Conservative Anglicans reject ‘Canterbury Instruments’ to elect new leaders in Abuja

The secretary general of the Anglican Communion Bishop Anthony Poggo and Gafcon’s Canadian-born secretary general Bishop Paul Donison had held meetings seeking to avoid the split.

A group of Anglican church leaders met in Nigeria to elect a new leadership in defiance of the Anglican Communion, despite a series of meetings attempting to resolve their differences.

The Global Anglican Future Conference (Gafcon) met in Abuja on 3-6 March, hosted by the Primate of the Church of Nigeria Archbishop Henry Ndakuba, with 347 bishops and 121 lay and clerical Anglican leaders from 27 provinces present.

Gafcon elected Archbishop Laurent Mbanda of Rwanda as chair of its Global Anglican Council and issued a statement rejecting the “Instruments of Communion” that govern the mainstream Anglican Communion.

“The Canterbury Instruments have compromised the authority of the Scriptures by normalising hermeneutical pluralism, elevating cultural capitulation and reframing the rejection of Scripture’s authority and clarity as ‘good disagreement’, and not what it really is – false teaching,” said a statement signed by Archbishop Mbanda.

The Tablet understands that before the Abuja meeting the secretary general of the Anglican Communion Bishop Anthony Poggo, a South Sudanese prelate, and Gafcon’s Canadian-born secretary general Bishop Paul Donison, held a series of discussions seeking to avoid the split, but could not find a compromise.

“The Church’s one foundation is Jesus Christ her Lord. The communion is a fellowship of churches who submit to the Lordship of Jesus Christ, whose life and teaching is revealed in the Scriptures. We understand the Bible is to be ‘translated, read, preached, taught and obeyed in its plain and canonical sense, respectful of the church’s historic and consensual reading’ [from Article II of the 2008 Jerusalem Declaration that established Gafcon], which reflects Article VI of the Thirty-Nine Articles of Religion,” said Mbanda’s statement.

“We reject the so-called Instruments of Communion, namely the Archbishop of Canterbury, the Lambeth Conference, the Anglican Consultative Council (ACC) and the Primates’ Meeting, which have failed to uphold the doctrine and discipline of the Anglican Communion”.

It added that “recent Archbishops of Canterbury have failed to guard the faith by inviting bishops to Lambeth who have embraced or promoted practices contrary to Scripture”, emphasising opposition to same-sex relationships.

“The former Archbishop of Canterbury [Justin Welby] welcomed the provision of liturgical resources for the Church of England to bless people who had entered same-sex civil marriages. The current Archbishop of Canterbury [Sarah Mullally] led the ‘Living in Love and Faith’ project that produced these liturgical resources for the Church of England. The moral and spiritual authority of the Seat of Augustine has been severely compromised by this.”

It said further that “the ACC and the Primates’ Meetings have likewise failed to uphold the doctrine and discipline of the Anglican Communion, notwithstanding the repeated recommendations of various reports, for example the 2004 Windsor Report. They have neither restrained nor challenged false teaching and instead have called for the acceptance of false teachers as fellow members of the Communion.”

The statement continued: “True communion is confessional, rather than defined by a shared history or institutional structures. The Jerusalem Declaration, which includes the Reformation Formularies, expresses our common confession of the Biblical truth, shared faith, and communal conviction. We are in fellowship with all who assent to the Jerusalem Declaration.”

It denied that the group was breaking away from the Anglican Communion or forming an alternative communion.

“There are not two Communions, but two incompatible definitions of communion – one confessional, the other institutional. We warmly invite all who submit to the Lord Jesus and cherish the Bible and our Anglican Formularies as expressed in the Jerusalem Declaration to join us,” it said.

“The Jerusalem Statement clearly says that ‘We cherish our Anglican heritage and the Anglican Communion and have no intention of departing from it.’ What has occurred instead is a shift of the stewardship of the Anglican Communion from the Canterbury Instruments to the Global Anglican Communion.

“We are returning the Anglican Communion to its roots. The Global Anglican Communion is not a new Communion, but the historic Anglican Communion reordered from within.”

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