No doubt many of you have already read about the Church of England’s recent decision to bless same-sex marriages. The orthodox leaders of the Global South Fellowship of Anglican Churches (GSFA) have responded with a declaration that is nothing less than an ecclesiastical shot heard round the world. These leaders are largely from Africa, although other regions are also represented. They have set forth a series of resolutions that effectively declare their independence from the heterodox Church of England.
Rather than explain it, I will let you read the powerful declaration in their own words:
As the Church of England has departed from the historic faith passed down from the Apostles by this innovation in the liturgies of the Church and her pastoral practice (contravening her own Canon A5), she has disqualified herself from leading the Communion as the historic “Mother” Church. Indeed, the Church of England has chosen to break communion with those provinces who remain faithful to the historic biblical faith expressed in the Anglican formularies (the 39 Articles, the Book of Common Prayer, the Ordinal and the Book of Homilies) and applied to the matter of marriage and sexuality in Lambeth Resolution 1.10 of the 1998 Lambeth Conference…
As much as the GSFA Primates also want to keep the unity of the visible Church and the fabric of the Anglican Communion, our calling to be ‘a holy remnant’ does not allow us be “in communion” with those provinces that have departed from the historic faith and taken the path of false teaching. This breaks our hearts and we pray for the revisionist provinces to return to ‘the faith once delivered’ (Jude 3) and to us…
The GSFA is no longer able to recognise the present Archbishop of Canterbury, the Rt Hon & Most Revd Justin Welby, as the “first among equals” Leader of the global Communion. He has sadly led his House of Bishops to make the recommendations that undergirded the General Synod Motion on ‘Living in Love & Faith,’ knowing that they run contrary to the faith & order of the orthodox provinces in the Communion whose people constitute the majority in the global flock. We pray that our withdrawal of support for him to lead the whole Communion is received by him as an admonishment in love…
Given this action by the Church of England’s General Synod, we believe it is no longer possible to continue in the way the Communion is. We do not accept the view that we can still “walk together” with the revisionist provinces as prescribed by the Anglican Communion Office and in the exploratory way proposed by IASCUFO (Inter-Anglican Standing Commission on Unity, Faith & Order) at the recent Anglican Consultative Council (ACC)-18 meeting…
To this end, GSFA will work humbly, boldly and charitably with other orthodox parts of the global Anglican Church. In our own Provinces, we will repent of the ways in which we ourselves fail to keep the covenant God has given us in Christ Jesus. We will ask God to purify and build up our churches so that we can authentically and passionately take the Gospel out to our respective nations and assigned fields…
To God be the glory as a new light mercifully dawns on His Church in the midst of the growing darkness. Isaiah 60:1-3.
I encourage you to read the whole letter. It is a masterpiece of courage, clarity, and conviction.
Conservative Anglican churches in Africa represent nearly half of the world’s estimated 100 million Anglicans (source). Who knew when Europeans brought Anglicanism to Africa that God would one day raise up those Africans to save the church from the heterodox Europeans?
Godspeed, brothers. We are praying for you.
7 He who is holy, who is true, who has the key of David, who opens and no one will shut, and who shuts and no one opens, says this: 8 ‘I know your deeds. Behold, I have put before you an open door which no one can shut, because you have a little power, and have kept My word, and have not denied My name. 9 ‘Behold, I will cause those of the synagogue of Satan, who say that they are Jews, and are not, but lie– behold, I will make them to come and bow down at your feet, and to know that I have loved you. 10 ‘Because you have kept the word of My perseverance, I also will keep you from the hour of testing, that hour which is about to come upon the whole world, to test those who dwell upon the earth. 11 ‘I am coming quickly; hold fast what you have, in order that no one take your crown. 12 ‘He who overcomes, I will make him a pillar in the temple of My God, and he will not go out from it anymore; and I will write upon him the name of My God, and the name of the city of My God, the new Jerusalem, which comes down out of heaven from My God, and My new name. 13 ‘He who has an ear, let him hear what the Spirit says to the churches.’
–Revelation 3:7-13
