Archbishop Tutu's Daughter Blocked From Conducting Funeral in England

[47of74]

Sad story out of the UK

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The Church of England has banned Archbishop Desmond Tutu’s daughter from conducting her godfather’s funeral because she is married to a woman.

Martin Kenyon, who died earlier this month at age 92, left explicit wishes for his goddaughter, Reverend Mpho Tutu van Furth, who is an Anglican priest, to conduct his funeral.

But the request from his family to hold the ceremony at his local church in Shropshire, England was turned down by the Diocese of Hereford because the daughter of the Nobel Peace Prize winner is in a same-sex marriage.

Rather than entrust the funeral service to someone else, Kenyon’s family opted to hold it in a marquee in the garden of the vicarage next door.

Kind of caught me off guard because I thought the Church of England had been open to same sex relationships given the hostility some parts of the Anglican Communion show to it and the Episcopal Church.  Guess not though.

[Hane]

@47of74, I thought the same—till I remembered all the conservative Episcopalian parishes in the US that decided to align themselves with the Anglicans over opposition to the marriage equality issue.

[47of74]

59 minutes ago, Hane said:

@47of74, I thought the same—till I remembered all the conservative Episcopalian parishes in the US that decided to align themselves with the Anglicans over opposition to the marriage equality issue.

Actually, the Episcopal Church is part of the worldwide Anglican Communion.  It's the US branch of the company, as it were.

The US conservatives who left the Episcopal Church and formed their own denomination only aligned themselves with some of the more conservative Anglican provinces.  (Uganda, Nigeria, some of the South American churches, and so on).  They usually operate under the Anglican Church in North America (ACNA) banner.  The ACNA is not recognized as part of the Anglican Communion either by the Communion itself nor most of the member churches.

Up in Canada the communion member is the Anglican Church of Canada.  In most respects they're fairly similar to the US Episcopal Church to the point that they share clergy and often team up.  Even so, I'd hear about an Anglican parish north of the border and automatically think they were a breakaway church before remembering that's what they're called up north. 

The Church of England started it all though with Henry VIII decided he wanted to be in charge of the church in England and not play second fiddle to the Pope.  Over the years as the English spread out over the globe they established churches in various countries so that's where the different churches that make up the communion come from.  QE2 never had any position of authority in the Episcopal Church, and nor does KC3, but the Queen is still held in very high regards in the Episcopal Church here in the US. 

Edited September 23, 2022 by 47of74

[Ozlsn]

On 9/24/2022 at 3:41 AM, 47of74 said:

Sad story out of the UK

Kind of caught me off guard because I thought the Church of England had been open to same sex relationships given the hostility some parts of the Anglican Communion show to it and the Episcopal Church.  Guess not though.

I hadn't realised the Church of England were still so backward looking, like you I'm disappointed. I realise the Anglican Communion is a broad church (pardon the pun), but I thought the CofE were towards the more progressive end.

This actually made me curious enough to go and look up what the Australian part of the Anglican Communion is doing, and the answer seems to be having a bob each way right now - they will bless same sex unions but not perform them (sighs heavily - not having liturgy is a weak excuse here). Even that has been enough to trigger a local split in the Church - honestly there are So. Many. Issues they could be focusing on here (poverty, Reconciliation, corruption, refugees) it still amazes me that this is what they take their bat and ball and go home over.

[47of74]

On 9/24/2022 at 7:06 PM, Ozlsn said:

I hadn't realised the Church of England were still so backward looking, like you I'm disappointed. I realise the Anglican Communion is a broad church (pardon the pun), but I thought the CofE were towards the more progressive end.

Some of the CofE had to be dragged kicking and screaming into the 21st century.  Like this one guy who whined when Bishop Libby Lane - the first CofE woman bishop - was consecrated.

He made his protest and Archbishop Sentamu shut him down.  I think Sentamu knew the guy was going to do this stunt because he had a prepared statement all ready for this clown.  Sentamu is no progressive by any means but he agreed to consecrate Bishop Lane so he must've believed it was proper.  Course the incel contingent was having a dumpster fire in the comments on this video.

[Jackie3]

On 9/23/2022 at 10:41 AM, 47of74 said:

Kind of caught me off guard because I thought the Church of England had been open to same sex relationships given the hostility some parts of the Anglican Communion show to it and the Episcopal Church.  Guess not though.

Nope, they're against same-sex marriage.

Interestingly, the head of the Church of England is an adulterer married to another adulterer who is also a divorcee. The Church of England strongly discouraged divorce, and didn't allow remarriage after divorce until 2002 though only "in certain circumstances." (Like being Prince of Wales).

When he ascends the throne, he'll promise to uphold the teachings of the Church of England, even though he broke those teachings right and left.

But two same-sex people in love marrying each other, no, that's wrong.

[Marmion]

The Anglican Communion, as I understand it, is actually a singular trinity of churches, the traditional liturgical Anglo-Catholic High Church , the evangelical Low Church, and the more liberal Broad Church.  Particular churches in certain regions will tend to be more conservative than others.  And the Anglican Communion as a whole, last I heard , disciplined the Episcopal Church over its officiating of same sex marriage. 

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Ordination of homosexuals and same-sex marriages are the most glaring examples of what some Anglicans perceive as a blasphemous deviation from Jesus's gospel. The watershed event that seemed to point to an irreparable split in the 77 million-strong Anglican Communion was about homosexuality. In 2003, Gene Robinson, an openly gay man, was elected and consecrated as the bishop of the Episcopal Diocese of New Hampshire. More liberal dioceses, located primarily in North America and Britain, either supported the decision or remained quiet. However, a large group of conservative congregants and clergy who come from the West, but also in disproportionately high numbers from Africa, Asia and South America vigorously protested what they called the "secularization" of the Anglican Church. These conservative Anglicans might represent only a third of the Anglican bishops, but they make up about 75 percent of Anglican churchgoers, said GAFCON organizers who spoke with The Jerusalem Post this week. An identical trend of an increasingly liberal West alienated from a more conservative East or South has threatened unity within the Catholic Church and various Protestant sects. But in no other church is the tension more pronounced. "In the Catholic Church, a local bishop would never dare publicly support the ordination of a woman as bishop, let alone a homosexual," said Rabbi David Rosen, the International director of interreligious affairs of the American Jewish Committee. "Protestant sects are much less centralized. Clergy enjoy much more freedom. The Anglican Church is somewhere in between. That's why it was more susceptible to the split that we are witnessing." The Church of England, known also as the Anglican Church or the Episcopalian Church, was created in the 16th century, and sought to distinguish itself from the corruption in the Catholic Church on the one hand, and the religious extremists of the Protestant Reformation on the other. GAFCON ORGANIZERS said they were not advocating a schism in the Anglican Church. Rather, the conference was an expression of an "impaired communion." Whichever terminology is used, it cannot be denied that the threat to the unity of the Anglican Church is very real. In December 2007, conservative Anglicans, led by Archbishop Peter Akinola of Nigeria, whose diocese boasts a flock of 22 million, decided to hold a conference in Jerusalem to protest liberalization trends that led to the ordination of Robinson and to the recognition by some Anglican bishops of same-sex marriages. The result was GAFCON, which is being held in Jerusalem's Renaissance Hotel. GAFCON was timed to precede by a month the Lambeth Conference, the single most important Anglican Communion gathering, which convenes once a decade in Canterbury, England, and which is presided over by the head of the Anglican Church, the Archbishop of Canterbury. Many of the bishops and delegates attending the Jerusalem conference will boycott Lambeth. The choice of Jerusalem, explained one of GAFCON's organizers, was natural. "Jerusalem, perhaps more than any other city, embodies the message that we believe in and the historicity and truth of the gospels," he said. "Jesus's life examples and teachings are real, just as the city of Jerusalem is real. And that is an important message to send out, at a time when there are those in the church who have ceased to take the scripture seriously." NOT EVERYONE was happy about the choice of the venue, however. The Anglican bishop of Jerusalem, Suheil Dawani, who defined himself as "orthodox," said that though he identified in principle with many of GAFCON's goals, holding GAFCON in Jerusalem would be "a disaster." There are a number of reasons why GAFCON in Jerusalem is a headache for Dawani. The local Anglican community receives hefty financial support from some of the more liberal Episcopalian dioceses in North America that have begun recognizing same-sex marriages and more equality for the lesbian, gay, bisexual and transgender (LGBT) community. The best schools in Israel that regularly rank among the highest on their matriculation grades belong to the Anglican Church.  

Some 7,000 students, both Christian and Muslim, are enrolled in them. There are also dozens of hospitals and charitable institutions that receive "liberal" Episcopalian money. Dawani, then, cannot be seen as the willing host to a group of conservative Anglican clergymen who vociferously attack their liberal brothers for ripping apart the church by compromising biblical truth. At the same time, Dawani is firmly rooted in the faith communities of the Middle East, where homosexuality is an anathema. The very fact that homosexuality is a point of contention within the Anglican Church is probably an embarrassment to Dawani. As Dawani's spokesman put it this week, GAFCON was "importing conflicts into an already contentious region. The conference is imposing the issue of homosexuality on the diocese, at a time when this issue is not at all relevant. Why should the local community be forced to bring up this issue?" ONE WOULD be hard-pressed to finds parallels between Anglicanism and haredi Judaism. However, Dawani's opposition to the open discussion of homosexuality is uncannily similar to the Edah Haredit's policy this year vis a vis the Jerusalem Pride and Tolerance March for Infinite Love. Unlike in past years, the Edah Haredit, an umbrella group for some of the most extreme hassidic and Lithuanian sects in Orthodoxy, decided to ignore the gay pride parade. For the Edah Haredit, and perhaps for Dawani, recognition of the LGBT community is simply not on the agenda. Protesting homosexuality unnecessarily exposes the faithful to what they consider to be the "depravities" of homosexuality. For those within the Anglican Church who do see homosexuality as a relevant issue that needs to be confronted, what is the solution? What does an Anglican clergyman tell a gay congregant? One answer might be found in a flyer that was passed out this week at GAFCON. Entitled "Celibrate," the flyer encourages a "celebration of celibacy." Celibrate's motto: No Sex? So What!   https://www.jpost.com/features/front-lines/religious-affairs-the-division-that-dare-not-speak-its-name

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The Anglican Church has slapped sanctions on its liberal U.S. branch for supporting same-sex marriage, a move that averted a formal schism in the world’s third-largest Christian denomination but left deep divisions unresolved.

The Anglican communion, which counts some 85 million members in 165 countries, has been in crisis since 2003 because of arguments over sexuality and gender between liberal churches in the West and their conservative counterparts, mostly in Africa.

Following four days of closed-door talks, the heads of the world’s 38 Anglican provinces said the liberal U.S. Episcopal Church would be barred for three years from taking part in decision-making on doctrine or governance.

Episcopal Church Presiding Bishop Michael Curry told his peers at the talks that he remained “committed to ‘walking together’ with you as fellow primates in the Anglican family”, but lamented their decision.  

“For fellow disciples of Jesus in our church who are gay and lesbian, this will bring more pain,” he told the gathering in remarks reported by an Episcopal news website.

The sanctions also prevent the U.S. church from speaking on behalf of Anglicans on interfaith or ecumenical bodies and bar it from certain committees for three years.

There were widespread fears of a schism ahead of the talks, which were convened by Archbishop of Canterbury Justin Welby, the spiritual leader of Anglicans.

One of the most outspoken conservatives, Archbishop of Uganda Stanley Ntagali, proposed at the talks that the Episcopal Church and the Anglican Church of Canada, which is considering also approving same-sex marriage, should withdraw from communion activities until they repent.

The proposal was rejected, and Ntagali left the meeting early, although he stopped short of quitting the communion.  https://www.reuters.com/article/idIN162162177920160118

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Tuesday 27th June 2006

The Archbishop of Canterbury, Dr Rowan Williams has today set out his thinking on the future of the Anglican Communion in the wake of the deliberations in the United States on the Windsor Report and the Anglican Communion at the 75th General Convention of The Episcopal Church (USA).
 

'The Challenge and Hope of Being an Anglican Today, A Reflection for the Bishops, Clergy and Faithful of the Anglican Communion', has been sent to Primates with a covering letter, published more widely and made available as audio on the internet.

In it, Dr Williams says that the strength of the Anglican tradition has been in maintaining a balance between the absolute priority of the Bible, a catholic loyalty to the sacraments and a habit of cultural sensitivity and intellectual flexibility:

"To accept that each of these has a place in the church's life and that they need each other means that the enthusiasts for each aspect have to be prepared to live with certain tensions or even sacrifices. The only reason for being an Anglican is that this balance seems to you to be healthy for the Church Catholic."

Dr Williams acknowledges that the debate following the consecration of a practising gay bishop has posed challenges for the unity of the church. He stresses that the key issue now for the church is not about the human rights of homosexual people, but about how the church makes decisions in a responsible way.

"It is imperative to give the strongest support to the defence of homosexual people against violence, bigotry and legal disadvantage, to appreciate the role played in the life of the church by people of homosexual orientation..."

The debate in the Anglican Communion had for many, he says, become much harder after the consecration in 2003 which could be seen to have pre-empted the outcome. The structures of the Communion had struggled to cope with the resulting effects:

"... whatever the presenting issue, no member Church can make significant decisions unilaterally and still expect this to make no difference to how it is regarded in the fellowship; this would be uncomfortably like saying that every member could redefine the terms of belonging as and when it suited them. Some actions - and sacramental actions in particular - just do have the effect of putting a Church outside or even across the central stream of the life they have shared with other Churches."

Dr Williams says that the divisions run through as well as between the different Provinces of the Anglican Communion and this would make a solution difficult. He favours the exploration of a formal Covenant agreement between the Provinces of the Anglican Communion as providing a possible way forward. Under such a scheme, member provinces that chose to would make a formal but voluntary commitment to each other.

"Those churches that were prepared to take this on as an expression of their responsibility to each other would limit their local freedoms for the sake of a wider witness: some might not be willing to do this. We could arrive at a situation where there were 'constituent' Churches in the Anglican Communion and other 'churches in association', which were bound by historic and perhaps personal links, fed from many of the same sources but not bound in a single and unrestricted sacramental communion and not sharing the same constitutional structures."

Different views within a province might mean that local churches had to consider what kind of relationship they wanted with each other. This, though, might lead to a more positive understanding of unity:

"It could mean the need for local Churches to work at ordered and mutually respectful separation between constituent and associated elements; but it could also mean a positive challenge for churches to work out what they believed to be involved in belonging in a global sacramental fellowship, a chance to rediscover a positive common obedience to the mystery of God's gift that was not a matter of coercion from above but that of 'waiting for each other' that St Paul commends to the Corinthians."

Dr Williams stresses that the matter cannot be resolved by his decree:

" ... the idea of an Archbishop of Canterbury resolving any of this by decree is misplaced, however tempting for many. The Archbishop of Canterbury presides and convenes in the Communion, and may ... outline the theological framework in which a problem should be addressed; but he must always act collegially, with the bishops of his own local Church and with the primates and the other instruments of communion."

"That is why the process currently going forward of assessing our situation in the wake of the General Convention is a shared one. But it is nonetheless possible for the Churches of the Communion to decide that this is indeed the identity, the living tradition - and by God's grace, the gift - we want to share with the rest of the Christian world in the coming generation; more importantly still, that this is a valid and vital way of presenting the Good News of Jesus Christ to the world. My hope is that the period ahead - of detailed response to the work of General Convention, exploration of new structures, and further refinement of the covenant model - will renew our positive appreciation of the possibilities of our heritage so that we can pursue our mission with deeper confidence and harmony."

The Primates of the Anglican Communion will meet early next year to consider the matter. In the meantime, a group appointed by the Joint Standing Committee of the ACC and the Primates will be assisting Dr Williams in considering the resolutions of the 75th General Convention of The Episcopal Church (USA) in response to the questions posed by the Windsor Report.  https://web.archive.org/web/20151108000711/http://rowanwilliams.archbishopofcanterbury.org/articles.php/1478/the-challenge-and-hope-of-being-an-anglican-today-a-reflection-for-the-bishops-clergy-and-faithful-o