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William Crawley | 17:01 UK time, Thursday, 31 July 2008

img_0264.jpgI've been bumping into fellow bloggers all over the Canterbury campus. I had lunch today with David Virtue from virtueonline and his colleague Hans Zeiger. Earlier, I had a chat with Simon Sarmiento from. Then in the afternoon, I had a cup of tea with Harold Miller, the of Down and Dromore, and walking back from the university halls where Bishop Harold is lodging, I met David Chillingworth, the Bishop of St Andrews, and had a very wide-ranging conversation about theology, Anglican polity and, inevitably, blogging. Bishop David's blog is called and includes commentary on the conference experience with pictures (such as the one displayed here). The bishop's reflections on the conference reflect some of the frustration I've heard voiced by others about the slow journey to the topic of sexuality and the lack of time to do justice to the issue. He is also critical of the lack of communication between conference organisers and participating bishops. Money quotes:

"I don't think the Indaba process will deliver what we need. We would need to set for hours and hours. We are giving too little time to it and trying to cover too much ground. This Conference has been running for nearly two weeks. I simply cannot understand why it will be Thursday before we reach 'The Bishop and Human Sexuality.' To rush the big issues at the end of a Conference is never wise. I went today to the hearings of the Windsor Continuation Group. Bishops from all over the world were being allowed three minutes each to speak on very complex issues - yellow card after two minutes and red after three. Differences were being aired with grace and dignity. But it was not a graceful or dignified process.

"If there is a channel through which issues like this can be raised with the management of the conference, I have not yet found it. Maybe there are different cultures at work here as regards expectations of how a conference can evolve as it happens."

Comments

  • Comment number 1.


    Bishop Millar suggests. (on his blog, see link above)

    "If you would like to pray, please pray that, in this uncertain time, the Lord would reveal his hand."


    Sorry about this Bishop, but I thought that the Lord had already done that; you know, Moses and the Prophets and then Jesus. There's something about the Son being the radiance of God's glory and the exact representation of his being, sustaining all things by his powerful hand. There isn't actually anything more to reveal - he's been there, said it and done it, but he got crucified instead of getting a t-shirt. However, as you know, this Jesus has been exalted to the highest place and before him every knee will one day bow, so when it comes to God's hand, it seems that the King is holding all the aces.



  • Comment number 2.

    Peter thats a strange criticism to put to Harold Millar. He is an evangelical conservative christian who believes in the incarnation and believes the bible should determine our beliefs. When He prays for God's hand to be revealed, he obviously means that God would show the communion some direction. Theres nothing unbiblical about that prayer.

  • Comment number 3.

    I don't know, PTL, I kind of liked Peter's comment.... worth thinking about.

  • Comment number 4.


    Hi PTL

    I sort of thought my comment might sail a bit close to the wind, as we say.

    Here's where I coming from. Although I'm not an Anglican, I know Harold Millar is an evangelical and I know that he pretty much fits what we expect an evangelical to be. I have no gripe with that, nor with Bishop Millar in particular. And, while I don't have anything against prayer, and while it is most certainly biblical, what concerns me about the broad evangelical tradition of which I am a member, is that we too often resort to these 'spiritual' kind of comments and seek some sort of, let's face it, mystical guidance. This sort of thinking is prevalent in the evangelical sub-culture, but it fixes nothing. All we end up with is one set of people saying God's leading us this way and another set saying God's leading us that way, and on it goes.

    Mr. Millar's comments were about being lost in a 'pea-souper without a compass'. All I'm saying is that somebody is already claiming to be the light of the world yet there's very little talk about him.

    Read the other blog linked at the top. It's complaining about the fact that the planned three minute address at Evening Worship (I mean three minutes, who's got a concentration problem) over-ran to fifteen. Good grief, a fifteen minute sermon, mind-blowing!

    I don't know about you PLT but too often I am inclined to make my own god in my own image, it's like the prayer book says, "We have followed too much the devices and desires of our own hearts."

    The solution, well the solution has already been revealed, and the solution is always the same. And I need to be reminded of this as much as, and probably more than, everyone else. If however, my words were too flippant or harsh, apologies.



  • Comment number 5.

    The Lord has revealed his hand - it's called the Catholic Church, no endless conferences on consecrating gays and dolls there.

  • Comment number 6.

    Smasher- Many of us would consider that a step backwards by hundreds of years. ;)

  • Comment number 7.


    Yes Smasher, the holy Catholic Church. Isn't that the one all christians belong to?


  • Comment number 8.

    Smasher
    "Do as you're told" is a solution?

    G Veale

  • Comment number 9.

    Smasher

    The Holy Catholic church - in both its Roman and Anglican branches has never had any difficulty consecrating gay bishops - just so long as they were hypocrites willing to hide their sexuality from their flocks.

    Bishop Roskam, probably correctly, suggests there are bishops at the conference who beat their wives - I would go on to suggest that Gene Robinson is far from the only gay bishop at Canterbury this week and that he could probably fill a disco with his fellows if he were in Rome.

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