Bill Bowder has a report in the Church Times today Two months to go and bishops are still checking in.
On Wednesday, numbers stood at 620 of the possible 880 bishops in the Anglican Communion. Officials calculate that about ten per cent of sees are vacant. Nigeria has said that none of its 141 bishops will attend; nor will Uganda’s 31 bishops. This leaves fewer than 20 bishops unaccounted for.”
…The Anglican Communion Office said on Wednesday that it had received no official notification that any of the bishops who had been invited were not attending.
“It is not wise to say who will be there till much closer to the event,” said a spokesman.
So far, 570 spouses have registered for the spouses’ conference.
This week, the organisers of the Global Anglican Future Conference (GAFCON) said that 280 bishops had registered to attend. GAFCON, a conservative gathering, takes place in Jordan and Jerusalem next month. It is now clear that many bishops plan to attend both conferences.
No mention in this article of others who have said they will not come:
Dave Walker has a nice cartoon here.
The official conference website has three posters, here, here, and here.
There are also numerous bookmarks here.
Question: will the former TEC Bishop Schofield be present? Was he disinvited when when he fled to the Southern Cone, or was he invited as part of the Southern Cone delegation?
Again, it is important to note that the number of bishops claimed by GAFFEPRONE includes bishops of various schismatic groups who are not nor have ever been part of the Anglican Communion.
On another point, I’m not convinced that we won’t see Akinola, Orombi et al at Lambeth. The recent announcements by Iker, Dincan, Venables &c are merely the opening trickle of a humiliating “conservative” retreat.
Simon,
I agree that the Church Times report raises questions about those provinces other than Nigeria and Uganda that have said they’re not coming. As long as we’re counting note also the Reuters link you point to reminds us that Sydney – a key player in GAFCON – has also said it will not be attending Lambeth.
So we are left with two alternatives: Church Times overlooked these cases, or there’s been a retreat by Kenya, Sydney, and Rwanda. Which is it, I wonder?
@Malcolm+:
I’ve said it before, I’ll say it again: If you had told me two years ago that all but one of ECUSA’s bishops would be present at Lambeth, but Nigeria’s wouldn’t be, I’d have thought you completely stark raving bonkers.
Thus while I think it’s a tad petty that +Gene is neither invited nor licensed, OTOH ye gotta admit, this is some turn of events. Maybe ++Rowan’s not such a lousy leader after all.
(hoping and praying I don’t have to eat my words in a couple months)
John
It is also possible that the boycott by Nigeria (or Uganda) is less complete than those primates would have us believe.
And I do wonder about the 10% vacant estimate.
Simon, do you have any direct information about Nigerian, Kenyan, Rwandan, Ugandan or Sydney bishops defying their schismatic metropolitans?
I’ve read on the conservative blogs about how these ” conservative ” bishops are converting Muslims..so I think its very brave of them to be holding their conference in Jordan.
It says something for religious freedom in Jordan that the Government has not banned the Conference.
I do hope it will not cause problems for the ancient fragile Christian remnant communities in Jordan.However Sydney probablly don’t regard these Christian groups as any more saved than the Muslims.
“However Sydney probablly don’t regard these Christian groups as any more saved than the Muslims.” I very sincerely doubt they think any of us are saved. It’s a hard debate to have, since we don’t have the same definition of “saved”. I believe we are saved from bondage to sin and death. They believe we are saved from the wrath of God. I worship God as the “lover of humankind”. They worship God as the vindictive judge who will roast them for all eternity if they don’t. For me, God is my friend. For them, God is in many ways… Read more »