Rowan Williams Friend or Foe?

Commentary by Robin G. Jordan

Do you remember the arguments that you had on the playground as a kid? Do you remember how good it felt when a friend took your side in a dispute? Right or wrong, you had someone who was backing you up. You had some who was on your side.

God, unlike human beings, looks at the heart and not the outward appearance. We, however, are not able to see directly into the heart as God does—into an individual’s innermost being. We must look at actions and words and then draw our conclusions from them about the individual’s heart. Since his appointments, Anglicans like myself have been struggling to fathom the heart of Archbishop Williams. We have been trying to figure out whose side is he really on. It has not been an easy task.

Archbishop Williams was quick to denounce the alleged anti-gay statements of a Nigerian bishop; yet to my knowledge he has not made a public apology to that bishop since it was subsequently determined that the bishop in question had not made those statements. As he was flying to New Orleans for the meeting with TEC House of Bishops the Internet was full of stories of the latest pro-gay statements Williams had made and his secretive meeting with gay and lesbian church groups in England. We read about his refusal to accept phone calls from the five conservative bishops who may take their dioceses out of TEC. In his two days of meetings with TEC bishops Williams was reported to have said very little. The four primates who were with him addressed the bishops. Only one of these addresses was released. One TEC bishop announced his resignation following those meetings. He attributed his decision to resign to recent developments in the denomination.

Before Williams left New Orleans, he publicly stated that he did not see the need for disciplinary action against TEC and he was going to report his conclusions to the other primates. He went on to say that the TEC bishops were highly committed to the Anglican Communion. He also stated that had no plans to cancel the 2008 Lambeth Conference or to call an emergency meeting of the primates.

On Tuesday TEC House of Bishops released its highly unsatisfactory response to the Primates’ Dar es Salaam Communique. While calling for restraint in the election, confirmation, and consecration of another sexually active gay bishop and the adoption of official rites for the blessing of same gender unions, the bishops took no action to stop the ordination of sexually active gays and lesbians in TEC or the blessing of same gender unions by priests in their dioceses, or to deprive Gene Robinson of his bishopric. It was business as usual. It certainly was not the repentance, the turning around, for which the global South primates have repeatedly called.

The response of the House of Bishops has done nothing to mend the tear in the fabric of the Anglican Communion. Archbishops Akinola and Orami have condemned the response, as have conservative Anglican groups in the United States. TEC continues to hemorrhage members. A number of conservative clergy and congregations are reviewing their options.

The response of the House of Bishops was purely cosmetic. It was intended to give the appearance of meeting at least half way what TEC bishops have characterized as the “demands” of the Tanzania Communique. The House of Bishops responded to the recommendations of the Tanzania Communique as it did to the recommendations of the Windsor Report. The aim is to keep the primates from taking any disciplinary action against TEC while providing TEC with more time to influence the other provinces of the Anglican Communion and to bring them around to TEC way of thinking. This seeming compliance is upon close examination no compliance at all. The liberal bishops have no intention of backing away from the present course of the denomination. Their real intention is to wear down their opponents until they cease their opposition. It is a strategy borrowed from gay rights campaigners. The liberal bishops believe that global South Anglicans will inevitably come to think like they do. It is just a matter of time. The Tanzania Communique represented a setback of sorts but one they could use to their advantage.

In his address to the House of Bishops in New Orleans, Archbishop Anis put his finger upon what divides TEC from most of the Anglican Communion. He drew the attention of the bishops to how Anglicans outside the United States see TEC not just as a “different church” but also as a “different religion”. The denomination’s radical position on homosexuality is only the presenting problem, a symptom that causes people to recognize the existence of a complex of related difficulties. The decreasing place that TEC gives the Bible in the denomination looms large among these difficulties. When these problems are viewed together, they embody a significant theological shift in the denomination away from orthodox Christianity and biblical Anglicanism. This is evident more in some parts of TEC than others. It may not be immediately recognized because of the veneer of traditional Anglo-Catholic worship that overlays it.

This shift is evident in the Episcopal churches in the part of Kentucky in which I am now living. It represents a radical change from what I heard preached and taught in the same churches over 20 years ago when I first began to visit the area. The message is not just one of the full inclusion of gays and lesbians in the church but of universalism, pluralism, and social and economic liberation. At the same time the worship in these churches can be characterized as traditionally Anglo-Catholic – candles, eucharistic vestments, elaborate ritual, processions, chanted prayers and other liturgical texts, incense, vested choirs, organs, standard hymns and anthems, and Holy Communion on weekdays, as well as Sundays.

Of the five Episcopal churches in the area, only two give any appearance of real vitality. The latter can be attributed in part to their location, one in the downtown district of the region’s only city and the other in a university town. The area had six churches but the sixth church was closed in 2005 and its congregation merged with that of another church. One of the remaining five churches gives all appearances of being slated for closure at some future date: it is little more than a preaching station.

Before he flew to New Orleans, Archbishop Aspinall talked about the need for “compromise”. However, one cannot compromise with what is clearly heresy. What is happening in TEC goes beyond a simple difference of opinion over human sexuality. It is not something upon which one can agree to disagree, a matter of secondary importance upon which Anglicans can amicably have different opinions and even reach compromises.

The five Episcopal churches in which I was involved in Louisiana were fairly orthodox. They upheld the historic Christian faith as the former Protestant Episcopal Church had received it. One of these churches was the parish of my youth where I was a regular attender and then a member for 26 odd years, where I was confirmed and where my nieces were baptized and my youngest niece confirmed. Another was a church that I helped to start and where I served as senior lay reader for 15 years.

However, the so-called “progressive” ideology that dominates Episcopal thinking at the national level is unavoidable in my part of Kentucky. This has, on a personal note, prevented me from becoming involved in the worship and life of any of the Episcopal churches in the area. It has also highlighted for me that the problems that beset TEC are more far reaching than the homosexuality issue that has gained the most attention from the media.

In the last decade of the 20th century I grew increasingly concerned over the apathetic and even hostile attitude of Episcopalians toward evangelism. I began to identify more and more with Anglicans in the global South where the Anglican Church was experiencing tremendous growth, clear evidence that for global South Anglicans reaching the lost and planting new churches were actual values and not values to which they aspired. Even the Church of England was displaying some vitality in its two provinces where Anglican Evangelicals were involved in evangelistic outreach and new church development.

I became convinced that if the Anglican Church was to enjoy similar growth in the United States, it would not be through the official US representative of the Anglican Church, the then Episcopal Church USA. In order to reach the spiritually disconnected and unchurched in the United States, it would be necessary to plant non-Episcopal Anglican churches in the shadow of the Episcopal Church. These churches would need to be Bible-based and mission-oriented, and wholeheartedly committed to the Great Commission. The Episcopal Church did not offer an environment conducive to the establishment of such churches.

It was also increasingly evident to me that TEC, despite its standing as a member of the Anglican Communion, was not really Anglican. Indeed developments in TEC had moved the denomination out of the Anglican via media and onto a different path early in its history. Contemporary Episcopalianism is arguably a divergent tradition from Anglicanism. It was for me the beginning of the transition from the ranks of those who see themselves as Episcopalians to the ranks of those who view TEC as a “different church” from the Anglican Church and a “different religion” from orthodox Christianity and biblical Anglicanism.

This transition has taken several years. One of the consequences is that I no longer have a church home. Western Kentucky has no Anglican churches that share my enthusiasm for the Biblical and Reformation theology of the Thirty-Nine Articles of Religion of 1562 and the Book of Common Prayer of 1552, 1559, 1604, and 1662 or my tastes in church music. Right now I am sojourning with a two-year old Southern Baptist church start that is primarily targeted at university students and has its Sunday worship gatherings on campus. It is an opportunity to be a fellow worker with God in ministering to these young adults. When I arrived in town, I looked for a new church start where God was at work; God led me to this one.

At times I wonder if Archbishop Williams gives any thought to the plight of Anglicans like myself. Does he care about us as much as he seems to care about gays and lesbians? During his visits to the United States he has not, to my knowledge, met individually or in groups with any of the clergy and congregations that have left TEC. He met with gay and lesbian church groups in England. He met with TEC House of Bishops. Why does he not meet with us? What are we to conclude from his actions and words? These questions deserve an answer.

While Archbishop Williams has repeatedly spoken out against the stigmatization and ill treatment of gays and lesbians, he has not made any strong public statements on the behalf of conservative Episcopalians persecuted by their bishops because they cannot in good conscience support the actions of the 2003 and 2006 General Conventions. He has chosen to view as irregular the Nigerian, Kenyan, and Ugandan consecrations of American bishops as did his predecessor viewed the Rwandan consecrations even though Lord Carey has publicly changed his view of the Rwandan consecrations. He is going ahead with the 2008 Lambeth Conference to which the TEC bishops are invited even though the Nigerian bishops have asked him to postpone the conference. He has talked about inviting Gene Robinson to the 2008 Lambeth Conference as a guest or observer. These and other statements and actions reveal a lack of sympathy and understanding upon his part for those who dissent from the General Conventions’ actions and their international supporters and an unwillingness to hold TEC accountable for these actions and the deep division that they have caused in the Anglican Communion. They also suggest that Williams believes that he can ignore the global South primates with impunity. They are not going to do anything but bluster.

The liberal TEC bishops lambasted Archbishop Williams for “dehumanizing gays” at his meetings with them in New Orleans, as gay advocacy groups have in the past whenever he teetered toward the hard line of the global South primates. However, I do not see Williams as being on the side of people like myself who cannot in good conscience embrace the normalization of homosexuality in the Church or society based not only upon what we understand is the Bible’s teaching upon homosexual practice but also upon how we view the authority and inspiration of the Holy Scriptures. He has questioned our understanding of the Bible and he certainly does not share our view of biblical authority and inspiration. His past comments suggest that he essentially views us as bigoted and homophobic. Those who believe that he is on our side are deceiving themselves. They are engaging in wishful thinking.

If any lesson is to be drawn from the events of the last three years, it is not to put our trust in men but to place our confidence in God. This is also a theme that runs through the Old Testament. We may not always understand God’s ways but of one thing we can be certain, he does have our best interest at heart. He loves us. We are important to him. God is better than even having a friend on our side. People are always changing their minds. They are blown this way and that. God, on the other hand, is unchanging and changeless. We can trust him. He is the best friend of all.