THE Anglican Primate of Australia, Phillip Aspinall, has called on rebel Anglicans, including the Sydney Archbishop, Peter Jensen, to reconsider their boycott of Lambeth, the decennial conference of national church leaders, saying reform must come from within. Responding to the conservatives' threat to create a breakaway faction within the global church, Dr Aspinall said there was room for diversity within the church's boundaries.
His guarded comments came as the Archbishop of Canterbury, Rowan Williams, challenged the autonomy and legitimacy of the breakaway faction, the Fellowship of Confessing Anglicans, announced by conservatives angered by liberal thinking over homosexual clergy and same-sex blessings.
But Dr Williams said a primates council comprised of a self-selected group would not "pass the test of legitimacy for all in the Communion". And any claim to be free to operate across provincial boundaries was fraught with difficulties, theological and practical.
"It is not enough to dismiss the existing structures of the Communion. If they are not working effectively, the challenge is to renew them rather than to improvise solutions that may seem to be effective for some in the short term but will continue to create more problems than they solve."
Dr Jensen, who alongside the Archbishop of Uganda, Henry Luke Orombi, was due to defend the conservative position to an audience of more than 750 clergy and churchwardens in London yesterday, said the Communion could not afford to ignore the political weight of the new primates council.
"No good can come from questioning the legitimacy of these men or their clear commitment to the church's mission," he said.
Dr Aspinall said the implications of the Jerusalem declaration issued at the conclusion of the Global Anglican Future Conference (GAFCON) this week were "not entirely clear and it may take some time before we know the likely impact of what is proposed".
"If participants at GAFCON … regard themselves as Anglicans, which I understand they do, then it seems to me they should be at Lambeth. It's there that the whole Anglican family will gather.
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