Conger

The retired Bishop of the Rio Grande has quit the Episcopal Church in the United States for the Church of Uganda.  The Rt. Rev. Terry Kelshaw will be the ninth US bishop to quit the American church in the past 12 months in protest to the Church’s leftward drift on doctrine and discipline.

On Feb 14 the Standing Committee of the Diocese of Rio Grande in New Mexico announced Bishop Kelshaw had written to US Presiding Bishop Katharine Jefferts Schori announcing his resignation from the House of Bishops.  Bishop Kelshaw’s successor, Bishop Jeffrey Steenson quit the Episcopal Church for the Roman Catholic Church in September.  Three other American bishops have gone over to Rome, two to the Southern Cone, one to Uganda and one to Nigeria.

Born in Manchester, Bishop Kelshaw trained at Oakhill College and was ordained a deacon then priest in the Diocese of Bristol in 1967/1968.  He served the Church of England for 14 years in university and parish ministry and moved to the United States to join the staff of the Trinity Episcopal School for Ministry in 1980.  He was elected Bishop of the Rio Grande in 1988 retiring in 2005.

“I wanted to leave the Episcopal Church five or more years ago but believed then that having a Diocese to care for it would be harmful to them,” Bishop Kelshaw told The Church of England Newspaper.

“Frankly I have not taken Holy Communion in the House of Bishops in about thirteen of the fifteen years I was in there because I did not consider myself in fellowship due to the pronouncements they were making concerning themselves and the church,” he said.

Bishop Kelshaw stated that he will become “Bishop in Resident” at St. James, Newport Beach, California.  St. James quit the diocese of Los Angeles in 2004 to join the Church of Uganda and is currently involved in litigation with the diocese.  Being an “Episcopal” bishop while serving the Church of Uganda congregation in California “would create difficulties” in the litigation he noted.

“My ministry will be here in the US,” he said, and “hopefully [be] away from the present punitive, tyrannical, oversight” of the Episcopal Church.

The Episcopal Church was in a “mess”, Bishop Kelshaw observed.  “For such a small Province in Anglicanism it has attracted far too much attention. In fact, I am not at all convinced it has ever been Anglican?” he remarked.

The Lord’s Resistance Army (LRA) has moved into Kajo Keji county in Southern Sudan, the Episcopal Church of the Sudan reports, sparking an exodus of civilians and fears the Ugandan civil war will spread north into the Sudan.

(LRA leader Joseph Kony, pictured)

On Jan 30 a battalion of LRA soldiers raided villages 75 miles south of Southern Sudan’s capital of Juba abducting 40 people, and killing four, according to a report released by an assessment team from the Diocese of Kajo Keji, the Danish Refugee Council and the government of South Sudan.

“The entire population is filled with panic and helplessness,” the report said. “They have lost all basic possessions such as household utensils, beddings, and clothing. People congregate together for fear and lack of protection. Many express intentions to cross to neighbouring counties.”

Church and aid leaders have urged the South Sudanese army to repel the invaders, and asked the international community to pressure the LRA to sign a peace agreement with Uganda, ending the 22-year war.

The LRA has denied involvement in the attacks. “We do not have any forces in that area,” LRA chief negotiator David Matsanga said according to a report published by the IRIN news service.

Kenya’s post-election violence has had harsh economic and social effects across East Africa, the Archbishop of Uganda’s assistant for international affairs, Canon Alison Barfoot reports from Kampala.

While there is little danger the political and ethnic strife will spill over into the Great Lakes region of Africa, Canon Barfoot reports the economic impact of the Kenyan civil unrest has been immediate.

Petrol supplies have all but run out in Kampala as Uganda’s petroleum supplies are imported via Mombasa. Since the violence began in Western Kenya, the flow of oil to Uganda and the other Great Lakes countries: Rwanda, Burundi and Eastern Congo, has stopped.

All domestic flights have been grounded due to a shortage of jet fuel, and the cost of public transportation has doubled in less than a week.

Some office workers in Kampala who had returned home to their villages for the Christmas holidays found they could not come back to Kampala due to the fuel shortage. When black market diesel fuel is available it sells for over £10 a gallon. Electricity is now being rationed at eight hours a day in the West Nile District of northwestern Uganda, with fuel stockpiles expected to last only through the end of the week.

Canon Barfoot reports the Church of Uganda has been sheltering Kenya refugees.

“Kikuyu (historically from the central region of Kenya), who were living in Western Kenya (home to the vast majority of Luos), have experienced the brunt of the post-election violence. They have been chased from their homes,” she reports.

“They are staying in our churches and schools, and at police stations. They need our prayers, as do our diocesan leaders in those places,” she said.

Read it all in The Church of England Newspaper.

A Ugandan bishop has urged Christians to back a campaign banning the death penalty.

The Rt. Rev. Zac Niringiye, the Assistant Bishop of Kampala told a Christmas Day congregation his ministry with death row convicts had taught him it was possible for murderers to reform.

He cited the case of John Katuramu, the former prime minister of Toro province, who in 2004 was sentenced to death for murdering the Prince of Toro, Charles Kijjanangoma.

“Katuramu now has joy, peace, love and faith because he has been redeemed by Jesus Christ,” said Dr. Niringiye. “He told me that he may physically be living in Luzira [prison] but at heart, he is a free man.”

“There are over 500 convicts on death row” in Uganda, he said. “I have interacted with them and seen how they have been transformed. Such people should be given a chance to live a new life,” the bishop said.

Amnesty International reports that as of August 2005 there were 555 prisoners on death row in Uganda, including 27 women. They have been convicted for various criminal offences including murder (65%), robbery (33%), kidnapping, aggravated robbery, treason, and cowardice in action.

Speaking to the Melbourne Age newspaper last week, the Archbishop of Sydney voiced support for the death penalty in that country. Dr. Jensen noted Article XXXVII affirmed the state’s right to impose the death penalty: “The Laws of the Realm may punish Christian men with death, for heinous and grievous offences.”

Dr. Jensen has challenged the use of the death penalty for those convicted of drug smuggling by the Indonesian government and in other, non-capital cases world-wide.

“But I cannot absolutely rule out capital punishment in all circumstances, since the Bible itself allows it,” he said.

Read it all in The Church of England Newspaper.

Gay activists and bishops of the Church of Uganda came to verbal blows last month at the Commonwealth Heads of Government Meeting in Kampala.

Gay activists from Europe and North America shouted down a Ugandan bishop during a press conference on Nov 22 at the Commonwealth People’s Space—a venue for NGO’s, civic groups and churches to hold forums and workshops during the meeting—while police broke up a presentation by Ugandan gay rights activists at the People’s Space the following day.

According to an account given by the Kampala Monitor, the Assistant Bishop of Kampala, the Rt. Rev. Zac Niringiye (pictured) was responding to questions from journalists about the Church of Uganda’s stance on the issue of human sexuality when he was interrupted by a Canadian.

Taking offense at the bishop’s statement that Commonwealth countries should not promote homosexuality or permit gay marriage, the Canadian shouted that in his country he was allowed to marry another man and his church supported this view.

Answering that this view was not shared by the Church of Uganda, Bishop Niringiye stated homosexual conduct was immoral. A crowd of Western gay rights activists then formed around the bishop, chanting slogans and pointing their fingers at him.

Bishop Niringiye was led away from the confrontation by fellow Ugandan bishops, and later told the Monitor that while the Church did not wish to silence their voices, it did not agree that legislation should be enacted that promoted the gay lifestyle.

At a press conference later that day, bishops from the Church of Uganda called upon the Commonwealth countries to follow the path of virtue. “The Commonwealth should not legislate for human wrongs. Homosexuality is an evil, which should never be discussed during CHOGM. In CHOGM meetings, we should advocate for them to change because the act is unnatural,” Bishop Niringiye said.

LGBT activists from Uganda were also the victims of abuse at CHOGM, Changing Attitude reported. Representatives from Integrity Uganda and other East African gay rights groups were blocked by the police from entering the People’s Space on Nov 23 and forcibly removed from the venue.

(Photo: The Rev. Willie Akena, Diocese of Northern Uganda)

An Anglican priest who lost his hands and an eye in a terror attack by the former South African apartheid regime travelled to Northern Uganda last month to meet with victims of the Lord’s Resistance Army (LRA).

The Rev. Michael Lapsley, the director of the Institute for Healing Memories in Cape Town, met with mutilated victims of the LRA as well refugees from the fighting that has ravaged Northern Uganda for the past two decades.

“We have something horrible in common that changed our lives,” he told a group of amputees. In its civil war with the Ugandan government, the LRA has terrorized villages with a campaign of destruction and murder that includes amputating the hands, feet or lips of perceived enemies.

In a talk to the Mother’s Union of the Diocese of Northern Uganda, Fr. Lapsley recounted his struggle to forgive those who had crippled him, urging them to put aside their hatred also and give their lives over to Christ and be healed.

A native of New Zealand, Fr. Lapsley trained for the ministry in Australia and went out to South Africa in 1973 to serve as a university chaplain. In 1976 the government refused to renew his visa due to his political activities. He left South Africa for Lesotho and then Zimbabwe, serving as a chaplain for the African National Congress (ANC).

In April 1990 a letter bomb disguised in the pages of a religious magazine posted from South Africa blew off his hands and blinded him in one eye.

On Nov 14 at a meeting in Gulu he said: “I had a choice, Am I going to have hatred and bitterness all my life or am I going to travel a journey of healing? “

“I realized that if I was full of hatred then I would be a victim for ever, they have failed to kill the body but I would have killed the soul,” he said.

There was a conception that healing occurred in an instant, “like taking tablets and everything will be okay. But people who have been hurt deeply the journey of healing takes some time,” he said.

He urged the Mother’s Union to “offer your selves to listen to the pain of others not just once but again and again” and “listen not only with our ears but also with our hearts.”

THE GOVERNMENT has been questioned over its efforts to ensure access for aid agencies to the people of Northern Uganda.

The call came from the Bishop of Chelmsford, the Rt Rev John Gladwin, who also serves as chairman of Christian Aid, on Oct 29 asked Baroness Vandera, a DfID Minister, if the government was talking to the Ugandan authorities to help development agencies operate there.

The question arose during a debate initiated by Baroness Cox on the government’s support for the peace process in Northern Uganda. Baroness Vandera said the bishop’s concerns were well stated, as a recent report from the World Food Programme found that food aid was not reaching an estimated 150,000 people.

The British government was responding to the problem by providing ‘support for emergency rations to be airlifted to areas that were not accessible by road. Efforts have also been made to improve road access,’ she said with Britain ‘bearing some of the costs of engineering to rebuild some of the roads to ensure that access is available for basic services.’

Baroness Cox urged the government to ‘make peace a priority’ in Northern Uganda.

The New Orleans statement of the US House of Bishops has “clarified all outstanding questions” posed by the Primates to the American Church, a report prepared by the Primates/ACC joint standing committee (JSC) has found.

However, the 19-page Sept 30 report has been dismissed as dishonest by US conservatives, and its conclusions rejected by the African churches.  Observers note the clumsy attempt of the JSC to usurp the prerogatives of the primates, and to become a de facto fifth “instrument of unity” has served to worsen the already bitter climate within the Communion.

The primates had asked the US Church to clarify the statement of its 2006 General Convention that it would not permit the election of further gay bishops or authorize gay blessings, that an autonomous scheme for pastoral oversight be given traditionalists, and that the lawsuits against breakaway conservative parishes would cease.

At their March meeting the US bishops invited Dr. Williams and the members of the primates standing committee to meet with them face to face to avert a blow up.  Over the summer this invitation was enlarged by the ACC staff to include itself and the ACC standing committee.

In New Orleans the US Bishops pledged “as a body” to “exercise restraint” in electing gay bishops, pledged not to authorize “public rites” of same-sex blessings, and agreed to delegated pastoral oversight for traditionalists under the supervision of Presiding Bishop Katharine Jefferts Schori.  It declined to address the issue of lawsuits, and chastised Global South primates for violating their jurisdictions in providing support for traditionalist congregations.

The JSC concluded that this response satisfied the Primates’ requests and added the US was correct in citing the “ancient councils of the Church” in protesting border crossings.  The primates were hypocrites in demanding the US church refrain from implementing gay bishops and blessings while they permitted the border crossings to go on.

“[W]e do not see how certain primates can in good conscience call upon The Episcopal Church to meet the recommendations of the Windsor Report while they find reasons to exempt themselves from paying regard to them. We recommend that the Archbishop remind them of their own words and undertakings,” the report said.

Crafted in a late night session on Sept 24 by Bishop Jefferts Schori and the JSC, the statement was adopted with amendments by the bishops on Sept 25.  Critics of the report charge it is ingenuous of the ACC to give an independent endorsement of a report that it helped write, and question the US Presiding Bishop’s role as defendant, judge and jury in the process.

Archbishop Henry Orombi of Uganda called the report “severely compromised, and the gross conflicts of interest it represents utterly undermine its credibility.”

He said the primates did not envision the ACC inserting itself in the process while the US was “considering our requests.  Yet, members of the [JSC] met with Presiding Bishop Schori in the course of the preparation of their House of Bishops’ statement in order to suggest certain words, which, if included in the statement, would assure endorsement by the [JSC].  Presiding Bishop Schori’s participation in the evaluation of the response requested of her province is a gross conflict of interest. We wonder why she did not recuse herself.”

Bishop Mouneer Anis of Egypt, a member of the JSC delegation in New Orleans repudiated the report saying the US had given an inadequate response.  “Instead they used ambiguous language and contradicted themselves within their own response.”

The African archbishops also questioned the integrity of the JSC report, stating on Oct 5 that “on first reading we find it to be unsatisfactory. The assurances made are without credibility and its preparation is severely compromised by numerous conflicts of interest. The report itself appears to be a determined effort to find a way for the full inclusion of The Episcopal Church with no attempt at discipline or change from their prior position.”

The JSC report will be forwarded to all of the members of the Anglican Consultative Council and the primates for consideration.  Archbishop Rowan Williams has asked for their responses by the end of October.

Archbishop of Canterbury Rowan Williams has begun soliciting the views of the primates as to whether the Sept. 25 statement from the House of Bishops adequately responds to the primates’ request for clarification on The Episcopal Church’s stance on gay bishops and rites for the blessing of same-sex unions.

Archbishop Williams has begun telephoning and writing the primates, seeking their views. However, his trip to Armenia and Syria, and the opening of the Church of England’s House of Bishops meeting on Oct. 1, has hindered a speedy response to the New Orleans statement.

Public statements from some of the primates indicate a split of opinion along factional lines, with some declaring the statement adequate, while others have dismissed it as dishonest and non-responsive to the primates’ request.

Archbishop Alan Harper, Primate of Ireland, said the “American bishops have gone a considerable way to meeting the reasonable demands of their critics.”

Bishop David Beetge of the Highveld, the acting primate and vicar general of the Anglican Church of Southern Africa, said he welcomed the decision “for the simple reason it gives us more space and time to talk to each other.”

The Primate of Australia, Archbishop Philip Aspinall of Brisbane said he believed the bishops had “responded positively to the substance of [the primates'] requests.”

Other primates were more critical. “What we expected to come from them is to repent. That this is a sin in the eyes of the Lord and repentance is what we, in particular, and others expected to hear” from the House of Bishops, said Archbishop Benjamin Nzimbi, Primate of Kenya.

The Primate of Nigeria, Archbishop Peter Akinola, said the bishops’ response fell short. The primates had given The Episcopal Church “one final opportunity for an unequivocal assurance” that it would conform “to the mind and teaching of the Communion,” he said, and the bishops failed to do that. The primates are unwilling to accept further “ambiguous and misleading statements” from The Episcopal Church, he said.

Published in The Living Church.

Reactions to the US House of Bishops New Orleans statement amongst the Primates have broken along factional lines, with conservatives denouncing the statement as insubstantial and dishonest, while liberals have praised its candor and modesty.

The divergent views of the adequacy of the US response to the Primates request for clarification of American church practices towards gay bishops and blessings further complicates the Archbishop of Canterbury’s hopes of forestalling a schism within the Communion.

Straightened finances and fears of a boycott by the primates of Wales, Ireland and Scotland to an emergency primates’ meeting to discuss the American response to the primates’ Dar es Salaam communique, has led to Dr. Williams telephoning the Communion’s primates to try to find a common mind.

Whether the primates’ round robin will produce an amicable resolution appears to be further hampered by the different world views of the players in Anglicanism’s great game. Aides to the Archbishop told The Church of England Newspaper during his meeting with the American bishops in New Orleans that Dr. Williams hoped to find the right combination of words that would satisfy the church’s disparate factions.

However, leaders of the Global South coalition have demanded not words, but action from the American church, and have little trust in the veracity of American promises of good behavior. Leaders of the liberal wing of the US Church and across the Communion are also divided, with some arguing that truth must not be subordinated to expediency while others hope their place within the councils of the church can be saved through the artful use of semantics.

The Primate of All Ireland, Archbishop Alan Harper of Armagh lauded the American response, saying the American “Bishops have gone a considerable way to meeting the reasonable demands of their critics.”

Archbishop Harper noted the “generous agreement” of Presiding Bishop Katharine Jefferts Schori “to put in place a plan to appoint Episcopal visitors for dioceses that request alternative oversight” and stated that while the bishops had declined “participation in the ‘Pastoral Scheme’ offered by the Primates,” they had “at least” recognized the “useful role” of the Communion in these debates.

Dr. Harper stated this seemed to be a “balanced and relatively generous response in a very delicate area of inter-provincial relationships.”

Bishop David Beetge of the Highveld, the acting primate and vicar general of the Anglican Church of Southern Africa, said he welcomed the decision “for the simple reason it gives us more space and time to talk to each other.”

The Primate of Australia, Archbishop Philip Aspinall of Brisbane said he believed the US had “responded positively to all the requests put to them by the Primates in our Dar es Salaam communiqué.”However, he went on to damn the American Church with faint praise saying “Certainly they have responded to the substance of those requests.”
However the Archbishop of Sydney, Dr. Peter Jensen was not as sanguine. “At first reading, the statement from the TEC bishops does not seem to say anything new,” he noted. “The situation may not then be changed in any way.”

The African churches were stronger in their condemnation. “What we expected to come from them is to repent. That this is a sin in the eyes of the Lord and repentance is what me, in particular, and others expected to hear coming from this church,” Kenyan Archbishop Benjamin Nzimbi said.

The Assistant Bishop of Kampala, David Zac Niringiye told the BBC’s Focus on Africa programme Uganda believed the statement was inadequate as it was “not a change of heart”, but a temporizing solution.The Primate of Nigeria, Archbishop Peter Akinola stated the US response fell short of what was required. The primates had given the US “one final opportunity for an unequivocal assurance” that it would conform to the “to the mind and teaching of the Communion.”

He said the primates were unwilling to accept further “ambiguous and misleading statements” from the US Church. “Sadly it seems that our hopes were not well founded and our pleas have once again been ignored.”

Meanwhile the Anglican Mainstream group said they were disappointed with the response because it failed to address the specific questions asked of it by the Primates’ Meeting in February, and backed the Common Cause College of Bishops. In a statement they said: “The first two points — on the election of non-celibate gay and lesbian bishops, and on public rites for blessing same-sex unions — suggest that the TEC House of Bishops has agreed not to walk further away from the rest of the Anglican Communion for the moment.

“However, the TEC House of Bishops gives no indication of being prepared to turn and walk back towards us so that we may walk ahead together, and in reality same-sex blessings are continuing.

“Moreover, there is no response to the Primates’ request to suspend all legal action.”

The Church Society also rejected the House of Bishops statement saying it demonstrates TEC has ‘abandoned orthodox Christianity’.

The Churches of Uganda and Kenya consecrated their American flying bishops this week, in actions taken to strengthen the remnants of traditionalist North American Anglicanism.

The Rt Rev William Murdoch and the Rt Rev Bill Atwood were consecrated as suffragan bishops of All Saints Diocese, Nairobi by Kenya’s Archbishop Benjamin Nzimbi on Aug 30, and the Rt. Rev. John Guernsey was consecrated a provincial suffragan bishop by Uganda’s Archbishop Henry Orombi on Sept 1 in the southwest Ugandan city of Mbarra.

Bishops Murdoch and Atwood will have oversight of the Kenyan churches 32 US congregations, while Bishop Guernsey, along with the former Bishop of North Dakota, Andrew Fairfield, will oversee Uganda’s 33 US congregations.

Eight primates along with representatives of two others participated in the consecration. Archbishops Drexel Gomez of the West Indies, Gregory Venables of South America, Justice Akrofi of West Africa, Bernard Malango of Central Africa, Ian Ernest of the Indian Ocean, Emmanuel Kolini of Rwanda, and representatives from Nigeria and South East Asia joined the Ugandan and Kenyan archbishops in laying hands on the new bishops.

The Bishops of Fort Worth and Pittsburgh, Jack Iker and Robert Duncan, the retired Bishop of Western Newfoundland, Don Harvey, as well as CANA Bishop Martyn Minns and AMiA Bishop Charles Murphy also participated in the ceremonies.

The Archbishop of Canterbury, Dr. Rowan Williams, had been notified of the consecrations, but was not consulted as to their propriety, Archbishop Nzimbi said.

While the consecrations do not alter the basic political calculus underlying the Anglican Communions sex wars, their symbolism, along with the simultaneous announcement of the nomination of a lesbian priest to stand for election as Bishop of Chicago, will not lighten Dr. Williams’ burden of holding the Church together.

The consecrations come three weeks before Dr. Williams meets with the American bishops in New Orleans, and a month before the Sept 30 deadline set by the Primates’ Dar es Salaam communiqué to clarify the American church’s response to the Windsor Report.

In his consecration sermon in Nairobi, Archbishop Gomez stated the new bishops were beginning their ministries “at a time when the Communion is being severely challenged” by questions of the “the maintenance of Eucharistic communion, continuity and apostolic teaching, and the oversight of the churches.”

He said the present crisis had arisen due to the actions taken by the American Episcopal Church “in respect of human sexuality with special reference to the consecration of a bishop living in an opened homosexual relationship.”

Yet Archbishop Gomez said the “issue is not primarily on of sexuality but one which seeks to answer the question ‘which relationships correspond to God’s ordering of life, and violate it?’ It is a division of opinion between those of us who firmly believe that homosexual practice violates the order of life give by God in scripture and those who seek by various mean to justify what scripture does not honour.”

“We believe that faithfulness to the gospel of Jesus Christ prevents us from compromising the truth so clearly revealed in Holy Scripture,” he said.

The Bishop of Rochester, Dr Michael Nazir-Ali, along with more than 30 members of General Synod sent an open letter of support to the new bishops, writing they would “represent vibrant and growing Churches in Africa in their love and care for those in the United States who are suffering for their commitment to the faith once delivered to the saints, in the face of a determined capitulation by The Episcopal Church to the forces of contemporary North American culture.”

The letter said the consecrations were a response of the “universal church” to the “needs of the “local church” in such a way as to “preserve global orthodox Anglican witness and fellowship that is not impaired by man-made intermediate structures.”

The Rev. Susan Russell, president of the American gay pressure group integrity, said the consecrations were the actions of a “fringe group” and “one more sad indication of just how far those committed to splitting the Episcopal Church are willing to go to achieve their goal of a church created in their own image.”

Three former congregations of the Diocese of Los Angeles that left The Episcopal Church for the Church of Uganda have asked the California Supreme Court to decide whether they or the diocese own their properties.

In an appeal filed on Aug. 6, St. James’, Newport Beach; All Saints’, Long Beach; and St. David’s, North Hollywood, asked the state’s Supreme Court to overturn a June 25 ruling by the Fourth Appellate District of the California Court of Appeal that found the Diocese of Los Angeles controlled the parish property.

Read it all in The Living Church.

The Archbishop of Uganda will not attend the September meeting between the Primates Standing Committee and the US House of Bishops. In an article published in the American journal First Things, Archbishop Henry Orombi stated the American church must give a clear response to the Primates’ call for reform.

“It is my conviction that our Dar es Salaam communiqué did not envision interference in the American House of Bishops while they are considering our requests,” he wrote.

“For me to violate our hard-won agreement in Dar es Salaam would be another case of undermining our instruments of communion. My decision to uphold our Dar es Salaam communiqué is intended to strengthen our instruments of communion so we will be able to mature into an even more effective global communion,” Archbishop Orombi stated.

He reiterated the stand taken by the Ugandan bishops in December that they would “definitely not attend any Lambeth Conference to which the violators of the Lambeth Resolution [1.10] are also invited as participants or observers.” If the “present invitations” to Lambeth 2008 stand, “I do not expect the Ugandan bishops to attend,” he said.

Aides to the Archbishop stated Dr. Rowan Williams also overstepped his authority by accepting the American invitation on behalf of the primates standing committee without first having consulting with them.

The Ugandan threat to boycott Lambeth was not a withdrawal “from the instruments of communion” but a mark of their “critical importance,” he said. The Lambeth Conferences were “greatly diminished when the persistent violators of its resolutions are invited. If our resolutions as a council of bishops do not have moral authority among ourselves, how can we expect our statements on world affairs to carry weight in the world’s forums?”, he asked.

“The Church of Uganda takes its Anglican identity and the future prospects of the global Anglican Communion very seriously. Our thoughtfulness in how we participate in the instruments of communion reflects our fundamental loyalty to our Anglican heritage,” Archbishop Orombi said.

This heritage he said was to an evangelical faith. Biblically driven, it sees Scripture as the Word of God written and the ultimate authority for faith and conduct. The three “pillars” or marks of the Church had been its experience of martyrs, revival and the historic episcopate.

From its first missionary English bishop James Hannington, to the 26 Buganda youths killed for the profession of faith and refusal to become homosexual objects for the lust of their king in 1886, to the Feb 1977 murder of Archbishop Janani Luwum at the hands of Idi Amin, martyrs have been a model and on-going witness for the church.

The Church had also been transformed by a revival that begin in 1935, and continues to animate Anglicanism, contributing to a passion for evangelism and personal holiness, while bishops have served as apostolic witnesses to an unchanging faith. The three pillars had led to the growth of the Ugandan Church in recent years, making it the second largest in the Communion.

The “long season of British hegemony” in the Anglican Communion was at an end, Archbishop Orombi stated. It will be “the younger churches of Anglican Christianity” who will “shape what it means to be Anglican” in the coming years, he said.

Uganda and Kenya have named two more bishops to support their congregations in the United States. On June 27 Archbishop Henry Orombi of Uganda announced that former North Dakota Bishop Andrew Fairfield had quit The Episcopal Church for Uganda, while on June 29 Archbishop Benjamin Nzimbi of Kenya named Massachusetts priest William Murdoch a suffragan bishop.

Bishop Fairfield is the fourth Episcopal bishop to quit the Church this year, while the appointment of Bishop-elect Murdoch by Kenya increases to 11 the number of bishops overseen by foreign Anglican jurisdictions active in The Episcopal Church.

Archbishop Orombi said it was an honor to receive Bishop Fairfield into the Ugandan Church noting he would be a “great support to Bishop-elect John Guernsey and all the congregations in America that are under our care.”

Elected Bishop of North Dakota in 1989, Bishop Fairfield retired in 2003. Prior to his consecration he served his entire career in the Diocese of Alaska, first as a missionary along the Yukon River and then as an assistant to the bishop. In moving to the Ugandan Church Bishop Fairfield said he sought “further Christian service, especially in the process of this transition in Anglican orthodoxy.”

Pittsburgh Bishop Robert Duncan applauded the move, saying Bishop Fairfield had “found a new ecclesiastical home in the Church of Uganda, a Province which has declared a state of broken communion with The Episcopal Church’s majority, but embraces full communion with all in the Anglican Communion Network.”

Bishop Fairfield is the fourth member of the House of Bishops to quit The Episcopal Church this year. In March, retired Assistant Bishop of Oklahoma William Cox moved to the Church of the Province of the Southern Cone, retired Suffragan Bishop of Albany, David Bena was received by the Church of Nigeria and serves as an Assistant Bishop of CANA, while the former Bishop of Albany Daniel Herzog was received by the Roman Catholic Church.

On June 29 the Provincial Synod of the Anglican Church of Kenya elected William L. Murdoch a Suffragan Bishop of All Saints Cathedral Diocese in Nairobi to “serve the international interests of the ACK including taking responsibility for care for the congregations and clergy in the USA under Kenyan jurisdiction,” Archbishop Nzimbi said.

Kenya’s two new American bishops, Bill Atwood and William Murdoch, “will collaborate with others in the Common Cause network, chaired by the Rt. Rev. Robert Duncan to provide orthodox Episcopal care and oversight, strategically uniting a broad conservative coalition that shares historic Anglican faith and practice.”
Rector of All Saints Episcopal Church in West Newbury, Mass., since 1993, Bishop-elect Murdoch was received by The Episcopal Church in 1984 after serving as a Congregationalist minister. He has served as Dean of the Anglican Communion Network’s New England Convocation since 2004.

The UN reports a breakthrough in peace talks between the Ugandan government and the rebel Lord’s Resistance Army (LRA). On June 29 the two sides reached an agreement on the contentious issue of accountability for war crimes committed during the 20 year insurrection that has devastated northern Uganda and displaced more than one million of the region’s residents.

The Ugandan government and the LRA have agreed to incorporate both Western legal remedies as well as traditional tribal reconciliation ceremonies to bring an end to hostilities.

The Rev. Willy Akena, press officer for the Diocese of Northern Uganda, reported that going into the talks the LRA had demanded International Criminal Court (ICC) arrest warrants for its leaders be quashed, while the Ugandan government sought a signed treaty with the ICC warrants in place and in force.

The current round of talks was the “most difficult” Mr. Akena said as they involved a discussion of the “Acholi traditional system of Mato Oput, amnesty law and of course the ICC.” Mato Oput is an elaborate reconciliation ceremony of the Acholi people of northern Uganda.

The break through came after the government and the LRA agreed to incorporate Mato Oput into the final accords for accountability and reconciliation.

“This agenda item was make or break for these talks, and I’m happy we have come out on the positive side,” Barigye Ba-Hoku, the Ugandan delegation spokesman, told UN’s IRIN news agency. “We discovered that neither the usual legal system nor the traditional system were sufficient to achieve accountability for crimes on such a large scale.”

Use of the traditional tribal formulas will not leave the guilty unpunished, however as “each person who committed a crime will be held individually accountable and will be punished accordingly.”

The proposed peace agreement also provides for reparations, in the form of rehabilitation, restitution and compensation, guarantees of non-recurrence, and apologies.

A Kampala newspaper has reported that the Archbishop of York, Dr. John Sentamu along with Archbishop Henry Orombi of Uganda, is among the seven candidates nominated to serve as chancellor of Makere University.

New Visions reported on June 26 that Dr. Sentamu had been nominated for the Ugandan university’s top non-administrative post, whose duties include presiding over graduation ceremonies and receiving awards on behalf of the university.

Dr. Sentamu is a 1971 law graduate of the University. The chancellor is required to be a Ugandan citizen, aged 55 to 75, holding an earned university degree, and possessing “high integrity and standing.”

Uganda has announced that it will consecrate an American priest to serve as bishop to its congregations in the United States. It has appointed the Rev. John Guernsey, rector of All Saints Church in Dale City, Virginia to oversee Uganda’s 26 congregations in 12 US states ranging from Southern California to Northern New York.

The election of Bishop Guernsey to serve the US Ugandan parishes marks the fifth Anglican province to appoint bishops to serve traditionalist congregations in the US. Existing bishops include: the Rwandan-backed AMiA led by Bishop Charles Murphy and his three suffragans, the Nigerian-backed CANA led by Bishop Martyn Minns and the former suffragan Bishop of Albany David Bena, Kenya’s congregations led by Bishop-elect Bill Atwood, and the South American congregations led by former Oklahoma suffragan bishop William Cox.

Further overseas bishops are expected to be appointed by the Church of Nigeria. On March 7 the Nigerian House of Bishops stated, “In light of the report from the recent meeting of primates in Dar es Salaam we agreed to defer the request for additional Episcopal elections for CANA until our meeting in September 2007.”

Central African Archbishop Bernard Malango is not expected to appoint a bishop to oversee his province’s US congregations, however.

The appointment of Bishop Guernsey was an interim measure to keep open a door for embattled traditionalists in the US to remain part of the Communion, Archbishop Orombi wrote on June 21.

“The need for a domestic episcopate for our Ugandan congregations grows daily, yet the anticipated, Biblically orthodox domestic ecclesial entity in the USA is not yet available. It has, therefore, seemed good to the House of Bishops and the Holy Spirit for us to take an interim step that acknowledges the need for a domestic bishop while at the same time affirming [their] full status as members of the Church of Uganda, and, therefore, of the Anglican Communion.”

Bishop-elect Guernsey said the decision to consecrate an American bishop had been made at the December Ugandan House of Bishops meeting and had been taken in consultation with other Global South provinces. The rejection by the US Church of the Primates’ pastoral council plan forced the Ugandan Church to act, Archbishop Orombi said.

“The carefully worked out and unanimously agreed Pastoral Scheme by the Primates in our February 2007 Dar es Salaam Communiqué has now been soundly rejected not only by TEC’s House of Bishops, but also by their Executive Council. We take their rejection very seriously,” he noted.

Uganda was not creating a separate ecclesiastical structure in the United States Bishop Guernsey said, and would work closely with other Anglicans to provide a haven for traditionalist groups. “Uganda is not building anything on its own, but we are working closely with Bishop Duncan [of Pittsburgh] and all our Common Cause partners toward a united and faithful Anglicanism in North America,” he told The Church of England Newspaper.

Under the Ugandan plan the 26 congregations will remain under the jurisdiction of their current bishops. Bishop Guernsey will be consecrated by the Ugandan House of Bishops on Sept 2 in Mbarara as a suffragan to offer pastoral and episcopal support, and will remain rector of All Saints.

Educated at Yale and the Episcopal Divinity School, Bishop-elect Guernsey has served his entire ministry in the Diocese of Virginia, serving as Assistant Rector at Christ Church, Alexandria, from 1978 to 1981, and as rector of All Saints from 1981 to the present. Popular among conservative evangelical clergy in the US, he has declined over a dozen nominations to episcopal office over the past 15 years, and told CEN that he had accepted the Ugandan appointment with some reluctance.

“My calling is to care for these churches and do the work of the Kingdom of God in the power of the Holy Spirit,” he said. The Dean of the Mid-Atlantic Convocation of the Anglican Communion Network, Bishop-elect Guernsey was a deputy to the US church’s General Convention from the Diocese of Virginia in 1994, 1997 and 2000.

Bishop Guernsey will be the Ugandan church’s second “Bishop in Mission” outside the geographic boundaries of the Province. On Nov 27, 2005 Archbishop Orombi consecrated the Rev. Prebendary Sandy Millar as an Assistant Bishop of the Church of Uganda to serve in London.

Comment on this story at Thinking Anglicans.

The Rt. Rev. Andrew H. Fairfield, retired Bishop of North Dakota, has joined the Church of Uganda and will assist bishop-elect John Guernsey in overseeing the church’s 26 US congregations, according to an announcement this morning by the Most Rev. Henry Orombi, Archbishop of Uganda.

“Now, although I am ‘retired’ from a jurisdictional and financial point of view, I seek further Christian service, especially in the process of this transition in Anglican orthodoxy,” Bishop Fairfield stated, noting that he had written to Presiding Bishop Katharine Jefferts Schori, resigning from the House of Bishops of The Episcopal Church.

Archbishop Orombi said it was an honor to receive Bishop Fairfield into the Ugandan Church, adding he would be a “great support to Bishop-elect John Guernsey and all the congregations in America that are under our care.”

Elected Bishop of North Dakota in 1989, Bishop Fairfield retired in 2003. Prior to his consecration he served as an assistant to the Bishop of Alaska.

Bishop Fairfield is the fourth member of the House of Bishops to quit The Episcopal Church this year. In March, the Rt. Rev. William Cox, a retired Assistant Bishop of Oklahoma, moved to the Church of the Province of the Southern Cone; the Rt. Rev. David Bena, retired Suffragan Bishop of Albany, was received by the Church of Nigeria and serves as an assistant bishop in the Convocation of Anglicans in North America; and the Rt. Rev. Daniel W. Herzog, retired Bishop of Albany, was received into the Roman Catholic Church.

Published in The Living Church.

The caption to this photo as printed by The Living Church on 6.22.07 read:

The Rev. John Guernsey, rector of All Saints Anglican Church, Dale City, Va., and the Rev. Canon Bill Atwood, visited together at General Convention 2006. The Church of Uganda has announced it will consecrate Fr. Guernsey as a missionary bishop to the U.S.; the Anglican Church of Kenya announced last week that it will consecrate Canon Atwood as a suffragan bishop to oversee the U.S.-based congregations of that church.

The Living Church

The Anglican Church of Uganda has announced it will consecrate a former Episcopal priest to serve as suffragan bishop to its congregations in the United States.

The Rev. John Guernsey, rector of All Saints Anglican Church in Woodbridge, Va., was selected by the Ugandan House of Bishops to oversee its 26 congregations in 12 states. He will be consecrated Sept. 2 in Mbarara, Uganda.

“The Rev. Guernsey has a long history with the Church of Uganda, including many short visits for teaching and preaching missions,” stated the Most Rev. Henry Orombi, Primate of Uganda, in a press release. “He is highly respected by clergy and bishops in the Church of Uganda, and has also been a pastoral and strategic leader in the Anglican Communion Network as dean of the Mid-Atlantic Convocation.”

Bishop-elect Guernsey said the decision to consecrate an American bishop had been made at the December Ugandan House of Bishops meeting and had been taken in consultation with other Global South provinces.

Uganda is not creating a separate ecclesiastical structure in the United States, he said, and would work closely with other Anglicans to provide a haven for traditionalist groups.

“Uganda is not building anything on its own, but we are working closely with Bishop Duncan and all our Common Cause partners toward a united and faithful Anglicanism in North America,” he told The Living Church. Bishop Robert Duncan, Bishop of Pittsburgh, is moderator of the Anglican Communion Network.

The 26 congregations, spread from Newport Beach, Calif., to Irondequoit, N.Y., are members of 10 different Ugandan dioceses. Under the plan set forth by the Ugandan House of Bishops, the 26 congregations will remain under the jurisdiction of their current bishops. Fr. Guernsey will be consecrated by the Ugandan House of Bishops as a suffragan to offer pastoral and episcopal support. He will remain rector of All Saints.

“My calling is to care for these churches and do the work of the kingdom of God in the power of the Holy Spirit,” he said.

Educated at Yale and the Episcopal Divinity School, Bishop-elect Guernsey has served his entire ministry in the Diocese of Virginia, first as assistant rector at Christ Church, Alexandria, from 1978 to 1981, and then as rector of All Saints. He served as a deputy to General Convention from the Diocese of Virginia in 1994, 1997 and 2000.

He will be the Ugandan church’s second “Bishop in Mission” outside the geographic boundaries of the province. On Nov. 27, 2005, Ugandan Archbishop Henry Orombi consecrated the Rev. Prebendary Sandy Millar as an Assistant Bishop of the Church of Uganda to serve in London. Bishop Millar, who was vicar of Holy Trinity Brompton, London, from 1985 to 2005, was one of the founders of The Alpha Course, a Christian formation program currently used by more than 35,000 churches in 153 countries.

The Bishop of London, the Rt. Rev. Richard Chartres, with the encouragement of Archbishop of Canterbury Rowan Williams, licensed Bishop Millar to serve as an honorary assistant Bishop in London under the Church of England’s Mission-Shaped Church report. That report recommended bishops be “sufficiently free from administrative overload to be able to invest time in a more apostolic role, developing mission strategy and taking the lead in the discernment of priority mission initiatives.”

Last week, the Most Rev. Benjamin Nzimbi, Primate of Kenya, announced he will consecrate the Rev. Canon Bill Atwood on Aug. 30 as a suffragan bishop to oversee the U.S.-based congregations of the Anglican Church of Kenya.

First published in The Living Church.

The Archbishop of Canterbury’s snub of Ugandan Bishop in Mission Sandy Millar did not influence that Church’s warning that it might boycott the 2008 Lambeth Conference. A spokesman for Archbishop Henry Orombi told The Church of England Newspaper the Ugandan Primate’s announcement was “simply re-stating a decision the [Ugandan bishops] took in December, and, applying it in light of the present circumstances.”

In a statement released on May 30, Archbishop Orombi stated that as Archbishop Rowan Williams had extended invitations to “all the American Bishops who consented to, participated in, and have continued to support the consecration” of Bishop Robinson, the Church of Uganda would honor its December commitment and not attend the 2008 Conference.

On Dec 9 the Ugandan House of Bishops unanimously endorsed the Road to Lambeth, a statement prepared by the Council of Anglican Provinces in Africa [CAPA] which stated its members “will definitely not attend any Lambeth Conference to which the violators of the Lambeth Resolution [1.10] are also invited as participants or observers.” On May 22, Nigerian Archbishop Peter Akinola noted his Church’s participation in the Conference was also in doubt due to its affirmation of the CAPA statement.
The issue “is not so much” Bishop Robinson, “as it is a church that could make the decision that it made and persist in it, rather than repent. At this point, the violators have been invited, so the Archbishop is now applying a decision that had already been made,” the spokesman said.

A member of the Primates Standing Committee, Archbishop Orombi has been invited by the American House of Bishops to meet with them prior to the September 30 deadline set by the primates for compliance with the Dar es Salaam communiqué. Archbishop Orombi’s spokesman noted that his attendance at the US meeting had not yet been settled.

Dr. Williams’ spokesman stated they could not confirm the dates of his September visit to America. While the Episcopal Church’s House of Bishops meets from Sept 20-25 in New Orleans, it was premature to say Dr. Williams and the Joint ACC-Primates Standing Committee would attend that gathering, Lambeth Palace said.

Bishop Sandy Millar, the former rector of Holy Trinity Brompton in London and presently a Bishop in Mission of the Church of Uganda based in London, would not be invited to the Lambeth Conference, a spokesman for the Archbishop of Canterbury told CEN.

While Bishop Millar was licensed to serve as a Bishop in the Diocese of London on Feb 9, 2006, this status did not afford him an invitation, Dr. Williams’ spokesman said.

ACC press spokesman Canon James Rosenthal noted that not all stipendiary bishops were extended invitations to the Lambeth Conference. Lambeth was reserved for active bishops serving in stipendiary Episcopal ministry he explained, noting this normally did not include bishops serving in “chapels, colleges, offices” or on the staffs of various national churches.

The Church of Uganda told CEN it was unaware of the status of Bishop Millar’s invitation, but noted the decision was unrelated to the question of Bishop Millar’s invitation. A spokesman for Dr. Williams stated they were reserving comment on Archbishop Orombi’s statement at this time.

The Church of Uganda will boycott the 2008 Lambeth Conference if the bishops who participated in the New Hampshire consecration are seated at the gathering of bishops from across the Anglican Communion.

In a statement released on May 30, Archbishop Henry Orombi of Uganda stated that as Archbishop of Canterbury Rowan Williams had extended invitations to “all the American bishops who consented to, participated in, and have continued to support the consecration” of Bishop V. Gene Robinson in New Hampshire, the Church of Uganda would honor the commitment it made last December and not attend.

Read it all in The Living Church.

American partisans of the Anglican Communion’s sex wars were united in their umbrage this week towards the Archbishop of Canterbury over his decision to omit eight bishops from the guest list of the 2008 Lambeth Conference.

While US Presiding Bishop Katharine Jefferts Schori has urged the members of the US House of Bishops to forebear criticism and take a “calm approach” to the news that New Hampshire Bishop Gene Robinson has not been invited, several American bishops have responded sharply to the decision.

Conservative activists were exercised over the decision not to invite CANA Bishop Martyn Minns, AMiA Bishop Chuck Murphy and his suffragans, Alexander (Sandy) Green, Thaddeus Barnum, and T.J. Johnson, and Recife Bishop Robinson Cavalcanti. Conservative Episcopal Church bishops have remained silent, while Bishop Minns and Murphy have released statements criticizing the decision.

However news the invitation to Harare Bishop Nolbert Kunonga is being withheld pending further discussion has been greeted with quiet approval by Central African leaders contacted by The Church of England Newspaper.

In a terse email to the American bishops on May 22, Bishop Jefferts Schori stated she would withhold comment on Dr. Williams’ decision for the moment. “It is possible that aspects of this matter may change in the next 14 months, and the House of Bishops’ September meeting offers us a forum for further discussion,” she said.

However the Bishop of Washington, John Chane wrote his diocese on May 23 saying the decision to omit Robinson had left him “deeply troubled.” The “real issue” was not Robinson, he argued, but “leadership within the Anglican Communion.”

“Until we are able to separate ourselves from our fixation on human sexuality as the root of our divisions and address the dynamics of power and leadership in the Communion, we are doomed to fail in Christ’s call to engage the world in the act of inclusive love and a mission-driven theology that claims justice, the rule of law and the respect for human rights as the core of our work as a Communion,” Bishop Chane said.

The Bishops of Arizona and Ohio, Kirk Smith and Mark Hollingsworth wrote their dioceses as well sounding similar themes. Both conceded Dr. Williams was within his rights not to invite Robinson, but argued the New Hampshire bishop’s “manner of life” was not a cause for scandal. While Robinson’s presence at Lambeth may be “awkward” for some, both believed him to be vessel for “reconciliation and resolution” that would benefit the work of the Conference.

California Bishop Marc Andrus was equally critical writing on his website “The isolation and exile of Bishop Robinson rebukes the bright vision of the unity of the Church, and substitutes the mechanism of the diabolic, the shattering of communion and integrity.”

Bishop Minns told supporters on May 23 Dr. Williams faced an “impossible task” and was “confronted by two irreconcilable truth claims.” However the Lambeth invitation decision had ignored “the underlying issue” elevating “process over principle.”

Plans to recast Lambeth from a gathering of bishops into a graduate seminar were unwise. “The Lambeth Conference has been reduced to a meeting where bishops and their spouses simply gather for group bible study, prayer and shared reflection. These are significant activities but hardly justify the enormous expense of such an extended and world-wide gathering,” he wrote.

Bring the bishops together for study and reflection without a “shared understanding of what the Bible is, who Jesus is and what he has done for us” would not lead to a common voice from the Church on presenting the Gospel to a “hurting world.”

Dr. Williams decision to invite the Episcopal bishops “prior to the release of their final response to the Primates’ concerns and demands for repentance” appeared “preemptive and even dismissive” Bishop Murphy wrote on May 24.

Bishop Murphy, like Bishop Chane saw the decision as a failure of “leadership” by Dr. Williams, but noted the center of gravity within the Communion was moving South. “I expect Archbishop Kolini [of Rwanda] and other Global South leaders will address this matter in a decisive way at their upcoming meetings this fall,” he said.

South American Primate, Archbishop Gregory Venables, told The Daily Telegraph on Monday the situation was a “mess.” “Unless there is a major shift there are going to be significant absences from Lambeth,” he said.

“The fact that Gene Robinson isn’t going to be at Lambeth is important. But the gesture towards the liberal American bishops is far, far more significant,” Archbishop Venables said.

Meanwhile the Archbishop of Uganda, the Most Rev. Henry Luke Orombi announced a boycott of the Lambeth Conference in a statement released Wednesday.

The statement referred to last years Counsel of Anglican Provinces in Africa (CAPA) Road to Lambeth Statement which said the Church of Uganda would not attend the conference if “violators of the Lambeth resolution” were invited.

The statement read: “We note that all the American Bishops who consented to, participated in, and have continued to support the consecration as bishop of a man living in a homosexual relationship have been invited to the Lambeth Conference. These are Bishops who have violated the Lambeth Resolution 1.10, which rejects “homosexual practice as incompatible with Scripture” and “cannot advise the legitimising or blessing of same sex unions nor ordaining those involved in same gender unions.”

“Accordingly, the House of Bishops of the Church of Uganda stands by its resolve to uphold the Road to Lambeth.”

Read the Comments on the AACBlog
and at Thinking Anglicans on this general issue.

The Primate of Uganda, Archbishop Henry Orombi has been named chairman of the African organizing committee for the Lausanne Committee for World Evangelization’s (LCWE) third international congress in Cape Town.

The third congress of evangelical leaders will focus engage “worldviews increasingly hostile to Christianity, the threat of terrorism, and HIV/AIDS” as well as the “new opportunities and new technologies” available for Christian mission, LCWE chairman the Rev. Douglas Birdsall said on May 4.

Approximately 4000 church leaders from 200 countries are expected to attend the Oct 16-25, 2010 congress, the LCWE said.  The date of 2010 was selected organizers note, to mark the 100^th anniversary of the Edinburgh World Missionary Conference, and the 200^th anniversary of English missionary William Carey’s call for the first international missionary conference.

“We believe the 200th anniversary of William Carey’s vision and the centennial of its fulfillment is an appropriate time to, once again, encourage international leaders to come together to chart the course for the work of world evangelization in the 21st century,” Dr. Birdsall said.

Anglicans have played significant roles in the 1974 Congress and the second, 1989 Manila Congress.

Receiving the March 18 letter in which the Rt. Rev. Jackson Tembo, Bishop of South Rwenzori in the Anglican Church of Uganda, announced that his diocese will not accept money to fund an HIV/AIDS program from the Diocese of Central Pennsylvania was difficult for the Rt. Rev. Michael W. Creighton. In a written response to the The Living Church, Bishop Creighton said “It felt like a Good Friday nail in the compassion of Christ.”

“This week our office accessed information on the position of the Diocese of Central Pennsylvania concerning their position on the consent on the New Hampshire Election,” Bishop Tembo wrote. “It reads ‘Yes’ for the clergy order and for the sitting Bishop. This places a theological conflict between our two dioceses because South Rwenzori Diocese upholds the Holy Scriptures as true word of God.”

Bishop Creighton said he was perplexed by the decision to break relations as the Windsor Report had encouraged “consultation” and not confrontation. “Our Gospel understanding,” he said, is “when people were labeled as ‘sinners and wrong doers,’ Jesus invited himself into relationship, not out of relationship.”

Bishop Creighton said he had written to Bishop Tembo noting “our dismay that our consent to the election of a bishop in New Hampshire appears to be more important than the compassionate ministry we have shown with his own people who are struggling with and dying of AIDS.”

Since the diocese began its companion relationship with South Rwenzori in 2001, Central Pennsylvania purchased a truck for the diocese and provided tuition for medical students, medicines, and other funds to assist the diocese and the Bishop Masereka Foundation—a Ugandan NGO—to combat the spread of HIV/AIDS, Bishop Creighton told The Living Church.

“The total of this support exceeds $65,000,” Bishop Creighton said, but he disputed that the Ugandan diocese had requested $352,941 as was stated in Bishop Tembo’s letter.

On Sept 23, 2004, the House of Bishops of the Province of Uganda issued a statement saying, “we have taken the position that, as a result of broken communion, we will not take any financial gifts from [the Episcopal Church].”

Read it all in The Living Church.