Link: http://www.washingtontimes.com/news/2009/jun/17/new-anglican-church-poses-dilemma/

In my mind this poses no dilemma except with those who have turned their back on the Gospel that Christ embodied and was shared by the apostles and disciples that through faith believed in Him. We are of one body under Christ Jesus and whether their are two associates that call themselves Anglican or just one, we are all the simply members of the body, each with our own functions and vocations. The dilemma, however, that this poses to the heretical Episcopal Church is that it takes money from their offering plates and places it in the plates of those who are more faithful to the Word of God and the mission of Lord Jesus.

There is no precedent in the communion for a country to have more than one recognized province, and Episcopalians who back the move have maintained that the U.S. and Canadian churches no longer preach and believe historic Anglicanism.

The formalities cap a six-year progression out of the 2-million-member Episcopal Church by Episcopalians over the U.S. church’s increasing doctrinal liberalism, which has prompted many to leave to other denominations, though others have hung on in the hope a conservative alternative would arise.

ACNA spokesman Peter Frank said the gathering will be inspirational instead of legislative. “This is really about mobilizing people to do mission at the local parish level,” he said.

Speakers will include such non-Episcopalians as Rick Warren, the pastor of California’s Saddleback evangelical megachurch, and Metropolitan Jonah, head of the Orthodox Church in America. Also attending will be the Rev. Todd Hunter, a church planter for the Anglican Mission in the Americas (AMIA), one of the 28 groups represented at ACNA.

Episcopal Church spokeswoman Neva Rae Fox said the denomination was “aware” of the gathering and officials were concerned that one of its active bishops, Peter Beckwith of the Springfield, Ill., diocese, may be participating.

A message left at Bishop Beckwith’s office was not returned Tuesday.

More than 70 of the Episcopal Church’s 110 dioceses are in serious financial straits, and its membership is dropping precipitously, with an average Sunday attendance of 727,822.

If the Episcopal Church could only quiet itself and listen to the still small voice that is calling it to repentance, perhaps some of the membership would return to the Church that they once loved. Physically the members of the new providence walked away but spiritually it was TEC who turned its back on the faithful after attempting to woo them into apostasy and heresy. Once the new Anglican Church is fully established it will be too late and the falling of the Episcopal Church will be mostly a silent affair as the truly faithful will have departed for the green grass of true faith and the crashing of the faithless will be just another sound added to the cluster of secular noise that is already deafening.

Link: http://www.christiantoday.com/article/i.have.not.divided.the.church.says.bishop/23082.htm

The Right Reverend Robert Duncan Speaks out on yesterdays announcement from GAFCON that it would recognize the Anglican Church in North America as a new providence of the Anglican Communion. Bishop Duncan makes many good points including the excerpt below.

“I’m a cradle Anglican. My grandfather was a boy chorister … My theological views haven’t changed. The problem is that folks who have become the leadership of the Episcopal Church in the United States have pulled the rug out from under me. The person who is our Presiding Bishop, she didn’t begin as an Anglican. I did. She represents something very different. I don’t think I’m a breakaway.

“I don’t believe I have divided the Church. I believe the innovators are the ones who are dividing the Church. I love them, and I want to behave in a godly way towards them, and I will do everything I can to convince them about the truth that’s been delivered; but my focus now has to be on those who don’t know Jesus.”

Link: http://news.bbc.co.uk/1/hi/uk/8002734.stm

This in and of itself probably does not mean that much, but in the grander scheme of things it is one more rung in the ladder to recognition by the Anglican Communion as a whole for the Anglican Church of North America.

A breakaway faction of the Anglican church in the US and Canada has been recognised by primates from a new coalition of traditionalist clergy.

The Global Anglican Future Conference (Gafcon) council gave the Anglican Church in North America (Anca) its backing at a meeting in London.

Traditionalists set up the new church last year in protest at the American Church’s liberal view on homosexuality.

Lambeth Palace and the Anglican Communion declined to comment.

Link: http://seattletimes.nwsource.com/html/localnews/2008976514_anglican03m.html?syndication=rss

The Anglican Church in North America grows a bit more with the creation of a new diocese in the Northwest. It is good to see those whose faith in the Lord Christ and in his Holy Gospel as it was given to us by Christ Jesus are uniting for the strengthening of the Body

The Cascadia Diocese, as it’s being called, is the latest local example of the deep divisions splitting the Episcopal Church and the Anglican Communion over issues such as Scriptural authority and church teachings. The differences erupted in 2003 when the Episcopal Church confirmed the election of an openly gay bishop in New Hampshire.

The Episcopal Church is the U.S. branch — or province — of the 77-million-strong worldwide Anglican Communion.

The Western Washington congregations are seeking to become part of the Anglican Church in North America — itself a newly formed conservative rival to the more liberal Episcopal Church and Anglican Church of Canada.

The rival province was formed last December by groups that included four U.S. dioceses and a number of parishes that had broken away from the Episcopal Church. This new province intends to seek the approval of leaders in the worldwide Anglican Communion.

The formation of the new province made it “clear to everybody it was time to coalesce into regional structures,” said the Rev. Duncan Clark, rector of St. Charles Anglican Church in Poulsbo.

As I read a quote in the article from Bishop Gregory Rickle I reflected on the sadness involved with watching those who are being driven away from the church they called home because TEC is bound and determined to take the church down a path of apostacy that God fearing believers can not follow.

Olympia Bishop Gregory Rickel said while he was happy people in those congregations are finding a diocese to call home, “it distresses me. I wish we would not have to go this route.”