GAFCON General Secretary, Peter Jensen, later told VOL that what happened in Canterbury was “a complete failure but worth doing. We had 700 of our people praying, and we thought that the result was not bad. We got the mildest rebuke to the worst offenders by the biggest number. It is what God wanted. There is no excuse for the subsequent behavior of The Episcopal Church.”

The former Sydney archbishop said Justin Welby had two great powers. “The first is to teach the Word of God clearly, unambiguously, and that power requires him to call sin, sin. The second power is the power of fellowship. He can extend the right hand of fellowship to those who stand in the orthodox positon and withdraw his fellowship with those who bless sinful activity. He can do this, especially, by not inviting those in the second category to meetings such as Lambeth, given his declaration that homosexual activity is a sin.”

Jensen went on to say that the ACC-16 Lusaka gathering was irrelevant to the GAFCON bishops. “The meeting in Lusaka, only highlighted again the inability of the current instruments to uphold godly order within the Communion. Delegates from the Episcopal Church, by their own admission, voted on matters that pertained to polity and doctrine, in defiance of the Primates. This action has damaged the standing of the Anglican Consultative Council as an instrument of unity, increased levels of distrust, and further torn the fabric of the Communion. I think that is pretty definitive.”

The Anglican Church of Canada managed to escape the sanctions at that time because Archbishop Fred Hiltz pointed out that the ACoC had not yet approved a change to the marriage canon. That changed in the July synod, when the motion to amend the marriage canon passed; even though another vote has to be taken in 2019, some bishops are proceeding with same-sex marriages – they planned to do so even if the vote failed. Does this mean the same sanctions will be applied to the ACoC at the next Primates' meeting, asks David of Samizdat?

“Does it really make any difference one way or the other? Since the sanctions were completely ignored by TEC and by anyone who had any authority to impose them, including Justin Welby, the answer is “no”, the sanctions were an empty gesture designed to do nothing more than maintain a mirage of unity and reconciliation.

“Conservative Primates who pressed for sanctions in January were bamboozled yet again; there was no good disagreement only good deceit – well executed liberal deceit, that is. It is time for the Primates to wash their hands of Canterbury’s conniving and formalize the division that has been eating away at the Anglican Communion for decades.”

This new attempt by The Archbishop of Canterbury to heal the divisions over sexuality by calling another meeting of the worldwide Archbishops of the Anglican Communion will fail. The “consequences” imposed on The Episcopal Church were unenforceable. The Church leaders clearly can no longer walk together. The jig is up.

END