Thursday, July 24, 2008

BREAKING NEWS: Common Cause Partnership to ask for GAFCON province status

BB NOTE: While the Lambeth bishops are swapping howdies with the Blue Bloods at the Palace, the GAFCON Primates Council is petitioned by the CCP to seat the Rt. Rev'd Bob Duncan on the Primates Council. Pass the tea and crumpets.

The Common Cause Partnership leaders issued a statement today welcoming the Jerusalem Declaration and the statement on the Global Anglican Future and pledging to move forward with the work of Anglican unity in North America.

"We, as the Bishops and elected leaders of the Common Cause Partnership are deeply grateful for the Jerusalem Declaration. It describes a hopeful, global Anglican future, rooted in scripture and the authentic Anglican way of faith and practice. We joyfully welcome the words of the GAFCON statement that it is now time 'for the federation currently known as the Common Cause Partnership to be recognized by the Primates Council.'

"The intention of the Executive Committee is to petition the Primate Council for recognition as the North American Province of GAFCON on the basis of the Common Cause Partnership Articles, Theological Statement, and Covenant Declaration, and to ask that their Moderator be seated in the Primate's Council.

"We accept the call to build the Common Cause Partnership into a truly unified body of Anglicans. We are committed to that call. Over the past months, we have worked together, increasing the number of partners and authorizing committees and task groups for Mission,
Education, Governance, Prayer Book & Liturgy, the Episcopate, and Ecumenical Relations. The Executive Committee is meeting regularly to carry forward the particulars of this call. The CCP Council will meet December 1-3, 2008."

The Common Cause Partnership links together nine Anglican jurisdictions and organizations in North America. Together, the American Anglican Council, the Anglican Coalition in Canada, the
Anglican Communion Network, the Anglican Mission in the Americas, the Anglican Network in Canada, the Convocation of Anglicans in North America, the Federation of Anglican Churches in the Americas, Forward in Faith North America and the Reformed Episcopal Church represent more the 1,300 Anglican parishes in the United States and Canada. The Common Cause Partnership Executive Committee is: The Rt. Rev'd Robert Duncan, Moderator; The Venerable Charlie Masters, General Secretary; Mrs. Patience Oruh, Treasurer; The Rt. Rev'd Keith Ackerman, Forward in Faith North America; The Rt. Rev'd David Anderson, American Anglican Council; The Rt. Rev'd Donald Harvey, Anglican Network in Canada; The Rt. Rev'd Paul Hewett, Federation of Anglican Churches in the Americas; The Rt. Rev'd Martyn Minns, Convocation of Anglicans in North America; The Rt. Rev'd Chuck Murphy, Anglican Mission in the Americas; The Rt. Rev'd Leonard Riches, Reformed Episcopal Church; The Rt. Rev'd Bill Atwood, Anglican Church of Kenya and The Rt. Rev'd John Guernsey, Church of the Province of Uganda.

9 comments:

Anonymous said...

Thank You bb,

This is indeed great news. Perhaps the next step in a new North American province???

RalphM

Anonymous said...

Just cause it walks like a province, talks like a province, and quacks like a province, doesn't make it a province.

Anonymous said...

I knew +Bob wanted to be a Primate! Woo hoo!

Seriously... a new province, recognized by GAFCON primates but not by Canterbury? Hmmm...

Padre Wayne

Anonymous said...

"While the Lambeth bishops are swapping howdies with the Blue Bloods at the Palace,"

talk about fiddling while Rome burns! (or, in this case, lambeth)

kc

Anonymous said...

This move is simply normative Christianity and what happens when a province or see or parish goes bad.

It's certainly the only means of discipline and protection available to the orthodox since the existing ones have either been compromised or never have worked properly.

Perhaps the Fulcrum/ACI/CPP/Covenant groups will also come up with something substantive with teeth that will work effectively and within a reasonable amount of time eventually. However, this ABC will only continue to hinder any group that tries to work with him.

Presumably, the CCP didn't ask permission of the ABC to make this move. There is now a new assumption that the orthodox GAFCON primates have declared their maturity and equality as players in the AC which will likely never be dominated again by the Westerners. The GAFCON Primates and bishops will do what their Lord, Scripture and their consciences tell them.

The Decades of Dialogue, Compromise of Scripture, Deception and Dominance by the Decadent West are dead.

Allelulia! Long live the New Anglican Communion!

It is a NEW era in Anglicanism, one in which Archbishop Deng Bul can speak his heart and mind and be respected, taken seriously as an equal under God.

Anonymous said...

Yes! The New Anglican Communion. Now that you have it, and have named it, please leave and let the rest of us alone. Thank You!

Anonymous said...

An absolute master-stroke.

First, doing this at Lambeth shows where the real power and initiative lies: with GAFCON and Akinola, not with Lamebeth and Williams.

Second, because - especially with the US HOB all sucking off Gene in England - they cannot move quickly against Duncan and the CCP. Because, make no mistake, this is an application to join a religious body that is not in communion with ECUSA --- and (at any other time) every single bishop or priest in the CPP would have been deposed by ECUSA, and the armed guards sent in with sledgehammers to seize the cathedrals and churches and the lawyers to seize the trust funds.

But, well, ECUSA can't very well do that a Lamebeth, can they? If they do: they they will be thrown out of Lamebeth at long last. But if they wait, in a couple of weeks by the time they get back to the US, they will discover the locks changed, armed guards on the properties, and the money and legal titles all changed because, well, ECUSA didn't object and stayed at Lambeth with Duncan and the CC Bishops.

ECUSA. Dammed if they do; dammed if they don't; dammed every possible way!

Alice C. Linsley said...

You're right, Georgia. Many people are so inexperienced with normative Christianity that they dfail to recognize it. This is what comes from from living a compromised life in Sodom.

A Musing Anglican said...

Isn't this a little bit premature?!!