Global prayer for Primates Meeting

Archbishop Thabo will be one of those attending this meeting, together with other archbishops from across Africa and the Communion:

[Anglican Communion News Service] Christians around the world are praying for next week’s Primates Meeting taking place in the grounds of Canterbury Cathedral.

Address to Graduates of the College of the Transfiguration

An address to the Graduation of the College of the Transfiguration, delivered at the Cathedral of St Michael and St George, Grahamstown, on March 19, 2014:

Lessons: Sirach 1:1-10; Psalm 19; and Matthew 28:16-20

I greet you all in the name of God, Creator, Redeemer and Sustainer. Amen.

Dean of the Province and Chair of Council, Bishop Rubin, members of Council, the Rector, the Revd Canon Pityana, staff and students, the Bishop of Grahamstown and other bishops present at this historic milestone in the life of our Province and the College, graduates, your family members, invited guests, ladies and gentleman: Greetings!

What an honor and privilege it is to be here as Visitor of Cott to speak at this graduation ceremony and at the Inauguration of the college as it begins a new life as a duly registered higher education institution and with an accredited qualification. As a teacher and pastor who is striving to be a theologian one day, this is one of the greatest moments in my archiepiscopal journey. I just want to say out loud, "Give thanks to the Lord, for he is gracious and ever faithful. He has carried us over the years and during the application phase and he will carry us into the future.” Today, we come together to celebrate and rejoice at God's wonderful mercies.

So, thank you’s are the correct place to start this address, which after all is about gratitude and a deep sense of appreciation. Let me start with you, Professor Pityana, for your robust leadership, your pragmatic spirituality and your reckless belief in God's purposes for you and the church. Without your firm hope and love for this church as well as your courage to affirm and yet to challenge, we could not have arrived at this milestone. When I approached Prof during a rugby match at Orlando Stadium shortly after your retirement from Unisa, I said the task would take a year to complete and was embarrassed that I didn’t even have a stipend to pay you. Your humility, especially against the backdrop of what others were offering you at the time, and your acceptance of this life of sacrifice and poverty, have stayed with me. I am eternally grateful for your role and hope to learn from it too. Thanks also for our friendship and those emails or SMS interventions that always come at the appropriate time.

The task has taken longer than I anticipated, and each time you have raised the succession debate, I have pleaded that I am not numerate and asked you, “Why are you raising the issue in your first year?” – even if it was your third year! In this way I have avoided the fact that one day I will have to face the prospect of appointing a successor to you. Thank you, Barney and Dimza, for serving the college, this city and the Province with such distinction. Thank you, Prof and your staff in your various capacities for enabling Cott to arrive at this stage. In my Charge to the 2013 Provincial Synod, I said that it is my dream that Cott should eventually be an Anglican university, dare I add that I pray it will happen sooner rather than later. Please join me in applauding Prof Pityana for his efforts.

To the Council, the Executive and the Chair of Council and all our benefactors, partners and students who make this institution succeed, thank you and please continue to be ambassadors of Cott, especially as it enters this new and untrodden path for the ACSA. We are writing church history and I hope someone will research and publish an account of this new phase of our witness and service to both church and society. May this place be a well from which we can draw true wisdom and where many will be formed to be sent to all nations to make disciples of them.

In our self-understanding of our identity as ACSA, we share publicly our vision that we seek to be:

Anchored in the love of Christ,
Committed to God's Mission, and
Transformed by the Holy Spirit.

We further commit in our mission statement that we will heed the Matthean command to grow communities of faith that form, inform, and transform those who follow Christ. In our list of stated priorities, we unpack how we propose to do this at Provincial level by identifying seven priority areas. There, theological education is second only to liturgical renewal for transformative worship. In fact, if you look at all the priorities, they boil down to the theological formation of all members of ACSA.

I can thus paraphrase today’s lessons by saying that at a Provincial level, ACSA holds that true wisdom comes from obeying the command to make disciples for Jesus Christ and to fashion our lives in his likeness; that this starts with theological literacy and the formation of all ACSA followers; that true wisdom is nurtured by transformative worship, wrestling with God as we seek to interact with our context through his ways; and that this will be expressed through acting for the marginalised, taking care of the environment and being good stewards. These are the key priorities of our Province, which we hope will enable each one of us to be a disciple who is anchored, committed and transformed.

As we respond to the times we live in, what tools do we need to address the issues we face? What wisdom do we need, and how can we apply it as we make disciples of all nations in our secularising world? Are we to “baptise all cultures” and end up with a flawed syncretism? When can we say boldly as those formed for mission, “This is wrong,” and “This is correct”? Does our wisdom teach us to be extra-sensitive to mission contexts, either so that we are afraid of pronouncements or that we are so dogmatic that we are afraid of engaging with difference? I guess the question is: do we have what it takes to fulfill our sent-ness as anticipated in the Matthew story?

Today, as I address these questions as they relate to what kind of priest we are training at Cott, and what our understanding is of the contexts in which they will be ministering, I want to share with you three broad issues that have occupied me over the last few months -- and some for longer than that. Addressing them, I believe, requires a relevant, disciplined and contextual spirituality, prayerfulness, wisdom and the courage to be humble.
I have taken from what’s on my desk, as I said, three areas: theological education and education more broadly; the coming political elections; and Uganda’s new anti-homosexuality law.

Let me begin with theological education and formation. Now that Cott has passed a new milestone, a new set of questions is emerging, or perhaps old ones with a new impetus. Globally, the cost of theological education and formation is unaffordable. There is a call to review our model of dioceses funding theological education. The current "full stipendiary" model is proving unsustainable and may need to be reviewed. The drop-out rate, especially of women clergy who are identified for stipendiary ministry within dioceses, is increasing.

Prof Pityana is exploring ways in which we could establish an endowment to fund theological education and formation and assist dioceses. Cape Town, for example, has established the Archbishop’s Theological Education Endowment Fund because theological training and formation comprises the second-highest item of expenditure in our budget. We also need to explore how we can encourage families of ordinands to help in the training and forming of our clergy, and to explore options for funding training, including partnerships and ecumenical formation. For South African students, and with Cott’s registration almost done, might student loans and the National Student Financial Aid Scheme (NSFAS) be another option?

In terms of pedagogy or the modes of delivery, should we be exploring using practitioners in the field without requiring them to be present at Cott? The stipend that we pay lecturers inhibits us from attracting the young and recently-qualified. I am conscious that this is a life of sacrifice but the reality is that young people’s sense of vocation is tied to material reward. Is this perhaps not another area in which we should be modelling and teaching selflessness and sacrificial giving among our clergy?

We need to explore the best that information technology can offer us, of course noting that nothing can or should replace human contact in the art of formation, for we are more than the acquisition of facts -- we model wisdom, which has at its core love, respect and using knowledge for the extension of the Kingdom. But we must make the theological education of all accessible beyond our site of delivery. Recently I launched at Bishopscourt the E-reader project in collaboration with Cott. This was a particularly exciting development, because it builds on a long tradition of educational pioneering at Bishopscourt: not only was it the place where Bishops School began, it was also the first home of Zonnebloem College, where the sons and daughters of leaders such as Maqoma and Sandile of amaRharhabe and Moshoeshoe of the Basotho studied. Later, Bishopscourt established one of the country's first electronic bulletin boards, used by Archbishop Tutu during the anti-apartheid struggle and it was there too that Archbishop Ndungane conceptualised and started the Historic Schools Restoration Project.

It is my firm belief that theological education equips us to embody and proclaim the message of God's redemptive hope and healing for people and creation as well as to honour God in worship that feeds and empowers us for faithful witness and service. The modalities may vary due to our differing contexts but in spite of these contexts, we are all formed and sent to proclaim these eternal, changeless truths to all and to feed on and be fed by them. As you gather by now, for me theological education is not to create a band of the elite who are invisible in the week and audible on Sunday, nor is it a sanctuary for those who do not have the courage to face life's challenges. Quite the opposite. It equips us with wisdom, God's wisdom to be loving pastors and shepherds of all, fervent in prayer and seeking God, and dedicated in pursuing peace with justice without fear or favour. Equally, it equips us to know when not to act but to be present in a context of need and to hold God's people together as they seek God' s wisdom themselves.

The next area that I want to reflect on is the coming elections. We have elections this year in three countries of our Province – South Africa, Mozambique and Namibia. This graduation is occurring in Lent, I can’t recall the rationale, perhaps we should review this tradition and move graduations to November or December. But seeing that this is currently the case, what can we learn from the discipline of Lent as we approach these elections? Well, first, just as we spend time on Bible studies, we could go deeply into party manifestos and make choices on the basis of what will help people to flourish. We could also drink from our spiritual wells, engage with our consciences and be guided by these rather than by fear and blind loyalty when we make our mark on the ballot paper. And vote we must: too many people have suffered and died for you to stay away from the polls out of apathy.

In South Africa, we are seeing sporadic violence and the looting of property as political parties introduce a new and unacceptable mode of campaigning: that of physically confronting their opponents. We are also seeing disturbing signs of those who have tasted power using race, culture and ethnicity to manipulate voters, treating God's people as pawns to maintain their power and wealth. And we are seeing a lot of mudslinging as parties and their supporters accuse one another of failing to deliver services or create jobs. Last week, the Human Rights Commission released a report in which they confirmed that poor provision of water and proper sanitation, especially for the poorest of the poor, is a legitimate "service delivery" concern. Without discounting the legitimate concerns of communities and while yearning for redemptive solutions that are hope-filled, I pose the challenge: Wouldn’t it be wonderful in this wonderful country of ours if, instead of pointing at what others can do for us, we could focus on what we can do to make South Africa succeed? If instead of looking for what we can take, we could explore what we can give to make our country work?

As proclaimers of redemptive hope, we are called to understand our context at a deeper level. We have the responsibility of giving real life to God’s world and to God's people. Are we in our different countries sufficiently equipped to engage with policies and programmes of the political parties, the strategies of wealth makers and the cries of those denied access to most resources? In the coming elections, as those graduating today are sent out to make disciples, how might this disciple-making pan out? How do we make the task of encouraging all registered voters to go to the ballot box part of making disciples? In Cape Town, I am part of the Electoral Code of Conduct Observer Commission – known as ECCOC -- whose task it is to act as referees to ensure that parties adhere to the code and that politicians are held accountable. Are you willing as Cott or in your ministers’ fraternals to start something like ECCOC to help our followers to understand how to hold their elected officials accountable and thereby to enable us to make South Africa the best it can be?

In South Africa, we have prided ourselves on our free and fair elections. But now a cloud has been cast over our Independent Election Commission by an alleged conflict of interest involving the chair of the commission and a business partner from a political party. I hope that we will demand that this be dealt with urgently, to avoid the credibility of the IEC being eroded. And while I am talking about institutions created by our Constitution which play a vital role in our democracy, let me tell you what I said in the media yesterday in defence of South Africa’s public protector, Thuli Madonsela.

We deeply regret that certain clergy have in the past week ganged up against the Public Protector in the name of the church, attacking her for her investigations into the IEC and the SABC. They have done so without adequate knowledge of her reports and their intervention only serves to undermine the fight against corruption. It is also shameful to see the dirty tactics being employed by politicians against the Public Protector. There is clearly a coordinated campaign by those implicated in her reports to denigrate her office and its work. This threatens to undermine the legitimacy of an institution established and protected by our Constitution. We welcome the Public Protector's reports on corruption and mismanagement. We thank her for making the country accountable and transparent. Her office's work helps to develop our democracy, and I call on civil society to join the churches in defending it against the current assault.

Much has been achieved in a democratic South Africa over the past 20 years against the backdrop of apartheid, but much still needs to be achieved by all of us. Our political and business leaders and civic organisations also have a duty go into the mission field, as it were, and to serve others. There are huge disparities between the wealthy and the poor, and there ought to be less of the social distance which that creates. There should also be less lining of pockets by those who are connected with wealth and power, and less lecturing to the poor that they should be patient, work hard and not expect government to do things for them. Yes, I agree that people need to do things for themselves, but there is nothing stopping us as voters from letting them have our taxes as resources to do something with!

As we dig into our scriptures and walk more closely with God this Lent, let us pledge to serve our neighbour, to be courageous in speaking out where our elected leaders are corrupt, and to alleviate poverty by sharing more of our resources. As we develop theological insights and deepen our spirituality, let our love for God be evident in our intolerance of discrimination.

Let me now deal with the third and last area, one that has been with us for a long time and will continue to be until we have reached a godly consensus on the matter. I am referring to the debate around human sexuality. In this debate we as Anglicans in Southern face the same tensions within our own ranks as the Communion does internationally. We have two polarities: those who believe that homosexual relationships are not permitted by the Bible and others who believe that we should treat same-sex unions in the same way as we do heterosexual relationships. In addition, in South Africa – although not in other southern African countries – our Constitution permits same-sex marriage and protects the rights of gay and lesbian people in just the same way as the rights of others are protected.

Our challenge therefore has been to respond to positions within the Church which are diametrically opposed and, in South Africa, to provide pastoral care to members whose rights to express their sexuality are protected by the Constitution. We have responded to this challenge by adopting the same approach as we did during the apartheid era in South Africa, when our Church was deeply divided on a range of issues, ranging from the ways in which we fought apartheid to questions such as whether to ordain women as priests. We have taken the position that our differences over human sexuality are not such basic issues of faith and doctrine that they should be allowed to divide us. We have maintained a strong commitment to talking through the issues over which we differ. People who experience their sexuality as lesbian, gay, bisexual or transgendered are God’s people, created in God's image, just as heterosexual people are, and in our Church we are committed to dialogue with one another over how we respond to the challenge of ministering to all of God’s people.

The approach, however, of many of our sister churches on the continent is different. Now, I have to say that as Africans we have over the past two centuries been subjected to Western attitudes of cultural superiority, and I have no desire either to perpetuate such attitudes or to promote new attitudes which assume that we in Southern Africa have a monopoly on the truth. We should as a Province, therefore, be hesitant to preach to our brothers and sisters elsewhere in the continent. We should instead be offering them – and the Anglican Communion – our own model of dealing with difference: patient dialogue in which we wrestle with difficult issues for as long as takes to reach consensus on them. This must simply be an offer to act as a bridge -- we cannot, neither should we wish to, impose our model on anyone.

In 2010, the Synod of Bishops recorded its concern at Uganda’s Anti-Homosexuality Bill and said it saw the Bill as a gross violation of human rights. We said that as bishops we believe that it is, and I quote, “immoral to permit or support oppression of, or discrimination against, people on the grounds of their sexual orientation, and contrary to the teaching of the gospel; particularly Jesus’ command that we should love one another as he has loved us, without distinction.” In that context, we cited John 13:34-35. Although the Bill was amended – in particular by removing the death penalty as a punishment– the law which President Museveni recently signed in Uganda continues to brand homosexuality as an offence. In its definition of the offence, it includes not only homosexual sex but says a person “commits the offence of homosexuality if... he or she touches another person with the intention of committing the act of homosexuality.” And touching is defined as including touching “(a) with any part of the body; (b) with anything else; (c) through anything...” Under this section of the law, offenders are liable to imprisonment for life. Moreover, a person who attempts to, and I quote “commit the offence of homosexuality” or anyone who aids, abets, counsels or procures another to engage in acts of homosexuality is liable to imprisonment for seven years.

As Anglicans in Southern Africa, we are calling for an intensification of the dialogue over our response as Christians to the debate over human sexuality, both within Africa and in the wider Anglican Communion. And as we wrestle with the theological, moral and legal issues of the debate, our behavior towards one another must be modelled on the imperative to love our neighbour. The persecution of anybody, including minorities, is wrong. All human beings are created in the holy image of God and therefore must be treated with respect and accorded human dignity.

Finally, it only remains for me to congratulate those who are graduating tonight, as well as your families who have given you such love and support. Congratulations too to Cott on reaching such a great milestone in our time.

May God the Holy Spirit transform us, and lead us as well as equip us for the journey ahead into the mission fields into which he sends us. May we be gentle like doves and wise like serpents. May God’s concerns be our concerns, and may God’s pain be our pain until we find one another and the fulfillment of our humanity in Christ Jesus our Lord. Amen.

+Thabo Cape Town

Church of the Province of Africa - ‘Ad Laos’ – To the People of God – February 2014

As has become my practice over the last six years, this February letter is the first for the year, so let me start by wishing you all a blessed New Year.

Some of you may have read the latest Synod of Bishops' statement in which the Bishops share briefly the salient points of their February meeting. These meetings form the cornerstone of governance in faith and doctrine matters in our Province, over and above meetings of the Provincial Synod, the Provincial Standing Committee, the Provincial Trusts' Board and of course Diocesan structures. Of particular note was that the Synod expressed its joy at the approval by the South African Qualifications Authority of the Diploma of Theology offered by the College of the Transfiguration in Grahamstown, as well as at the provisional accreditation of the College as a private higher education institution.

Following the meeting of the Synod of Bishops, Lungi and I travelled to Lagos, Nigeria for a meeting of Anglican Primates and their spouses organised by the Council of Anglican Provinces in Africa (CAPA). This was my first CAPA meeting as Archbishop, as Bishop Jo Seoka of Pretoria is our episcopal representative to CAPA and has previously attended meetings on my behalf.

In our time together in Lagos, we as Archbishops from the different Anglican Provinces around the continent shared both our common and our differing contextual challenges. We shall continue to have different understandings on matters of human sexuality, whether legally, theologically or because of our different experiences, so we cannot paint everyone with the same brush. This applies even within provinces, as we see within our own Province, where only South Africa has legalised same-sex unions. For me, love and respect for all who are created in the image of God remain key. The Synod of Bishops affirmed this, as well as the importance of seeking justice and reconciliation on this issue – the differences over which we do not regard as being so serious as to be church-dividing.

Human sexuality was not, however, the central matter in our deliberations in Lagos. We were deeply concerned at tensions and conflict in places as varied as South Sudan, the Democratic Republic of Congo, Lesotho and Mozambique, as well as the conflict between Muslims and Christians and the terror created by the followers of Boko Haram in Nigeria. Governor Babatunde Fashola of Lagos State and his deputy welcomed us, and stressed the need for a critical solidarity by the Church with those called to serve through a vocation to politics.

Immediately after Lagos, Lungi and I were joined by our daughter, Paballo, to travel to Xai-Xai in Mozambique where I was blessing a new church, Salvador do Mundo (Saviour of the World). This was a wonderful occasion, with the Diocese’s largest parish packed to capacity. The worship was so joyful and moving as Bishop Dinis Sengulane and I moved around the church, sprinkling water amid clouds of incense, accompanied by the choir all singing in unison in Mozambique's unique alto voices. The choirmaster had a small school bell and rang it harder and harder the more we sprinkled holy water around the building! Coming from an urban diocese, dedicating new churches is not what one does frequently, especially in Shangaan and Portuguese and wearing full vestments when the temperature is 30 degrees. We are grateful for Bishop Dinis, who will retire soon after four Lambeth conferences and 38 years as a bishop in the Church of God. We are grateful for his ministry not only in the Church but in highlighting the scourge of malaria and the need for peace in the world, particularly in Mozambique. We can only say, while +Dinis is still alive, “Well done, good and faithful servant!”

After Mozambique I chaired an ecumenical meeting at the Wits Business School. Ecumenical witness has seen many challenges and changes in post-apartheid South Africa, where we are experiencing the declining influence and identity of previously-strong ecumenical bodies and the rise of new ones which readily support state theology and loathe prophetic and liberation theology. It is as if we are regressing into what the apartheid government achieved through its grip on the Dutch Reformed Church, only this time it is South Africa’s current ruling party which is coercing interfaith and ecumenical bodies to align with it and thereby benefit materially or from their proximity to power and influence. However, in South Africa today the Church is called upon to support the State in this democratic dispensation when it does what is godly and serves the needs of all God’s people, but to be critical if it does not. And we cannot just sit back and point at what is wrong, we need too to work to bring about justice, equity and a sharing of God’s abundant resources. The meeting in Johannesburg highlighted these issues and reminded me of how easy it is to forget our primary vocation because we want government resources even to the point of compromising the prophetic word.

Finally, I attended a church leaders’ consultation with the South African Christian Leaders’ Initiative (SACLI), where we looked at how to strengthen the unity of the ecumenical voice in being courageous and prophetic. We looked at organisational as well as moral issues in our country, we planned for the forthcoming SACC triennial meeting and we considered how we could encourage SACC member churches to adopt education as a priority missional issue. We also noted that, welcome as the birth of SACLI is, it has created confusion and tensions at a time during which the SACC is ailing. Bishop Zipho Siwa, Presiding Bishop of the Methodist Church, has been asked to chair a subcommittee to look at aligning the ecumenical bodies in our country so that we can all act together in tackling the challenges faced by our country, especially in the upcoming elections. As chair of the church leaders’ consultation, I find these meetings edifying – stretching but fulfilling too as we face the challenge: How do we maintain our prophetic voice in a constitutional democracy when legitimate leaders are robbing the land and ignoring the cause of justice?

I have headed this letter the Church of the Province of Africa, to highlight the need for us to strive, whether in our Anglican Communion in Africa or ecumenically, to bring God’s real shalom, peace, justice and equity to the continent. There will be differences in theology, in matters of sexuality and in politics – let us face these and deal with them, and not pretend we don’t encounter them. Let us adopt a Pauline understanding of our vocation and build the body of Christ, recognising that it has different parts and abilities, but that they can all work together towards a common purpose. In this way we will have a deeper appreciation of the presence of the incarnate Christ at work within the body, pointing us to the realised Eschaton which at the same time is yet to be realised. This tension should not divide us, instead it should help us appreciate that we are of the same coin, bringing quality and equality to all.

This year, God willing, we will see the election of two new bishops suffragan, of Niassa and Mthatha. We are thankful to God that in spite of the challenges we have in a few dioceses, our Province is healthy and continues to witness to what God is up to in this part of God's vineyard. As we prepare to observe Lent, let me once again encourage you all to use the Bible study material that Professor Gerald West and his team have prepared for our Province.

I end on a note of thanksgiving – even if it is tinged with sadness. The “Masite Sisters” – the members of the Society of the Precious Blood in Lesotho – who provided a home away from home for South African political refugees as well as spiritual refugees over many years, will close their house in Maseru at the end of this month. The sisters have planted the seeds of faith for many but the remaining sisters are ageing, so although their Chapter says they may resurrect their ministry differently one day, for now we wish them well and give God deep thanks for their ministry in building the body of Christ in our Province.

As we enter this Lent, let us continue to build the body of Christ, in our relationships with one another, in our places of worship and in our different nations in this Province.

God bless you all in your Lenten observances,
+Thabo Cape Town

Blogging from Busan - On All Saints Day, Meeting Anglicans, Moving Stories from Asia, Discussing Just Peace and Raised Blood Pressure

Today, on All Saints Day, let me start at the end of the day.

The Anglican Church of Korea hosted a dinner for our Anglican confessional group at the Novotel. There were about 160 Anglicans present, plus some of our hosts. I proposed a toast to our beloved Anglican Communion and to Archbishop Justin and Caroline Welby. A delightful evening with good company and delicious food on the occasion of the 123rd year of the founding of this diocese, as Archbishop Paul Kim of Korea pointed out. The dinner reminded us that nothing replaces face-to-face encounters with other Anglicans, for through these we appreciate each other more and consequently grow in love for God and one another, for this is communion.

The dinner was preceded by a service celebrating All Saints Day, and Archbishop Justin preached a sermon reminding us of the gift and responsibility we have as Anglicans to care for one another even as we value our differences. In a plenary session in the auditorium, Archbishop Justin had also addressed the WCC assembly, again drawing on our Anglican heritage and highlighting the enormous privilege and also responsibility of defining our identity within the broader ecumenical framework.

In another WCC plenary dedicated to Asia, drama and speeches drew our attention to the life, witness, worship and near-martyrdom of the church in this continent. This was very moving, drawing us into their story and how they perceived their position as a persecuted minority which faced near-extinction in certain places. There were also redemptive stories, especially one related by a missionary doctor who told of his experience of two parents at first rejecting a pair of Siamese twins, but then – when one died after an operation to separate them – reclaiming the surviving twin. Again, we were challenged by the difficulty most communities have in dealing with difference and disability.

Today, I also had an opportunity to connect with Presiding Bishop Ziphozihle Siwa of the Methodist Church of Southern Africa at the assembly's health machine vendor, where as we measured our blood pressure we chuckled at how ecumenical work raised it. I also had some time with Bishop Jo of Pretoria, just connecting at a personal and informal level. Bishop Jo and I are together in the “Just Peace” conversation group. Today we were running behind schedule at this session, and there was less input by speakers and more rushed conversation. But it was still very useful since although we went off initially at a tangent, we finally got stuck into discussing the real definitional and conceptual issues of what a just peace is all about, as well as strategies for praxis.

The business plenary was tense and rigorous, which reflected our reality and was to be expected, especially after one of the speakers raised issues of marriage and sexuality and posited his theological view as the correct one. There is a growing conservatism – and I say this without advocating moral relativism – which can lead to the trashing of God-given freedom and rational thought, as well as of the celebration of diversity. Of course there should be limits to everything, such as we found in our ecumenical conversation, where we were starting to explore a call to close down a nuclear power plant, mindful of the fact that we are only a few kilometres from one in South Korea.

As most of you know by now, for me communications and accountability are key. Today I spent time with the Episcopal News Service in the person of Matthew Davies, as well as with WCC communications people, exploring further ways in which I and our province can communicate more effectively. We recorded an AIDS day message as well as one about our perception and understanding of ecumenism.

Tomorrow, we have excursions around the area where we are meeting and, God willing, we will go to the port and ecological areas preserved around Busan. It is our daughter's birthday today, so I want to end this on the personal and send her “hugs and kisses,” as she would normally say when she is in a good mood.

May God our parent who looks after us all shower her and all parishes named All Saints with blessings. We are all saints if we do the will of God who sent us.

God bless
+Thabo

PHOTO: A performance at the WCC assembly features Asian concerns, acknowledging struggles of churches seeking justice and peace.

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.

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)

Visit to Diocese of Natal - Interview in The Witness

The following interview appeared in The Witness on 21 November 2011, and can also be found at http://www.witness.co.za/index.php?showcontent&global%5B_id%5D=72190.

THABO Makgoba, Anglican Archbishop of Cape Town and Metropolitan of the Anglican Church of Southern Africa (ACSA), has challenged the government on issues of service delivery and corruption, and is a “proud” member of the Press Freedom Commission. In the province recently, he spoke to The Witness about a range of hot topics in the church and society. It was clear that Makgoba (51) is cast from the same mould as some of his illustrious predecessors like “the scourge of apartheid”, Joost de Blank and Geoffrey Clayton (who refused to obey the Native Laws Amendment Act), and Desmond Tutu.

Julius Malema

“I agree with Julius Malema when he raises questions about the need for economic emancipation. I agree with him when he raises questions about the number of unemployed youth who voted the ANC into power but whose votes have manifestly not translated into creating jobs, better education, or access to health care. I agree with him, but I don’t agree with him on how he thinks this should be achieved. I disagree with the suggestion of nationalisation without putting the specifics on the table. Will nationalisation increase access to health care, improve the national education standards, address the housing backlog and sanitation and improve the living standards of unemployed youth? Without specifics, I cannot agree with him.”

The Church and politics

“The understanding persists that the church should not be involved in politics. I have a different understanding of religion and what God in Jesus Christ through the Holy Spirit calls us to do and be. We cannot privatise faith — there is a eucharistic imperative that sends us into the world to love and serve. This entails asking why some people are more privileged than others, why some have too much food while others go hungry? And asking why and which structures and systems support that? Poverty and hunger are not because some people are more blessed or work harder than others. There are lazy rich people and poor people.

“As soon as you ask questions people call it ‘politics’. But in the Bible Jesus Christ learnt and cited the Torah and studied with the synagogue leaders — that is education. We need to raise these things, we cannot leave them to the party political heads.”

Apartheid reparations

“This is one of the things that Julius Malema is articulating, but in a clumsy way. The TRC, Desmond Tutu and other commissioners (who were mostly people of faith), could have done better in terms of reparations. They produced a document but then left it to politicians to put into action, which either did not happen or happened too slowly. Now it is coming back to bite us. The TRC did not address the economic and apartheid structures and systems that sustain and maintain poverty and economic inequality, so now we need to find a vehicle to do that.

“Desmond Tutu’s idea of a wealth tax is a way of recognising that politicians have not done what should have been done.

“The church could have done far better in addressing this issue, seeing that it was the church — specifically, the Dutch Reformed Church — that gave the moral, spiritual and theological basis to apartheid.”

The Press Freedom Commission and corruption

“I am proud to be part of the Press Freedom Commission under the chairmanship of Justice Pius Langa, to review best practice and regulation within the print media. An effective free press, and the ability of all to speak truth to power, is indispensable to successful constitutional democracy. The Secrecy Bill and Media Tribunal have the potential to undermine press freedom. If the citizenry does not engage with these they could undermine the core of our democratic ability to make constitutional values a reality.

“[The commission] will contribute to making this country’s democracy work, encouraging people to speak out and makes those we have elected serve the citizens and transform corruption. There is too much corruption and we want to make South Africans intolerant of it.

“To a large extent we are still a moral and Christian country. We must use that, not to proselytise, but to make this country shine.”

Transformation in the church

“We have talked the talk but not walked the walk in this area. The legacy of apartheid needs to be transformed, for example, priests live in houses of very different standards. Even Bishopscourt in Cape Town where the archbishop lives is a legacy of colonial times that predates apartheid. What was — and what is — the relationship between the church and the structures of power? How does it benefit some and not others? Those are the kinds of questions we need to ask if we are to be transformed.

“It can also mean changing those areas of church life that were socially engineered by apartheid, like barring people from worshipping across colour lines. It means looking at the Biblical apartheid of having only men as bishops. The Anglican Church in southern Africa has been going since about 1860 but we have only been ordaining women for about 20 years. There are 30 bishops in this province and not one is a woman. We need to start to walk our talk.”

Homosexuality

“The issue of transformation in the church touches on this issue too. There are those who feel called by God to be in a same-sex union, and those who believe it is against the Bible and God’s principles to be in that state. We need to allow God through the Holy Spirit to continue working in us and we need to keep talking until God prevails, and not us. There are no easy solutions. We must remember that it took many years before the book of Revelations was included in the canon of scripture. Look at the Nicene Creed (325): people argued and talked and died for many years before that was settled.

“I have always held that homosexuality should not be a church-dividing issue, but we need to take seriously people who take an either-or position. We need to wrestle together to understand scripture and our vocation to the world.”

Climate change and the environment

“These are also issues of social and economic justice and human rights, and we need to raise them. If you look at the mine dumps in Gauteng and the West Rand, you see a pattern that mirrors racial and political divides in geography. If you look at economic development you see big business and politicians in cahoots to get their hands on opportunities to benefit only themselves, like oil rights and access to energy. You see the developed world as the worst producers of carbon emissions at the expense of the developing world.

“There is a lot of greenwashing going on ahead of Cop17 in Durban. The government preaches the right message but does not practise it. We are far behind in developing renewable energy sources. Eskom pays huge subsidies to big industry at the expense of the poor, which is scandalous, and the government is planning another coal-burning power station.

“I hope Cop17 will be a chance to highlight these issues and I encourage everyone to make their voice heard. Sign the pledge to care for the environment in the We have Faith — act now for climate justice campaign and attend the interfaith rally at the start of the conference on November 27.”

Who is Thabo Makgoba?

CONSECRATED in 2008 at the age of 48, Makgoba was the youngest archbishop to head ACSA. He grew up in Alexandra township, Johannesburg, and went to school at Orlando High, Soweto, during the politically turbulent eighties. He is a qualified psychologist, holds a PhD in spirituality from the University of Cape Town and is a committed father to Nyakallo (17) and Paballo (12) and husband to Lungi, a former development consultant.

The Feast of Christ the King

This Sermon for the Feast of Christ the King, was preached at a ‘Pontifical High Mass’ at the Church of St Michael and All Angels, Observatory, Cape Town, on 20 November 2011. The Mass was sung to Haydn’s Missa Sancti Nicolai, with additional music by Edward Elgar and from Handel’s Messiah.

The readings were those set for ‘The Coming of the Kingdom of God,’ on pp.389ff of the Southern African Book of Common Prayer: Colossians 1:12-20; John 18:33-37.

May I speak in the name of God, Father, Son and Holy Spirit. Dear brothers and sisters in Christ, let me again say what a pleasure it is to be with you. It is a pleasure also to welcome you, Dean Michael Weeder, to this service. Thank you, Fr Richard Girdwood and Wardens, for your invitation, and thank you to everyone who has contributed to this morning’s service: whether through participating or as one of the many unsung heroes and heroines behind the scenes. Let me also at this point congratulate Fr Richard on his appointment by the Minister of Arts and Culture to South Africa’s Heraldry Council. This is wonderful news! Let us offer him a round of applause.

Today, on the last Sunday before Advent, the Anglican world observes the Feast of Christ the King. This postdates the Book of Common Prayer, so Fr Richard has been creative in proposing the readings set there for ‘the coming of the Kingdom of God’. And in fact our Epistle today is one which is set every third year within the Revised Common Lectionary. The objective is the same – to help us reflect upon the coming of God’s kingdom, and the coming of Christ as King of kings and Lord of Lords, both in this world, and for all eternity.

Pope Pius XI first instituted this commemoration, in 1925, in response to the growing nationalism and secularism he perceived in the years following the First World War. In Italy, the Fascists, under Mussolini, were increasingly influential, and the Pope realised that both the faithful and the wider world should be regularly reminded that ultimate power of every sort lies in the hands of God, and allegiance to him overrules all other claims on our loyalties. Following a decision of Pope Paul VI in 1969, the Feast has been observed on the last Sunday of the church calendar, and has increasingly been adopted by Anglicans and others.

This is with good reason – for the need remains both to proclaim that Jesus is Lord of all; and, furthermore, to insist that all legitimate power and rule are to be exercised and understood according to the model of Christ our King. Both the wider world and the church itself need to be reminded of such truths.

Three weeks ago I came the closest I have ever been to preaching to a king, when the Prince of Wales and the Duchess of Cornwall came to St George’s Cathedral! By chance, the lectionary had set for our Old Testament reading a passage in which the prophet Amos warned the leadership of Jerusalem that all their religious observances – no matter how fine – were worse than useless and brought only judgement, if they were not matched by holy living and the pursuit of righteousness and justice. As we sat in the splendour of the Cathedral, with wonderful music uplifting our liturgy, it was a salutary warning to the church also.

And I guess the same must be said today, in the magnificence of this pontifical mass. However much we adore Christ as King, with all the trappings of majesty and might, we must also follow him faithfully – as the one who emptied himself of the glories of heaven; the one who came not to be served but to serve and to lay down his life for his friends; the one who calls us all to take up our crosses and follow after him.

As Pilate was perplexed to hear – as our Gospel reading recounted – Jesus’ kingship is very counter-cultural to the expectations and standards of the world.

For on the one hand, he is a far greater King than any human monarch. He cannot be relegated to some constitutional figurehead with limited engagement in the daily running of his realm. All power and majesty and might are his. Yet the exercise of his sovereign rule bears no resemblance to even the most powerful absolute head of state. For, if Jesus truly is the ruler of all, we might ask how it is that so much of the world seems out of step with the kingdom of God – from the sinfulness of humanity to the levels of suffering unconnected with human malpractice. It doesn’t seem to point to a very effective kingship. And indeed, at no point does Jesus ever force us to follow his rule.

But the answer lies with the second counter-cultural aspect of Jesus’ rule – that of the suffering servant who lays down his life for his people. This is the subversive kingship who does not confront the powers of the world by overcoming them with greater strength. Rather evil is to be overcome by good, those who are prepared to give up their lives will gain life immortal, our enemies are to be loved, and the few cents that the poor widow gives add up to far, far more than the large donation made from the surplus of the wealthy man. (Though having said this, let me not undermine the generous giving of sums both large and small to St Michael’s Stewardship campaign, which I understand concludes today! All that we give to the Lord’s work is valued and used by him, of that I am sure!)

So the question with which we are posed, when considering the coming of God’s kingdom, in this world and the world to come, is this: what does it mean for each of us to live as citizens of the kingdom of God? What does it mean for us to be not so much ‘proudly South African’ as ‘proudly Jesus people’? For certainly, we should bear our allegiance to him with pride, and not be ashamed to call him Lord! And while rugby or cricket or football can call us to sport our green and gold shirts, or rainbow scarves, we can demonstrate our loyalty in many ways, not just, for example, through dog collars or crosses and ‘What Would Jesus Do?’ bracelets.

Through our lives, our actions, our words, our attitudes, there are two messages we want to proclaim. First is the challenge to anything else that tries to claim our primary allegiance. This may come in many forms – we might use the broad terminology of idolatry. This can span both the public and private sphere.

So, for example, Christians say loud and clear – as Pope Pius XI intended in creating this feast – that any ideology, from secularism to nationalism, from the claims of any political party, or economic theory, or philosophy of life – it must all come second to the kingdom of God. Furthermore, since God is God of all of life, all of creation, there is no part of human activity that can fall outside his interest. This means that it is for us to critique every area of life, according to Christian principles – to the standards of the Kingdom.

Idolatry also extends to money – though remember that Scripture does not say that money itself is the root of all evil, but that love of money is the problem. Money, and what it can buy, can be very seductive. But we should not be afraid of it and should learn to use it wisely. There was a banner at the Occupy Wall Street protests that put it well: ‘You don’t have to be poor to be good, you don’t have to be rich to be bad, but you have to be fair to be right.’

Idolatry can come in other forms, in our private lives, and includes any sort of addictive behaviour – not just alcohol or drugs. There may be other aspects of our lifestyle that have an unhealthy hold on us. These might include our attitudes to others and ways we speak about people, and perhaps even exploit them. It may be that we have a superiority complex, seeing ourselves as something of a ‘king’; or the reverse, an inferiority complex where we always want to please others as if they were ‘kings’. Or it may be our self-image, our good name, our status, the opinions of others, that we most care about – vanity and pride. Our sexuality and how we express it can also become idolatrous, especially in a world that over sexualises so much and promotes promiscuity, pornography, and the objectification of other people for our own gratification.

But, whatever it is that we battle with, thanks be to God, he does not just tell us to put him first – he helps us! By the power of the Spirit dwelling within us, if we ask him, he will help us place every aspect of our lives under his rule.

And the second message we have to proclaim is that God’s ways are best – the way of peace and love and honesty and truth. The story of the widow’s mite tells us that even the smallest acts of compassion and kindness bear unimaginable value in God’s scales; and what might seem insignificant lives, if lived through his love, can have consequences that will make their mark on eternity. To be a proud citizen of the kingdom of God, we do not need to make a big splash. We just need to be faithful and obedient, in our own context, in whatever are the circumstances of our lives.

Let us therefore, in this Eucharist, be conscious of offering ourselves to God as his loyal citizens, as followers of Jesus Christ. We come to his table, with our hands open to present ourselves, wholly without reserve, in his service – and open to receive whatever he gives to us: both his bread for the journey, and the path on which he calls us forward.

Yes, today we celebrate the coming of the kingdom of God – the kingdom of the one who is the Way, the Truth and the Life, and we remember the words of Jesus to Pilate: ‘Everyone who belongs to the truth, listens to my voice.’ May we be those who listen, and follow faithfully. May it be so. Amen.

Synod of Bishops Statement - Leadership in our Times

The following statement from the Synod of Bishops was issued on 15 February 2011

Leadership in our Times

“The Son of Man came not to be served but to serve.” (Mark 10:42-45)

We, the Bishops of the Anglican Church of Southern Africa, meeting at Mariannhill in the Diocese of Natal between 7 and 12 February 2011, greet our people throughout Southern Africa in the Name of the Lord – all of you in that great sweep from the north of Angola on the west coast of Africa, to Tristan da Cunha in the south, and from there to the border between Mozambique and Tanzania in the east.

Leadership

Our theme for this week has been leadership, as we took time to reflect on our own roles and ministries as bishops, and our need to be effective in these days of rapid change.

We have also discussed the leadership required of our clergy, and the spiritual formation and theological and pastoral education required for their work. We heard an assessment of the College of the Transfiguration in Grahamstown from the Revd Professor Barney Pityana, the College’s new Rector, and we are considering the consequences of his report as we plan for the future of the College.

We are sharply conscious too that leadership in the Church is not exercised only by the ordained. Training in good leadership and stewardship is required at every level, from the trustees of the Province to the chapelry council of the most remote congregation. We commit ourselves afresh to be, as bishops, the trainers of the trainers of the people of God.

Governance and Public Policy in South Africa

We were privileged on Wednesday 9 February to receive for dinner a prominent Anglican in the person of King Zwelithini, together with Queen Thandi, herself a member of the Mothers’ Union. The King is well known for his leadership on key issues especially that of HIV and AIDS, and we appreciated hearing him speak in person about these matters. We congratulate the King on entering the 40th anniversary year of his accession and we commend him, with the royal family and the Zulu people, to the grace of God.

On Thursday 10 February many of us watched President Jacob Zuma of South Africa giving his State of the Nation address. We wish to assure the President and his government of our support in the work of governing South Africa and of providing for the needs of all our people, without lining the pockets of the few. We therefore welcome the President’s commitment to combat corruption – what is often now known as ‘systematised and structuralised corruption’.

We also welcome the President’s many undertakings for the future while sharing the widespread concern across the nation about the ongoing gap between promise and delivery. The words of Bongokuhle Miya which the President quoted should haunt every public employee in South Africa: ‘If the government, which is doing very well, could just pay more attention, with a bit of urgency to such areas.’ The poor are all too evidently still with us, and, after years of principled struggle for justice and the common good, we do not accept that their lives must remain forever as they are.

As we see local elections looming in South Africa, we reiterate our commitment to peace and to the democratic process at the local level. We are disturbed at reports of running fights in some of our communities, between the supporters of competing political candidates, even within the same parties. We dread what may happen when the parties start to face each other, unless restraint prevails. We call on political parties to campaign with dignity and discipline, and with due regard for the constitutional rights of all our citizens, including the right to hold differing opinions. No politician should demonise another. No political organisation has a divine right to public support.

Climate Change

The 17th Conference of the Parties of the United Nations Framework Convention on Climate Change (COP 17) will take place in Durban later this year. This affords another dimension to the search for the good of all; and we implore world leaders not to miss another opportunity to address climate change and its impact on livelihoods.

The Nations of Southern Africa

Once again we wish to urge high standards of ethical conduct and principled leadership upon all public leaders in all the countries which make up our Province of Southern Africa. We continue to be concerned, for example, at repressive conditions in Swaziland, and we call for open dialogue between the government and civil society to decide the future of that country.

Africa and the Middle East

Further afield we pray that leaders in Egypt, Tunisia, Yemen and the Sudan may offer servant leadership in the crises in their respective countries. We have written fraternal letters to Archbishop Mouneer Anis of Egypt and Archbishop Deng of the Sudan and have held them steadily in our prayers together during our meeting.

Our Archbishop’s Role

Reverting to the Anglican Church of Southern Africa, we wish to affirm the developing leadership of our Metropolitan, Archbishop Thabo Makgoba. In addition to visiting many dioceses and fielding a multitude of issues, Archbishop Thabo travels internationally to speak on faith in the public sphere and to promote dialogue and bridge-building, even now in Israel-Palestine.

We are in unanimous support of the Archbishop’s attendance at Anglican Communion meetings. We urge the leaders of the Anglican Church in Africa not to abdicate leadership of the Communion to the First World.

Human Sexuality and Civil Unions

At home Archbishop Thabo has taken a lead in bringing concerns to us from the dioceses in the Western Cape with regard to the pastoral care of those who have entered into civil unions with a person of the same gender or who are considering doing so. This is not a matter of us legitimising same-sex unions but of our care for these worshippers and also for their wider families. Our Church does not consider any relationship to be marriage unless it is the historic relationship of a man and a woman uniting, ideally, for life.

We will continue to work towards creating guidelines in several areas of difficulty which are raised by the issue of civil unions. It is difficult to give blanket guidelines because the position is starkly at variance in the legal systems of the seven countries in which our Church is found. A draft for discussion in dioceses is in development. However we note that guidelines in other areas could also be useful – for example, in supporting and affirming those who choose celibate singleness in their Christian discipleship, whether pending future marriage or for life.

We reiterate that we do not regard differences over human sexuality as a church-dividing issue. We continue to draw upon our experience of holding together by the grace of Christ in times of acute tension and disagreement in this subcontinent, as a basis for our work and for a possible bridging role in the tensions in the Anglican Communion.

Lausanne III Congress

On a wider front we rejoice in having had the 3rd Lausanne Congress in Cape Town recently: a body which has long – since at least 1974 – exercised leadership for good in the broadly evangelical Christian community worldwide. We rejoice too that Anglicans from Southern Africa and elsewhere played key leadership roles in the Congress and that Archbishop Thabo was able to attend some of the Congress events.

The Church in Mozambique

One of the greatest but least known stories of leadership over many years has been the heroic ministry of our Church in Mozambique, embodied supremely in the person of Bishop Dinis Sengulane. In times of war, of disease, and of postwar reconstruction – and now in the face of new challenges such as human trafficking – our church across Mozambique has played a sacrificial role in ministry and in church expansion. Now the Dioceses of both Lebombo and Niassa are raising the possibility of reconstituting themselves into several new dioceses and we are considering how best to enable this to happen.

Internal Disputes in the Church

We are deeply grieved at the breakdown in pastoral leadership in, and of loyalty to, our Church, reflected in isolated disputes reported from a number of places in the Province. Some of these have borne ugly fruit in inappropriate and costly court actions and, in one case, in a series of disgraceful electronic mails. All this is utterly beyond the framework of godly dispute resolution within the Church, especially given the extensive work invested in recent years to reinforce due process and fairness in all our procedures. We must take account of this in our leadership training.

Conclusion

We also join in the prayers and petitions of all and wish Madiba, our beloved former President, and his family, God’s peace at this time.

With these concerns and words of encouragement, and always seeking to follow the light and example of Jesus Christ, our Lord and Saviour, we commend you to the grace of God.

The Bishops of the Province

Anglican Synod of Bishops meets in KwaZulu-Natal 7 – 11 February

This press release was issued on 8 February 2011.

The Synod of Bishops of Anglican Church of Southern Africa is meeting in Marianhill, Pinetown, for its twice a year regular meeting. At these meetings issues of faith, doctrine and ethics are discussed.

At this meeting the bishops will receive a report from Archbishop Thabo Makgoba on the meeting of Anglican primates which he attended recently in Dublin. The meeting will also focus on spiritual formation, social analysis (or orthopraxy), ecumenical relationships and theological education and inculturation. The bishops will continue their work on guidelines which the church requested they provide for couples in same sex relationships.

An external company specialising in leadership will lead a session for the bishops, as will the Revd Dr. Barney Pityana, who was recently appointed by the Archbishop as Rector of the College of the Transfiguration – the Church’s theological college in Grahamstown.

King Goodwill Zwelithini, who is a member of the Anglican Church, will join the bishops for dinner on Wednesday evening.

Note for Editors: The Province of the Anglican Church of Southern Africa comprises Angola, Lesotho, Mozambique, Namibia, South Africa, Swaziland, St Helena and Tristan da Cunha.

Issued by the Office of the Anglican Archbishop of Cape Town Inquiries to Gail Allen on 021- 763-1328 (office hours)

A statement by the Synod of Bishops of the Anglican Church of Southern Africa

We, the Bishops of the Anglican Church of Southern Africa, have met in Synod at the Kopanong Conference Centre, Benoni, Gauteng East Rand from 27 to 29 September 2010. In prayer and fellowship - the hallmarks of our Synod - we deliberated over many matters affecting the life of the Church: our own Church, the wider Anglican Communion and the ecumenical Church of Southern Africa. In this time we heard the stories of achievements and pain from the Bishops of Swaziland, Namibia, Mozambique and St Helena.

The presence of Bishop Zaché Duracin, Bishop of Haiti, among us reminded us of the devastation that his country had recently experienced and of the long road that still has to be travelled towards full restoration. We are grateful for Archbishop Thabo Makgoba’s pastoral visit to Haiti and for the many Anglicans of our Province who contributed towards the rebuilding efforts.

The Bishops who attended the recent meeting of African Bishops in Uganda, gave mainly positive reports. However, while not able to endorse all that was said and done at that meeting, we state our full commitment to the Anglican Church in Africa, of which we are a part.

We, the Bishops, were deeply disturbed to hear from the Bishop of Swaziland of the growing human rights abuses in his country. He also challenged the Church to become more involved in the urgent quest for democracy; we agreed.

The Bishops of St Helena, Namibia and Lebombo (Mozambique) reminded us of the many missional challenges facing their countries.

We noted with joy the creation of the new Diocese of Mbhashe. And we received a request from Bishop Dinis Sengulane for the multiplication of his diocese – all signs of the growth of the Anglican Church in Southern Africa.

We reflected on other ways of growing our Church, and in this regard encouraged the use of “Rooted in Jesus”, a Church growth programme.

The draft document entitled “Pastoral Guidelines in Response to Civil Unions” was given careful consideration. It has been drafted in response to pastoral situations that are arising within parishes as a consequence of South Africa’s Civil Union legislation. An amended document has been referred back to the Diocese for comment and will be discussed by us again at the February Synod of Bishops. As Bishops all are acutely aware of the need to act pastorally and prudently on this sensitive matter, while at the same time committed to remaining within the accepted teachings of our Church on marriage and the ongoing dialogue within the Anglican Communion.

The important subject of “African Spirituality, Traditional Practice, Orthodoxy and Traditional Healing” received attention once again. At the heart of our discussions was the question: What does it mean to be a Church in Africa, in terms of liturgy, pastoral practices, such as healing, Christology, etc.

We re-stated our support for the “Anglican Covenant”, a document which was issued for consideration by the Churches of the Anglican Communion in response to the difficulties currently facing our church. It can be a tool for healing and for helping the Communion move forward. We noted that this matter will be raised at Provincial Synod.

The Bishops were mindful of meeting at a time when many pressing problems are facing our countries, especially poverty and rising unemployment. We therefore call on all our political leaders to put aside its internal divisions and to focus on addressing these and other problems.

However, in the midst of all the pain and problems within our region, we rejoice at what God is doing in our church and the peoples of all our lands. As we walk in the faith so God will be glorified. To God be all the glory.

Addressing Anglican Differences - Spirit and Culture at the Foot of the Cross

Press Release Issued on 10 June 2010

‘Jesus Christ is the standard for discerning the path between authentic cultural expression and flawed syncretism, between ensuring we do not quench the Spirit and yet properly testing what we believe may be the Spirit’s leading’ said Archbishop Thabo Makgoba. He was addressing the USPG Annual Conference in Swanwick, England, on 'Mission Realities for Southern African Anglicans – and their Wider Implications’.

The Archbishop of Cape Town described how agreement about who Jesus is and the salvation he brings enabled Anglicans in Southern Africa to see Christ in one another and be held together by him, despite differences over human sexuality. ‘When we meet, we feel sharp pain and great distress, yet none of us feels called to turn to another and say “I no longer consider you a Christian, a member of the body of Christ – I am no longer in communion with you”,’ he said. Rather ‘sharing our pain has left us feeling more closely bound to one another – it is as if we see the marks of the living Christ, the suffering Christ, in one another and in our common life, as we await together the power of the resurrection within our painful circumstances.’

In his address, Dr Makgoba said it sometimes appeared that The Episcopal Church had not listened sufficiently to the rest of the Communion, and acted in ways that communicated a lack of care about the consequences of their actions, especially in the Global South. The continuing dominance of debate on human sexuality ‘undermines our witness and dissipates energies that should be spent on mission’ he said. He also criticised others who had breached the ‘moratoria’, and everyone who failed to act with ‘gracious restraint’, and pointed to St Paul’s warning that not everything that is lawful is necessarily right to pursue.

The Archbishop urged greater effort in building mutual understanding across different contexts. ‘No one is without culture’ he said, and ‘all cultures must be open to both the judgement and hope which the gospel brings’. While some cultural practices might more easily be aligned with the gospel than others, all needed to be ‘baptized’ – dying to the assumptions of surrounding society and being reborn ‘within the perspectives of Jesus, his incarnation, cross and resurrection’. He pointed to the Spirit as the key to the translation of the gospel across different languages and cultures, with dunamis, power, rightly being understood not as just ‘brute force’ but the full range of ‘subtle gifts’ of Isaiah 11, including wisdom and discernment, which together enable the achievement of God’s purposes.

He therefore warned the Communion about unthinkingly relying overly on ‘parliamentary’ styles of debate which exacerbated polarisation around motions that encouraged ‘for and against’ stances, and explained, with extensive parallels from Scripture, how also using ‘appropriately baptised Indaba’ could help Anglicans ‘reconnect with more gospel-shaped approaches, that better reflect theologies of the work of the Spirit, and the body of Christ’.

Dr Makgoba commended the Continuing Indaba project, to assist better mutual listening within the Communion. ‘Surely we can never give up on each other – for God never gives up on any of us’ he said. ‘Differences of opinion are inevitable, schism is not.’

Below is the full text of the Archbishop’s Address on Mission Realities for Southern African Anglicans and their Wider Implications given on 10 June 2010 at the USPG Annual Conference, Witnessing to Christ Today, in Swanwick, England.

‘Spirit and Culture at the Foot of the Cross’

‘Witnessing to Christ Today’ is the theme of our conference. I want to begin by addressing this from the perspective of mission realities for Southern African Anglicans across our hugely diverse Province. In particular I want to consider the difficult issues of gospel, culture, and diversity. I shall then offer some reflections on the wider implications for the whole Anglican Communion, during which I shall say something about that troublesome word, indaba, which we seem to have inflicted upon the rest of the world!

The Call to Witness and Mission

Let me begin with words of Jesus which commission his followers to witness and to mission. As Luke’s gospel records, Jesus, at his ascension, tells his disciples to remain in Jerusalem to wait for the promise of the Father, the baptism of the Holy Spirit. He then says to them ‘You will receive power when the Holy Spirit comes upon you; and you will be my witnesses in Jerusalem, in all Judea and Samaria, and to the ends of the earth’ (Acts 1:4,8).

Being witnesses to Jesus Christ is the essential heart of mission. Therefore we proclaim the eternal Second person of the Trinity incarnate at Bethlehem. He is the Son of God in a unique way: crucified for the sins of the world; risen and ascended; of whom St Peter said ‘there is no other name under heaven given among mortals by which we must be saved’ (Acts 4:12).

Yet this is not only a Christo-centric, a Jesus-centred, undertaking. Both Father and Spirit are intimately involved. The Father sends the Holy Spirit to dwell within us, and it is this that makes witness and mission truly possible. The nature of this empowering for the tasks God gives us, is at the heart of what I want to talk about today.

Power in the Spirit

The Greek word for ‘power’ is dunamis, from which we derive the word dynamite. Yet it is not just about brute strength. Dunamis is about the ability to achieve. In ancient Greece this covered everything from politics to battle, from philosophical and spiritual realms to medicine. In the New Testament, dunamis conveys the power, the capacity, that enables the fulfilment of God’s purposes. The prophet Isaiah – in verses often used at confirmations and ordinations – speaks of the 7-fold Spirit, of wisdom and understanding (or discernment), of counsel and might, of knowledge and of the fear of the Lord (Is 11:2). Alongside ‘might’ we are given a great range of other abilities.

This should give us confidence and encouragement in our task of mission and witness. For God’s promise is to empower and equip us, not with brute force and naked power, but with far broader – and perhaps more subtle – gifts for proclaiming the gospel ‘to the ends of the earth’, and giving it true and authentic expression in ways that genuinely communicate, in whatever contexts we may find ourselves. It seems to me that the gifts of wisdom and understanding and discernment are of vital importance, first, in engaging with the various cultures of our world, and second, in holding on to one another as we do so.

Gospel and Culture

No-one, nowhere, is without culture. All of us find ourselves in cultures of one sort or another, and the gospel has a message of both judgement and hope for each one. It is only dependence on the Spirit’s guiding that will enable us to hold each up to the searing light of Christ, and to know what it is we may affirm, and what we must challenge.

Even where there is much to affirm, we will generally want to do this through a recontextualisation within the perspectives of life in Christ. Or, to put this in the language of Scripture, we will want to ensure it is transferred from the dominion of darkness, to the kingdom of light (Col 1:13), and that it is understood from within that perspective of light and life. What I mean is that we must make clear that we uphold what is good and godly, for reasons that are good and godly. Often we may not want to affirm the assumptions and motives behind practices of contemporary societies, even though we may support the practices themselves.

It can be helpful to speak of ‘baptizing culture’. In doing so, we recollect that baptism means being united with Christ through dying to the old life and being reborn in him. So even where our faith finds expression in ways that align with surrounding cultures, we expect there to be a radical dying to the underlying assumptions of that culture and a rebirth into new life where Jesus, and Christ-likeness, reign.

I find baptism a helpful touchstone as I try to discern what the Spirit is saying to the cultures in which I find myself pursuing God’s mission. And, in Southern Africa, I certainly find myself in a lot of cultures! South Africa alone has 11 official languages, each with varying cultures, alongside myriad other indigenous and immigrant communities. We also have vast socio-economic diversity that increasingly transcends differences of race: from opulent suburbs to impoverished shanty towns; from wealthy traditional rural leaders to near-destitute peasant farmers. And we are still wrestling with the transition to a multicultural, pluralist, democracy.

Our Province also includes Angola, Lesotho, Mozambique, Namibia and Swaziland – from ancient kingdoms to new democracies (some, post-civil war). Among them are some of the worlds highest child mortality rates and lowest life expectancies (whether from HIV and AIDS or malaria). We also have two of the most remote inhabited islands on the planet – St Helena and Tristan da Cunha.

We are in many ways a global microcosm. How we heed God’s call to mission and witness, appropriately expressed across such a breadth of people and circumstances, while still holding together, certainly requires all the wisdom, understanding and discernment that the Holy Spirit offers us! And questions of gospel and culture are often where this is most acutely felt.

I was conscious of this last month, when I was in the Diocese of Zululand for the 140th anniversary of their foundation. This was, of course, by Victorian English gentlemen, operating in a colonialist context; and – as you mentioned in your pastoral letter last week, Bishop Katharine – colonial missionary expansion tended to be ignorant and insensitive in imposing its own uniform standards and practices on the cultures it encountered. But there is hope! Zululand was the first Southern African Diocese to have a black diocesan Bishop – whose name, appropriately enough, was Alphaeus Zulu. That was in 1960. Our current Bishop is of Italian descent, married a Zulu lady, and speaks fluent isiZulu. Well, this is perhaps a rather radical way of combing European and African heritages! Nonetheless we find there are still many areas where practices rooted in the English Victorian church come up against African tradition, and knowing how we should respond is not always easy.

Gospel, Culture and Marriage

Let me take the example of marriage and family life. This can be one of the most central, and problematic, areas within parish ministry and mission. We may think we know what we mean by marriage, but the word embraces a huge range of practices. In Scripture we find everything from strategic tribal alliances to individuals falling in love at first sight; from Old Testament polygamy to the New Testament ideal of faithful lifelong monogamy. The church, of course, upholds faithful lifelong monogamy between a man and a woman. But the cultures and practices around this differ hugely within the communities of our Province.

I am a from the Bapedi people, and my wife is UMxhosa, and our extended families often have different views on how we ought to live! You can imagine that the church’s marriage preparation classes in different parts of our Province have to tackle very different questions, and all need to be held up to the light of the gospel. What is the appropriate influence of parents and wider families? What is our attitude to paying lobola or traditional dowry? Does the church’s teaching reflect the remarks with which St Paul, writing to the Ephesians, prefaces his comments on the roles of husbands and wives, ‘Submit to one another, out of reverence of Christ’ (Eph 5:22), or are we allowing Victorian patriarchal views to compound those of African cultures?

And what about our mission where polygamy is seen as a mark of a man’s success? South Africa’s current President is polygamous, as is the King of Swaziland, and non-heads of state like the Zulu king, and many of their subjects. South African legislation also recognises polygamous Muslim marriages. From 1888 to 1988 Lambeth Conferences concluded that a polygamist who wants to become Anglican must not marry further wives, but also must not put away current additional wives and children, because of the social deprivation they would suffer.

But other issues still arise. Should there be different treatment of subsequent wives as compared to first wives, or to women in monogamous marriages, or, indeed to unmarried mothers? Are we clear about our reasons? And are we ensuring we do not encourage communities to stigmatise children who, through no fault of their own, are born to parents who don’t fit into tidy categories of marriage – particularly the categories of the Victorians!

These issues can become very stark, and the source of longstanding disputes within parishes! We must respond in ways that not only provide ‘answers’, but, more importantly, help individuals and communities to grow in knowledge and love of God; in maturity of faith; and in sharing this faith, this godly love, with others.

We must sit with Scripture before us. We must bring to bear all that we have learnt from two millennia of tradition, the history of God at work among his people and in his church. And – being Anglicans, and wedded to the primacy of Scripture, interpreted through tradition and reason! – we must then use all the skills that reasoning offers. This is the reasoning of the wisdom, understanding, discernment by which the Holy Spirit helps us find Christ-shaped, redemptive and life-giving answers. These answers may appear different on the surface, but on a deeper level, they will be coherent with each other and with the gospel of Jesus Christ.

This is the vital point – Jesus Christ is the standard for discerning the path between authentic cultural expression and flawed syncretism; between ensuring we do not quench the Spirit (1 Thess 5:19), and yet nonetheless properly testing what we believe may be the Spirit’s leading. As St John writes in his first letter, we recognise the Spirit in the confession of Jesus Christ incarnate (1 Jn 4:1-2). Orthodox Christology, orthodox life in the Spirit, and orthodox praxis, all go together, whatever the cultures we find ourselves in – and our ability to recognise this in one another is what holds us together in our different expressions of gospel truth.

This is a profound truth. It is fundamental in helping us discern between acceptable diversity, and unacceptable deviation. It is what helps us in our vocation to ‘make every effort to maintain the unity of the Spirit in the bond of peace’ when we wrestle with the really difficult questions (Eph 4:3).

So let me know turn to the ‘really difficult question’ of the Anglican Communion – our differences over human sexuality and how we handle them.

An Anglican Microcosm

Southern Africa is not only a global microcosm in socio-economic, political and geographical terms. Our Province is also something of a microcosm of the Anglican Communion. Alongside huge diversities in race, language and culture, we are high church and low church; those who call themselves Anglo-Catholics and ‘Afro-Catholics’ and Evangelicals; and those whose passion is Christ’s ‘good news for the poor’ pursued through political and social justice alongside evangelistic outreach.

While geographically, and in other ways besides, we are part of the Global South, that is not the whole story. We do take our membership of the Global South very seriously, and fully share the mission priorities identified in April’s Fourth Anglican Global South to South Encounter. We face the same concerns over poverty, hunger and sickness, and the breadth of human consequences of injustice and failure in our economic systems. We too are challenged by crime, violence, corruption, and the weaknesses – even instabilities – of our political life; and by the problems and threats of natural disasters, climate change and ecological fragility. Alongside the rest of the Global South, we too are committed to prioritising the pastoral needs of the laity, especially professionals, women and young people, and resourcing them for witnessing to our faith, as so many do, at the cutting edges of mission.

But we are not typical of the Global South. We also have many congregations that are wealthy and westernised, people who are much more typical of the Global North – and, let me say also, with all the breadth of churchmanship that is found in the North!

Nonetheless, we still hold together – and are managing to do so over human sexuality.

It is well-known that within our Province, and within our Synod of Bishops itself, one can find pretty much the whole range of views on human sexuality that are found within the global Anglican family. This ranges from seeing Mary Glasspool’s longstanding lesbian relationship as no impediment to her suitability for consecration, through to membership of the Fellowship of Confession Anglicans.

This is a live issue within our Province also, since South Africa now allows for civil partnerships between people of the same gender. In response, and though we are by no means of a single mind, we continue to affirm that the marriage of Christians is between a man and a woman, and that clergy who are not married should be celibate; and we do not allow clergy to officiate at civil unions or to bless them.

We are also considering pastoral guidelines for the consequences and questions that civil partnerships raise for ministry within our parishes. Do we welcome people in such partnerships in our congregations? Should their children attend Sunday School? What if they seek baptism for their children? What if those children in their teens seek baptism and confirmation for themselves? And what do we say to the parents of those who enter civil unions, who may be overwhelmed by confusion and conflicting emotions?

These questions also prompt us to think more deeply about the essence of marriage. It is not solely the legitimating of genital acts, but sometimes our discussions of polygamy and of same sex relationships seem to reduce it to little more than this. Therefore all this is no light or easy matter to us.

When we meet – as, for example, the Bishops do twice yearly – we feel sharp, sharp, pains and great distress when, as inevitably is the case, we are called to consider developments around these issues. But we are united in this: that none of us feels called to turn to another and say ‘I no longer consider you a Christian, a brother in Christ, a member of the body of Christ’. None of us says ‘I am no longer in communion with you.’

The sharing of our pain has in fact left us feeling more closely bound to one another. Reflecting on this has brought me to conclude that, it is as if we see the marks of the living Christ, who is also the suffering Christ, in one another and in our common life, as we await together the power of the resurrection within our painful circumstances.

Now, it is true that in the past, the Church in Southern Africa, by the grace of God, held together against all odds, under the pressures of apartheid. To some degree, shared opposition to apartheid helped forge a common identity. Even so, it was a very hard won unity, since there was little agreement about how best to oppose apartheid: about sanctions or the armed struggle or army chaplains. But a shared enemy – and one now in the past – is not a reliable foundation for going forward together. Today we are having to revisit the question of common identity, vision and mission, expressed authentically in the diversity of our contexts. This we shall do at Provincial Synod in September.

Yet it is not skilful use of vision-building techniques that truly holds us together. Rather it is God at work among us, calling us together as the body of Christ, to share in mission, in witness, for the sake of God’s broken and hurting world.

Jesus Christ, his Crucifixion and Resurrection

Sometimes it seems to me that God does this by working through, rather than in spite of, our own brokenness and pain. In this we find two important messages for the world. First, the way God deals with us, his people, demonstrates how he desires to deal with the world around us. Second, our readiness – or otherwise – to receive his ministering to us, can also be a powerful testimony – for good or ill – to the on-looking world.

The heart of God’s ministering is through the Spirit making real to us our baptism: that is, our participation in the death and resurrection of Jesus Christ our Lord and Saviour. The question before the Anglican Communion is whether we really are prepared fully to participate in Christ’s death and resurrection in this way.

What this might mean was brought home to me vividly in April, which saw the twentieth anniversary of the letter-bombing of Fr Michael Lapsley SSM by the agents of the apartheid regime. Some of you may know his story. He lost one eye and both hands. To watch him preside at the Eucharist, holding the bread between articulated metal claws as he repeats Christ’s words ‘This is my body, broken for you’ is to be challenged to a deeper appreciation of the cross, and of its cost, and what it means to share in it, without which we cannot share in resurrection.

But resurrection comes. Fr Michael invited us to a service of thanksgiving: not only that his life was spared; but that out of the great evil perpetrated against him, God by his grace is bringing a far greater and more lasting good. For Fr Michael set up and runs the Institute for the Healing of Memories which conducts significant work among victims of violence and torture all around the world. As he says himself, this ‘is not to say that I will not always grieve what I’ve lost … Yet I believe I’ve gained through this experience. I realise that I can be more of a priest with no hands than with two hands.’ Fr Michael is a living embodiment that walking the path of Jesus Christ opens the possibility for God to take all that is destructive or broken, and transform and transfigure it, and bring a good that is far greater than what went before.

This is the redemption that we seek for our Communion. Therefore we must go forward, unafraid to bear our pain honestly as we keep journeying with Christ, and seeking his mind for us at each step of the way. This is our experience in Southern Africa. Looking back, we see God’s grace in the painful struggle against apartheid, that not only threatened to divide the church, but was for many a life and death matter. Against those experiences we find it hard to understand how human sexuality has become such a touchstone of faith, and mark of fellowship or enmity within the Anglican Communion.

Yet today, especially in what I have experienced within our Synod of Bishops, what counts is not the past we shared in adversity; but rather it is the continuing sensing of Christ in and among us, in the pain of our divisions, which holds us together, through our suffering – confident in the resurrection. And so we dare to join together in the prayer of St Paul, who said ‘I want to know Christ, and the power of his resurrection and the sharing of his sufferings by becoming like him in death if somehow I may attain the resurrection from the dead’ (Phil 3:10,11).

Another Anglican Microcosm

I would even go so far as to say we see parallels between ourselves as a Synod, and Archbishop Rowan Williams himself. In the role of the Archbishop of Canterbury, as a focus of unity for the whole Communion – a role not of his choosing, but a heart-rending gift of the Communion as we constitute ourselves – Archbishop Rowan is in some senses called to bear the strains of the whole worldwide Communion within himself. We can only imagine, from our own experiences, the considerable personal cost this is to him, as he continues to ‘hold on’ as long as this call to do so is laid upon him. We in Southern Africa carry him in our heartfelt prayers, as he too awaits the outworking of resurrection in our suffering.

All this goes back to what I said earlier about Jesus being our standard. If in our Synod of Bishops we did not see Christ in one another – and if we did not agree on the central issues of who Jesus is and of the salvation that he brings – it would be another matter. But we do. And so our differing views on human sexuality therefore take second place alongside the strength of this overpowering conviction of Christ among us. As long as we know unity in Christ in this way, human sexuality is not, and cannot be, a church dividing issue.

This is why our Synod of Bishops said last September ‘we remain committed to upholding the bonds of unity with one another, as we journey together through the difficult questions that confront the worldwide Anglican Communion. Differences of opinion are inevitable, schism is not.’ Therefore our heartfelt prayer is that the Anglican Communion will also find ways of continuing to journey, even in pain, together – sharing in both suffering and resurrection hope.

Renewal in the Spirit

For us, keeping talking together, and, more importantly, worshipping together, reading Scripture together, praying together – in shared openness and vulnerability to God and to each other – has been the key to continuing to see Christ in one another. The possibility of continuing to share fellowship in Christ is the strength of the proposals of the Archbishop of Canterbury’s Pentecost letter, ‘Renewal in the Spirit’. Though these acknowledge the brokenness in our common life, and our damaged relationships – especially in our engagement with the wider ecumenical world – they nonetheless exclude no-one from our common counsels and our common life.

I firmly believe this is how it should be. Exclusion, severing ties and breaking contact can never be the best way forward. Surely we can never give up on each other – for God never gives up on any of us. This is assuredly the message of the penitent thief on the cross. To our last breath, God holds the door open to us – as individuals, and together as his people.

Archbishop Rowan speaks of us as not having yet fully received the Pentecost gift of mutual understanding for common mission. The Spirit’s gift of understanding is not only about each of us grasping God’s call on our own lives, it is also about recognising God at work in one another in our authentic mission work in differing contexts.

St Paul refers to this in writing in Chapter 12 of his First Letter to the Corinthians, about what it is to be the body of Christ. Considerable legitimate diversity under Christ is to be expected. ‘There are varieties of gifts, but the same Spirit, and there are varieties of service but the same Lord; and there are varieties of activities, but it is the same God who activates all of tem in everyone’ (1 Cor 12:4-6). But this diversity can be hard to handle, as St Paul goes on to illustrate. The eye cannot comprehend what it is for the ear to hear, nor can the ear comprehend sight – but the one Spirit holds the different parts together, and enables them to work in harmony.

It is as if the breath of the Spirit has the capacity to translate the gospel of the Word made flesh, not only into the different languages of the first day of Pentecost, and all the languages of our twenty-first century world; the Spirit can also translate into every culture of our world – and between the inculturation of the gospel in different cultures. So, when we cannot understand each other, we must be sure that we have listened carefully to the still small voice of the Spirit. Is the Spirit speaking to each of us? Can we recognise the presence of Christ, which is the touchstone, the standard, of the true Spirit of God?

I am convinced that in our current situation within the Communion neither have we done, nor are we continuing to do, enough of this sort of listening to one another. We do not understand one another and one another’s contexts well enough, and we are not sufficiently sensitive to one another in the way we act. Autonomy has gone too far. I do not mean that we should seek a greater uniformity – I hope it is clear I am saying nothing of the sort. But we risk acting in ways that are so independent of one another that it becomes hard for us, and for outsiders, to recognise either a committed interdependent mutuality or a common Christian, Anglican, DNA running through our appropriately contextualised and differentiated ways of being.

Bishop Katharine, what I am going to say next is painful to me, and I fear it may also be to you – but I would rather say it to your face, than behind your back. And I shall be ready to hear from you also, for I cannot preach listening without doing listening. It sometimes seems to me that, though many have failed to listen adequately to the Spirit at work within The Episcopal Church, at the same time within your Province there has not been enough listening to the rest of the Anglican Communion. I had hoped that those of your Bishops who were at the Lambeth Conference would have grasped how sore and tender our common life is. I had hoped that even those who, after long reflection, are convinced that there is a case for the consecration of individuals in same sex partnerships, might nonetheless have seen how unhelpful it would be to the rest of us, for you to proceed as you have done.

There are times when it seems that your Province, or some within it, despite voicing concern for the rest of us, can nonetheless act in ways that communicate a measure of uncaring at the consequent difficulties for us. And such apparent lack of care for us increases the distress we feel. Much as we understand that you are in all sincerity attempting to discern the best way forward within your own mission context, the plea is: be sensitive to the rest of who are still drinking spiritual milk and are not yet eating solids.

Let me immediately add that, if there were certain others here, I would speak to them equally frankly. Cross border visitations and other moratoria violations have undermined not only your polity, but wider attempts to handle disagreements in a godly way before the face of the watching world. I will also add that, outside the scope of the moratoria, there are too many other shameful and painful ways that ‘gracious restraint’ has not been exercised by various different individuals and groups from all manner of perspectives. These too destructively exacerbate our attempts to live truly as a Communion, and contribute to the way that disagreements over human sexuality and its handling have come to dominate the life of the Anglican Communion to a disproportionate and debilitating extent. When I am interviewed, when I participate in radio phone-ins, no matter what the ostensible topic, again and again I find myself derailed by questions on this. I have to say this undermines our witness; dissipates energies that ought to be spent on the true priorities of mission; and distorts the focus and agenda of the Communion’s common life to an increasingly detrimental degree.

In these circumstances, I find myself returning to the words of St Paul, when he warned the Corinthians that not everything that is lawful is necessarily helpful (1 Cor 6:12). St Paul writes that even when we believe our understandings, our actions, to be justifiable and correct, we can – and sometimes should – choose not to pursue them, while that is to the greater benefit of the whole body of Christ. Yet this runs so counter to so much of today’s culture, in which we are far more conscious of our so-called rights, and our freedom to exercise them to the full.

So now I want to return, for the final section of my reflections, to the question of how the Spirit helps us critique, and baptise, culture.

Gospel Light on Cultural Practices of Handling Difference

Earlier today I talked

• about how all our various cultures must be open to both the judgement and the hope which the gospel brings;

• about how some cultural practices may more easily be aligned with the gospel than others;

• and about how nonetheless, all need to be ‘baptised’ and find new life within the perspectives of Jesus, his incarnation, cross and resurrection.

Let me now apply these principles to how we handle difference, and set limits of acceptable diversity, within our Communion.

I want to suggest that we have not adequately grasped how following the practices of parliaments and international organisations can exacerbate polarisation, adversarial attitudes, and ‘winner versus looser’ mindsets. What do I mean? When we propose motions, people are generally invited to speak ‘for’ and ‘against’. Of course, in debate people can range more widely and offer amendments; but a prior shape is imposed on our discourse both by the terms of the motion itself, and by our need to vote, yes or no – with the outcome being ‘success or defeat’.

Now, I am not saying we should completely stop doing this. But we should be far more aware of how polarising and oppositional such practices are; and how all of this feeds destructive attitudes of competitiveness, dominance and power, over and against one another, that then run through our common life.

Furthermore, I hope it is not too cynical to say it sometimes seems that the popularity of successive drafts of the Covenant has ebbed and flowed, among various groups, in ways that correlate closely with their expectation of whether a particular text can be used to deliver their preferred outcomes around human sexuality – and not because it will best help us all live the far broader life of witness and mission to which God calls us. Of course, no text will be perfect, because we are not perfect, but I think what we have is ‘good enough for now’. It is now up to us to trust God and trust each other, and cooperate in making it work well. Remember, we do have the opportunity to amend and improve it. And it does not exist in isolation, but sits alongside the Instruments of Communion with all their diffused responsibilities and structures that help shape our decisions. I do not see it as intended to centralise power or impose uniformity; and these should not be our goals, either.

When I read my Bible, competitiveness, dominance, power, polarisation and adversarial attitudes are not what I think of first when St Paul writes that ‘we have the mind of Christ’ when it comes to making spiritual judgements (1 Cor 2:16). I’m also conscious of our Godhead as Trinity being an amazing example of mutually enhancing diversity in unity – rather than difference becoming the first step to oppositional thinking.

Faced with all this, my reason for introducing the concept of Indaba into the Anglican Communion (and yes, I was the guilty party on the Lambeth Design Group!) was to help us reconnect with more gospel-shaped approaches, that better reflect theologies around the work of the Spirit, and the body of Christ. I believe it can powerfully enhance our traditional ways of doing business.

Indaba

Indaba is not about trying to make everyone into Amazulu, nor about transplanting elements from one culture into a completely foreign and inappropriate context. I also know that Indaba is far from perfect – it is not always conducted inclusively, and it can be abused by leaders intent on getting their own way. But at its best, there is a great deal that is readily susceptible to the sort of ‘baptism’ of which I spoke earlier. Let me explain:

• Scripture speaks of us living as the Body of Christ, as one, but with many different members (1 Cor 12:12).

• Indaba calls community members together to share news of developments or discuss concerns that affect the life of the community or individuals within it.

• Scripture says that God has so arranged the body that the members may have ‘the same care for one another’ (1 Cor 12:25).

• Indaba is predicated upon a strong sense of shared well-being, experienced on a reciprocal and mutually supportive basis.

• Scripture says that when one part of the body suffers, ‘all suffer with it’ (1 Cor 12:26).

• Indaba necessarily entails a degree of acknowledged interdependence, even vulnerability, towards one another.

• Scripture says that the members of the body that are ‘weaker are indispensable’ (1 Cor 12:22).

• Indaba says leaders must work for the well-being of the entire community, especially those in greatest need, and the ‘haves’ must provide for the ‘have nots’.

• Scripture says that the less respectable should be treated with greater respect (1 Cor 12:23).

• Indaba promotes an egalitarian ethos, in which everyone should be encouraged to grow into a productive and contributing member of the community.

• Scripture says that to each is given the manifestation of the Spirit for the common good (1 Cor 12:7).

• Indaba says debate is conducted through everyone being allowed to have their say, contributing their own perspective, so that the fullest picture can be drawn, and from it an outcome that is as consensual, and as ‘win-win’ as possible, can emerge.

• Scripture says that, notwithstanding all this diversity, when living as God intends, there need not, there should not, be dissension (1 Cor 12:25).

So, I hope you can see why I felt that there was much within Indaba that can help us – as the best of a cultural practice, appropriately baptised. Part of such baptism is the contextualisation within the kingdom of God. For Christians, it is a matter of relating and listening not just to one another, but individually and together to the empowering Spirit – the Spirit of wisdom, understanding and discernment. Perhaps a similar sort of listening was what happened at the Council in Jerusalem in Acts 15, after which the apostles and elders wrote to the Gentile believers ‘it seemed good to the Holy Spirit and to us …’ (Acts 15:28). Let me add one further point.

Indaba is not an interminable talking shop. Indaba can and does impose sanctions, including the ultimate sanction of expulsion, on those who transgress the life of the community – but only after every other possible option is fully explored.

I hope you will see why I have drawn on indaba in my search for a more gospel-shaped space, a safer environment, for bringing and sharing concerns and differences, which we can use alongside the more adversarial cultures of debate which we have inherited and adopted, perhaps too unthinkingly. Engaging this way will help us get to that deeper level of mutual engagement, opening ourselves to recognise Christ at work within us, meeting in our pain at the foot of his cross, as we await the redemption of his resurrection hope.

And for this reason, the Continuing Indaba, together with the Bible in the Life of the Church project, and other shared Anglican initiatives must continue. This is the way to help us re-find one another, within the body of Christ to which we are called, and in which we are empowered, each as we need to be, by the Spirit, for our life of witness and mission.

May God bless us as we seek faithfully to follow his calling, and may he make us a blessing to others – for the building of his kingdom, and for the glory of his holy name. Amen.