Gafcon in Kigali: a Q and A

Supporters of the Global Anglican Futures Conference (Gafcon) meeting in Kigali might find this a negative piece. That’s because it is a collection of responses to readers who had critical questions or comments about the Gafcon 4 meeting in Kigali. Please send in more questions, and I will try to answer them. The Other Cheek signed Gafcon’s Jerusalem Declaration and attended the Kigali meeting. But The Other Cheek believes in critical inquiry…

1. Why the dumping on the Archbishop of Canterbury? Surely there was too much personal criticism.
   
   The office of the Archbishop of Canterbury (ABC) exercises a great deal of control over the “instruments of communion” that have traditionally run the Anglican Communion. The ABC convenes the decennial gathering of bishops called the Lambeth conference, determining who can come and what the agenda is. The Primates Council meets or does not meet at the say-so of the ABC. The Anglican Consultative Council secretariat is heavily influenced by who is appointed to the Anglican Communion Office.
   
   While Gafcon has led a boycott of the Lambeth Conference for a couple of decades, the Global South group of Anglican provinces has generally joined in. But at Kigali, they came determined to join Gafcon in repudiating the existing structures of the Anglican Communion.
   
   They believe too much control is exercised from London by a province that has moved in a progressive direction with the Church of England’s new prayers of love and faith.
   
   Some primates, such as James Wong of the Indian Ocean, feel reasonably let down by Justin Welby, whom they believe assured them of his personally taking a conservative stance on homosexuality.
   
   As ABC, Justin Welby seconded the motion to take the new prayers forward and said he rejoiced in their adoption in a speech at the Church of England General Synod. Consequently, GSFA and Gafcon primates no longer wish him to be the “first among equals” heading the communion.
   
   The “Kigali commitment” statement reflects a view that there needs to be a “reset communion” – a point about structure – and a call for repentance – which involves Justin Welby’s actions as the Church leader of England.
   
   The Western managerial style that Justin Welby has adopted, of making comments agreeing with what the various factions in the Anglican Communion have to say to keep them all on board, has not translated well to the African/Asian context of the Primates who feel personally let down by him.
   

The conference’s Kigali Commitment statement is the best resource to examine what Gafcon had to say about the Archbishop of Canterbury rather than heated social media or reports of comments made by individuals, including bishops. https://gafcon23.org/wp-content/uploads/2023/04/Kigali-Commitment-2023.pdf Some media interviews included personal attacks, but the statement does not.

2. Too many Australians?
   There were about 70 Australians at the Gafcon 4 conference in Kigali out of 1300 delegates. Many of these were involved in behind the scene work, such as setting up the committee rooms or managing the press conferences. UPDATE: One person consulting a delegate list tells The Other Cheek 93 Australians, including the logistics office.
   
   But in my view, there were instances where too many Australians gave reports or spoke on the stage – such as reports of speeches about finances, the history of Gafcon or the draft statement.
   
   David Virtue, a very conservative reporter based in the US, had strong words: ”Why is the Australian presence so dominant? Why is there an excessive white presence when GAFCON and GSFA are predominantly African and Black? One wag observed that perhaps we should call it the; Global Australian Fellowship of Churches.” 
   
   I had conversations with Nigerians who thought there were too many white speakers.
   

 3. Was the drafting committee unbalanced?
A similar criticism can be made of the makeup of the drafting committee.

“Chair – Rt Rev Dr Michael Stead – Australia
Ven Kara Hartley – Australia
Rev Canon Dr Mark Thompson – Australia
Rev Anne Kennedy – Anglican Church in North America
Rt Rev Sammy Morrison – Chile
Rev Tim Anderson – Ireland
Rev Andrew Symes – Anglican Network in England
Rt Rev Dapo Asaju – Nigeria
Rev Canon Dr John Senyonyi – Uganda
Rt Rev Alfred Olwa – Uganda

That’s about 60 per cent “white” (Morrison is Anglo-Chilean, 4th generation, I am not sure how to classify him).

Two other Australians kept the minutes and looked after the room, without voice or vote. But the general reaction at Gafcon was that the Kigali Commitment statement itself sounded very “African.” This especially is true of the flavour of the comments about the Archbishop of Canterbury. English delegates wanted it toned down. But their reaction was complex, and they tended to come around to dealing with the Church of England’s situation in the statement was the week wore on.

But it is simplistic to assume that the conference’s “Kigali Commitment” reflected the drafting committee’s views. That was not their job. The drafting committee attempted to record what the conference wanted rather than reflect their own priorities. They had over 500 written responses to an earlier draft and results from a mail chimp survey testing various draft comments. The primates had significant input.

4. Why no direct mention of LGBTQIA in the Kigali Commitment statement issued at the end of the conference?

See my forthcoming story on “The sexual politics of Gafcon.” Direct mention of LGBTQIA persons was removed from the draft – which was evidence of strong African influence. (This is also evidence that the statement did not reflect the makeup of the drafting committee.) The answer as to whether there was an objection to directly mentioning LGBTQIA persons in the conference statement is undoubtedly yes, given the changes made to the first draft delegates saw. The Anglo members of the drafting committee would have kept the direct mentions of LGBTQIA persons in if it had been up to them.

5. What about the Gafcon/GSFA claim to represent 85 per cent of the communion?
There are fair questions about the exact church-going population of each province. Still, it is clear, for example, that the Anglosphere’s progressive churches are outnumbered massively in the Anglican Communion. One can work out whatever maths, but wandering too far from that figure would be hard. Taking the most sceptical view of African numbers but being optimistic about western provinces might get one to 70 per cent.

After the Kigali conference, I visited village churches and Bible Colleges in rural Tanzania. There is no doubt that the clergy believe what their bishops believe about same-sex marriage and teach it in their churches. My view is that my visit was to a microcosm of what happens in Gafcon provinces. So within the rough limits of Anglican representation (General Synods, etc.), Gafcon and GSFA represent the social attitudes of the people in their churches. That’s not to say the subsistence farmers I met know Gafcon, but that they would be conservative on same-sex marriage.

6. How does Gafcon deal with gender diversity? 

The Gafcon statement does not give a response to gender diversity as such, but says, “Any refusal to follow the biblical teaching that the only appropriate context for sexual activity is the exclusive lifelong union of a man and a woman in marriage violates the created order (Genesis 2:24; Matthew 19:4–6) and endangers salvation (1 Corinthians 6:9).” 

7. Why is there no mention of the Ugandan laws?
In a piece on the “sexual politics of Gafcon”, I will examine this issue in detail. First, but briefly, in upholding human dignity and speaking against demeaning those we disagree with, the Kigali Commitment is a (mild) reproof of the Ugandan laws. “As Resolution I.10 affirms, we oppose the vilification or demeaning of any person, including those who do not follow God’s ways, since all human beings are created in God’s image.” Many readers might wish for a stronger or more direct statement, but the chief advantage of the Kigali Commitment is that the Ugandans were part of the discussions and, therefore, more likely to hear the arguments for treating LGBTQIA persons with dignity. In the case of the Ugandan debates, messages from abroad have a tendency to increase support for anti-gay laws. Sending bishops and other leaders to visit Uganda to dialogue is probably the best response.

8. Why not concentarte on ministry and not do this church politics stuff?
At Kigali different groups had different views on this. American delegates in particular were keen to see Gafcon move on to become a church planting and missionary movement. this has been the experience of the now ten-year-old Anglican Church in North America which has moved on from it’s breakaway beginnings to be a church planting movement. On the other hand Church of England delegates were sorting through what they would do in a radidly evolving Church of England situation. There was a real contrast between these two groups.
Global South delegates were keen to set up new structures in a “re-set” Anglican Communion. But it was an week out of normal life for most, especially the Africans. Just about everyone in Kigali spend their lives doing ministry, rather than Gafcon stuff, and that was reflected in what the conference talked about. Richard Borgonon, Founder of The Word One to One, and Rico Tice from Chrsitianity Explored gave strong evangelicalistic presentations.