Time to get really annoyed with the Gafcon soapbox
One of the latest stories out of the anti-gay jamboree that calls itself orthodox Anglicanism is the call of one Nigerian bishop for Rowan Williams to resign. Emmanuel Chukwuma was the idiot who tried to exorcise Richard Kirker’s demon of homosexuality at the 1998 Lambeth Conference.
Chukwuma did additional study at St John’s College Nottingham in the 1980s before being consecrated a bishop. My abiding memory of him was his changing sides during the 1986 FA Cup Final so that he could be sure of supporting the winning side.
My sources tell me that he occasioned very serious discussion in the staff room over whether they could allow him to finish his course with anything remotely approaching a pass grade. He got it, I would judge, for political reasons only, since he would have made two short planks look like Einstein. (I wonder if Lambeth 1998 made any of them regret it?) Indeed it would be hard to say whether his ignorance or his arrogance were his dominant characteristic. (See this page for the way he styles himself “Lord Bishop Venerable Dr. Emmanuel Chukwuma”)
This is the man whose call for Rowan Williams’ resignation is being propagated round the world by the BBC.
What we are seeing here is some massive posturing, however informed by principle it might seem to be, including posturing from some like Chukwuma who are underwhelmingly qualified to understand what the theological questions raised in Western interpretation actually are.
I don’t doubt that here are some serious issues to be asked about scriptural interpretation, and genuine questions to be asked about the ready identification by opposite camps of their own cultural preferences with Christian values. Nor do I doubt that there are some at GAFCON ready and able to explore them. However, I don’t seen an interest in exploring them. I see, instead, a power struggle disguised by apparently orthodox rhetoric.
We have seen, and are seeing, just how much a mix of an anti-colonial mindset, combined with a fervent anti-gay and above all anti-Western rhetoric, has been used to justify the evil that is Mugabe’s Zanu PF dictatorship. It seems to me that not only is it dangerous to allow the same rhetoric to dominate in the church, but that GAFCON’s ready adoption of it is going hand in hand with ignoring some rather more seriously life-or-death sins going on under many of their noses.
June 24th, 2008 at 11:29 pm
Masterful, Doug, simply masterful. TVM.
June 25th, 2008 at 12:06 am
Thanks Doug. Not only is this interesting, you gave me a wonderful laugh to start my day. The concept of someone “making two short planks look like Einstein” is just so wonderful. I hope I can use it in my own conversation, if not my writing?
June 25th, 2008 at 12:15 pm
What else can we expect from Africa! If they are so ‘right’ about everything, how come they have a continent in so much trouble? Thank God for Europe!
June 26th, 2008 at 11:30 am
[...] has perhaps had a bit of a break since then, but this week at GAFCON, as the BBC reports (and Doug Chaplin mocks, I hope the Nigerian church’s libel lawyers are merciful to him), Nigerian bishop Emmanuel [...]
June 26th, 2008 at 5:15 pm
Your ad hominem is probably justified but that doesn’t mean that practicing homosexuals are living a life pleasing to the Lord.
June 27th, 2008 at 2:27 am
David - practicing x is not worse than thinking x according to the Sermon on the mount.
Who is living a life pleasing to the LORD? He who has not slandered his neighbor (psalm 15) …
Any life that is in Christ who is the Beloved Son in whom the LORD is well pleased - any such life - is his and is pleasing to him. Why must you judge to condemn according to your view of Law - maybe there is more to the teaching of the LORD than even you with your brilliant wit actually see.
Let us not do this. Homosexuality is often abusive and camp and outside our sensibility - but so also is a lot of heterosexual practice.
June 27th, 2008 at 5:59 am
I have pondered adultery. But if I make it my practice I trample upon the gift of grace.
June 27th, 2008 at 12:18 pm
Doug - we need a sermon on the Sermon. Thank you David - Let us continue in tenderness. Whether with the same or other gender. But there is something missing from our considerations - on all sides.
June 27th, 2008 at 8:42 pm
Thanks. I have much to learn.
July 24th, 2008 at 2:38 pm
Chi, If you’re wondering why your comments have been deleted, I’m not convinced you are a serious commenter. See here.