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Welby's Real Father * Forged Letter Scandal at ACC-16 * TEC spins Lusaka * Canadian Anglicans use 'local option' to allow SS marriage * Nigeria: Gay Marriage is Madness * Sudan expands with new Archbishop * VTS wins Architecture award

Welby's Real Father * Forged Letter Scandal at ACC-16 * TEC spins Lusaka * Canadian Anglicans use 'local option' to allow SS marriage * Nigeria: Gay Marriage is Madness * Sudan expands with new Archbishop * VTS wins Architecture award *

Reputation and revelation. We need the humility of Mary. She accepted God's purpose, saying, 'May it be to me as you have said' . . . We also need Mary's courage. She was so completely willing for God to fulfil his purpose, that she was ready to risk the stigma of being an unmarried mother, of being thought an adulteress herself and of bearing an illegitimate child. She surrendered her reputation to God's will. I sometimes wonder if the major cause of much theological liberalism is that some scholars care more about their reputation than about God's revelation. Finding it hard to be ridiculed for being naive and credulous enough to believe in miracles, they are tempted to sacrifice God's revelation on the altar of their own respectability. I do not say that they always do so. But I feel it right to make the point because I have myself felt the strength of this temptation. --- John R.W. Stott

I would speculate as to the reasons why congregations willfully choose revisionist priests, and while there may not be one unifying cause, let me suggest that people cannot know what they should look for, or look out for, in a religious leader if they have not studied the mistakes of the past as recorded for us in the Bible and in the history of the Church. Generations of American Episcopalians have not been grounded in Bible study or in the study of Church history and doctrine, and therefore are no longer capable of making choices that are truly Spirit led. --- The Underground Pewster

To say it in the plainest way possible. Modern feminist categories have fallen into the way of idolatry, the way all human categories eventually do. An idolatry that dehumanizes the other and breaks people and systems apart rather than putting them back together. And it's gotten to be so bad that I, as a Christian, am unwilling to brand myself with that label. Feminism, at its core, is inconsistent with my Christianity. So while I'm grateful for the sacrifice of the women of yesteryear, I'm not willing to compromise with a rigid political agenda that doesn't build up the humanity of massive portions of the human family. --- Anne Kennedy

It becomes a death spiral for the denomination when the keys to the Church are handed over to revisionist bishops and priests time and time again who ensure that the fundamentals of Christianity are not taught to future generations. Those future generations of blissfully ignorant pewsitters will continue to make poor choices, and as long as there are enough of them to pay the bills, the church will stagger on...to its doom. --- The Underground Pewster

Dear Brothers and Sisters
www.virtueonline.org
April 15, 2016

Who's your daddy? Well, now we know. It turns out that Archbishop Justin Welby's father was not Mr. Gavin Welby, but the late Sir Anthony Montague Browne, the personal private secretary to Winston Churchill, who had a brief affair with Welby's mother when both were stone drunk.

The story is right out of a soap opera Days of our (Anglican) Lives, but it garnered much sympathy and deep understanding from readers across the board, especially when Welby and his mother acknowledged the truth after a DNA test was done.

This comes as a complete surprise, said Welby. The story is his mother (Jane Williams) and father (Gavin Welby) were both alcoholics at the time.

When it comes to headlines in a national newspaper, surely it doesn't come better than this: "Outpouring of respect for Archbishop Justin Welby after DNA paternity 'surprise'." The Archbishop of Canterbury is on the way to becoming a national treasure, one of the few public figures in the land beyond reproach or criticism, rather like our soon to be 90 years old Queen. It is the sort of position that a Catholic prelate can only dream of. And it is not simply the result of good public relations or spin.

Welby responded, appropriately enough, saying that we are who we are because of our relationship with Jesus Christ, the Redeemer. Archbishop Welby's simple pronouncement emerges from the hinterland of Augustinian theology. We become ourselves when we accept the call of God. We find ourselves when we are found by God. This is a wonderful antidote to the contemporary narcissistic search for our supposed true selves.

One or two observers did note that the timing seemed to be interesting in that it occurred at a time designated to gender sympathy for his failing efforts to keep the communion together, with the paternity story coinciding with the 'bad news' story of Lusaka and the ACC rebellion. You can read more in today's digest.

Ironically, the design of the logo of the Anglican Consultative Council meeting in Lusaka, Zambia mirrors the shape of the roof of Lusaka Cathedral, a cathedral built on the top of a hill, whose roof can be seen from around the city of Lusaka. The colors used in the image are all the colors in the flags of Botswana, Malawi, Zimbabwe and Zambia - the countries of the dioceses that make up the Province of Central Africa who invited the ACC to Lusaka. Someone observed that, put together, the flags look very much like the LGBTQI flag.

*****

A brouhaha over three Kenyan bishops who attended the Lusaka ACC-16 gabfest heated up when the Archbishop of Kenya Eliud Wabukala denied that he signed or approved a letter released under his signature that appeared to change Kenya's stance on its boycott of the meeting of Anglican leaders in Zambia this week.

The forgery was a ruse to defy his authority and justify the attendance of the Kenyan delegation in Lusaka.

In a letter released to the diocese, the archbishop said he had been in northern Kenya when he realized the Kenya delegation had tickets and reservations to travel to Lusaka. As he could not get there, he sent an aide to attend a meeting with the leader of the delegation to explain the Archbishop's position that was against the delegation traveling to the Anglican Consultative Council meeting.

Nigeria, Uganda, Kenya and Rwanda, the Southern Cone, Jerusalem and the Middle East have all boycotted the meeting, and Archbishop Wabukala had intended that Kenya should do the same.

He said the delegation then decided they would go to Lusaka. They drafted the letter in question, asked him to sign it and read it to him over his cell phone.

Parts of the document were acceptable, the archbishop noted: "the ACK does not approve of TEC. We support the Global South. We support the primates' meeting."

Wabukala said the line on his cell phone had not been clear and he was unable to make out everything in the letter. "I was not comfortable. So I said I will come back and see what it is."

He added: "So when I came back to the office, I found the letter had been released under my signature. This is not what I said. So I was real annoyed. I called the office of communications and said 'please do not put that thing out because it was not what I wrote'."

The letter was signed with a "rubber stamp", a digital signature used for internal church memorandums.

He said it presented a false position to the Kenyan Church and the wider Anglican Communion. "I think it is a bit of a misunderstanding, a very clear misunderstanding. That statement does not bear my position."

The secretary general of the Anglican Consultative Council, Josiah Idowu-Fearon, got in on the act and said the unsubstantiated public allegations of forgery against the members of the Kenyan delegation were scurrilous and untrue, and went on to say that it was a "false impression" that the Episcopal Church delegates were in Lusaka in defiance of the will of the Primates who spelled out "consequences" at their meeting in January over the US decision to back gay marriage.

He said the Archbishop of Canterbury had fulfilled his responsibilities and asked those members of interfaith or ecumenical bodies who are from TEC and whose appointment he controls, to stand down, and they have done so.

The Archbishop of Canterbury, Justin Welby, said; "As Archbishop of Canterbury, I have acted on the Primates' decision in those areas for which I have responsibility. It is both my and the Primates' desire, hope and prayer that the Anglican Consultative Council should also share in working through the consequences of our impaired relationships."

We may never know who leaked what to whom and in the end it doesn't really matter. The three Kenyan bishops did show up in Lusaka in defiance of their archbishop, and it would appear that the ring leader, the Rt. Rev. Joel Waweru, might have killed his chance to be the next Archbishop of Kenya to replace the retiring Eliud Wabukala. Are there cracks in the Kenyan House of Bishops over gay marriage? Nope.

*****

The Episcopal Church began almost immediately to spin what happened in Lusaka, Zambia, this week. TEC and its individual members earned praise from Anglican Communion Secretary General ,Archbishop Josiah Idowu-Fearon, for working hard to walk together despite differences over same-sex marriage. Really, and that is why five Anglican provinces absented themselves, including Nigeria, Uganda, Rwanda, The Southern Cone.

The secretary general's remarks came in his report to the Anglican Consultative Council about this work since he took up his post last July.

The 78th General Convention's decided last summer to change canonical language that defines marriage as being between a man and a woman (Resolution A036) and, in Resolution A054, to authorize two new marriage rites with language allowing them to be used by same-sex or opposite-sex couples. Resolution A054 also requires bishops who oppose same-sex marriage to "make provision for all couples asking to be married in this Church to have access to these liturgies."

Idowu-Fearon praised the resolution's provision that "no bishop, priest, deacon or lay person should be coerced or penalized in any manner, nor suffer any canonical disabilities, as a result of his or her theological objection to, or support for, the 78th General Convention's action contained in this resolution." The secretary general also said he was happy to learn about a small group of bishops that will be appointed to continue seeking unity within the House of Bishops and within and between dioceses.

That's not praise, that's compromise, and based on past experience in TEC over women's ordination, there will be a brief window for remaining orthodox Episcopalians to get out before the hammer comes down and same-sex marriage is mandated. We have been down the road before and we know where it ends.

*****

Some priests are likely to marry same-sex couples even if the marriage canon change fails to pass, says an orthodox Anglican priest in the Anglican Church of Canada.

Canadian Archbishop Fred Hiltz has suggested that even if the vote to change the Marriage Canon fails to pass at General Synod, some priests will ignore the fact and go ahead with same-sex marriages anyway. Although Hiltz frames it as "civil disobedience", one is left with the impression that he is dropping a broad hint to liberal dioceses as to how they should proceed.

The same strategy was adopted by the national church in 2010, when at the General Synod, while approval was not given for dioceses to start blessing same-sex unions, it was understood that many dioceses would still do so. And they did. An easy solution for Hiltz, since he was absolved of responsibility and liberal dioceses got what they wanted.

"In 2010, we had the local option for same-sex blessings, along with the assurance that there would be no same-sex marriages," a source told VOL. (For the record 'local option' was a political tactic that TEC effectively used).

"In 2016, the ACoC will have the local option for same-sex marriages, along with the assurance that no priests will be compelled to perform them.

"In 2020 we will have.... well, you get the drift.

"Some bishops have expressed concern about the possibility that some priests may go ahead and marry gay couples in the event that a resolution changing the marriage canon to allow same-gender marriages is rejected at General Synod this summer, said Archbishop Fred Hiltz, primate of the Anglican Church of Canada.

"If it's not approved, then, as we sometimes, say...there could be some 'civil disobedience' on the part of clergy and parishes, and the bishops are going to have to handle that, because all of us that are ordained make a solemn promise to conform to the doctrine, discipline and worship of the Anglican Church of Canada," Hiltz told the Anglican Journal April 12. Hiltz made the comments during an interview on the House of Bishops meeting last week, April 4--8.

*****

The Rt. Rev. Emmanuel Kanamani, Bishop of the Anglican Diocese in Maiduguri, Borno state, Nigeria, says "gay marriage is madness of the highest order and is responsible for so many problems in the world." Bishop Kanamani was speaking during the 2016 Synod of the Diocese in Maiduguri on Friday.

Bishop Kanamani regretted that those who reject gay marriage were regarded as primitive people, noting that, "If men marry men and women marry women, who will give birth to the next generation?

"They say it is freedom, but I assure you it will render negative effect to the entire society,'' the Bishop added.

*****

A portent of things to come for the Anglican Church of Canada. Major debt has caused Inuvik's Anglican Church to lose its pastor. The Anglican Church of the Ascension faces a debt of more than $100,000, as well as an uncertain future. After nearly three years of service, pastor Steve Martin left Inuvik when he learned the parish would not be able to pay his stipend.

Last week, after nearly three years of service, Pastor Steve Martin left Inuvik for Ontario, when he learned the parish would not be able to pay his monthly stipend come September. The church usually relies on donations from the local congregation to take care of buildings, the pastor's stipend and residence.

"In times past that works really well," said Martin, "but in economical situations where we struggle financially, there's things that can't always be paid. The donations that were once big on the plate aren't there anymore."

*****

The Anglican Archbishop of Adelaide Jeffrey Driver is to retire after almost 11 years in the pivotal role.

In an unexpected move, Archbishop Driver, 65, advised parishioners of his intention to step down in August.

Archbishop Driver was elected in 2005, at a time when the church was deeply demoralized following the damaging Brandenburg child abuse scandal that cost former Archbishop Ian George his job.

Under his leadership, the diocese has been transformed and revitalized and now leads the world in practices and protocols aimed at both preventing and detecting child abuse and dealing with survivors.

*****

The Episcopal Church in South Sudan's Central Equatoria state said it is going to appoint its own Archbishop to represent the region. Currently, The Episcopal Church of Sudan and South Sudan has an overall Archbishop, Daniel Deng Bul, whose seat is in Juba, Central Equatoria.

However, the Bishop of Yei Diocese, Hillary Adeba, said that the church held a synod which decided to group different dioceses into clusters with their own administrations. Adeba said in the new cluster system, Daniel Deng Bul would not be called an Archbishop, but rather a primate and metropolitan who oversees the province.

He added that there is no special time for appointing an Archbishop for Central Equatoria, but the process would not exceed three years. He added that renovating premises for the establishment of the new cluster would cost two million South Sudanese Pounds.

*****

In Conway, New Hampshire they demolished Christ Episcopal Church rectory and razed it to the ground, making way for an auto parts store. Preservationists decried the razing of the rectory of the Christ Episcopal Church on Pine Street in North Conway. The 1800-built structure was taken down in just under two hours by an excavator. The Rev. Richard Belshaw, the new pastor of Christ Episcopal Church, said the rectory building was deemed by church leaders to be beyond repair.

I suppose we should be grateful that it was not sold to a group of Islamists for a mosque.

*****

If you had any doubts about the loyalties of former Southern Malawi bishop, James Tengatenga, this should put your mind to rest. In Palm Springs, California, last Sunday before heading out the door to Lusaka, he gave the blessing at the 60th birthday party for the Rev. Canon Albert Ogle, an openly gay Episcopal priest who is known around the world for his activism on behalf of LGBT people. This is the same Tengatenga who networked with LGBT leaders and their straight allies at an informal gathering in Palm Springs, and the same Tengatenga who gave an unprecedented two-hour interview with this LGBT media organization -- his first major interview since the controversy erupted last summer.

He's bought and paid for by TEC, which tells you everything.

He was elected chairman of the ACC in 2009 for a six-year term, which will conclude at the 2016 gathering in Zambia. Tengatenga says he will not stand for re-election, and is ready to pass the torch to someone else.

Does this mean he will be a man without a country? Tengatenga says yes and no. "No, in a sense that I can go back [to Malawi] -- but to what?" he said as we lounged in the shade next to one of the five swimming pools at the modestly-priced spa and resort hotel where we all were staying. "I would be a nuisance to my successor as bishop, because I would not be restricted to speaking my mind. At least now, it's not an option." You can be sure that TEC will find him a sinecure, he is the perfect foil (he's African) that they can use against the GAFCON primates and bishops.

*****

Virginia Theological Seminary (VTS) based in Alexandria, VA. proudly announced that Immanuel Chapel received from Faith & Form Magazine an award in the category of "Religious Architecture: New Facilities and from Period Homes," and won a 2016 Palladio Design Award from Traditional Building and Period Homes magazines in the "New Design and Construction" category. Robert A.M. Stern Architects (RAMSA) Partners Robert A.M. Stern and Grant Marani led the design of Immanuel Chapel, which was consecrated on October 13, 2015.

"We were very pleased to receive news of the awards from Faith & Form and Traditional Building and Period Homes magazines," said the Rev. James Barney Hawkins IV, Ph.D., vice president for Institutional Advancement at VTS. "Immanuel Chapel deserves such recognition! As we live into the Chapel, we continue to be grateful for the Seminary's creative and satisfying collaboration with Robert A.M. Stern Architects."

The Annual Religious Art and Architecture Design Awards program is co-sponsored by Faith & Form Magazine and the Interfaith Forum on Religion, Art and Architecture (IFRAA), a knowledge community of the American Institute of Architects. The awards program was founded in 1978, with the goal of honoring the best in architecture, liturgical design and art for religious spaces. The program offers five primary categories for awards: Religious Architecture, Liturgical/Interior Design, Sacred Landscape, Religious Arts, and Unbuilt Work.

The Palladio Awards honor outstanding achievement in traditional design.

*****

The Rt. Rev. Dr. Steven Croft is the new Bishop of Oxford, Downing Street announced this week. Bishop Steven succeeds the Rt. Rev. John Pritchard, who retired in October, 2014, after seven years in the post.

Bishop Steven, who is 58, is currently Bishop of Sheffield, a role he has held since 2009. He serves on the Archbishop's Council and Chairs the Ministry Council of the Church of England. He has been a member of the House of Lords since 2013.

He has a passion for mission and evangelism and for finding creative ways of sharing the Gospel. He is the co-author of the Emmaus and Pilgrim courses, both of which are resources to help people engage with the Christian faith.

A source told VOL that Steven is a former Evangelical, but sadly and to all intents and purposes, a company man. Management has replaced Atonement.

*****

A former Archbishop of Canterbury has warned that Labour will not be ready to govern if Labour leader Jeremy Corbyn does not act to combat antisemitism.

Lord Carey of Clifton said he did not wish to suggest that the Labour Party was riddled with anti-Semitism. However, the problems were real enough that Corbyn had already promised to deal with the issue as a matter of urgency.

"If he does not take effective action, this will demonstrate that the Labour Party is not ready to govern," said Lord Carey in a lecture, Combatting History's Oldest Hate - A Christian Perspective. Antisemitic attitudes stubbornly persist in a few dark corners in Britain."

Lord Carey was speaking in Emmanu-El Synagogue in Manhattan, in the US.

He was delivering the annual Dorothy Gardner Adler State of Anti-Semitism Lecture, endowed by Simon Wiesenthal Centre trustee, Allen Adler.

Lord Carey said there have been worrying signs in recent years. The Community Security Trust, a respected Jewish organization, reported in 2014, that antisemitic incidents in the UK reached their highest level in 30 years.

*****

The Church of Norway voted at its annual conference to allow gay marriage, with the Christian body joining the French Protestant Church, the U.S. Episcopal and Presbyterian Church (U.S.A.) denominations, among others, in now supporting same-sex unions.

Of the 115 delegates at the Lutheran denomination's synod, 88 backed embracing gay marriage, while also including a caveat for priests who do not wish to take part in same-sex weddings that allows them to opt out of doing so, Reuters reported.

The denomination itself called the institutional change "a historic decision that marks a shift in the church's teaching on marriage," with the vote reportedly receiving a standing ovation from most of the participants in attendance.

Though the Church of Norway is declining in prevalence, 74 percent of Norwegians are still members, but locals say the churches are for the most part empty.

As TheBlaze has reported, the battle over gay marriage within churches across the world continues to rage. Last June, the Episcopal Church officially joined Presbyterian Church (U.S.A.) and the United Church of Christ, in becoming the third mainline denomination to embrace gay marriage rites -- a move that came just days after the U.S. Supreme Court legalized same-sex unions.

The theological debate over gay marriage is likely nowhere near over.

*****

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Thank you for your support.

David

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