Ugandan Anglicans in ultimatum to US church over gay marriages

[kwassa]

Here comes the schism! I can hardly wait for them to leave.

http://www.guardian.co.uk/world/2008/feb/19/religion.usa

Ugandan Anglicans in ultimatum to US church over gay marriages
by Riazat Butt, religious affairs correspondent

The Anglican church in Uganda yesterday threatened to leave the worldwide communion unless the US Episcopal church condemned homosexuality.

The ultimatum came from the Rev Aaron Mwesigye, provincial secretary and spokesman for the Ugandan church, who warned that the attitude of some American clergy could trigger the disintegration of the world's third biggest Christian denomination.

He said: "If they don't change and continue to support homosexual practices and same-sex marriage, our relationship with them will be completely broken. Anglicanism is just an identity and if they abuse it, we shall secede. Yes, we shall remain Christians, but not in the same communion."

African provinces have been at loggerheads with American Anglicans following the 2003 ordination of a gay man, Gene Robinson, as bishop of New Hampshire. The tension increased in 2006 with the appointment of Katharine Jefferts Schori, a liberal, as presiding bishop of the Episcopal church.

[saltpoint]

1. I'd be happy to drive Rev. Mwesigye to the bus station.

[xchrom]

2. ok -- you drive -- i'll pack his bags.

i'd have driven -- but you called it first.

this infuriates me -- because of all the money my little episcopal church sends to uganda among other things.

that includes ''gay dollars''. :grr:

[pingzing58]

3. For Africans it's all about power, prestiege and money. Who is funding this war? Mwesigye is

making how much? Money talks and when money talks politicians and bishops listen.

[madrchsod]

4. wow... there are no gay christians in africa?

george is over there today maybe can mediate this rift....

[kwassa]

5. The Bishop of Nigeria believes there are no gays in Nigeria at all

Akinola, the ringleader of this movement.

[kwassa]

6. Update: Uganda changes it's tune.

realizing all the money they stand to lose, probably.


http://www.kendallharmon.net/t19 /


A CORRECTION on the Church of Uganda position regarding the Anglican Communion and the Lambeth Conference

“The Church of Uganda is not seceding from the Anglican Communion,” said Rev. Canon Aaron Mwesigye, church spokesperson. “Some press stories have misrepresented our position.”

no, we were just quoting you

“The plain fact is that we are simply not attending the Lambeth Conference in July 2008, but we are still very much a part of the Anglican Communion.”

The Church of Uganda broke communion with the Episcopal Church in the United States of America in 2003 after they elected and consecrated as Bishop Gene Robinson, a divorced man living in a same-sex relationship. But, the Church of Uganda has remained a consistently active member of the Anglican Communion.

“It is the Americans who have seceded from the Anglican Communion because of their decisions and their teaching,” Mwesigye said. “They have departed dramatically from the historic faith, teaching, and practice of the Bible and the Anglican Church.”

[Lydia Leftcoast]

7. According to one of our former priests, who hosted a Ugandan bishop

(I don't know which one; I wasn't in Minneapolis yet)for General Convention in 2003, this Ugandan swore up and down that there were no gay people in Africa before the Europeans came.