General Synod in Winnipeg (continued)
Two items from last night's (Thursday evening's) session as reported by one blogger-delegate from the Diocese of New Westminster and the Anglican Essentials folks who have some sort of observer status at GS. The new Prolocutor of General Synod (who acts as vice-chair of GS and chair of the Council of General Synod) is a 'relatively' conservative clergyman from the Diocese of Algoma. The author of the 'live blog' which Anglican Essentials Canada is hosting from General Synod got breathless at this point and, noting that the individual in question was 'Essentials-friendly', promptly spelled the man's new position incorrectly at least once.
This prompted the following comment:
Praise the Lord that Stephen Andrews was elected Proluctor (sic) of our General Synod. This a major step in the right direction. Now we need to elect a Primate who will call the Church back to the Authority of Scripture and defeat all motions which would allow same sex blessings in our church or even allow for local option. We need to come under the Authority of Scripture and not align ourselves with our culture. The church must always stand over against the culture of our time to call people to repentance and to new life in Christ by the power of the Holy Spirit.
Okay, so it's not an easy word to remember. It's probably not even included in the spell-check so the poor blogger is really on his own.
One is hesitant to see this as a decision by General Synod to elect 'a conservative' to a senior position in the hierarchy of General Synod. Bloggers from Anglican Essentials Canada are looking constantly for the presence of 'their folks' in the wings, in the visitors' seats and potentially in key positions. Equally one might conceive that a blogger from the Diocese of New Westminster might be looking at the same possible evidence from an entirely different treetop.
Nonetheless, one does wonder what the 'conservative in hand' as vice-chair of General Synod and a potential middle-right Primate could possibly do with an eventual decision to proceed with the blessing of same sex-unions.
Synod also defeated an amendment to a motion to receive the report of the Windsor Response Group. The amendment called on Dioceses (such as New Westminster with its 8 parishes presently able to bless such unions) to abide by a moratorium on the blessing of same. This caused much discussion on what was implied by the 'reception' of a report - is it simply received or is it accepted? Speakers against the amendment noted that such a decision would prejudge the discussion and decisions to take place later at Synod and the amendment failed massively.
The Anglican Journal Daily Journal, - Issue 3, dated the 22nd of June is available HERE
A propos of nothing: Andrew Goddard was speaking to the Essentials folks about the Anglican covenant. The video of his presentation is here
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