Naked We Stand…

Fondly packing their cherished purples and fine linens, 440 bishops of the Anglican Communion descended on London a few months back in the hope of forestalling a ten-year-old prophecy. They came from many countries, the largest contingent being from the United States. Their destination was Lambeth XI, the three-week conference called by the Archbishop of Canterbury every ten years.

The prophecy (made during Lambeth X in 1968) was that the 1978 conference might be the final one because by then we should see “the windup of the Anglican Communion.” This came from Bishop Ralph Dean of Canada, executive officer and secretary of the Conference; but all he was doing was adding a timetable to the much-quoted claim of his predecessor, Bishop Stephen Bayne, executive officer of Lambeth IX, that “it is the vocation of the Episcopal Church to disappear.” Slowly emerging details of what happened behind the resolutely closed doors of Lambeth XI make it clear that delegates were facing the fact that their church might indeed be disappearing, though not for the reasons anticipated.

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H. N. Kelley

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Fondly packing their cherished purples and fine linens, 440 bishops of the Anglican Communion descended on London a few months back in the hope of forestalling a ten-year-old prophecy. They came from many countries, the largest contingent being from the United States. Their destination was Lambeth XI, the three-week conference called by the Archbishop of Canterbury every ten years.

The prophecy (made during Lambeth X in 1968) was that the 1978 conference might be the final one because by then we should see “the windup of the Anglican Communion.” This came from Bishop Ralph Dean of Canada, executive officer and secretary of the Conference; but all he was doing was adding a timetable to the much-quoted claim of his predecessor, Bishop Stephen Bayne, executive officer of Lambeth IX, that “it is the vocation of the Episcopal Church to disappear.” Slowly emerging details of what happened behind the resolutely closed doors of Lambeth XI make it clear that delegates were facing the fact that their church might indeed be disappearing, though not for the reasons anticipated.