One final thought from the American Episcopal Church for today.  It was recently reported that, for them, the decisions of their General Convention (their General Synod) were deemed to be the most authoritative way of knowing God’s will.

Forgive me, but that seems just a little arrogant.  I’m rather glad that the Church of England says clearly two things about that:

1.  The Thirty-Nine Articles make it clear that Councils (and Conventions) can and do err – no human ‘parliamentary’ decision can ever permanently and infallibly reveal God’s will.  They need to be tested.

2.  And the place of testing is the Bible – which all the Anglican formularies have as our primary source of authority.  Rather more objectivity and security in the way we do things, methinks.

Midsomer Murders: the detective series with the highest body count on TV (average 3+ per episode), outrageously implausible plots and extremely dodgy characterisation – yet somehow inexplicably compelling, and it’s also filmed in my home turf of the Chiltern Hills.

The last episode was true to form, looking at the antics of a group of villagers engaged in occult, pagan rituals, using incantations supposedly handed down in secret from Ancient Egypt.  Complete and utter hokum, but it did cause me to reflect in some surprising ways:

The rituals were found to be a hoax, invented by a local in the 1960s, in the midst of a drug-addled haze.  But nevertheless they had the power to tip an vulnerable lady over the edge into insanity.  The occult is dangerous, whether indulged in as a game, a hoax or for real.  Praise God for Christ’s victory over the powers of darkness.  We need fear no evil.

Beware – clergy anorak point coming (others can skip this paragraph).  The programme three times showed a priest leading matins or evensong.  Using just the Book of Common Prayer was OK for this plot (but they always do!).  More annoyingly, he was leading the service from the pulpit, and wearing a stole rather than surplice and scarf.  Er…NO!  I’ll happily be their church consultant for a very small fee!

Most importantly, the plot turned on the search for a Book of Power, supposedly containing ancient magic, preserved secretly through the centuries.  No such book existed.  Rather, the hunt resulted in the discovery of some pages from the first edition of Tyndale’s New Testament – an absolutely priceless find.  But how wonderful it was to see the real Book of Power turning out to be the Bible – God’s word, which turned England upside down in the Sixteenth Century, and has been changing lives for nearly 2000 years.  Perhaps the programme didn’t intend it to come across in this way, but it was lovely to see the Scriptures prized in this way.

Want a Book of Power?  Try the Bible – it’s magic.

I was asked recently why our Church magazine hadn’t carried articles about the two big political hot potatoes in the Church of England: women bishops and gay clergy.  My response, perhaps ducking the issue ever so slightly, was to plead that these issues had not yet affected us directly in Ledbury, and there were many more important subjects I wanted to concentrate on – notably building up and sharing our faith.

Yet these two issues have dominated the news over the past couple of weeks, perhaps because it’s the slow time of year for news (the politicians are on holiday, so nothing happens in the world!), and notably because of General Synod and the Lambeth Conference – so perhaps some thoughts are necessary.

Women bishops: an inevitability after 1992, and something I have no problem with as long as faithful Anglicans who disagree still have a place within the Church.  Will they?  Time will tell.  It will be some time before the first draft of a Code of Practice appears, and much longer before it is debated by Deaneries and Dioceses before returning to General Synod.

But what about the fault-line in the Anglican Communion?  The division between those North American dioceses explicitly ordaining sexually-active gay clergy, and traditionalists, frequently in the developing world, who are so strongly opposed to such developments.  We’re not seeing active disputes at the Lambeth Conference this time around (unlike 1998), partly because of the anodine way in which the Conference is being managed, and mainly because many of the more vociferous traditionalists have stayed away.

It’s hard therefore to comment on what might emerge, but for what they’re worth here are just a few general observations:

Old colonial patterns of paternalism towards African and Asian churches simply will not do (and neither will attempts at neo-colonial control through financial aid).  These churches are the liveliest, most evangelistic and Biblically-faithful churches in the Communion.  They are growing rapidly.  Western churches are not.  Anglicanism is no longer a ‘white’ faith, and the strongest Anglican churches are in the Southern hemisphere.  We need to learn from them, and to hear talk about such churches needing to ‘grow up’ makes me weep with frustration.  Why on earth would we want them to become like us?

While it may not have been altogether wise for African and South American churches to intervene in the internal affairs of the American and Canadian Episcopal churches, by including them as Churches in Rwanda, Uganda or Nigeria, I can share their frustration.  The North Americans have agreed to, and then ignored and breached, a whole series of resolutions and agreements at and since Lambeth 1998, most recently the Windsor process.  It seems that any attempt to reach agreement is worthless, so reciprocal action must seem a very attractive possibility – and indeed the only way of helping fellow Christians.

And such action may well be necessitated by the actions of the North American leadership.  Their persecution of traditionalist congregations and bishops seems, from this side of the pond, to resemble nothing less than totalitarian dictatorship, rather than the love and fellowship expected within the people of God.  It is a frightening sight, and looks for all the world like a huge self-inflicted wound.

Perhaps something good will come out of Lambeth to heal the divisions.  We can only hope and pray so, but I’m not that confident, not least because of the list of Lambeth absentees.