http://www.virtueonline.org/portal/modules/news/article.php?storyid=8930
[VirtueOPnline] 3 Sep 2008--When the GAFCON primates met in London to decide how they would respond to the Lambeth Conference, they made their position abundantly clear - there will be no going back on what was accomplished in Jerusalem. The new ship of Anglican orthodoxy has set sail. It will not turn back.
In a single breath, they rejected any overture by the Archbishop of Canterbury that would require them to compromise on the faith once for all delivered to the saints. They will have no truck with sexual behavior outside of heterosexual marriage between a man and a woman.
The finality in their communiqué must have sent chills around Lambeth Palace and across town at the Anglican Communion Office run by Canon Kenneth Kearon and his liberal staff.
The only question left is whether the Archbishop of Canterbury wants to join the GAFCON primates or form his own Global South equivalent by co-opting Archbishops like John Chew (Singapore) and the CAPA (African) bishops. There is no middle ground. The high moral ground is now firmly in the hands of the Global South, so are the numbers.
GAFCON might have had only 303 bishops in Jerusalem, but they represent more than 75% of the Anglican Communion's church going worshippers. The 600 plus bishops at Lambeth represented less than 25% of the communion.
It is ironic that the largest bloc of bishops in attendance at Lambeth was The Episcopal Church USA with 127 bishops. The second largest contingent came from the Church of England, which registered 103 (39 diocesan and 64 suffragan/assistant bishops) people. The Episcopal Church has less than 800,000 church-going Episcopalians, the C of E a little over 1 million, the equivalent of two medium-sized Nigerian Anglican dioceses. The Lambeth conference had a budget shortfall. There was no budget shortfall for GAFCON attendees.
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