The Downing Street website has this:
The Queen has approved the nomination of the Right Reverend Stephen David Conway, MA, Area Bishop of Ramsbury, for election as Bishop of Ely in succession to the Right Reverend Anthony John Russell, BA, DPhil, on his resignation on the 28th February 2010.
Read more here.
And from the diocesan website here.
Vice president of Affirming Catholicism! This looks like some good news.
And a signatory to the Open Letter to the Leadership Team of GAFCON –
http://www.thinkinganglicans.org.uk/archives/003011.html –
better still!!
Why does Downing Street announce something that the Queen has done? Next the PM will be reading the Speech from the Throne at the opening of Parliament!
I see that one our Suffragans here in Chichester is on the list of addressees. Any response from him I wonder?
“Stephen has been a spiritual director and soul friend to clergy and lay people since he was a curate. Prayer and worship are at the heart of everything. He has been formed principally within the Anglican catholic tradition, shaded by positive experience of other traditions throughout his ministry like the charismatic movement. He is committed to being a bishop for the whole Church, regardless of tradition.” – Ely Diocesan Bio. of Bishop Stephen – Sounds a pretty good all-rounder to me – Keble College, Oxford; a Methodist Sunday school childhood; ecumenical connections; Vice Chair of Affirming Catholics; Man of Prayer,… Read more »
In answer to Mr Dilworth – this is a long-standing practice rather than a recent innovation. Those things The Queen does as Head of State are not personal decisions for which she is responsible, but the responsibility of Ministers who recommend them. While The Queen approves the appointment of Bishops (and Ministers, and other public office-holders), Ministers make the recommendations on which she acts and are accountable for their advice – hence, I think, the announcement comes from Downing Street. Similarly, while the Speech from the Throne is read by the Monarch, it is written by the Government and the… Read more »
Thanks, Mr Hobday. I knew that the Queen’s Speech is written by the government. I was just noting the inconsistency of UK practice – sometimes you keep up the appearance of royal agency more than at other times.
My limited analysis of such an appointment:
http://pluralistspeaks.blogspot.com/2010/09/appointment-method.html
“That means that Anglo-catholics who are standing for election for the General Synod, or voting in General Synod elections, are standing, or voting, to defeat the women bishops’ legislation.” – Bishop of Ebbsfleet, Pastoral Letter 2 – This is where I get confused with the exclusive use of the term ‘Anglo-Catholics’ by the F.i.F. crowd. Bishop Stephen, Bishop-elect of Ely, will in all probability not vote “to defeat the women bishops’ legislation” (hopefully, being vice-Chairperson of Affirming Catholics who want women bishops); so why do ‘Forward in Faith’ continue to arrogate to themselves alone the title ‘Anglo-Catholic’? In fact, if… Read more »
Calls itself, rather amusingly, FiF-UK, Fr. Ron.
Yes, I admit I wickedly think of it as ‘Backward in Doubt’.
But it can be a hoot *(despite itself!) – so that is an unintended plus point.(Laugh and thw world laughs with you.)
He sounds an excellent chap. And – o joy! -a further excuse for those of us in Cambridge to look down our collective nose at our fenland friends in Peterborough.
Fr Ron. Is it appropriate to call upon the help of Our Lady of Walsingham when her Shrine doesn’t allow women priests to celebrate mass or be priest associates? Or may be you are right and she could be very helpful. Could be a wonderful Damascus Road conversion, just imagine it!
When I saw he had come in for some stick on a less pleasant US site, his stock rose in my eyes !
Richard, I have noted that the Administrator and the Council of the Anglican Shrine of Our Lady of Walsingham do not presently ‘allow’ a woman to celebrate Mass at her Shrine in England. Perhaps there needs to be a new attitude towards the dignity of women in that place, which comemmorates a mere woman as being the Mother of God. What more dignified title could be given to a woman who, if one can believe her ‘Catholic’ protectors, has already attained to that state of grace that the Angel Gabriel attributed to her on the occasion of the Annunciation –… Read more »