier this month that decisions have been finalized and the crisis has passed within the Communion. For Bishop Jefferts Schori—an outspoken supporter or the mainstreaming of homosexuality—-and Dr. Jensen—a champion of the traditional Biblical view of human sexuality, the decision by the American Episcopal Church to go ahead with the consecration of a second gay bishop has changed the Communion.
Speaking in advance of the consecration of the Bishop of Upper South Carolina on May 22, Bishop Jefferts Schori said the American decision to go ahead with gay bishops and blessings had actually strengthened the church’s relations with some portions of the Anglican Communion. She also contrasted the silence from Canterbury and large sections of the overseas church over the consecration of Mary Glasspool with the furore that followed the 2003 consecration of Gene Robinson.
“The reactivity right now” over the consecration of Mary Glasspool in Los Angeles “is much, much less than it was seven years ago,” Bishop Jefferts Schori said .
American Anglicans had come around to her point of view, she added. “I think the church, and certainly the part of the church in the United States, is reasonably clear about where we’re going, even though everybody doesn’t agree. And those in the church, I think, are willing to live with that tension,” she said.
Bishop Jefferts Schori conceded “there are certainly parts of the Anglican Communion that continue to be unhappy with the Episcopal Church and the church in Canada, but we continue to build relationships across the communion, mission partnerships, and I think those are probably stronger than they were 10 years ago, and there are more of them.”
In a statement released after the April 28 Singapore Global South to South Encounter, Dr. Jensen stated Dr. Rowan Williams’ pledge to do something about the Glasspool consecration was moot.
The Archbishop of Canterbury “seemed to suggest that the consecration of a partnered lesbian Bishop will create a crisis. In fact the crisis itself has passed. We are now on the further side of the critical moment; the decisions have all been made; we are already living with the consequences,” he said.
The split between left and right within the Anglican Communion had its first public airing at the 2003 emergency primates meeting at Lambeth Palace, shortly before the Robinson consecration. A number of Global South primates led by Nigerian Archbishop Peter Akinola declined to participate in a Eucharist with US Presiding Bishop Frank Griswold. Dr. Williams was able to convince the Global South group to relent, but at the 2005 Primates Meeting in Northern Ireland, and at all subsequent primates meeting, no corporate Eucharists were celebrated.
At the Alexandria primates meeting in 2009, Presiding Bishop Gregory Venables of the Southern Cone told The Church of England Newspaper that the Global South group did not consider Bishop Jefferts Schori “to be a Christian as we understand it.”
In Singapore last month, the Global South’s view that the American and Canadian churches taught a false gospel that led to damnation was spelled out. “In recent years the peace of our Communion has been deeply wounded by those who continue to claim the name Anglican but who pursue an agenda of their own desire in opposition to historic norms of faith, teaching and practice,” the Singapore communiqué said.
The embrace of the gay agenda by the US and Canada was a rejection of “the Way of the Lord as expressed in Holy Scripture,” and the election of a second gay bishop “demonstrated” a “total disregard for the mind of the Communion.”
The North Americans have continued “in their defiance as they set themselves on a course that contradicts the plain teaching of the Holy Scriptures on matters so fundamental that they affect the very salvation of those involved.”
These “actions violate the integrity of the Gospel, the Communion and our Christian witness to the rest of the world,” the Global South said.
Bishop calls for gambling ban in the Bahamas: The Church of England Newspaper, May 28, 2010 p 6. June 5, 2010
Posted by geoconger in Church of England Newspaper, Church of the Province of the West Indies, Politics.comments closed
The Rt. Rev. Laish Boyd, Bishop of the Bahamas and the Turks and Caicos Islands
First published in The Church of England Newspaper.
The Bishop of the Bahamas has denounced government plans to legalize gambling for its subjects. On May 12, the Rt. Rev. Laish Boyd, Bishop of the Bahamas and the Turks and Caicos Islands said a national lottery or ‘numbers’ game would be an “opening of the floodgates” that would swamp the morals and values of Bahamians.
While casino gambling has long been permitted for tourists in the West Indian nation, locals are forbidden to gamble. In April, a government committee led by Tourism Minister Vincent Vanderpool-Wallace said it was considering a proposal to soften the ban on gambling for Bahamians and has explored instituting a government-run ‘numbers’ game open to Bahamians to increase state revenues.
However, church leaders have urged the government not to put short term revenue gains ahead of morality. Gambling “promotes values that are harmful to the moral fiber of our communities,” Bishop Boyd said last week, adding that it would be a mistake to legalize gambling “at a time when there are so many negative influences on the society, and when our community is suffering from a lack of values.”
“In matters of this kind the government has the constitutional and moral responsibility to protect the value base of the country,” the bishop wrote in a pastoral letter to the islands’ Anglicans.
Bishop Boyd said the numbers game was an especially pernicious vice. It encourages avarice and laziness, and served as a disincentive to thrift, hard work and a positive work ethic.
Many of its habitués “become obsessed with finding the right number and wait anxiously to see which number will fall. It becomes a consuming force, often dictating every other area of that person’s life. Most Christian moralists agree that the real danger in gambling lies exactly in this kind of excess,” he said.
Those who can “ill afford to be often the biggest users, abusers, and losers,” Boyd said. “It forms a false and unreliable foundation upon which to base one’s personal finances. It encourages what seems to be a short cut approach to financial security rather than through the principles of Christian or other forms of stewardship.”
The lottery was a negation of Christian teaching in stewardship. “Life cannot be simply about chance where so many people lose and only a few win. This is what the numbers game typifies. We need to be promoting culture and activities that are based on planning and productivity, purpose and positive advancement. Stewardship calls us to acknowledge what we have, and to build on it constructively and incrementally to accomplish higher goals,” he wrote.
Legalized gambling “would be a bad move for the moral fabric of our society and far more devastating in its long-term effects than any monetary or taxation advantage that can be gained in the short-term,” the bishop said.
Gambling industry leaders denounced the bishop’s pastoral letter saying the church was being hypocritical. Sidney Strachan of the pressure group the Bahamas Gaming Reform (BGR), told the Nassau Guardian that when the church needed money it “did not turn to tithes and offerings, instead they lifted a many years long moratorium and resorted to gambling” by allowing raffles.
He argued the ban on Bahamians gambling was discriminatory. “The Anglican Church is now asking the government to deny Bahamians the same basic rights afforded the church and foreigners: To participate in and operate games of chance,” Mr. Strachan said.
A government spokesman said Prime Minister Hubert Ingraham would likely announce his views on this issue sometime this week.
Zulu leader pledges to carry on: The Church of England Newspaper, May 28, 2010 p 8. June 5, 2010
Posted by geoconger in Anglican Church of Southern Africa, Church of England Newspaper, Politics.comments closed
Chief Mangosuthu Buthelezi
First published in The Church of England Newspaper.
The Anglican Church of Southern Africa has honoured Zulu political leader Chief Mangosuthu Buthelezi for his support for the church’s HIV/AIDs ministries, awarding him its Order of Saint Michael and All Angels at a ceremony last week in the Diocese of Zululand.
The public honour from the Anglican Church has come at an opportune moment for Chief Buthelezi, the 81-year old leader the Inkatha Freedom Party (IFP). Chief Butheleze has been under pressure from younger leaders of the IFP to step down, however, he has trumpeted the award as evidence that he remains relevant the to the party’s future.
In a statement released by the IFP, the Bishop of Zululand, the Rt. Rev. Dino Gabriel was quoted as saying: “Prince Buthelezi has treasured his Christian upbringing throughout his long life, which gave him the strength to persevere in times of victimisation, turmoil and change. Against all odds, he remained a faithful and devoted member of the Anglican Church of Southern Africa and of the Diocese of Zululand in particular.”
Chief Buthelezi was also praised for his role in the anti-apartheid movement as well as his openness about Aids deaths in his family.
In 1975 Chief Buthelezi founded the IFP as part of the African National Congress (ANC) but broke with the ANC in 1979 over the proper aims of the anti-apartheid movement—with the IFP rejecting the armed struggle approach taken by the ANC’s UmKhonto we Sizwe (Spear of the Nation) force.
In the first post-Apartheid coalition government, Chief Buthelezi was appointed Minister of Home Affairs, a position he kept following the 1999 elections. Following the 2004 elections President Thabo Mbeki offered Chief Buthelezi the Deputy Presidency. However, the IFP leader refused as a condition for taking the office would be to relinquish the Premiership of the IFP-dominated province of KwaZulu-Natal. After he rejected the president’s officer, Chief Buthelezi broke with the government and took his party into the opposition. He was reelected to Parliament at the April 2009 general election and remains head of the IFP.
In a May 20 statement commemorating the death of anti-apartheid activist Dr Fredrick van Zyl Slabbert, Chief Buthelezi noted the Anglican award was evidence that it was not yet time for him to leave the political scene.
He noted that in May 2006, Cape Town Archbishop Njongonkulu Ndungane “conferred on me the Church’s highest provincial award for distinguished lay service. The support of my Church gave me considerable encouragement then, for it came at a difficult point in my life.”
In 2006 there was “great debate outside our Party and in the media about whether I should continue to lead.” However “I have never placed my own interests above the interests of the country, and I felt we should fully consider what would be best for South Africa,” deciding to remain as party leader.
Chief Buthelezi said that “now, four years later, the IFP again faces an elective General Conference and there is much speculation in the media and outside our Party about its future leadership. But this time there are also rumblings from within our Party and there have been clear indications that ambition is fuelling a succession debate.”
“I would willingly exit politics if I no longer had a mandate to lead and if my departure were in the best interests of our country,” he said, adding that “my faith has always given me the strength to persevere in times of turmoil.
The award of the Order of Saint Michael and All Angels by the Anglican Church “was an unexpected honour for which I am deeply grateful. I have found, once again, that spending time with men and women who share my faith has lifted my spirits and inspired me to keep working and keep serving this nation,” Chief Buthelezi said.
The IFP leader said the award from the Church encouraged him to stay on as party leader. Only God knew why “the great patriot, Dr Fredrick van Zyl Slabbert, has departed this earth while I still plough on? He made a contribution worth many lifetimes. It seems, I have yet to finish mine,” Chief Buthelezi said.
