August 15, 2008 by Stephen Day.

The following is an official statement from Msalato Theological College regarding my recent blog posting:

The administration of Msalato Theological College sincerely regrets the inaccurate information in the blog entry entitled, A Missionary’s Perspective on Lambeth, published on August 8, 2008.  The college would like to reiterate the Notice published at the beginning of the blog which states that the entry was solely the views and thoughts of the author, Stephen Day, and that it does not represent the official position of The Episcopal Church, its Mission Personnel Office, the Young Adult Service Corp, the Anglican Church of Tanzania, or of this college. 

Lambeth this year was expected to be filled with tension and division.  We were quite surprised by Stephen’s analysis of the proceedings.  For some reason he dwelt on the divisions of the church and brought them here to central Tanzania.  We find that most unfortunate as by all accounts the spirit of Lambeth this year was one of reconciliation and unity brought about by prayer and spiritual reflection.  This same spirit of cooperation and unity is present between the administration of St. John’s University and Msalato Theological College.  God’s purpose and mission for the church is moving forward.  We are sorry that for some reason Stephen centered on negative aspects and apologize for any pain or insult caused at St. John’s University with whom the administration of this college has been working hand in hand for the last several months.

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August 15, 2008 by Stephen Day.

This is a revised version of a blog posting that I made on Friday, August 8, 2008.  I revised the original posting for numerous reasons, but the most important one was that it was being viewed as an attack on the Tanzanian church and its members.  That was not my intention.  I have also been informed of numerous factual errors that I made.  I have included a paragraph at the end of this commentary that explains my factual errors.  Also please remember the following notice:

Notice: The following is a personal commentary on the Anglican Communion and should not be viewed as the official position of the Episcopal Church USA (or TEC), the Mission Personnel Office, the Young Adult Service Corps program, the Anglican Church of Tanzania, the Diocese of Central Tanganyika, Msalato Theological College, the Episcopal Diocese of West Virginia, or anyone or anything else. Please remember that these are the views and thoughts of one individual and no one else.

        Many Anglicans should be aware that every ten years “all” of the bishops and archbishops within the Anglican Communion are invited to Lambeth Palace, the home of the Archbishop of Canterbury, to meet, discuss, and make decisions about the future of the Church. Last Sunday the most recent Lambeth Conference ended. This was a very important conference for which there had been high hopes. As many of you likely know, this Church has reached a crossroads and decisions must be made. However, at this Lambeth Conference the only thing decided was to not to decide anything. It was all about talking and not deciding anything.

        Those of you that know me well, have a pretty good idea what I think about the decisions made by the Episcopal Church, which, in some ways, precipitated the current crises. In short, they were the right decisions, but done in the wrong way, the wrong order. However, that is secondary to the real problems. For this Lambeth Conference the Archbishop of Canterbury decided not to invite an American bishop who had been a part of the original controversy. In doing so, he angered many progressives. At the same time, the Archbishop of Canterbury refused to invite bishops who had been consecrated outside of the typical methods and outside of the geographic boundaries of the church that consecrated them. This angered conservatives who had used these consecrations to try to deepen the divide within the Episcopal Church in the USA and supplant that “heretical” institution. As a result of this action twenty percent of the world’s Anglican bishops and archbishops refused to accept the Archbishop of Canterbury’s invitation. So the eighty percent of the Church’s leadership who did go to Lambeth were moderates, progressives, and a few conservatives. Despite this fact, that a significant part of the Church’s leaders abandoned this very important “instrument of unity,” the leaders of the Church who did participate were unwilling to take advantage of the opportunity to make decisions that would allow the Anglican Communion to move forward.

        Communicating and being involved in a dialogue with other bishops and archbishops is important. I believe in that; however, the Church has been in this dialogue since 2003 and nothing has really changed. Very few people have changed their minds and the Church has lost its focus and its vision. As a missionary serving in Africa, the part of the world that has (in very general terms) had the largest problem with the actions of the Episcopal Church USA, I have been keenly aware of the condition of the Church and its perilous position at the edge of a precipice.

       As many of you know I am serving as a missionary in the Diocese of Central Tanganyika (DCT), which is a very large diocese in the Anglican Church of Tanzania (ACT). There are those in America and other parts of the world who would seek to create or enlarge divisions within the church in Africa.  These outsiders wish to promulgate an agenda by supporting certain projects and leaders whose ideology is closer to their own.  They have this right.  However, doing so in the name of Christ is wrong.  Trying to increase natural divisions in churches is wrong.   Also, trying to use other people to further your own goals is wrong.  History is replete with such mistaken approaches to bringing about change.

        Historians would call this a proxy war. One in which two larger powers use local leaders to wage a war against each other without risking any of their own people. Proxy wars were very common during the Cold War and were fought throughout the developing war. This is a sad and tragic development. A perversion of the Church and a bastardization of mission theology. The Church should not look to the Soviet invasion of Afghanistan, the conflict between the Contras and Sandinistas, or the Bay of Pigs invasion to find tactics or ethical support.

        An example of the strife within the Anglican Communion and its impact “on the ground” comes from a fellow missionary serving within DCT. She was recently involved in a campaign to setup a water well in a village an hour or so from here. This village had one well that was designed for 600 people, but the village has grown into a town with 8,000 people, so there was a clear need for more water. Dodoma is located in a very dry and arid part of Tanzania. This missionary was able to raise a lot of money from individuals in the United States, Great Britain and other parts of the world. None of these people had a covert agenda and their only goal was improving the lives of others. Once the wells were drilled and the water was found, the missionary worked to try to get the churches in this village/town to organize and manage the well (this just meant devising how to distribute the water and collect modest fees for maintenance). However, the non-Anglican churches refused to work with the DCT churches because of the loose connection and affiliation that DCT has with ECUSA. The well is being maintained and managed well by the DCT churches, but an opportunity for inter-denominational cooperation and sharing responsibility and authority was missed because of the festering crises within the Anglican Communion.

        I have strong feelings about the initial issue that started the series of events that led to the current crisis in the Anglican Church, but they have nothing to do with the need to bring some conclusion to this crisis. While serving as a missionary in Tanzania I have seen many examples of the impact that these crises have had on the Church in the developing world. The Church is essential in these communities. It is often the only source of education and leadership that is open and free to all people. The Church provides health-care, job training, education, pastoral support, food and so many other services here. At the same time the Church is being tied down and prevented from being involved in important and essential ministries because of the problems in the international Church. Talking is good, but there is a need for conclusion so that all members of the Church can move forward. It would be ideal if we could move forward together, but if not, then we must move forward separately.

        I pray that the Church will move forward soon. We must if we wish to be relevant and true servants of Christ.

Corrections:

1.    In my original post I discussed the relationship between Msalato Theological College (where I am serving) and the nearby St. John’s University and made numerous errors.  St. John’s and MTC have a good relationship and MTC is going through the appropriate steps to become a campus college and formally affiliated with the university.  This will be a beneficial arrangement to both institutions, their staffs and students.  Also, the principal of MTC sits on two governing boards at St. John’s along with the leaders of two other academic institutions.  Finally, the St. John’s does not have a program to train pastors/priests, which is the main function of MTC; therefore, there is no overlap and no program to replace MTC.

2.    When discussing the origin and funding for St. John’s University I also made significant errors.  First, the university was not founded by Americans.  It was the idea and vision of the retired Archbishop of the Anglican Church of Tanzania and was supported by the bishops of that church.  More than 75% of the funding for the university comes from within Tanzania.  Also, the university was founded an established several years before the recent struggles within the Anglican Communion.  Also, St. John’s did not “steal” students away from MTC.

3.    Finally, I was wrong in my discussion about the nature of the DCT during the 1960s during which time MTC was established.  At that time DCT encompassed almost all of mainland Tanzania and therefore it was much closer in its form to what is now called ACT.  This is important to understanding the relationship between ACT and DCT schools and property.

In conclusion, I want to make it clear who I am critiquing and chastising – my fellow Americans.  I have nothing but respect and love for the members and leaders of the Tanzanian church.  They have such a passion for Christ and are eager to share it with others through word and deed.  They lift each other up and serve each other.  I am writing this because these are the things that I wish I saw in the American church.  I have seen it at times and in places, but far too often the American church is fixated on what divides us and not what unites us – the love of God.  We need to return to that if we are to be true servants of Christ.  If we cannot move forward together then we must recognize that we must go forward separately.  Just talking accomplishes nothing if neither side is open to change.

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August 11, 2008 by Stephen Day.

Somehow my last post about my thoughts on Lambeth have garnered some surprising interest. The operator of Virtue.net posted my entry on that site, which is dedicated to “orthodox Anglicanism,” which basically rejects many of the actions of the Episcopal Church the recent decades. The interesting thing is that I disagree with them on numerous levels, but they still posted my entry (without asking me). Also, there have been some interesting and rather nasty comments about my blog entry on the Virtue site. Check it out at:

Click here: VirtueOnline - News - As Eye See It - A Missionary’s Perspective on Lambeth - Stephen Day

Quo Vadis » Proxy Wars and A Missionary’s Perspective on Lambeth

Special thanks to Andrea Wall of the Poverty Eradication Network Trust (www.pentrust.org) for spotting these uses of my text.  Also, please note that there are some misinterpretations and errors made by the commentators.  

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August 8, 2008 by Stephen Day.

This entry has been redacted.  An updated version will be posted shortly.

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