Canterbury's Advent letter

Anglican Archbishop Faults Factions
By LAURIE GOODSTEIN
The New York Times
December 15, 2007

The archbishop of Canterbury, the Most Rev. Rowan Williams, sent a lengthy letter to the members of his warring Anglican Communion on Friday, saying that both sides had violated the Communion’s boundaries and put the church in crisis.

He criticized the American branch, the Episcopal Church, for departing from the Communion’s consensus on Scripture by ordaining an openly gay bishop and blessing same-sex unions, “in the name of the church.”

But the archbishop faulted conservative prelates in Africa, Asia and Latin America for annexing American parishes and an entire California diocese that have recently left the Episcopal Church, and for ordaining conservative Americans as bishops and priests.

“There can be no doubt that these ordinations have not been encouraged or legitimized by the Communion over all,” the archbishop wrote, contradicting those conservatives who said they were acting with his approval.

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Anglican Archbishops: no consensus on Episcopal Church
Many leaders remain skeptical of the U.S. organization's promises to stop consecrating gay bishops and authorizing same-sex blessings.
By Rebecca Trounson
Los Angeles Times
December 15, 2007

Archbishop of Canterbury Rowan Williams, in a long-awaited message to the global Anglican Communion he heads, said Friday there was no consensus among Anglican leaders on whether the Episcopal Church had met demands that it stop consecrating openly gay bishops and authorizing same-sex blessings.

In an Advent letter released Friday, Williams said just more than half of the fellowship's top bishops and archbishops had responded positively to recent pledges from the Episcopal Church to roll back its relatively liberal positions on homosexuality and the Bible.

But for the rest of the Anglican leaders surveyed around the world, the promises made by Episcopal bishops were "inadequate," the archbishop wrote. In a September meeting in New Orleans, the bishops pledged to "exercise restraint" in consecrating openly gay bishops and said they would not authorize official blessings for same-sex couples.

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Williams: No Anglican consensus on Episcopal Church
By Tom Heneghan
Reuters
Dec 14, 2007

PARIS (Reuters) - Archbishop of Canterbury Rowan Williams said on Friday the Anglican Communion he heads cannot agree if the United States Episcopal Church has stepped back from its liberal stands on gay bishops and scriptural authority.

Just over half the Communion leaders surveyed felt the Episcopal Church had reassured them it would not appoint another gay bishop or allow blessings for same-sex couples, but the rest felt it fell short, he said in his Advent Letter to Anglicans.

Williams said he would ask professional mediators to help guide talks between the Episcopal leadership and its traditionalist critics among U.S. and foreign Anglicans.

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Archbishop: No Change Over Gay Bishop
By ROBERT BARR
The Associated Press

LONDON (AP) — The archbishop of Canterbury said Friday he will not reverse his decision to exclude a gay U.S. bishop from joining other bishops at a global Anglican gathering next year.

The office of Archbishop Rowan Williams said he also had not changed his mind about refusing an invitation to Martyn Minns, a traditionalist U.S. priest who was consecrated as a bishop in the Anglican Church of Nigeria to minister to disaffected Episcopalians in the U.S.

Williams, spiritual leader of the world's Anglicans, said he has recruited professional mediators in trying to reach greater understanding between the U.S. Episcopal Church and its critics both at home and abroad.

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