The Archbishop of Canterbury has defended the selection of the Primate of the West Indies, the Most Rev. Drexel Gomez, as chair of the Anglican Covenant drafting committee.
Writing to Episcopal Majority, a church advocacy group, Archbishop Rowan Williams explained that a covenant among the churches of the Anglican Communion was necessary because the “existing historic links and bonds are not proving effective as expressions of mutual accountability.”
On Nov. 9, Episcopal Majority wrote to Archbishop Williams, urging him to remove Archbishop Gomez as chairman of the covenant drafting team because of his public statements on The Episcopal Church. The letter said by signing the Kigali Communique, Archbishop Gomez had shown himself to be a partisan of the Anglican Communion Network, a group they claimed was “dedicated to isolating or even overthrowing the American Episcopal Church.”
Episcopal Majority recently published its own letter as well as a Nov. 20 response in which Archbishop Williams defended his choice of Archbishop Gomez, noting the covenant drafting team would “include people who hold differing perspectives on the question, whatever the views of the chair. Since nearly every primate in the Communion has some sort of ‘record’ on the divisive questions of the day, I simply note that it is practically impossible to find a chair unequivocally acceptable to all.”
In a brief response to a second letter from Episcopal Majority, which asked the Archbishop of Canterbury to condemn calls for alternate episcopal oversight on the grounds they were “illegal,” “secessionist” and would “legitimate the break-up of the [Episcopal] Church,” Archbishop Williams affirmed he had no jurisdiction in the United States. He noted that he had “not sought” nor was “seeking to impose any new structure” on Episcopalians.
(The Rev.) George Conger
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