Source: Anglican Mainstream
STATEMENT FROM ANGLICAN MAINSTREAM SOUTHERN AFRICA
We welcome the Kigali Communique in which the African Provinces of the Anglican Communion have spoken so clearly and bravely, and note that many of them have made their stand over the past couple of years at great financial cost to themselves. We applaud their witness to the truth.
We as Anglican Mainstream Southern Africa affirm the statement in its entirety and want to especially commend the initiative aimed at finding ways of providing alternative primatial oversight for those North American dioceses which are committed to the Anglican faith and doctrine as historically received, and who in conscience cannot accept the oversight of a newly elected Presiding Bishop – a bishop whose stated position on human sexuality is in defiance of holy scripture and the official position of the Anglican Communion, and who has abandoned a Christian epistemology.
We also have received and reflected on “The Road to Lambeth” report. We would like to endorse the analysis of the current situation especially the following paragraphs:
The current situation is a twofold crisis for the Anglican Communion: a crisis of doctrine and a crisis of leadership, in which the failure of the “Instruments” of the Communion to exercise discipline has called into question the viability of the Anglican Communion as a united Christian body under a common foundation of faith, as is supposed by the Chicago-Lambeth Quadrilateral.
Secondly we would endorse the clear and uncompromising call of CAPA to the rest of the communion:
We in CAPA want to say clearly and unequivocally to the rest of the Communion: the time has come for the North American churches to repent or depart. We in the Global South have always made repentance the starting point for any reconciliation and resumption of fellowship in the Communion. We shall not accept cleverly worded excuses but rather a clear acknowledgement by these churches that they have erred and “intend to lead a new life” in the Communion (2 Corinthians 4:2). Along with this open statement of repentance must come “fruits befitting repentance” (Luke 3:8). They must reverse their policies and prune their personnel.
Thirdly we wish to state that there are many Anglicans in Southern Africa who are a facing a crisis of conscience over the stand of their leadership who persist in building closer ties with those North American bishops who have declined to submit to the Windsor Report and whom we frankly regard as apostate.
Canon Dave Doveton
St Andrews Anglican Church
PO Box 10685
Meerensee, 3901
tel/fax 035-7534171
email: standrews01@telkomsa.net
Canon Theologian, Diocese of Zululand
[Anglican Church of Southern Africa]
Convenor: Anglican Mainstream Southern Africa
http://www.anglican-mainstream.org.za