A Word for Africa

In an earlier blog I raised the question of whether the critical dialogue between the Anglican Communion’s Global North and Global South had become one-way traffic because political correctness or racism awareness training, and possibly both, have rendered the North loath to be critical of anything African lest this be hailed as racist. But unless there is a framework for mutual critique and constructive dialogue, we run the risk of projecting grotesque caricatures of one another.

This week my attention was drawn to two instances of Anglican leaders in the Global North being willing to be critical of the theology and politics espoused by self-styled and cavalier leaders of the Global South like Archbishop Akinola of Nigeria.

The first was a statement made last month by Anglican Bishop John Chane of Washington writing in his Diocesan newspaper. Chane was willing to tackle Akinola directly describing him as "one of the most outspoken of this small group of men who presumes to speak for the entire global Communion."

The Bishop went on to say: "If the Church is to really focus on the issues of the Bible's teaching and the core teachings of Jesus Christ, why does this Archbishop spend so much time on human sexuality issues while so many of his countrymen and women are oppressed by poverty, illiteracy and violence? Where is the strong voice of the Nigerian Anglican Church in opposing the continued neglect of vulnerable women and children, or in advocating on behalf of the poorest of the poor? Jesus was very clear in his hard teachings that one could always tell the righteous from the damned by whether they (were) feeding the hungry, clothing the naked, welcoming the stranger and visiting those who were in prison."

The Bishop might also have added to the Archbishop’s catalogue of faults the fact that while appearing to discuss nothing but sexuality in his pronouncements about the West, he constantly and deliberately avoids addressing the troubling issues of sexuality within African culture including those of polygamy, widow inheritance, widow cleansing, and HIV/AIDS.

Secondly, I was reminded that we now have an African Archbishop in one of England’s ancient Sees, that of York, when last week Archbishop John Sentamu signed the documentation which confirms his appointment. Archbishop Sentamu was born in poverty in Uganda and, a judge by profession, had to flee his country during Idi Amin’s reign of terror. An articulate Evangelical, his appointments first as Bishop of Stepney in London Diocese, then as bishop of multicultural Birmingham and now as Archbishop of York and Primate of England, have been hailed as visionary. He brings all that is good in vibrant African culture, faith and practice to a Church that many regard as lacking vitality.

In an exclusive interview with Dr Sentamu last week in The Guardian, he told his interviewer that he disapproved of the language in which the gay debate is being conducted ‘particularly by some African Archbishops who have spoken of homosexuals as a third sex threatening social unrest and have warned they will sever connections with the Church of England’ and the Anglican Communion.

Archbishop Sentamu continued: “Some of our disagreements are not Christian really . . . it seems to suggest that all of the great evils of the world are being perpetrated by gay and lesbian people, which I cannot believe to be the case. What is wrong in the world is that people are sinful and alienate themselves from God and you do not have to be gay to do that. To suggest that to be gay is to be evil, I find that quite unbelievable. Is somebody saying a gay and lesbian can’t live in Christ? . . . All of us are sinners, all of us have baggage. Why should my baggage as a heterosexual be more acceptable than the baggage of a gay person?” Here at last, is an African who is willing to both confront and respond to the biblical fundamentalism emanating from Nigeria.

Whether Africa will take any notice of course, is an entirely different question. To many of the people who raise the question of the future of the Anglican Communion with me in direct conversations in the University’s staff room and at a distance by students scattered around the world, the die already appears to be cast. Under the leadership of Peter Akinola many Anglicans will leave the Communion to establish a new ecclesial body.

It is often argued that we live today in a post-modern world where people adopt a consumerist ‘pick and mix’ approach to religion. People are joining and leaving churches for all kinds of reasons. But this has always been the case throughout the history of Anglicanism. One big exodus, at least in terms of leadership, spirituality and devotion occurred in the nineteenth century at the time of controversy over the Oxford Movement when John Henry Newman and many others reluctantly parted company with Anglicanism. Although his own brothers were also to make that journey Romewards, ‘Soapy Sam’ Wilberforce, son of the great social reformer, who would later become Bishop of Oxford, remained. He wrote in some anguish at the time:

“The glory of our beloved little church is departed. The heavens weeping over us, and the trees dropping round us, seem acted parables of our thoughts”.

But the Anglican Church’s ministry and mission were not compromised by these severe catholic losses or indeed, by the loss of the evangelical Methodists, and a vibrant church emerged from what David Newsome in his marvellous book called “The Parting of Friends”. And while there will be similar grief to see Anglican brothers and sisters of the Global South leave the Anglican Communion, for they have made a notable contribution to it, I confidently expect that Anglicanism with its unique vision, ethos and theology will survive and prosper.