Some of my readers may wonder why I have shown such little interest in the Lambeth Conference now coming into its final days, not to rise again for another ten years. After all, even Stephen Colbert did a lengthy piece on it. There are plenty of other sites that are dedicated to, one might even say obsessed with, Lambeth, and I have offered my thoughts on several of them. I taught a workshop on Lambeth at the small rural church I serve in retirement, and offered my materials to any other priest in our diocese who might want to use them. I get daily updates on Lambeth goings on from multiple sources of varying reliability. The one thing they all have trouble with is remembering and having faith that this is not our church but God’s church of which we are the temporal custodians.
Lambeth Sidebar
I love our Anglican ways, especially as they are expressed in the Episcopal Church, and I hope that the greater Anglican Communion can grow in godly wisdom and strength. I favor a covenant of some kind to give more structure and identity to the communion, but not in a form that is built around punitive discipline. I regret the controversies over homosexuality and personally favor full inclusion in ways that bring all into making commitment to the fullness of the Christian moral life, and that would mean finding a way to provide blessings for same sex unions, but only through a solid biblically based theological argument.
My prescription for dealing with fulminating extremists frothing at the mouth is probably not very acceptable to the majority. I would require them to join together in missionary outreach for three to five years in a certain place. The Falkland Islands come to mind, perhaps somewhere in the outer Aleutians, or, if they are too cold and wet, how about Midway?
In the meantime, I want to get on with proclaiming the gospel, celebrating the sacraments, teaching and forming disciples, helping others discover their gifts for ministry, and being the pastor I am called to be, even as a retired priest and aspiring curmudgeon.