Accepting Evangelicals
Meeting with the Archbishop of Canterbury.
First, a big thank you to everyone who sent in
emails with your comments to pass on to the Archbishop!
The meeting was organised by
Inclusive
Church (www.inclusivechurch.org) and a
delegation of 5 of us met with the Archbishop and his senior staff.
The delegation brought together a wide spectrum of Anglican
perspectives all arguing for greater acceptance and inclusion in the Church of
England.
The group consisted of:
·
Giles Goddard, Chair of
Inclusive Church
·
Benny Hazlehurst, Accepting
Evangelicals
·
Christina Rees, Broadcaster and
WATCH
·
Nick Holtam, Vicar of St Martin in the Fields,
Trafalgar Square
·
Giles Fraser, Church Times columnist
and Vicar of Putney
I had a good opportunity to express the
concerns of Accepting Evangelicals and remind the Archbishop that Evangelical
opinion is not as uniform as the media would have us believe, with huge variety
of opinion on the place of gay & lesbian people in the church.
The Archbishop listened carefully to all
the contributions and said that he was grateful for the opportunity to meet.
We also discussed the present tensions in
the Anglican Communion and the position of the Episcopal Church in the USA
following the recent meeting of Primates in Africa.
Overall the discussion was solid and
constructive, and it was agreed that we should meet again in the Autumn.
My own reflection on the 2 hour meeting was
that it was a good start, but only a start.
There is a long way to go, both in this country and internationally, to
achieve the changes we long for, and the present polarisation of views is
hindering constructive dialogue.
To draw an analogy from
Elijah on the mountain of the Lord (2 Kings XXX). Although it may seem like
the Church is in the midst of the earthquake, wind and fire – God was not in
any of those – and what we need is to listen for that still small voice of
calm – the voice of God.
As the famous hymn says:
Breathe through the heats of our desires
thy coolness and thy balm;
let sense be dumb let flesh retire;
speak through the earthquake wind and fire,
O still small voice of calm.
Events since that meeting have only served
to reinforce that conviction, and I am sure that the Archbishop needs our
prayers in seeking to steer both the Church of England and the Anglican
Communion through this most difficult of times.
In particular, please pray for him on the
19th-21st September when he goes to the USA to
meet with the Bishops of the Episcopal Church there.
Benny Hazlehurst
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