AMiA-Rwanda Break Is Serious Blow to North American-Global South Cooperation

By Robin G. Jordan

This week began with the news that Bishop Chuck Murphy of the Anglican Mission had submitted a letter to the Archbishop Onesphore Rwaje of the Anglican Church of Rwanda in which he states that he and a number of the Anglican Mission bishops under him have resigned from the Rwandan House of Bishops. A perusal of the letter that the Anglican Mission released to the media suggests that it was designed to be more than a letter of resignation but also was intended to influence Anglican Mission congregations, clergy, and mission partners’ perceptions of what is happening. Having claimed that the Anglican Mission was “embedded” in the Rwandan canons, Bishop Murphy is now claiming that the Anglican Mission was only a “personal prelature,” borrowing an argument taken from the so-called Washington Statement. (For an explanation of a "personal prelature," see the Addendum to my article, "What the Future Holds for the Anglican Mission." )

The Rwandan canons, however, do not require a formal application from a group of faithful Anglicans desiring godly oversight from the Church of Rwanda in order for the Rwandan House of Bishops to establish a missionary jurisdiction or society in their area of the world. For the past three years the Anglican Mission has been operating under the provisions of the 2008 Rwandan canons, particularly Canon 6. The Anglican Mission has been recognized by the Church of Rwanda as a missionary jurisdiction of the Province in North America. Bishop Murphy has been recognized by the Church of Rwanda as the Primatial Vicar of the Primate of Rwanda in North America. He has also represented himself as a Primatial Vicar of the Primate of Rwanda under the provisions of Canon 6 and been exercising the authority of a Primatial Vicar of the Primate of Rwanda under the provisions of the same canon.

Article I of the Canonical Charter for the Ministry of the Anglican Mission in Americas describes the Anglican Mission to be a “a Missionary Jurisdiction of the Anglican Province of Rwanda.” Article 3.2 of the Charter recognizes the Primatial Vicar to be “the presiding ecclesiastical authority of the Anglican Mission in the absence of the Primate of Rwanda.” Article 5.3 recognizes the Primatial Vicar to be the Chairman of the Board of Directors of the Anglican Mission and the chief executive officer of the Anglican Mission. The claims that Murphy makes in the letter to Archbishop Rwaje are a misrepresentation of the facts.

Further proof of Bishop Murphy’s misrepresentation of the facts is found in the Guiding Principles section of the Network Development Manual (May 23, 2006). It predates the 2008 Rwandan canons by two years. Under the heading “Authority” we read:

As Anglicans we are men and women under authority. In understanding the way in which this authority is manifested within the Mission Networks we begin with the Statement by the Episcopal Church of Rwanda on the creation of AMiA: “The Anglican Mission in America serves as a missionary outreach of the Province of Rwanda, under the authority of the Provincial Synod, the House of Bishops and the Archbishop of the Province.”

Under the provisions of Article V of the Anglican Mission’s Solemn Declaration the Anglican Mission ceases to exist if the altered by any means:

Article V. Unalterable Nature of the Solemn Declaration

The teaching of this Church is defined by adherence to the doctrinal norms and formularies found in the Solemn Declaration, consequently we make no provision for their alteration by addition or subtraction. Should this Solemn Declaration be altered by any means, this Church would thereby cease to exist. Any money or property owned by the Province per se would be returned to the donors or their heirs and where that was not possible it would be sold and given to an orthodox Christian missionary society as soon as possible.

When the Anglican Mission became a missionary jurisdiction of the Anglican Province of Rwanda under the provisions of Canon 6, the Anglican Mission as it had previously existed was dissolved under the provisions of Article V of the Solemn Declaration. The 2008 Rwandan canons embodied doctrine, language, norms and principles from the Roman Catholic Church’s Code of Canon Law that conflict with the doctrinal norms and formularies found in the Solemn Declaration and which did away with them. The Anglican Mission as an ecclesiastical organization now only exists as a missionary jurisdiction of the Anglican Province of Rwanda under the provisions of Canon 6 and the Canonical Charter for the Ministry of the Anglican Mission in Americas.

Since the Anglican Mission’s articles of incorporation and bylaws are not available for examination on its website, it is difficult to say how the Anglican Mission as a secular organization was affected by these changes. Under the provisions of Article 5.3 of the Anglican Mission’s Canonical Charter for Ministry the Primatial Vicar is the Chairman of the Board of Directors and chief executive officer of the Anglican Mission’s secular organization. If this is reflected in the Anglican Mission’s bylaws, Bishop Murphy can be expected to seek to make changes in the bylaws to retain his position as Chairman of the Board of Directors and chief executive officer and to retain control of Anglican Mission’s Board of Directors and its assets and funds.

Under the provisions of Article 8.3 of the Anglican Mission’s Canonical Charter for Ministry the Board of Directors in the event of the dissolution of the Anglican Mission is empowered “to dispose of all the assets to such organizations as shall at the time qualify as an exempt organization under Section 501 (c) (3) of the Internal Revenue Code of 1986 as the Board of Directors shall determine.” A Murphy-controlled Board of Directors could dispose of the assets to a successor organization established by Murphy, depriving of any benefit from their disposal those networks, churches, and pastors that remain with the Church of Rwanda.

The role of the Board of Directors in the allocation of resources is described in the Financial Responsibility section of the Network Development Manual (May 23, 2006). I have reproduced the entire section because it does not support Bishop Murphy’s statements regarding monies given to the Church of Rwanda. It also shows how the Board of Directors through its control of the purse strings exercises control over the Mission Networks and the congregations and clergy forming the Mission Networks.

All Anglican Mission congregations are expected to participate in the 10-10-10 stewardship model by which individuals give 10% to the church, the church gives 10% to the National Resource Center (“NRC”), and the NRC gives 10% to our international sponsors. Participation in 10-10-10 should be viewed as a floor not a ceiling. It takes substantially more money to support the work of the Anglican Mission than 10-10-10 will provide. Frankly, this is the problem faced by any organization that is growing quickly – revenue lags expense. Although the Anglican Mission has been blessed from its inception by generous donors (individuals and churches) who have given substantial sums, continuing our growth requires that the increasing financial burden be spread across an increasing donor base. Fundraising is an important element of financial responsibility.

Mission Networks are expected to cooperate in the annual budget process in which Mission Network revenue and expense for the upcoming year are estimated. What would constitute a “legitimate Network expense” will vary from Network to Network depending on the individual mission strategy of each. The budgeting process is the time to ask and answer these questions. The Mission Network budgets roll up to the overall Anglican Mission in America budget. As we continue to grow, administering our fiscal dimension is not a trivial task. An accurate budget at all levels is a critical planning tool.

Once a Mission Network is officially recognized, and so long as its congregations are substantially faithful to the 10-10-10 model, approximately one-half of the funds received by the NRC from that Mission Network’s congregations will be reserved for use in Mission Network administered mission projects. Mission Networks must submit Project Plans to the NRC as a first step in funding a mission project. Preparing a Project Plan encourages the participants to think systematically through the project requirements.

A properly written Project Plan will set forth in concise detail the missionary objectives of the project, interim targets that will show if the project is on track, and the timing and amounts of financial, personnel and other resources needed. Project Plans recommended by the Mission Network will be submitted to the Anglican Mission Board of Directors, to allow the Board to effectively plan for resource allocation. The Board reserves the right to require additional explanation if a project appears to be out of sync with the Mission
Network’s expressed missionary strategy.

Funding allocated to approved Project Plans will carry over from one fiscal year to the next, so a Mission Network should feel no annual pressure to “use or lose” funds dedicated to agreed upon mission projects. On the other hand, if Mission Network congregation contributions to the NRC fall below projected levels, adjustments to the project budgets may be necessary. Periodic reporting will be required in order for the Network Team and the NRC to ensure that contributions and expenditures are on track. Annual audits of Mission Network accounts will be conducted.

As may be seen from this section of the Network Development Manual, control of the Board of Directors is vital to Murphy’s control of the Anglican Mission. It is also critical to his creation of a successor organization to the Anglican Mission.

The corporate scandals of recent years offer insights into what is happening in the Anglican Mission. In a number of cases the complaints of stockholders and the investigations of regulatory agency brought wrongdoing into the open. As a non-profit organization the Anglican Mission has no stockholders and no stockholders’ meeting. But it does have stakeholders—the congregations, clergy, and mission partners of the Anglican Mission. The Rwandan House of Bishops is the closet thing to a regulatory agency overseeing the Anglican Mission. Murphy’s plan in breaking with the Church of Rwanda is to move out from under the oversight of the Rwandan House of Bishops as much of the Anglican Mission as he can persuade to join him and reorganize it into a successor organization without any real oversight. It is similar to a corporation moving its headquarters to a location outside the United States where there are no regulations, no regulatory agencies and no oversight.

What Bishop Murphy does in next few months and how he tries to spin it will be very revealing as to his character. Congregations and clergy—bishops included—who choose to join Murphy may come to regret their choice. What has happened to date has raises serious questions about Murphy’s commitment to Anglican doctrinal norms and formularies, his honesty, and his trustworthiness. It suggests that Murphy has cynically exploited the Anglican Province of Rwanda, milking the relationship between the Anglican Mission and its “international sponsors” for whatever benefits can be gained from that relationship.

While some in and outside the Anglican Mission may wish to see Bishop Murphy as the aggrieved party, this is clearly not the case. The Rwandans are the ones who rightly have a grievance. They made changes in their canons, believing that they were helping the Anglican Mission only to discover that the new canons they had adopted were a Trojan horse. Murphy and Canon Kevin Donlon had connived together to affect the overthrow of Evangelical Christianity in the Anglican Province of Rwanda. There is no explaining away Bishop Murphy’s culpability in this matter.

The global South now is faced with two threats from North America. One is modernism. The other is a virulent form of retrograde Anglo-Catholicism. Both seek to subvert the Evangelical Christian Faith that the global South Anglican provinces received from the Church of England. Anglicans in Africa, Asia, Australia, and South America now must be on guard against all Anglicans in North America, not fully able to trust them as friends due to the duplicity of Bishop Murphy and his Canon for Ecclesiastical Affairs.

The whole affair has spiritual warfare dimensions that must not be overlooked. Through the duplicity of Murphy and Donlon the enemy has struck a blow against the work that God is doing in Africa and North America. The enemy struck this blow in Rwanda where God had begun the East African Revival through which hundreds of thousands of Africans would come to know Jesus Christ and to accept Him as their Savior and Lord. It was the second blow that the enemy struck against this landlocked nation and its Christian community. The enemy struck this blow knowing that God is doing a mighty work that he could not stop but which he could greatly hinder.

In North America the enemy having turned the Anglican Church of Canada and the Episcopal Church in the United States from the teaching of the Scriptures and the true gospel, struck at the Anglican Mission in which God was at work. The enemy struck where the Anglican Mission was the weakest. This included its fragile commitment to given truth in Scripture and the desire of its chairman for greater influence and power.

The enemy struck at the alliance between conservative Anglicans in North America and orthodox Anglicans in the global South. The enemy has sought to cause the greatest hindrance to God’s work in Africa and North America that he can. This includes encouraging conservative North American Anglicans and orthodox global South Anglicans to turn away from the teaching of the Scriptures and the true gospel of salvation by grace by faith in Christ and to put their faith in the teaching of church tradition and a false gospel of good works and sacraments.

The tenor of Bishop Murphy’s resignation letter is no surprise. The theme for this January’s Anglican Winter Mission Conference is the Holy Spirit. To seasoned Anglican Mission watchers like myself, the announcement of this particular theme for the upcoming Winter Conference signaled that Murphy was going to announce a major initiative at that Winter Conference. Murphy uses gatherings like the Winter Conference and Clergy Retreats to generate support for new initiatives and to rally Anglican Mission congregations, clergy, and mission partners behind these undertakings. The use of the Holy Spirit as the theme of this January’s Winter Conference suggested that that the initiative that would be announced at the gathering would be a big one.

The Anglican Mission is described in its literature as riding on a wave of the Holy Spirit. The choice of theme suggested that Murphy was going to say something to the effect that he and other Anglican Mission leaders had discerned another wave of the Holy Spirit coming—the big wave—and were calling upon the Anglican Mission congregations, clergy, and mission partners to join them in catching it. It suggested that Murphy was going to announce that the Anglican Mission would be taking a new direction—a direction that he would claim was the work of the Holy Spirit.

A number of Anglican Mission congregations, clergy, and mission partners are charismatic and see Murphy as the God-anointed leader of the Anglican Mission. They are likely to give credence to such a claim. Due to the prevalence of “three streams” theology in the Anglican Mission with its emphasis upon piety and practice over doctrine, they are open to accepting retrograde Anglo-Catholic beliefs and practices that are likely to be a major part of this initiative—a successor organization to the Anglican Mission.

Plans for this initiative appear to have been in the pipe for some time. This suggests the possibility that Murphy may have even engineered the break with the Church of Rwanda and deliberately provoked the Rwandans.

Whatever happened, the spirit at work does not appear to be the Holy Spirit. The Holy Spirit is the spirit of truth, not deceitfulness. The Holy Spirit upholds the teaching of the Scriptures and the true gospel and does not replace them with error and superstition. The Holy Spirit does not prompt a man to take advantage of his friends as Murphy has taken advantage of the Rwandans.