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Gay issue rips
Anglican Church down the middle in Kenya
25.12.2005- As the year draws to a close the subject of homosexuality
continues to be a thorny issue for the Anglican Church.
Never in the
history of the 450-year-old church has it witnessed such turbulence as
that triggered by the controversial 2003 election of a gay priest in the
US as Bishop of New Hampshire, a move that has alienated the church in the
west from its African, Asian and Latin America counterparts who are
opposed to same sex unions.
The Anglican
church leader and Archbishop of Canterbury, Rowan Williams, has his work
cut out for him in the new year as he struggles to hold together the 70
million strong Anglican Communion, the third largest family of Christians
in the world after the Roman Catholics and the Orthodox. The Anglican
Communion is a worldwide organisation of Anglican churches. Although each
church has its own legislative process and overall Episcopal leadership
headed by a local primate, the Church of England is still regarded as the
‘Mother church’.
Kenya’s
Archbishop Benjamin Nzimbi and Nigeria’s Archbishop Peter Akinola have
openly castigated their western counterparts for their support of gay
ordinations and have led the continent’s rejection of "western
liberalisation which has brought satanic practices into the church".
Reacting to Gene
Robinson’s ordination Nzimbi said, "The devil has entered the church. God
cannot be mocked. Consecrating a confessed homosexual as bishop is an
insult to God and to the church". Since then divisions in the church have
deepened, even as Canadian Anglicans began blessing same sex marriages,
while Britain gave a nod to clergy allowing them to enter civil unions.
This has angered ‘conservatives’ in the church who argue that these
practices contravene the teaching of the Bible.
Williams, at a
meeting in London last month of the church’s governing synod, called for
reconciliation among factions, an appeal which appears to have been
rebuffed by almost half of the world’s Anglican archbishops.
The latter, in a
strongly worded letter to Williams, attacked his leadership and demanded
that he take action over "unrepented sexual immorality in the church".
Headed
by Nigeria’s Archbishop Peter Akinola, 17 of the church’s 38 archbishops
told Williams to crack the whip on "errant clergy".
The letter read
in part: "We wonder whether your personal dissent from this consensus
prevents you from taking the necessary steps to confront those churches
that have embraced teachings contrary to the overwhelming testimony of the
Anglican communion."
However, not all
churches in the West support the ordination of gay clergy. In October, the
Anglican Church in Australia’s main city of Sydney, voted to reconsider
its links with the Church of England, backing concerns raised by Nigeria
over the ordination of gay clergy and same sex unions.
An Episcopal
congregation in Virginia left the US church to affiliate with an Anglican
diocese in Uganda, joining a list of more than 10 Episcopal congregations
which have switched jurisdiction to that of the Anglican province of
Uganda.
The African
church, with its 12 provinces and more than 40 million members, has come
out strongly in its refusal to have anything to do with dioceses which
support gay unions.
Earlier this
month, the Anglican Church in Malawi, with close to two million followers,
rejected the appointment of a liberal British vicar as one of the
country’s three bishops because of his support for gay rights.
The Kenyan
province, with over three million followers, has stopped receiving any
form of funding from its Western counterparts who embrace gay unions. To
further register their disgust, the ACK has suspended sending their clergy
to train in churches allied to gay ordinations.
Nzimbi, at a
consultative meeting ahead of 2008 Lambeth Conference in Northern Ireland,
made it clear that the church in Kenya would not compromise its stand on
same sex unions.
"We don’t want
their money if that is what it will take to remind them of the role of the
Church to preach the Great Commission. What kind of gospel are they
preaching now saying that there should be union of people of the same
sex?"
The Lambeth
conference is held after every 10 years to review the church’s doctrines
and make development plans.
The subject of
gay clergy within the Anglican Communion is likely to dominate debate
during the meeting. In Africa only Archbishop Desmond Tutu of South Africa
appears to view the matter of homosexuality in the church from different
lenses. An individual’s sexual orientation, he opines, should not be used
as a yardstick to measure one’s relationship with God.
The Anglican
Communion traces its origins to the 16th century when it became a separate
movement in 1534 after England’s King Henry VIII broke away from Rome.
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