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Posted by Kindgo (Member # 2) on :

web page

Denounce gays or quit, church body tells Williams
By Jonathan Petre, Religion Correspondent
(Filed: 26/09/2002)

Prominent evangelicals in the Church of England raised the stakes over homosexuality yesterday by challenging the new Archbishop of Canterbury to renounce his liberal views or resign.

Reform, the conservative evangelical network whose 1,500 members include more than 500 clergy and a bishop, said that it could not welcome the appointment of Dr Rowan Williams to Canterbury because of his "non-biblical" views.

Dr Rowan Williams
In an unprecedented move, the group said that unless Dr Williams was prepared publicly to affirm the Church's traditional teaching that all sex outside heterosexual marriage was sinful he should withdraw from the post "for the sake of the Church's gospel witness and unity".

Although archbishops have in the past faced calls for their resignation, none is believed to have been asked to step down before he has formally been confirmed in the job. The present archbishop, Dr George Carey, does not retire until the end of next month and Dr Williams does not officially take over until the new year.

In a foretaste of a potentially bitter battle to come, Reform's ruling council, whose members include the suffragan Bishop of Lewes, the Rt Rev Wallace Benn, said in a statement that many of its members had been "shocked" by the appointment.

The group said it had carefully studied the writings and statements of Dr Williams, who has admitted ordaining a practising homosexual. "Even shortly before the appointment, he publicly said he is 'not convinced that a homosexual has to be celibate in every imaginable circumstance'," it said.

The statement urged Dr Williams to endorse the 1998 Lambeth Conference resolution that described homosexual practice as incompatible with scripture.

It asked him to affirm and defend the teaching that church members "abstain from sexual relations outside holy (heterosexual) matrimony", to support "appropriate discipline" where necessary and to ordain only those who uphold and live by this teaching.

The statement continued: "Regretfully we ask Rowan Williams if he is unwilling or unable, personally and publicly, to make these affirmations, to withdraw his acceptance of the nomination to be the next Archbishop of Canterbury."

The statement was denounced as "risible" by the Rev Richard Kirker, the general secretary of the Lesbian and Gay Christian Movement.

"The presumptuous self-righteous tone of Reform simply beggars belief and will, I suspect, make them even more isolated than they already are in the Anglican Church," he said.

Friends close to Dr Williams said he was "deeply saddened" that Reform had taken up this position, adding that he could not accept that the issue of sexuality had the prominence or centrality that Reform gave it.

"Rowan neither looked for nor welcomed his appointment and he only accepted it because so many, including evangelicals, expressed their feelings that it was God's will," said one.

Posted by Lost (Member # 343) on :

we need to be praying for the reform party that God increases their numbers. and we need to pray that rowan williams steps down from this position.
one thing i'm continuing to learn is... never understimate the power of prayer

lost

Posted by Laura (Member # 450) on :

We need more of these "Reform" parties. May God bless them and help them in their fight to maintain a moral and righteous people in the sight of God.

Prayer is the only way.