¨We should not allow the world to think that the Archbishop of Canterbury speaks for the Communion as a whole...

...God only knows what he has said to the Pope!¨

Rowan Williams, The Archbishop of Canterbury, ¨First among Equals¨ at The Anglican Communion

¨...We can quibble about when the Communion began its transformation from an instrument of mutual mission to the quarrelsome, meddlesome, dysfunctional leviathan it is fast becoming...

Bishop V.G. Robinson, Diocese of New Hampshire, TEC

...Certainly, the transformation accelerated in 2003 when Archbishop of Canterbury Rowan Williams agreed to calling an emergency meeting of the primates in the wake of the consent to consecrate Gene Robinson...

The Very Reverend Dr.Jeffrey John, Dean of St. Albans

...Earlier in the year, the newly enthroned archbishop had proved that he could be intimidated when the protests of English Evangelicals led him to demand that Jeffrey John decline his appointment as Bishop of Reading...

Bob Duncan, deposed Bishop of Pittsburgh, TEC

...When the 2003 General Convention voted to allow the New Hampshire consecration to go forward, Bishop Robert Duncan and his band of conservative malcontents knew how to pull Rowan’s chain...

Archbishop Drexel Gomez, The Province of the West Indies (later, chairperson of The Anglican Communion Covenant group)

...The October 2003 meeting of the primates set in motion what has become known as The Windsor Process, a malevolent movement with zombie-like staying power pushing the Communion inexorably toward a more authoritarian polity...¨

The Archbishop of Canterbury

...That the Archbishop of Canterbury is a member of all the “Instruments of Unity” gives him unique opportunities to influence discussion and events within the Anglican Communion. There is no good reason—neither tradition nor history provide adequate rationale—that an English bishop should be so privileged.

That special position of the Archbishop of Canterbury allows him, whether legitimately or not, to speak on behalf of the Anglican Communion. Nothing constrains what he says, and almost never does he actually speak for the Communion in a formally authorized voice. Surely Rowan has been known to make some strange pronouncements...

The Archbishop of Canterbury and the Pope

...God only knows what he has said to the Pope! We should not allow the world to think that the Archbishop of Canterbury speaks for the Communion as a whole. I leave it to others to decide if he even does a good job of speaking for the Church of England. Since he has made it clear that he does not always speak his own deeply held opinions, it is difficult to know for whom Rowan does speak. In his defense, the role (or roles) is inherently problematic. In any case, I don’t want Rowan or any other archbishop to be seen as speaking for The Episcopal Church.

Even if we want to do so, how do we dethrone the Archbishop of Canterbury? We can start by rejecting the proposed Anglican covenant. The covenant institutionalizes the “Instruments of Unity” as never before and centralizes power within the Communion. The fight to separate the Archbishop of Canterbury from his special privileges will be long and difficult, however. I hope that our own Presiding Bishop, in her travels to other Anglican churches, is beginning to build a coalition to oppose those who would transform the Communion into a worldwide church on the Roman model. More churches have to learn to just say no. HERE

· Thanks to Lionel Deimel
· Thanks to Lionel Deimel’s Web Log, sidebar
· Thanks to Random quick takes by Lionel Deimel
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NO ANGLICAN COVENANT.

TAKE ACTION AGAINST BIGOTRY, IGNORANCE and OUTCASTING/SOCIAL ISOLATION and THE ABUSERS of FELLOW ANGLICANS/others at The Anglican Communion:

The ANGLICAN UN, United Nations, HUMAN RIGHTS Observer, Mrs Hellen Grace Wangusa from Uganda, has an office and staff provided by the Episcopal Church (USA) at the Church Center 815 Second Avenue, New York, 10017. The direct office line is (001) 212-716- 6263 and the email address unoffice@episcopalchurch.org

Lionel Deimel, Anglican HERO, click HERE,¨No Anglican Covenant¨