Statement by the Most Revd Thabo Makgoba, Archbishop of Cape Town:
“In recent weeks, four individuals have either spoken out publicly or contacted my office privately to report experiences of sexual abuse in two dioceses, apparently during the 1970s and 1980s.
Showing posts with label Canon Law. Show all posts
Showing posts with label Canon Law. Show all posts
Thursday, 22 March 2018
Monday, 14 October 2013
Canon Law Council Established
A final report from Provincial Synod
Act to Establish a Canon Law Council
Questions of Canon Law were a major theme at Provincial Synod. A decision was taken to relaunch the Canon Law Society, and work was also done in revising the disciplinary canons.
Archbishop Thabo underlined the importance of having good canons and using them well in his Charge. He said
That we live by grace and covenant, and not by law, is at the heart of the rejuvenation of the Canon Law Society. This … is not about placing legalistic and legislative burdens upon us. Rather, it is for helping us to use Canon Law better: as our good servant, not bad master.
… In today’s world far too often the immediate response to disagreement is to rush to litigation as the first, not last, resort: whether in politics, business, or even running football clubs! Alas, Christians often follow the same path. The amount of time and money our church has spent in the last five years in secular legal processes is shocking. It pains me deeply that legal cases have consumed significant resources that should be devoted to mission and ministry. It also distresses me to see the church falling into ungodly practices of lobbying and putting on pressure, to get our own way, or to get our own back when we can’t get what we want through proper processes.
God calls us instead to wrestle with one another within the body of Christ, and together to wrestle with him, so we may discern his will in the complexities of our relationships in this complex world. Better understandings of Canon Law should help resource us to deal with difficult issues in more holy ways.
This is also the aim of revising disciplinary Canons: that these should bring us greater confidence and freedom in following our calling, just as the introduction of Pastoral Standards has done. God calls us to offer models of good and holy practice to the world – for those who long to find the Lord’s favour, as in our first reading; and even to those who think they know better, as in our second. We must follow good governance and best practice in all that we do, where necessary revising both structures and practices. We must be good stewards of our resources, for example asking whether the expense of meetings could be better handled through having our own Anglican conference centre.
As we live before the watching world, we should not fear difference, or even disagreement, because it is through wrestling together – as brothers and sisters who know our unity in Christ is greater than anything that can divide us – that we can be like rough stones polishing each other to become beautiful smooth gems. It is a demanding calling, but I am sure it is one to which God especially calls Anglicans, in Southern Africa and around the world.
The Provincial Registrar, Mr Henry Bennet, with input from a number of other members of Synod, led a session that explained about the background, development and use of canon law. This was extended into a second session, in place of group work, to allow fuller discussion and questions and answers. Various Measures were passed to amend the Disciplinary Canons to make them more workable, and better reflect best practice and good governance.
Later in Synod, a resolution was passed to establish a Canon Law Council as an Act of Synod. Elections were held for its membership.
The following people were elected to the Canon Law Council
Mr Henry Bennett - Provincial Registrar
Adv Ronnie Bracks - Deputy Provincial Registrar
The Revd Matt Esau - Cape Town
Justice Ian Farlam - Provincial Chancellor
Mr Lloyd Fortuin - Saldanha Bay
The Very Revd Andrew Hunter - Grahamstown
The Ven M Mariri - Pretoria
Adv Daryl Newton - Port Elizabeth
Adv Jill Oliphant - Johannesburg
Mr Roger Schärges - Port Elizabeth
Justice Leona Theron - Johannesburg
The Revd Charles Williams - Saldanha Bay
The text of the Resolution follows below
This Church accepts the thesis that while theology provides it with a vision and definition of its purposes and Christian values, these are implemented in the form of canon law, which provides the norms of action for their implementation. Thus, canon law has a theological basis, and theology works through canon law. In so doing it also accepts the need for the Church to exercise its leadership to ensure that its legal apparatus and procedures match its vision and purposes, and at the same time meet current needs and aspirations in relation to its members’ rights, responsibilities and freedoms.
To this end the Church establishes, as an Act, a faculty to be known as the Anglican Canon Law Council (the “Council”), the constitution of which will be as follows:
1. The Council will be an integral part of the Church, functioning under and reporting to the Provincial Trusts Board (the “Board”), but reporting also to Provincial Synod and Provincial Standing Committee, with a liaison bishop to be appointed to the governing body by Episcopal Synod.
2. The members of the Council will be:
2.1 All Provincial and Diocesan Chancellors and Registrars, ex officio;
2.2 Any Bishop currently in office or retired, on application;
2.3 Any Cleric, currently licensed or retired, on application; and
2.4 Any Confirmed Communicant, on application.
3. The purpose and objectives of the Council will be:
3.1 Collegial, namely, the sharing of information, creating the facility for those interested in canon law to meet (personally or by other means of communication) to discuss canon law issues and matters and to seek interactively answers where these are needed.
3.2 Opinions, namely, where possible assisting bishops and others in authority in the Church on issues and matters referred to it by them.
3.3 Publications, namely, to record and make available canon law studies and discussions relevant to the Church, its governance, rights and responsibilities.
3.4 Mentoring, namely, guiding Bishops, members of Chapters, Provincial and Diocesan Trusts Boards and newly appointed Chancellors and Registrars in their work.
3.5 Archiving, namely, as facilities become available retaining and storing in retrievable form, as may be submitted, judgments of Church tribunals, relevant judgments of Courts of Law of interest, and opinions of the Council, Chancellors, Registrars and diocesan attorneys and counsel.
3.6 Conferences, namely, creating opportunities for legal officers and others across the Province interested in canon law to establish or renew contact, to deliver papers and to discuss issues and matters of the day.
4. The Council’s governing body will be a Committee, comprising:
4.1 The Liaison Bishop.
4.2 The Provincial Chancellor and Registrar.
4.3 Three persons, clerical or lay, learned in the law elected by Provincial Synod.
4.4 Three persons, being Provincial or Diocesan Chancellors or Registrars, elected at the Annual Conference of the Council.
5. The periods of office of Committee Members will be for as long as their appointments a Liaison Bishops, Provincial Chancellor or Registrar last, in the case of those referred to in 4.1 and 4.2, and for three years in the case of those referred to in 4.3 and 4.4. Episcopal Synod or the Metropolitan shall appoint successors to fill vacancies that occur under 4.1 or 4.2, as the need arises; Provincial Standing Committee shall fill any vacancies that may occur between sessions of Provincial Synod under 4.3; and the Committee shall itself nominate persons to fill any vacancies between Annual Conferences that occur under 4.4. Committee Members under 4.3 and 4.4 may be re-elected after their periods of appointment have expired.
6. The Committee shall elect its own Chair, Deputy Chair and Secretary at its first meeting each year, at or after the Annual Conference. The quorum for Committee meetings shall be the majority in number of Committee Members in office at the time.
7. The Council shall have no financial powers independently of the Church. All income and expenditure shall be duly authorised, held and paid by the Church through the office of the Provincial Treasurer. It is not intended that the Council shall become a cost centre to the Church: members of Council are volunteers and as far as possible they or their Dioceses shall bear their costs (such as travel and accommodation, by way of example and without limitation), while the Church will bear such costs as are appropriately attributable to it (such as the costs of publications and archiving, and those of the Liaison Bishop and any other office bearer serving a Provincial function in relation to Council work).
8. The Committee shall make such arrangements for the Annual Conferences and the work of Council as it shall deem appropriate. It may also pass such rules of procedure or bye laws as it sees fit, and appoint such sub-committees as it deems necessary, Moreover, it may put forward to Provincial Synod such amendments to this Act as it wishes to recommend, after it has obtained the support for them from the Board on each occasion.
9. As an ordinary resolution of Synod, not an Act, this Synod resolves that all Resolutions of this Synod referring matters to the steering Committee of the Canon Law conference shall be deemed to be referred to the Board of the Canon Law Council.
Act to Establish a Canon Law Council
Questions of Canon Law were a major theme at Provincial Synod. A decision was taken to relaunch the Canon Law Society, and work was also done in revising the disciplinary canons.
Archbishop Thabo underlined the importance of having good canons and using them well in his Charge. He said
That we live by grace and covenant, and not by law, is at the heart of the rejuvenation of the Canon Law Society. This … is not about placing legalistic and legislative burdens upon us. Rather, it is for helping us to use Canon Law better: as our good servant, not bad master.
… In today’s world far too often the immediate response to disagreement is to rush to litigation as the first, not last, resort: whether in politics, business, or even running football clubs! Alas, Christians often follow the same path. The amount of time and money our church has spent in the last five years in secular legal processes is shocking. It pains me deeply that legal cases have consumed significant resources that should be devoted to mission and ministry. It also distresses me to see the church falling into ungodly practices of lobbying and putting on pressure, to get our own way, or to get our own back when we can’t get what we want through proper processes.
God calls us instead to wrestle with one another within the body of Christ, and together to wrestle with him, so we may discern his will in the complexities of our relationships in this complex world. Better understandings of Canon Law should help resource us to deal with difficult issues in more holy ways.
This is also the aim of revising disciplinary Canons: that these should bring us greater confidence and freedom in following our calling, just as the introduction of Pastoral Standards has done. God calls us to offer models of good and holy practice to the world – for those who long to find the Lord’s favour, as in our first reading; and even to those who think they know better, as in our second. We must follow good governance and best practice in all that we do, where necessary revising both structures and practices. We must be good stewards of our resources, for example asking whether the expense of meetings could be better handled through having our own Anglican conference centre.
As we live before the watching world, we should not fear difference, or even disagreement, because it is through wrestling together – as brothers and sisters who know our unity in Christ is greater than anything that can divide us – that we can be like rough stones polishing each other to become beautiful smooth gems. It is a demanding calling, but I am sure it is one to which God especially calls Anglicans, in Southern Africa and around the world.
The Provincial Registrar, Mr Henry Bennet, with input from a number of other members of Synod, led a session that explained about the background, development and use of canon law. This was extended into a second session, in place of group work, to allow fuller discussion and questions and answers. Various Measures were passed to amend the Disciplinary Canons to make them more workable, and better reflect best practice and good governance.
Later in Synod, a resolution was passed to establish a Canon Law Council as an Act of Synod. Elections were held for its membership.
The following people were elected to the Canon Law Council
Mr Henry Bennett - Provincial Registrar
Adv Ronnie Bracks - Deputy Provincial Registrar
The Revd Matt Esau - Cape Town
Justice Ian Farlam - Provincial Chancellor
Mr Lloyd Fortuin - Saldanha Bay
The Very Revd Andrew Hunter - Grahamstown
The Ven M Mariri - Pretoria
Adv Daryl Newton - Port Elizabeth
Adv Jill Oliphant - Johannesburg
Mr Roger Schärges - Port Elizabeth
Justice Leona Theron - Johannesburg
The Revd Charles Williams - Saldanha Bay
The text of the Resolution follows below
This Church accepts the thesis that while theology provides it with a vision and definition of its purposes and Christian values, these are implemented in the form of canon law, which provides the norms of action for their implementation. Thus, canon law has a theological basis, and theology works through canon law. In so doing it also accepts the need for the Church to exercise its leadership to ensure that its legal apparatus and procedures match its vision and purposes, and at the same time meet current needs and aspirations in relation to its members’ rights, responsibilities and freedoms.
To this end the Church establishes, as an Act, a faculty to be known as the Anglican Canon Law Council (the “Council”), the constitution of which will be as follows:
1. The Council will be an integral part of the Church, functioning under and reporting to the Provincial Trusts Board (the “Board”), but reporting also to Provincial Synod and Provincial Standing Committee, with a liaison bishop to be appointed to the governing body by Episcopal Synod.
2. The members of the Council will be:
2.1 All Provincial and Diocesan Chancellors and Registrars, ex officio;
2.2 Any Bishop currently in office or retired, on application;
2.3 Any Cleric, currently licensed or retired, on application; and
2.4 Any Confirmed Communicant, on application.
3. The purpose and objectives of the Council will be:
3.1 Collegial, namely, the sharing of information, creating the facility for those interested in canon law to meet (personally or by other means of communication) to discuss canon law issues and matters and to seek interactively answers where these are needed.
3.2 Opinions, namely, where possible assisting bishops and others in authority in the Church on issues and matters referred to it by them.
3.3 Publications, namely, to record and make available canon law studies and discussions relevant to the Church, its governance, rights and responsibilities.
3.4 Mentoring, namely, guiding Bishops, members of Chapters, Provincial and Diocesan Trusts Boards and newly appointed Chancellors and Registrars in their work.
3.5 Archiving, namely, as facilities become available retaining and storing in retrievable form, as may be submitted, judgments of Church tribunals, relevant judgments of Courts of Law of interest, and opinions of the Council, Chancellors, Registrars and diocesan attorneys and counsel.
3.6 Conferences, namely, creating opportunities for legal officers and others across the Province interested in canon law to establish or renew contact, to deliver papers and to discuss issues and matters of the day.
4. The Council’s governing body will be a Committee, comprising:
4.1 The Liaison Bishop.
4.2 The Provincial Chancellor and Registrar.
4.3 Three persons, clerical or lay, learned in the law elected by Provincial Synod.
4.4 Three persons, being Provincial or Diocesan Chancellors or Registrars, elected at the Annual Conference of the Council.
5. The periods of office of Committee Members will be for as long as their appointments a Liaison Bishops, Provincial Chancellor or Registrar last, in the case of those referred to in 4.1 and 4.2, and for three years in the case of those referred to in 4.3 and 4.4. Episcopal Synod or the Metropolitan shall appoint successors to fill vacancies that occur under 4.1 or 4.2, as the need arises; Provincial Standing Committee shall fill any vacancies that may occur between sessions of Provincial Synod under 4.3; and the Committee shall itself nominate persons to fill any vacancies between Annual Conferences that occur under 4.4. Committee Members under 4.3 and 4.4 may be re-elected after their periods of appointment have expired.
6. The Committee shall elect its own Chair, Deputy Chair and Secretary at its first meeting each year, at or after the Annual Conference. The quorum for Committee meetings shall be the majority in number of Committee Members in office at the time.
7. The Council shall have no financial powers independently of the Church. All income and expenditure shall be duly authorised, held and paid by the Church through the office of the Provincial Treasurer. It is not intended that the Council shall become a cost centre to the Church: members of Council are volunteers and as far as possible they or their Dioceses shall bear their costs (such as travel and accommodation, by way of example and without limitation), while the Church will bear such costs as are appropriately attributable to it (such as the costs of publications and archiving, and those of the Liaison Bishop and any other office bearer serving a Provincial function in relation to Council work).
8. The Committee shall make such arrangements for the Annual Conferences and the work of Council as it shall deem appropriate. It may also pass such rules of procedure or bye laws as it sees fit, and appoint such sub-committees as it deems necessary, Moreover, it may put forward to Provincial Synod such amendments to this Act as it wishes to recommend, after it has obtained the support for them from the Board on each occasion.
9. As an ordinary resolution of Synod, not an Act, this Synod resolves that all Resolutions of this Synod referring matters to the steering Committee of the Canon Law conference shall be deemed to be referred to the Board of the Canon Law Council.
Tuesday, 1 October 2013
Charge to Provincial Synod - "A Vision for Education – Education for a Vision"
Here is the full text of the Charge delivered to Provincial Synod this afternoon, 1 October 2013
"A Vision for Education – Education for a Vision"
Zechariah 8:20-23, Luke 9:51-56
May I speak in the name of God – Creator, Redeemer and Sanctifier.
Dear brothers and sisters in Christ, members of Synod, distinguished guests, I greet you in the name of our Lord and Saviour Jesus Christ, and welcome you to the thirty-third session of the Provincial Synod of the Anglican Church of Southern Africa.
I extend a particular welcome to our guests – especially my dear brother from the Episcopal Church of Sudan, Archbishop Daniel Deng Bull. May your time with us be one of growing and deepening communion within the Anglican / Episcopal family. A warm welcome also to Revd Dr James Cooper and Revd Canon Benjamin Museka Lubega, of Trinity Wall Street, a longstanding partner in the gospel to our Province. I also greet our ecumenical guests, our brothers and sisters within the Body of Christ.
A special welcome to Synod first-timers. I hope you will quickly feel at home among our processes and procedures, and make a full contribution.
Let me thank everyone who has helped prepare this Synod and this Charge, and who supports my ministry as Archbishop more generally. First, as always, my thanks go to Lungi (who is currently representing our Province at a USPG consultation in India) and my children, who have come to expect that in the run-up to Synods, while I am present in body, there is no guarantee that I am present in mind or spirit!
Thank you also to the staff at Bishopscourt and in the Provincial Treasurer’s office; to the Synod Advisory Committee, particularly Mr Henry Bennett; to the Dean of the Province; to the Bishop of Table Bay and the Cape Town Diocesan staff; and to everyone else who has contributed to this Synod.
We record particular thanks to Gail Allen, who has ensured the smooth running of more Synods than we can count, and who rightly is awarded the Order of Simon of Cyrene. This year has brought a particularly weighty responsibility, after Revd Canon Allan Kannemeyer stepped down as PEO to return to the Diocese of Pretoria where he is now Dean. We therefore thank Revd Keith Griffiths for returning from retirement to act as Synod Manager.
I give thanks to God for the support of the Dean of the Province and the Synod of Bishops, for the collegiality we share, and for the responsibilities each bishop shoulders through the year as they lead various portfolios.
Collegiality is also shared with Bishops and Archbishops of the past, and in thanking God for them, I particularly want to pay tribute to Archbishop Philip Russell, who died in July. Last month we interred his ashes in Greytown, in a quiet but moving service, at which Archbishop Emeritus Desmond Tutu preached, with Natal bishops, current and retired, present. Let us observe a moment’s silence as we thank God for all this passionate, compassionate, unsung hero meant to, and did for, our Province.
I also need to add that, since we went to print, a member of our Synod who should have been with us today, Mr James Thomas, a church-warden in the Diocese of Cape Town, was murdered in the terrorist attacks in Nairobi. We pray for his wife Colleen and family, as they hold his funeral tomorrow.
It is always a delight to welcome new bishops to Synod – eight in all! Those of you who were here three years ago will remember me admitting I dreamed of consecrating a woman bishop for our Province – by the grace of God, we now have two! This is also the last Synod for several bishops, and we thank God for them and their ministry.
I’d also like to express gratitude to the Revd Canon Dr Sarah Rowland Jones. She came to South Africa 11 years ago to marry Bishop Justus Marcus, and, since his death the following year, has spent a decade as Researcher to two Archbishops. Later this month she returns to Wales to take over Cardiff’s city centre parish. We give thanks for her unstinting enthusiasm and hard work in serving our Province, as well as for all she continues to do for the worldwide Anglican Communion and global ecumenism. We pray God’s blessing on her and her husband in their new life.
It is the hard work of these, and many others, which allows us to say, in the words of Zechariah, ‘Come, let us go to entreat the favour of the Lord, and to seek the Lord of hosts.’
So let me turn now to the substance of my Charge, for which we are blessed with two pertinent lectionary readings. Our primary purpose is indeed to meet the Lord: to seek his face, and seek his guidance. We come because the Lord calls us to be his people, whom he loves, and whom he calls to return his love, and to share his love.
Zechariah writes that when our lives clearly demonstrate that we are God’s people – that God is with us, and guides us – then others will be drawn to us, so they may also find God, and God’s ways, and God’s blessing.
Zechariah was writing at the time of the Babylonian Empire, which spanned many peoples, languages, cultures, and faiths. The Jewish people had returned to Jerusalem from exile, some 18 or 19 years earlier. 19 years ago, Southern Africa returned from the exile of apartheid’s hold on South Africa and dire impact on its neighbours. In our region of many peoples, languages, cultures, and faiths, there is – as there was in Zechariah’s time – a yearning for a deeper sense of identity, purpose and blessing in their lives.
We are to reflect the hope they seek – being those in whom others can recognise God’s presence, and therefore say, ‘let us go with you, for we have heard that God is with you.’ We too seek God’s clarity for our identity and purpose, so we may be a channel of blessing, through our Vision: ‘Anglicans ACT – Anchored in the love of Christ, Committed to God’s Mission, and Transformed by the Holy Spirit.’
Our gospel reading, in contrast, points out that not everyone will respond in this way. Some will reject Jesus Christ’s messengers, and the good news of his gospel. Today too, some of Christ’s messengers also respond inappropriately, wanting to ‘command fire to come down and consume’ those who reject him and us. Yet we are not to reject them in turn, says Jesus – for the love of God rejects no-one. And even if we are rejected or rebuked, we are to continue walking with Jesus, who ‘set his face to go to Jerusalem.’
This is not his journey to his crucifixion, but an earlier visit to the place where the Jewish people celebrated their calling from God, and found nourishment for their faith journeys. We too must be focussed on what nurtures and sustains our pilgrimage of faith. Our capacity to be God’s people, for the sake of God’s world – rooted in our baptism, and affirmed at confirmation – must be diligently fed throughout our lives. Regular, deepening, prayer, Bible-study, worship, and receiving the sacraments – none are optional if we are serious about witness and service; if we are serious about the re-evangelisation of the Anglican communities of Southern Africa; and if we are serious about truly being salt and light in God’s world.
This is why, for me, education in all its forms is so central. This is why I have chosen as Synod’s theme ‘A Vision for Education – Education for a Vision’, and invited three distinguished speakers to address us. We also have a special session led by Mr Henry Bennett, Provincial Registrar, to educate us in better understanding and use of our Canons, to help us live out the identity and purpose to which God calls us. Godly education can help form, inform and transform us and our church, so we – like those whom Zechariah addressed – can walking together confidently, knowing that God is with us, promising his good favour, and that therefore we need not fear whatever obstacles come our way.
Last year Provincial Standing Committee decided that 2013 should be our ‘Year of Theological Education’. Well-trained leaders, clergy and laity, will help us grapple more deeply with our faith – and not merely with our heads, but inwardly digesting, so we are better able to hear and respond to God’s call to us in our own contexts, within and beyond the walls of the church.
I am grateful to Revd Canon Professor Barney Pityana, Rector of the College of the Transfiguration, and to his staff, for spearheading this work. I commend to you all their ‘From Root to Branch’ study series. Thank you also to Bishop Raphael Hess, HOPE Africa, and all who worked on our special Theological Education Sunday in August; and thank you to everyone who gave generously.
Prof Pityana will be our keynote speaker on how investing in theological education is a vital step towards ensuring our Church’s future. We congratulate him on moving COTT towards registration of courses with the South African Qualifications Authority. My dream is to go further, and to have an Anglican owned and run university campus, focussed on theology and the liberal arts, launched from the COTT campus. Please join me in exploring how this vision might find concrete expression.
Good education – theological and otherwise – is at the heart of our capacity to grow into our Provincial Vision, ‘Anglicans Act’. This is why I am asking Synod to look particularly not only at what we hope to achieve in each priority area, but how we aim to educate our Province to what we are doing. For work at Synod is just the beginning: our responsibility is to ensure that what we do here makes a difference when we go home. As you debate and decide, keep asking yourself ‘What do I want to happen, as a result of seeking God at Synod?’
From liturgy and worship to the environment, from health to young people, from leadership development to public advocacy, from finance to gender issues – in all these areas, we want to see our Lord more clearly, love him more dearly, and follow his lead more nearly – and help the rest of our Province to do the same. We thank all who are involved in media and communications, for the contribution they make to this task.
I’d also like to highlight the work underway to revise our Prayer Book. I cannot overestimate the importance of the centrality of worship that draws us ever closer to our Lord and Saviour. To this end, I want to thank Revd Bruce Jenneker and the Liturgical Committee as they lead this task. May God guide and strengthen you in your work.
Earlier this year, I followed a 30-day retreat, which brought me profound new insights into how to listen to God speaking through Scripture directly into today’s challenges of mission and ministry. Five years into my Archiepiscopate, it was a tremendous privilege to step back, and take stock with the Lord, and find fresh perspectives, and deeper insights. There was a new level of encounter with God, beyond what I had expected. My hope is that through theological education, we will encourage all our people to take risks in faith. We need to let ourselves be led beyond our comfort zones into places of unexpected grace and rich encounter.
Last year’s Anglicans Ablaze conference was such a place, for me and many others. It was the largest gathering from across our whole Province anyone could remember. Everyone was there – all races; all languages; all ages; all sexes and sexualities; high church and low church; Anglo-Catholics (or Afro-Catholics!), Evangelicals and Charismatics. We all felt God’s presence among us; and recognised how, in Christ, we all belonged to one another. We learnt that our common life was not threatened, but enriched, by our diversity. It was the most amazing celebration of God’s life pouring through us all! It was a time of renewal, and let me stress I mean renewal in its broadest sense: we felt God breathing freshness into a holistic life of evangelism and discipleship and integral mission and social justice. I found myself confronted by a vision of the breath-taking beauty of Anglicanism, when we allow God’s inspiring love to weave a gloriously colourful cloth from our different threads! This has stayed with me: finding new vibrancy in reading my prayer book, new freedom in celebrating the sacraments, and a new liberty in speaking with honest confidence about the realities of our diversity – and the riches, as well as the challenges, this brings.
It delights me to announce there will be a second Anglicans Ablaze Conference from 2 to 5 July, next year. Furthermore, Archbishop Justin Welby, the new Archbishop of Canterbury, will be one of our speakers!
Both at Anglicans Ablaze, and in international meetings, I am increasingly appreciating that Anglicanism is a precious gift, as well as a challenge. At our best we can show the world what it means to live in creative, enriching, harmony, across diversity and difference – daring to make ourselves accountable to one another, committed to pursuing a common life that is not an ‘obligation’ but a ‘choice’ that sets us free to deepen the charism of being members together of the body of Christ. This is why I am promoting the ratification of the Anglican Covenant, which we provisionally adopted three years ago. ACSA belongs at the very heart of Anglicanism, offering our own experience of deepen bonds of affection across difference, to those who share this commitment.
That we live by grace and covenant, and not by law, is at the heart of the rejuvenation of the Canon Law Society. This, like the Anglican Covenant, is not about placing legalistic and legislative burdens upon us. Rather, it is for helping us to use Canon Law better: as our good servant, not bad master. This is also an educative task.
Both our readings spoke of God’s people within wider contexts. In today’s world far too often the immediate response to disagreement is to rush to litigation as the first, not last, resort: whether in politics, business, or even running football clubs! Alas, Christians often follow the same path. The amount of time and money our church has spent in the last five years in secular legal processes is shocking. It pains me deeply that legal cases have consumed significant resources that should be devoted to mission and ministry. It also distresses me to see the church falling into ungodly practices of lobbying and putting on pressure, to get our own way, or to get our own back when we can’t get what we want through proper processes.
God calls us instead to wrestle with one another within the body of Christ, and together to wrestle with him, so we may discern his will in the complexities of our relationships in this complex world. Better understandings of Canon Law should help resource us to deal with difficult issues in more holy ways.
This is also the aim of revising disciplinary Canons: that these should bring us greater confidence and freedom in following our calling, just as the introduction of Pastoral Standards has done. God calls us to offer models of good and holy practice to the world – for those who long to find the Lord’s favour, as in our first reading; and even to those who think they know better, as in our second. We must follow good governance and best practice in all that we do, where necessary revising both structures and practices. We must be good stewards of our resources, for example asking whether the expense of meetings could be better handled through having our own Anglican conference centre.
As we live before the watching world, we should not fear difference, or even disagreement, because it is through wrestling together – as brothers and sisters who know our unity in Christ is greater than anything that can divide us – that we can be like rough stones polishing each other to become beautiful smooth gems. It is a demanding calling, but I am sure it is one to which God especially calls Anglicans, in Southern Africa and around the world.
Turning now to a subject very near to my heart, the education of our young people, I want to pay a particular tribute to Bishop Peter Lee and his team; and to STEP Consulting, a Christian-based company who have deployed some bright young Anglicans to help us develop our strategy for education. Bishop Lee has taken PSC’s resolution on the Archbishop’s Initiative in Education, and breathed vibrant life into it.
We made three commitments then:
• to strengthen what our Province is already doing in education;
• to encouraging parishes in the on-going upliftment of communities through partnership with local public schools; and
• to create more excellent church schools for all.
We shall hear how all three have seen wonderful growth and development. Let me just mention that our Province now has a fully registered NPO, ‘ABESA’, the Anglican Board for Education in Southern Africa, working across ACSA’s countries. Great educationalists on the board are bringing synergy between private and public schools. Through this initiative, and in partnership with Vuleka schools, the Archbishop Thabo Makgoba Boys’ School will soon be built in Gauteng.
I am delighted to welcome Professor Mary Metcalfe as our keynote speaker on the theme of education. Ours is a continent of young people. We thank God for the work of AYSA and ASF, and all our programmes with children and youth. Within our schools, colleges and universities we aim to form fully rounded individuals, capable of analysing critically the world around us, and acting compassionately.
Indeed, our Vision priority of leadership development is designed to promote this among all our people. As Zechariah said, God’s people should be those who lead communities to walk in the ways that lead to blessing. Revd Professor Bev Haddad will give our keynote address on ‘Transformational leadership: building redemptive communities’.
Our world needs the combination of critical analysis and compassionate hearts. We need it in Syria, Egypt, Israel and Palestine, Kenya and Pakistan. There are rarely easy answers to finding lasting peace with justice. Any attempts to find solutions through simplistic military engagement are almost certain to lead to greater violence. Prayer is the best route to wise action. Sudan and South Sudan also need this. We look forward to hearing more from you, Archbishop Daniel, about how we can best support you and your Province.
We all need to know how God’s timeless principles apply in our own context – in each of our own countries, as we pray for our political leaders. This is especially true where, as in South Africa, we are headed towards elections next year. We must also, as individuals and local congregations, learn what it means to live out the gospel within our own communities, in our work, in family life, wherever we find ourselves.
We continue to give thanks for the life of Nelson Mandela, Madiba, who helped us find a way forward based on gospel values. His example has been a pillar of strength to me, and to so many of us in church leadership, and to all who continue to strive for social justice. Gospel values, wisdom and compassion, living within us by the power of God’s Holy Spirit, will guide our lives and direct our energies. His Spirit will help us, whether in pursuing the deepening of democracy, or countering corruption in all its forms, or opposing such brute force as we saw at Marikana, or working for peace and reconciliation, or tackling gender-violence.
There is so much that we can do – and I commend the work done by the Anglican AIDS and Healthcare Trust, and by HOPE Africa, working with various partners, including Tearfund and USAID on the 16 days of Global Activism, and others.
There are a great range of topics addressed in our draft motions, and I invite you to wrestle with them as fully as you can, asking God to give you holy wisdom and insight.
Let me just mention that we continue to work towards finalising guidelines for pastoral ministry in response to Civil Unions. We all know that the matter of same gender loving has created great anguish both for those who feel called by God to this state, and those who oppose this. I long for the day when faith leaders can apologise authentically for the pain we have caused through our inept handling of pastoral realities, and our theological reflection on them. I want to add my own small voice of apology that, in our sensitivities and fears of upsetting one another, we are still at such an undeveloped state; and I pray that we may dare to engage together more deeply in critical theological praxis and move forward together as a Church.
Yet as we look at the breadth of issues before us, it is important to remember that none of us are called to do everything. Each of us must attend to our own particular calling – as I find myself putting the spotlight on education, on water and sanitation, and on the environment. I am honoured to chair the Anglican Communion Environmental Network, and proud when Anglicans lead the world, as the Diocese of Auckland did last month, becoming the first New Zealand institution to divest from fossil fuels.
Whether in specific public walks of witness, or by the witness of our daily lives, we are to be living testaments to the Good News of Jesus Christ – and it is the Church’s task to equip our people to be such leaders in the world. Education can, and should, be an evangelistic tool. We cannot nurture our children, our people, in mind, and heart, and body, without also nurturing their souls.
As I travel around our Province, I find my soul lifted by meeting Anglicans in every imaginable walk of life. It can be a tremendous joy to leave behind Synods and meetings, and the complexities of institutional life; and to spend time with people who have such pride in being Anglicans, and such joy in the Lord, in their own contexts. It teaches me that ‘revelation is on-going’. God’s eternal unchanging truths find fresh expression in every new circumstance. And here let me commend to you the on-going work of Growing the Church, in developing authentically Southern African ‘Fresh Expressions’. These draw on our sacramental and theological traditions and our concern for social justice in finding ways to promote new congregations. Christ is indeed born anew in us, day by day by day – the living Word of God, active among us, challenging our staleness, and surprising us by springing up where we had not expected it.
Jesus himself, the greatest teacher of all, calls each of us to follow him, wherever we find ourselves. Our two new members of the Order of Simon of Cyrene illustrate how broadly Christ’s call can come – whether to faithful years of service in the structures of the church; or, equally, to be salt and light in a life that has gone from Robben Island to the South African Council of Churches and then to the highest echelons of our country’s movers and shakers.
I come to Synod conscious of a spirit of deep thankfulness within me, for all God is and for all God does for us. For I know that, whatever our weaknesses, the fragrant aroma of God’s Spirit among us continues to attract people to himself, and to his mission and ministry. We know, in our heads, our hearts, our deepest selves, that God is faithful and he will do this. Day by day he sends forth faithful people, men and women, young and old, who give their time, their money, their gifts and their resources, to take forward the work to which God calls the Anglican Church of Southern Africa, and to enable my own ministry, and the ministry of so many others within it.
For all our benefactors, for our ordained and lay leaders and their families, for our fellow pilgrims on the road, for all our brothers and sisters in Christ throughout the ages, we give thanks to God.
Like the people of Zechariah’s time, our journeying to Jerusalem to seek the Lord and entreat his favour may be difficult and daunting, with complex challenges. But let us go forward in faithfulness and confidence, sure of our identity in the one who gives us life, so we may share this life with the peoples of all the races and nations among which we find ourselves.
And to God, the source of all blessing, be the glory, now and in all eternity. Amen.
"A Vision for Education – Education for a Vision"
Zechariah 8:20-23, Luke 9:51-56
May I speak in the name of God – Creator, Redeemer and Sanctifier.
Dear brothers and sisters in Christ, members of Synod, distinguished guests, I greet you in the name of our Lord and Saviour Jesus Christ, and welcome you to the thirty-third session of the Provincial Synod of the Anglican Church of Southern Africa.
I extend a particular welcome to our guests – especially my dear brother from the Episcopal Church of Sudan, Archbishop Daniel Deng Bull. May your time with us be one of growing and deepening communion within the Anglican / Episcopal family. A warm welcome also to Revd Dr James Cooper and Revd Canon Benjamin Museka Lubega, of Trinity Wall Street, a longstanding partner in the gospel to our Province. I also greet our ecumenical guests, our brothers and sisters within the Body of Christ.
A special welcome to Synod first-timers. I hope you will quickly feel at home among our processes and procedures, and make a full contribution.
Let me thank everyone who has helped prepare this Synod and this Charge, and who supports my ministry as Archbishop more generally. First, as always, my thanks go to Lungi (who is currently representing our Province at a USPG consultation in India) and my children, who have come to expect that in the run-up to Synods, while I am present in body, there is no guarantee that I am present in mind or spirit!
Thank you also to the staff at Bishopscourt and in the Provincial Treasurer’s office; to the Synod Advisory Committee, particularly Mr Henry Bennett; to the Dean of the Province; to the Bishop of Table Bay and the Cape Town Diocesan staff; and to everyone else who has contributed to this Synod.
We record particular thanks to Gail Allen, who has ensured the smooth running of more Synods than we can count, and who rightly is awarded the Order of Simon of Cyrene. This year has brought a particularly weighty responsibility, after Revd Canon Allan Kannemeyer stepped down as PEO to return to the Diocese of Pretoria where he is now Dean. We therefore thank Revd Keith Griffiths for returning from retirement to act as Synod Manager.
I give thanks to God for the support of the Dean of the Province and the Synod of Bishops, for the collegiality we share, and for the responsibilities each bishop shoulders through the year as they lead various portfolios.
Collegiality is also shared with Bishops and Archbishops of the past, and in thanking God for them, I particularly want to pay tribute to Archbishop Philip Russell, who died in July. Last month we interred his ashes in Greytown, in a quiet but moving service, at which Archbishop Emeritus Desmond Tutu preached, with Natal bishops, current and retired, present. Let us observe a moment’s silence as we thank God for all this passionate, compassionate, unsung hero meant to, and did for, our Province.
I also need to add that, since we went to print, a member of our Synod who should have been with us today, Mr James Thomas, a church-warden in the Diocese of Cape Town, was murdered in the terrorist attacks in Nairobi. We pray for his wife Colleen and family, as they hold his funeral tomorrow.
It is always a delight to welcome new bishops to Synod – eight in all! Those of you who were here three years ago will remember me admitting I dreamed of consecrating a woman bishop for our Province – by the grace of God, we now have two! This is also the last Synod for several bishops, and we thank God for them and their ministry.
I’d also like to express gratitude to the Revd Canon Dr Sarah Rowland Jones. She came to South Africa 11 years ago to marry Bishop Justus Marcus, and, since his death the following year, has spent a decade as Researcher to two Archbishops. Later this month she returns to Wales to take over Cardiff’s city centre parish. We give thanks for her unstinting enthusiasm and hard work in serving our Province, as well as for all she continues to do for the worldwide Anglican Communion and global ecumenism. We pray God’s blessing on her and her husband in their new life.
It is the hard work of these, and many others, which allows us to say, in the words of Zechariah, ‘Come, let us go to entreat the favour of the Lord, and to seek the Lord of hosts.’
So let me turn now to the substance of my Charge, for which we are blessed with two pertinent lectionary readings. Our primary purpose is indeed to meet the Lord: to seek his face, and seek his guidance. We come because the Lord calls us to be his people, whom he loves, and whom he calls to return his love, and to share his love.
Zechariah writes that when our lives clearly demonstrate that we are God’s people – that God is with us, and guides us – then others will be drawn to us, so they may also find God, and God’s ways, and God’s blessing.
Zechariah was writing at the time of the Babylonian Empire, which spanned many peoples, languages, cultures, and faiths. The Jewish people had returned to Jerusalem from exile, some 18 or 19 years earlier. 19 years ago, Southern Africa returned from the exile of apartheid’s hold on South Africa and dire impact on its neighbours. In our region of many peoples, languages, cultures, and faiths, there is – as there was in Zechariah’s time – a yearning for a deeper sense of identity, purpose and blessing in their lives.
We are to reflect the hope they seek – being those in whom others can recognise God’s presence, and therefore say, ‘let us go with you, for we have heard that God is with you.’ We too seek God’s clarity for our identity and purpose, so we may be a channel of blessing, through our Vision: ‘Anglicans ACT – Anchored in the love of Christ, Committed to God’s Mission, and Transformed by the Holy Spirit.’
Our gospel reading, in contrast, points out that not everyone will respond in this way. Some will reject Jesus Christ’s messengers, and the good news of his gospel. Today too, some of Christ’s messengers also respond inappropriately, wanting to ‘command fire to come down and consume’ those who reject him and us. Yet we are not to reject them in turn, says Jesus – for the love of God rejects no-one. And even if we are rejected or rebuked, we are to continue walking with Jesus, who ‘set his face to go to Jerusalem.’
This is not his journey to his crucifixion, but an earlier visit to the place where the Jewish people celebrated their calling from God, and found nourishment for their faith journeys. We too must be focussed on what nurtures and sustains our pilgrimage of faith. Our capacity to be God’s people, for the sake of God’s world – rooted in our baptism, and affirmed at confirmation – must be diligently fed throughout our lives. Regular, deepening, prayer, Bible-study, worship, and receiving the sacraments – none are optional if we are serious about witness and service; if we are serious about the re-evangelisation of the Anglican communities of Southern Africa; and if we are serious about truly being salt and light in God’s world.
This is why, for me, education in all its forms is so central. This is why I have chosen as Synod’s theme ‘A Vision for Education – Education for a Vision’, and invited three distinguished speakers to address us. We also have a special session led by Mr Henry Bennett, Provincial Registrar, to educate us in better understanding and use of our Canons, to help us live out the identity and purpose to which God calls us. Godly education can help form, inform and transform us and our church, so we – like those whom Zechariah addressed – can walking together confidently, knowing that God is with us, promising his good favour, and that therefore we need not fear whatever obstacles come our way.
Last year Provincial Standing Committee decided that 2013 should be our ‘Year of Theological Education’. Well-trained leaders, clergy and laity, will help us grapple more deeply with our faith – and not merely with our heads, but inwardly digesting, so we are better able to hear and respond to God’s call to us in our own contexts, within and beyond the walls of the church.
I am grateful to Revd Canon Professor Barney Pityana, Rector of the College of the Transfiguration, and to his staff, for spearheading this work. I commend to you all their ‘From Root to Branch’ study series. Thank you also to Bishop Raphael Hess, HOPE Africa, and all who worked on our special Theological Education Sunday in August; and thank you to everyone who gave generously.
Prof Pityana will be our keynote speaker on how investing in theological education is a vital step towards ensuring our Church’s future. We congratulate him on moving COTT towards registration of courses with the South African Qualifications Authority. My dream is to go further, and to have an Anglican owned and run university campus, focussed on theology and the liberal arts, launched from the COTT campus. Please join me in exploring how this vision might find concrete expression.
Good education – theological and otherwise – is at the heart of our capacity to grow into our Provincial Vision, ‘Anglicans Act’. This is why I am asking Synod to look particularly not only at what we hope to achieve in each priority area, but how we aim to educate our Province to what we are doing. For work at Synod is just the beginning: our responsibility is to ensure that what we do here makes a difference when we go home. As you debate and decide, keep asking yourself ‘What do I want to happen, as a result of seeking God at Synod?’
From liturgy and worship to the environment, from health to young people, from leadership development to public advocacy, from finance to gender issues – in all these areas, we want to see our Lord more clearly, love him more dearly, and follow his lead more nearly – and help the rest of our Province to do the same. We thank all who are involved in media and communications, for the contribution they make to this task.
I’d also like to highlight the work underway to revise our Prayer Book. I cannot overestimate the importance of the centrality of worship that draws us ever closer to our Lord and Saviour. To this end, I want to thank Revd Bruce Jenneker and the Liturgical Committee as they lead this task. May God guide and strengthen you in your work.
Earlier this year, I followed a 30-day retreat, which brought me profound new insights into how to listen to God speaking through Scripture directly into today’s challenges of mission and ministry. Five years into my Archiepiscopate, it was a tremendous privilege to step back, and take stock with the Lord, and find fresh perspectives, and deeper insights. There was a new level of encounter with God, beyond what I had expected. My hope is that through theological education, we will encourage all our people to take risks in faith. We need to let ourselves be led beyond our comfort zones into places of unexpected grace and rich encounter.
Last year’s Anglicans Ablaze conference was such a place, for me and many others. It was the largest gathering from across our whole Province anyone could remember. Everyone was there – all races; all languages; all ages; all sexes and sexualities; high church and low church; Anglo-Catholics (or Afro-Catholics!), Evangelicals and Charismatics. We all felt God’s presence among us; and recognised how, in Christ, we all belonged to one another. We learnt that our common life was not threatened, but enriched, by our diversity. It was the most amazing celebration of God’s life pouring through us all! It was a time of renewal, and let me stress I mean renewal in its broadest sense: we felt God breathing freshness into a holistic life of evangelism and discipleship and integral mission and social justice. I found myself confronted by a vision of the breath-taking beauty of Anglicanism, when we allow God’s inspiring love to weave a gloriously colourful cloth from our different threads! This has stayed with me: finding new vibrancy in reading my prayer book, new freedom in celebrating the sacraments, and a new liberty in speaking with honest confidence about the realities of our diversity – and the riches, as well as the challenges, this brings.
It delights me to announce there will be a second Anglicans Ablaze Conference from 2 to 5 July, next year. Furthermore, Archbishop Justin Welby, the new Archbishop of Canterbury, will be one of our speakers!
Both at Anglicans Ablaze, and in international meetings, I am increasingly appreciating that Anglicanism is a precious gift, as well as a challenge. At our best we can show the world what it means to live in creative, enriching, harmony, across diversity and difference – daring to make ourselves accountable to one another, committed to pursuing a common life that is not an ‘obligation’ but a ‘choice’ that sets us free to deepen the charism of being members together of the body of Christ. This is why I am promoting the ratification of the Anglican Covenant, which we provisionally adopted three years ago. ACSA belongs at the very heart of Anglicanism, offering our own experience of deepen bonds of affection across difference, to those who share this commitment.
That we live by grace and covenant, and not by law, is at the heart of the rejuvenation of the Canon Law Society. This, like the Anglican Covenant, is not about placing legalistic and legislative burdens upon us. Rather, it is for helping us to use Canon Law better: as our good servant, not bad master. This is also an educative task.
Both our readings spoke of God’s people within wider contexts. In today’s world far too often the immediate response to disagreement is to rush to litigation as the first, not last, resort: whether in politics, business, or even running football clubs! Alas, Christians often follow the same path. The amount of time and money our church has spent in the last five years in secular legal processes is shocking. It pains me deeply that legal cases have consumed significant resources that should be devoted to mission and ministry. It also distresses me to see the church falling into ungodly practices of lobbying and putting on pressure, to get our own way, or to get our own back when we can’t get what we want through proper processes.
God calls us instead to wrestle with one another within the body of Christ, and together to wrestle with him, so we may discern his will in the complexities of our relationships in this complex world. Better understandings of Canon Law should help resource us to deal with difficult issues in more holy ways.
This is also the aim of revising disciplinary Canons: that these should bring us greater confidence and freedom in following our calling, just as the introduction of Pastoral Standards has done. God calls us to offer models of good and holy practice to the world – for those who long to find the Lord’s favour, as in our first reading; and even to those who think they know better, as in our second. We must follow good governance and best practice in all that we do, where necessary revising both structures and practices. We must be good stewards of our resources, for example asking whether the expense of meetings could be better handled through having our own Anglican conference centre.
As we live before the watching world, we should not fear difference, or even disagreement, because it is through wrestling together – as brothers and sisters who know our unity in Christ is greater than anything that can divide us – that we can be like rough stones polishing each other to become beautiful smooth gems. It is a demanding calling, but I am sure it is one to which God especially calls Anglicans, in Southern Africa and around the world.
Turning now to a subject very near to my heart, the education of our young people, I want to pay a particular tribute to Bishop Peter Lee and his team; and to STEP Consulting, a Christian-based company who have deployed some bright young Anglicans to help us develop our strategy for education. Bishop Lee has taken PSC’s resolution on the Archbishop’s Initiative in Education, and breathed vibrant life into it.
We made three commitments then:
• to strengthen what our Province is already doing in education;
• to encouraging parishes in the on-going upliftment of communities through partnership with local public schools; and
• to create more excellent church schools for all.
We shall hear how all three have seen wonderful growth and development. Let me just mention that our Province now has a fully registered NPO, ‘ABESA’, the Anglican Board for Education in Southern Africa, working across ACSA’s countries. Great educationalists on the board are bringing synergy between private and public schools. Through this initiative, and in partnership with Vuleka schools, the Archbishop Thabo Makgoba Boys’ School will soon be built in Gauteng.
I am delighted to welcome Professor Mary Metcalfe as our keynote speaker on the theme of education. Ours is a continent of young people. We thank God for the work of AYSA and ASF, and all our programmes with children and youth. Within our schools, colleges and universities we aim to form fully rounded individuals, capable of analysing critically the world around us, and acting compassionately.
Indeed, our Vision priority of leadership development is designed to promote this among all our people. As Zechariah said, God’s people should be those who lead communities to walk in the ways that lead to blessing. Revd Professor Bev Haddad will give our keynote address on ‘Transformational leadership: building redemptive communities’.
Our world needs the combination of critical analysis and compassionate hearts. We need it in Syria, Egypt, Israel and Palestine, Kenya and Pakistan. There are rarely easy answers to finding lasting peace with justice. Any attempts to find solutions through simplistic military engagement are almost certain to lead to greater violence. Prayer is the best route to wise action. Sudan and South Sudan also need this. We look forward to hearing more from you, Archbishop Daniel, about how we can best support you and your Province.
We all need to know how God’s timeless principles apply in our own context – in each of our own countries, as we pray for our political leaders. This is especially true where, as in South Africa, we are headed towards elections next year. We must also, as individuals and local congregations, learn what it means to live out the gospel within our own communities, in our work, in family life, wherever we find ourselves.
We continue to give thanks for the life of Nelson Mandela, Madiba, who helped us find a way forward based on gospel values. His example has been a pillar of strength to me, and to so many of us in church leadership, and to all who continue to strive for social justice. Gospel values, wisdom and compassion, living within us by the power of God’s Holy Spirit, will guide our lives and direct our energies. His Spirit will help us, whether in pursuing the deepening of democracy, or countering corruption in all its forms, or opposing such brute force as we saw at Marikana, or working for peace and reconciliation, or tackling gender-violence.
There is so much that we can do – and I commend the work done by the Anglican AIDS and Healthcare Trust, and by HOPE Africa, working with various partners, including Tearfund and USAID on the 16 days of Global Activism, and others.
There are a great range of topics addressed in our draft motions, and I invite you to wrestle with them as fully as you can, asking God to give you holy wisdom and insight.
Let me just mention that we continue to work towards finalising guidelines for pastoral ministry in response to Civil Unions. We all know that the matter of same gender loving has created great anguish both for those who feel called by God to this state, and those who oppose this. I long for the day when faith leaders can apologise authentically for the pain we have caused through our inept handling of pastoral realities, and our theological reflection on them. I want to add my own small voice of apology that, in our sensitivities and fears of upsetting one another, we are still at such an undeveloped state; and I pray that we may dare to engage together more deeply in critical theological praxis and move forward together as a Church.
Yet as we look at the breadth of issues before us, it is important to remember that none of us are called to do everything. Each of us must attend to our own particular calling – as I find myself putting the spotlight on education, on water and sanitation, and on the environment. I am honoured to chair the Anglican Communion Environmental Network, and proud when Anglicans lead the world, as the Diocese of Auckland did last month, becoming the first New Zealand institution to divest from fossil fuels.
Whether in specific public walks of witness, or by the witness of our daily lives, we are to be living testaments to the Good News of Jesus Christ – and it is the Church’s task to equip our people to be such leaders in the world. Education can, and should, be an evangelistic tool. We cannot nurture our children, our people, in mind, and heart, and body, without also nurturing their souls.
As I travel around our Province, I find my soul lifted by meeting Anglicans in every imaginable walk of life. It can be a tremendous joy to leave behind Synods and meetings, and the complexities of institutional life; and to spend time with people who have such pride in being Anglicans, and such joy in the Lord, in their own contexts. It teaches me that ‘revelation is on-going’. God’s eternal unchanging truths find fresh expression in every new circumstance. And here let me commend to you the on-going work of Growing the Church, in developing authentically Southern African ‘Fresh Expressions’. These draw on our sacramental and theological traditions and our concern for social justice in finding ways to promote new congregations. Christ is indeed born anew in us, day by day by day – the living Word of God, active among us, challenging our staleness, and surprising us by springing up where we had not expected it.
Jesus himself, the greatest teacher of all, calls each of us to follow him, wherever we find ourselves. Our two new members of the Order of Simon of Cyrene illustrate how broadly Christ’s call can come – whether to faithful years of service in the structures of the church; or, equally, to be salt and light in a life that has gone from Robben Island to the South African Council of Churches and then to the highest echelons of our country’s movers and shakers.
I come to Synod conscious of a spirit of deep thankfulness within me, for all God is and for all God does for us. For I know that, whatever our weaknesses, the fragrant aroma of God’s Spirit among us continues to attract people to himself, and to his mission and ministry. We know, in our heads, our hearts, our deepest selves, that God is faithful and he will do this. Day by day he sends forth faithful people, men and women, young and old, who give their time, their money, their gifts and their resources, to take forward the work to which God calls the Anglican Church of Southern Africa, and to enable my own ministry, and the ministry of so many others within it.
For all our benefactors, for our ordained and lay leaders and their families, for our fellow pilgrims on the road, for all our brothers and sisters in Christ throughout the ages, we give thanks to God.
Like the people of Zechariah’s time, our journeying to Jerusalem to seek the Lord and entreat his favour may be difficult and daunting, with complex challenges. But let us go forward in faithfulness and confidence, sure of our identity in the one who gives us life, so we may share this life with the peoples of all the races and nations among which we find ourselves.
And to God, the source of all blessing, be the glory, now and in all eternity. Amen.
Monday, 30 September 2013
Synod of Bishops and Provincial Synod
Please pray for Synod of Bishops and Provincial Synod, meeting this week
Media Advisory - Anglican Church of Southern Africa's Provincial Synod to Meet October 1 to 4
25 September 2013
The highest decision-making body of the Anglican Church of Southern Africa (ACSA), its Provincial Synod, will meet at the Kopanong Conference Centre, Benoni from Tuesday October 1 to Friday October 4.
During the opening service of the Synod on Tuesday afternoon, the Archbishop of Cape Town, the Most Revd Dr Thabo Makgoba will deliver his Charge, the address in which he summarises the life of the Church and the challenges before it.
The theme of the Synod will be "A Vision for Education - Education for a Vision". Prof Mary Metcalfe, formerly of the University of the Witwatersrand and now with the Development Bank of South Africa (DBSA), will make a presentation on Education to the Synod.
A special guest at the Synod will be the Most Revd Dr Daniel Deng Bul Yak, Archbishop of the Episcopal Church of the Sudan and Bishop of Juba. The Revd Dr J Cooper of Trinity Wall Street, Washington, a long time partner of ACSA, will also join part of Synod.
Other items on the agenda include:
1. Matters of Canon Law (the rules by which the Church lives);
2. A presentation on transformational leadership by Prof Bev Haddad of the University of Kwazulu-Natal;
3. A presentation on human sexuality by Bishop Martin Breytenbach of the Diocese of St Mark the Evangelist.
4. A presentation on theological education by Prof Barney Pityana, Rector of the College of the Transfiguration.
5. The consideration of resolutions on matters including Church action on alcohol and drug abuse, the protection of the environment and pastoral guidelines for ministry to couples who enter same-sex civil unions.
Dioceses in Angola, Lesotho, Mozambique, Namibia, South Africa, the island of St. Helena and Swaziland will be represented by their bishops as well as clergy and lay members of the Church.
The meeting will be preceded by a closed meeting of the Church's Synod of Bishops.
Issued by the Office of the Anglican Archbishop of Cape Town
Inquiries: Ms Wendy Kelderman, 021 763 1320 (office hours)
The Revd Canon Dr Sarah Rowland Jones, 082 856 2082 (during Synod)
Media Advisory - Anglican Church of Southern Africa's Provincial Synod to Meet October 1 to 4
25 September 2013
The highest decision-making body of the Anglican Church of Southern Africa (ACSA), its Provincial Synod, will meet at the Kopanong Conference Centre, Benoni from Tuesday October 1 to Friday October 4.
During the opening service of the Synod on Tuesday afternoon, the Archbishop of Cape Town, the Most Revd Dr Thabo Makgoba will deliver his Charge, the address in which he summarises the life of the Church and the challenges before it.
The theme of the Synod will be "A Vision for Education - Education for a Vision". Prof Mary Metcalfe, formerly of the University of the Witwatersrand and now with the Development Bank of South Africa (DBSA), will make a presentation on Education to the Synod.
A special guest at the Synod will be the Most Revd Dr Daniel Deng Bul Yak, Archbishop of the Episcopal Church of the Sudan and Bishop of Juba. The Revd Dr J Cooper of Trinity Wall Street, Washington, a long time partner of ACSA, will also join part of Synod.
Other items on the agenda include:
1. Matters of Canon Law (the rules by which the Church lives);
2. A presentation on transformational leadership by Prof Bev Haddad of the University of Kwazulu-Natal;
3. A presentation on human sexuality by Bishop Martin Breytenbach of the Diocese of St Mark the Evangelist.
4. A presentation on theological education by Prof Barney Pityana, Rector of the College of the Transfiguration.
5. The consideration of resolutions on matters including Church action on alcohol and drug abuse, the protection of the environment and pastoral guidelines for ministry to couples who enter same-sex civil unions.
Dioceses in Angola, Lesotho, Mozambique, Namibia, South Africa, the island of St. Helena and Swaziland will be represented by their bishops as well as clergy and lay members of the Church.
The meeting will be preceded by a closed meeting of the Church's Synod of Bishops.
Issued by the Office of the Anglican Archbishop of Cape Town
Inquiries: Ms Wendy Kelderman, 021 763 1320 (office hours)
The Revd Canon Dr Sarah Rowland Jones, 082 856 2082 (during Synod)
Tuesday, 12 March 2013
Synod of Bishops' Statement
Synod of Bishops of the Anglican Church of Southern Africa, March 2013
Jesus spoke to them saying: “I am the light of the world. Whoever follows me will never walk in darkness but will have the light of life.” – John 8:12
We, as the Bishops of the Anglican Church of Southern Africa, meeting at St Augustine’s, Modderpoort, in the Diocese of the Free State, from 5 to 8 March 2013, greet God’s beloved throughout the length and breadth of this our beautiful Province in the name of Jesus Christ, our Saviour and Lord!
As we gathered, our hearts were filled with gratitude for the many blessings that God bestows on us as a church.
We continue to celebrate the gift of two sister Bishops, Ellinah Wamukoya (Diocese of Swaziland) and Margaret Vertue (Diocese of False Bay), to the Church, as we meet at this historic Synod of Bishops, where we can be both sister and brother Bishops together.
We are also grateful to God for the growth that we, as the Church in this Province, are experiencing at present.
The Diocese of Niassa has borne witness to an amazing outpouring of God’s grace resulting in a process of spiritual and numerical growth that is nothing short of miraculous. In response to a proposal to multiply, the Synod of Bishops gave unanimous approval to the establishment of a new episcopal area and election of a Suffragan Bishop. The Archbishop has set the processes in motion for them to realise this dream.
We were pleased to hear from the Rector of the College of the Transfiguration, the Reverend Canon Professor Barney Pityana, of the positive developments at the College. We applaud the Rector, the Staff and the College Council for the progress that has been made with the accreditation of the academic programmes and registration of the College. We also express thanks to all who contributed generously for the refurbishment of the infrastructure.
The Provincial Standing Committee has declared 2013 a year of Theological Education in our Province. We support this initiative and call upon all Anglicans throughout the Province to make special monetary contributions to the College of the Transfiguration on Theological Education Sunday, which will be on 18 August 2013.
We commend and encourage those educators, officials and concerned citizens, at all levels of the educational system and society, who are working exceptionally hard to turn the situation around and who are doing their very best to ensure quality education for all. There is no doubt that education is a key sector for building the future. However, the state of the education system in South Africa continues to cause great concern and pain. We urge those whose task it is to shape, nurture and educate the next generation of leaders to take their task very seriously. We call for stern action to remedy the situation and for bold steps to be taken even if it requires the dismissal of those responsible for the situation and the replacement of incompetent officials.
We further support the Archbishop’s Education Initiative and commend Bishop Peter Lee, from the Diocese of Christ the King, who drives this process.
At the same time, our hearts are deeply troubled as we gather. Through our sharing and praying we have again become deeply aware of the hard realities of our varied contexts and of the cries of God’s people throughout the region.
We have noted with sadness the ever widening gap between the rich and the poor. Many of our people are trapped in the ever deepening spiral of abject poverty. We note the evidence for a close correlation between corruption and poverty. We, as a church, strongly condemn all forms of corruption, whether it is in the church or in civil society or in government or in business.
We call upon all of us to strive for a corruption free society and to challenge the governments and businesses in our region to do the same.
An area of particular concern is the escalating violence in South African society. It was particularly poignant that our discussions fell on International Women’s Day. The shocking fatal attack on the young woman Keamogetswe Sefularo at Mohlakeng which occurred during our meeting, as well as the brutal rape and murder of the young woman Anene Booysen at Bredasdorp, and also the violence displayed by the police towards a Mozambican national, Mido Macia, at Daveyton, who subsequently died, vividly highlights this crisis.
We condemn any form of violence, whether it is civil or state violence, domestic or public violence. We call upon all our people to strive for a violence-free society and, by so doing, to allow the light of Christ to permeate our society. We urge everyone, ‘Raise your voice! Stand up and be counted!’
We were moved by the homily of the Bishop of Khahlamba, at our Thursday Eucharist, on the inseparable link between the reform of liturgy and spiritual renewal. We, as Bishops, re-affirm our unqualified support for the initiative for the renewal of liturgy. There is a great sense of excitement as we embark on this process, as the Province, of revising the Anglican Prayer Book 1989. We realise that this will not be a hasty process, especially since we want to ensure that it will be a dynamic tool for mission and ministry, which will give expression to our distinctive identity and spirituality.
The problems experienced in the Dioceses of Pretoria and Umzimvubu presented us with particular challenges and we wish to assure our people in these Dioceses that we share their pain and have adopted strategies that, we hope, by the guidance of the Holy Spirit will lead to healing and wholeness in the Body of Christ. We implore you to pray for these pastoral interventions so that we may be whole, in answer to the prayer of our Lord Jesus, who prayed that we ‘may be one’ (Jn 17:11,21).
We acknowledge with gratitude the inauguration of the Canon Law Council of our Province, which was launched from 21 to 24 January 2013, in Grahamstown. We affirm the wide need for a better understanding of when and how to resort to canonically based action, while noting that Canon Law should be viewed as a good servant but poor master; for we also recall that Jesus, who came to fulfil the law, was against legalism, and that God’s people live under grace not law.
We give thanks for the fellowship in the gospel we share with our brothers and sisters around the Anglican Communion, particularly praying in joyful expectation for Archbishop Justin Welby and his family, as he prepares for his enthronement as Archbishop of Canterbury. We also gave thanks for the recent meeting of the Anglican Consultative Council, on which the Archbishop reported.
We pray that we as the Church will listen intelligently to what God is saying to us at this time; observe diligently the signs of God’s restorative grace that is breaking through in places where our people are struggling; teach faithfully what God commands us to do; and continue to be God’s Good-news people wherever we live and work.
With these concerns and words of encouragement, and always seeking to follow the light of Jesus Christ, our Lord and Saviour, we commend you to the grace of God.
Issued by the Office of the Anglican Archbishop of Cape Town
Inquiries: Ms Wendy Kelderman 021 763 1320 (office hours)
Jesus spoke to them saying: “I am the light of the world. Whoever follows me will never walk in darkness but will have the light of life.” – John 8:12
We, as the Bishops of the Anglican Church of Southern Africa, meeting at St Augustine’s, Modderpoort, in the Diocese of the Free State, from 5 to 8 March 2013, greet God’s beloved throughout the length and breadth of this our beautiful Province in the name of Jesus Christ, our Saviour and Lord!
As we gathered, our hearts were filled with gratitude for the many blessings that God bestows on us as a church.
We continue to celebrate the gift of two sister Bishops, Ellinah Wamukoya (Diocese of Swaziland) and Margaret Vertue (Diocese of False Bay), to the Church, as we meet at this historic Synod of Bishops, where we can be both sister and brother Bishops together.
We are also grateful to God for the growth that we, as the Church in this Province, are experiencing at present.
The Diocese of Niassa has borne witness to an amazing outpouring of God’s grace resulting in a process of spiritual and numerical growth that is nothing short of miraculous. In response to a proposal to multiply, the Synod of Bishops gave unanimous approval to the establishment of a new episcopal area and election of a Suffragan Bishop. The Archbishop has set the processes in motion for them to realise this dream.
We were pleased to hear from the Rector of the College of the Transfiguration, the Reverend Canon Professor Barney Pityana, of the positive developments at the College. We applaud the Rector, the Staff and the College Council for the progress that has been made with the accreditation of the academic programmes and registration of the College. We also express thanks to all who contributed generously for the refurbishment of the infrastructure.
The Provincial Standing Committee has declared 2013 a year of Theological Education in our Province. We support this initiative and call upon all Anglicans throughout the Province to make special monetary contributions to the College of the Transfiguration on Theological Education Sunday, which will be on 18 August 2013.
We commend and encourage those educators, officials and concerned citizens, at all levels of the educational system and society, who are working exceptionally hard to turn the situation around and who are doing their very best to ensure quality education for all. There is no doubt that education is a key sector for building the future. However, the state of the education system in South Africa continues to cause great concern and pain. We urge those whose task it is to shape, nurture and educate the next generation of leaders to take their task very seriously. We call for stern action to remedy the situation and for bold steps to be taken even if it requires the dismissal of those responsible for the situation and the replacement of incompetent officials.
We further support the Archbishop’s Education Initiative and commend Bishop Peter Lee, from the Diocese of Christ the King, who drives this process.
At the same time, our hearts are deeply troubled as we gather. Through our sharing and praying we have again become deeply aware of the hard realities of our varied contexts and of the cries of God’s people throughout the region.
We have noted with sadness the ever widening gap between the rich and the poor. Many of our people are trapped in the ever deepening spiral of abject poverty. We note the evidence for a close correlation between corruption and poverty. We, as a church, strongly condemn all forms of corruption, whether it is in the church or in civil society or in government or in business.
We call upon all of us to strive for a corruption free society and to challenge the governments and businesses in our region to do the same.
An area of particular concern is the escalating violence in South African society. It was particularly poignant that our discussions fell on International Women’s Day. The shocking fatal attack on the young woman Keamogetswe Sefularo at Mohlakeng which occurred during our meeting, as well as the brutal rape and murder of the young woman Anene Booysen at Bredasdorp, and also the violence displayed by the police towards a Mozambican national, Mido Macia, at Daveyton, who subsequently died, vividly highlights this crisis.
We condemn any form of violence, whether it is civil or state violence, domestic or public violence. We call upon all our people to strive for a violence-free society and, by so doing, to allow the light of Christ to permeate our society. We urge everyone, ‘Raise your voice! Stand up and be counted!’
We were moved by the homily of the Bishop of Khahlamba, at our Thursday Eucharist, on the inseparable link between the reform of liturgy and spiritual renewal. We, as Bishops, re-affirm our unqualified support for the initiative for the renewal of liturgy. There is a great sense of excitement as we embark on this process, as the Province, of revising the Anglican Prayer Book 1989. We realise that this will not be a hasty process, especially since we want to ensure that it will be a dynamic tool for mission and ministry, which will give expression to our distinctive identity and spirituality.
The problems experienced in the Dioceses of Pretoria and Umzimvubu presented us with particular challenges and we wish to assure our people in these Dioceses that we share their pain and have adopted strategies that, we hope, by the guidance of the Holy Spirit will lead to healing and wholeness in the Body of Christ. We implore you to pray for these pastoral interventions so that we may be whole, in answer to the prayer of our Lord Jesus, who prayed that we ‘may be one’ (Jn 17:11,21).
We acknowledge with gratitude the inauguration of the Canon Law Council of our Province, which was launched from 21 to 24 January 2013, in Grahamstown. We affirm the wide need for a better understanding of when and how to resort to canonically based action, while noting that Canon Law should be viewed as a good servant but poor master; for we also recall that Jesus, who came to fulfil the law, was against legalism, and that God’s people live under grace not law.
We give thanks for the fellowship in the gospel we share with our brothers and sisters around the Anglican Communion, particularly praying in joyful expectation for Archbishop Justin Welby and his family, as he prepares for his enthronement as Archbishop of Canterbury. We also gave thanks for the recent meeting of the Anglican Consultative Council, on which the Archbishop reported.
We pray that we as the Church will listen intelligently to what God is saying to us at this time; observe diligently the signs of God’s restorative grace that is breaking through in places where our people are struggling; teach faithfully what God commands us to do; and continue to be God’s Good-news people wherever we live and work.
With these concerns and words of encouragement, and always seeking to follow the light of Jesus Christ, our Lord and Saviour, we commend you to the grace of God.
Issued by the Office of the Anglican Archbishop of Cape Town
Inquiries: Ms Wendy Kelderman 021 763 1320 (office hours)
Tuesday, 28 February 2012
Our Church and Canon Law
This is the edited version of some reflections shared on 28 February 2012 with a group considering the re-launch of the Anglican Church of Southern Africa's Canon Law Society.
Thank you for coming today, to consider the re-launch of ACSA’s Canon Law Society. Let me offer a few reflections, from my own perspective.
I recently asked staff to put together a file of papers on the canon law issues that have crossed my desk since becoming Archbishop barely 4 years ago. The file, I have to say, is far too fat! And it seems to me that there are two reasons that contribute to this.
The first is that there is not enough awareness of how and where to apply and implement canon law – and there is a particular need for Bishops to be better equipped in this area. So my first challenge to a new Society, to you, would be to compile a sort of ‘Dummies’ Guide to Canon Law’ – a user-friendly manual. Particularly helpful would be some guidelines that say ‘If situation X arises, do Y’, where this is appropriate.
But the second issue we face is the need for a right understanding of when to resort to canonically based actions. As someone has said, the Canons do not replace the Bible! And scripture is clear. While Jesus came to fulfil the law, he was against legalism. St Paul also writes about avoiding – and avoiding provoking – legislative procedures, especially in secular courts, wherever possible. Both put the emphasis on relationships and actions that are rooted in, unearth, and birth, love and compassion.
In equipping Bishops and church leaders, all should know how to respect and uphold canon law and the regulations of the church, in all forms. But, more importantly, they must be chief pastors, and understand how our first obligation is always to exhaust the pastoral routes open to us.
At Morning Prayer today, we read the 23rd Psalm, and I was reminded again of the calling, particularly to Bishops, to shepherd our sheep as Christ does his flock. Legal actions should, generally speaking, always be the last resort. And the legal advice that comes to us should share this same perspective. The laws of love and grace are our priority.
Those giving legal advice should not be afraid to challenge Bishops! We need this. We need to be told if we are thinking of heading in the wrong direction – in the procedures to which we look, and in their appropriate application. If you don’t tell us clearly, you are not helping!
There is another angle to this, specifically in relation to clergy ‘vocation’ questions. I know that the relationship between Bishops and clergy as not one of direct employment remains where we stand in terms of case law. But this is no excuse whatsoever for Bishops to treat clergy poorly. The church should behave towards its clergy better than the best practices of any employment code. She should live the biblical values of what it is to be human and created in the image of God, as well as demonstrate the wider constitutional context within which she serves.
I know that in the past rectors treated curates, and bishops treated clergy, often more than high-handedly. But we need to wake up, and acknowledge that this was wrong; and that it is completely unacceptable to perpetuate either such attitudes or such practices today.
Nor can we ignore the changed legal context, which has rebalanced working relationships, providing workers with far fuller rights than in the bad old days. In my view, then, vocational and employment matters are also first a moral and then a legal question. There is no justification for Church practices to be anything less than the best we see in the world around. Therefore, on moral grounds at least as much as legal grounds, I hope that we resort to this area of law as little as possible.
I also hope that through regularising clergy licensing across dioceses, we will also be able to avoid some of the recent sorry tales – including where (as in the case of Fr Mbombo and the Diocese of the Highveld) secular courts have told us that we are failing in our responsibilities, including at the highest level, through our appeals system.
There are some other reflections I want to mention briefly.
The first is this, that all of us need to be aware of the high, high, cost of litigation. It is scandalous that we have to spend such vast sums, which ought to be directed towards the mission and ministry of the church. Indeed, I would put it stronger – we are depriving the church of these sums, which were given precisely for mission and ministry. It is appalling stewardship. People, on whatever side of whatever argument, need to know this. (For example, ensuring the consecration of the Bishop of Mbashe in the face of court challenges cost ACSA a lot of money. And there are other examples I could mention.)
Arising from this is the thought that we need to do better in ensuring matters of canon law are included in training clergy. I know some dioceses are now including this within Anglican Studies modules, but we need to do this more widely. This not only means College of the Transfiguration (COTT), but – and perhaps especially – with those who follow more general courses that are not taught within an Anglican framework. Perhaps you might be able to help with producing training materials.
So, as is clear, there is plenty on the canon law plate for you to get your teeth into! May God bless your discussions – so that you, and your work, may be a blessing to God’s church and God’s people, in our ministry and mission to God’s world. Thank you.
Thank you for coming today, to consider the re-launch of ACSA’s Canon Law Society. Let me offer a few reflections, from my own perspective.
I recently asked staff to put together a file of papers on the canon law issues that have crossed my desk since becoming Archbishop barely 4 years ago. The file, I have to say, is far too fat! And it seems to me that there are two reasons that contribute to this.
The first is that there is not enough awareness of how and where to apply and implement canon law – and there is a particular need for Bishops to be better equipped in this area. So my first challenge to a new Society, to you, would be to compile a sort of ‘Dummies’ Guide to Canon Law’ – a user-friendly manual. Particularly helpful would be some guidelines that say ‘If situation X arises, do Y’, where this is appropriate.
But the second issue we face is the need for a right understanding of when to resort to canonically based actions. As someone has said, the Canons do not replace the Bible! And scripture is clear. While Jesus came to fulfil the law, he was against legalism. St Paul also writes about avoiding – and avoiding provoking – legislative procedures, especially in secular courts, wherever possible. Both put the emphasis on relationships and actions that are rooted in, unearth, and birth, love and compassion.
In equipping Bishops and church leaders, all should know how to respect and uphold canon law and the regulations of the church, in all forms. But, more importantly, they must be chief pastors, and understand how our first obligation is always to exhaust the pastoral routes open to us.
At Morning Prayer today, we read the 23rd Psalm, and I was reminded again of the calling, particularly to Bishops, to shepherd our sheep as Christ does his flock. Legal actions should, generally speaking, always be the last resort. And the legal advice that comes to us should share this same perspective. The laws of love and grace are our priority.
Those giving legal advice should not be afraid to challenge Bishops! We need this. We need to be told if we are thinking of heading in the wrong direction – in the procedures to which we look, and in their appropriate application. If you don’t tell us clearly, you are not helping!
There is another angle to this, specifically in relation to clergy ‘vocation’ questions. I know that the relationship between Bishops and clergy as not one of direct employment remains where we stand in terms of case law. But this is no excuse whatsoever for Bishops to treat clergy poorly. The church should behave towards its clergy better than the best practices of any employment code. She should live the biblical values of what it is to be human and created in the image of God, as well as demonstrate the wider constitutional context within which she serves.
I know that in the past rectors treated curates, and bishops treated clergy, often more than high-handedly. But we need to wake up, and acknowledge that this was wrong; and that it is completely unacceptable to perpetuate either such attitudes or such practices today.
Nor can we ignore the changed legal context, which has rebalanced working relationships, providing workers with far fuller rights than in the bad old days. In my view, then, vocational and employment matters are also first a moral and then a legal question. There is no justification for Church practices to be anything less than the best we see in the world around. Therefore, on moral grounds at least as much as legal grounds, I hope that we resort to this area of law as little as possible.
I also hope that through regularising clergy licensing across dioceses, we will also be able to avoid some of the recent sorry tales – including where (as in the case of Fr Mbombo and the Diocese of the Highveld) secular courts have told us that we are failing in our responsibilities, including at the highest level, through our appeals system.
There are some other reflections I want to mention briefly.
The first is this, that all of us need to be aware of the high, high, cost of litigation. It is scandalous that we have to spend such vast sums, which ought to be directed towards the mission and ministry of the church. Indeed, I would put it stronger – we are depriving the church of these sums, which were given precisely for mission and ministry. It is appalling stewardship. People, on whatever side of whatever argument, need to know this. (For example, ensuring the consecration of the Bishop of Mbashe in the face of court challenges cost ACSA a lot of money. And there are other examples I could mention.)
Arising from this is the thought that we need to do better in ensuring matters of canon law are included in training clergy. I know some dioceses are now including this within Anglican Studies modules, but we need to do this more widely. This not only means College of the Transfiguration (COTT), but – and perhaps especially – with those who follow more general courses that are not taught within an Anglican framework. Perhaps you might be able to help with producing training materials.
So, as is clear, there is plenty on the canon law plate for you to get your teeth into! May God bless your discussions – so that you, and your work, may be a blessing to God’s church and God’s people, in our ministry and mission to God’s world. Thank you.
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