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Archbishop Rowan: Yellowbelly or a Martyr in the Making?

Archbishop Rowan has been nicknamed ‘Archbishop Yellowbelly’, presumably because he was thought to be a liberal at the time of his enthronement on 27 February 2003, an opinion confirmed by his announcement on 20 May 2003 of Jeffrey John as the new Bishop of Reading. When a number of conservative Anglican leaders said they would leave the Anglican Communion if the consecration went ahead, Archbishop Rowan asked Dr. John to withdraw his acceptance of the post, which John duly did on 6 July 2003.

It seems worth going over this old ground to remind ourselves of the dates. Do the facts really indicate that he is ‘yellow’, in other words a coward? In my view they do not: I think the explanation may be more worrying.

Civil servants are advised to wait six months in a new post before taking any precipitate action. This is the path of caution which one would expect a new archbishop to follow, certainly if he were a coward. Doubtless the new archbishop made several minor decisions in his first three months in office, but none of these was ever likely to hit the headlines.When he decided to proceed with the appointment of Jeffrey John as a suffragan bishop, it is simply not credible that he was not fully aware in advance that this appointment was unlikely to be well-received by, for example, the African primates. Knowing this, he went ahead. We must presume this was because his personal conscience told him this was the right thing to do, a desirable and indeed necessary next step for the Church of England. One can almost hear him humming:

Father, hear the prayer we offer:
Nor for ease that prayer shall be,
But for strength, that we may ever
Live our lives courageously.
Not forever in green pastures
Do we ask our way to be,
But the steep and rugged pathway
May we tread rejoicingly.
Not forever by still waters
Would we idly rest and stay;
But would smite the living fountains
From the rocks along our way.

In the weeks between May and July, one imagines telephone calls, emails and visitations warning the ABC that this one precipitate action, taken on the basis of his own personal views, would destroy the Anglican Communion, which was not his personal fiefdom: having accepted the leadership of ‘the whole world’, he had a duty to follow the conservative majority in order to maintain unity.

At that point, no doubt after much soul-searching, Archbishop Rowan seems to have decided that God had not appointed him ABC in order to preside over the disintegration of the Anglican Communion, whose unity should be the over-riding factor. It is then that I think he switched on the auto-pilot.

I fear that he has decided that he must hold to the allotted course, come what may, even if it results in his own personal martyrdom.

There is an undeniable nobility in this: the only problem is that many others will be joined to his martyrdom in what is beginning to bear all the hallmarks of a Greek tragedy.

3 comments on this post:

Leonardo Ricardo said...
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Martyrs come in many forms–I think lifetimes of being treated as secondclass Christians/Anglicans gives good cause for millions of LGBTI Christians Anglicans and our families and friends to feel ¨miffed¨ and grossly/unfairly ¨marginalized¨…odd to me is that Rowan Williams, Archbishop of Canterbury rarely even ¨notes¨ the grave injustice and violant daily acts of fear/hate directed, often at Church and sometimes by the ABC, against abused LGBTI Anglicans in Africa, blood drenched Jamaica/West Indies (home of Anglican Covenants very own ¨push for punitive¨ +Drexel Gomez) and even the U.K.–Does Dr. Williams have ¨selective thinking¨ in order accommodate those with dangerous (to me and others) selective Scriptural thinking/beliving than results in far greater harm than standing up for a CROWN APPROVED Bishop Suffragan and basic decency and good-judgement?

28 April 2011 13:42
Lay Anglicana said...
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Thank-you for this heartfelt comment,Leonardo. I am no psychologist, and cannot really see into ++Rowan's head. Would that I could! For what it's worth, I think he does note the pain, and probably does feel it also, but thinks that in becoming Archbishop of Canterbury he has assumed a role of keeping the Anglican Communion together at all costs. To me it seems obvious that the looser the official cords that bind us, the stronger will our spiritual unity be, but what do I know? I am just a member of the laity, recognised in the TEC as one of the orders of ministry but not so recognised in the Church of England.

28 April 2011 17:46
Leonardo Ricardo said...
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I think I´m going to have a ¨be nice to Rowan Williams Day¨ tomorrow as I watch the magical love celebration on T.V. at Westminster Abbey (we have to get up at 2:00 A.M. to be with you in spirit)– already the candles are lit in my garden as you, dear cousins, are getting your beauty rest. Best wishes to all, tomorrow. as tomorrow is no doubt going to be a beautiful day for all Anglicans (no matter where/when our sun rises and sets).

Un abrazo fuerte,

Leonardo
Central America

29 April 2011 00:57

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