Canterbury Tails

The Final Tail

Well, folks, this wraps it up for me from Canterbury.

It's been a real pleasure talking at you for the past two weeks, and I am most grateful to the Compass Rose Society and our President Bishop Phillip Poole for giving me the privilege to attend the 2008 Lambeth Conference. And many thanks also to those at the Anglican Communion Office who helped with the booth design and the meeting logistics.

Some positive news to end with from this morning's Times:

Bishops back Rowan...

...and so it seems does the Times in its editorial

So some, but of course not all, will say "progress" here. There's much more to do as we go forward.

Let us pray:

Almighty God, you sent your Son Jesus Christ to reconcile

the world to yourself: We praise and bless you for those

whom you have sent in the power of the Spirit to preach the

Gospel to all nations. We thank you that in all parts of the

earth a community of love has been gathered together by

their prayers and labors, and that in every place your servants

call upon your Name; for the kingdom and the power and

the glory are yours for ever. Amen

Blessings,

Norris Battin
Compass Rose Society Communications Committee
 

Friends Arrive

This morning we welcome to the stand the Rev. Sarah Buxton-Smith, a CRS member and rector of St. Andrew's Church in Buffalo, NY. Sarah is at Lambeth to share  with the bishops and their spouses a pastoral reflection on interfaith marriage.Her presentation is tomorrow so she will cheer on CRS today.

It's great to have company in the booth once again, as Bob Biehl left for home last Friday.

Another CRS notable who's here working at her Anglican Communion travel responsibilities is Lynne Butt who stopped by on her way from breakfast to greet Sarah. She tell us that she has the November Cyprus trip well in hand.

We've been traveling a lot by bus between downtown Canterbury and the University of Kent. The service excellent: two bus routes go to the university and between them, they run about every 15 minutes. A weekly "all you can ride" pass costs seven pounds (the one way journey is one pound twenty, round trip two pounds.) Here's the scene at the university stop and a view inside the double-decker omni.

As for the meeting itself, one bishop we talked to early this morning said that "We're getting close to the fire." Let's see what happens next.

Norris Battin
Compass Rose Communications Comittee

Three (make that four) Good Reports

Reports from the Church Times blog:

From the Chief Rabbi

The Windsor Continuation Group

Week three: where are we?

Windsor Continuation Group proposals on homosexuality issues, interventions, get mixed reception

Norris Battin

Compass Rose Communications Committee

Images of the University

Here are a few pictures to accompany +Phil's description of the University of Kent campus (click to enlarge).

Norris Battin

Compass Rose Society Communications Comission

 

Staying Tuned on the Sabbath

Two reports I found of great interest today:

George Conger's  here  and

Ruth Gledhill's here (the "fifth instrument" piece)

Let's see what week two brings.

And new (at least to me) from cyberspace -- Pipes. These appear to be blog aggregators that collect blogs with a common theme. Here are two Pipes about Lambeth from Helen Mosher of the Diocese of Washington (D.C.) I'll add them to the links section of this page also. (Click on "links" for the stories and "images" for pictures.)

Lambeth Bishops

Episcopal Cafe

Norris Battin
Compass Rose Society Communications Comittee

Saturday Morning Notes

An early morning walk revealed the two sides of Canterbury -- the steadily diminishing 15th century view and the features of today.

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Lambeth by the numbers
There are 670 registered for 2008 Lambeth Conference. About 880 bishops were invited. About 750 out of 800 eligible bishops attended the 1998 conference. There have been 13,000 viewings of the conference website and 15,000 viewings of photos on a Flickr website.

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Some Background: Windsor Continuation Group chair outlines plans for conference
There will be a three-part process for bishops at the Lambeth Conference to discuss the on-going work of the Windsor Report, according to Bishop Clive Handford, the chair of the Windsor Continuation Group and former primate of the Episcopal Church of Jerusalem and the Middle East.

The process began during the opening plenary session July 20, which was open only to bishops. Handford outlined for the bishops the group's "preliminary observations" since its work began in February. The observations, he said, are meant to "spark off dialogue and discussion."

Among the observations are a "breakdown of trust," "a gap between promise and follow through" at all levels, "the implications that requests and responses are either not fully thought out or they are disregarded," and "litigation and interventions have become locked in a vicious spiral." There is "diminishing sense of communion” that impoverishes witness to Christ, “placing huge strains on the functioning of the Instruments of Communion." Such turmoil "affects our relations with our ecumenical partners, many of whom face similar tensions," the paper concludes.

The next step in the process takes place July 23 at a hearing held by the Continuation Group, during which the members will ask the bishops "where we would like to get to," Handford said. Another hearing July 28, the question will be "how do we get there from here," he said.

"This isn't a quick fix," Handford cautioned. "It's an on-going process."

More about the Continuation Group here.

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Talking to some the bishop's spouses, there seems to be a good many "scales falling from eyes" as the Northern and Southern cultures are compared and contrasted in the Bible study groups. "Imagine," one said, "walking seven days to visit your diocese, or living in a culture where women are required to be totally subservient to men. It still happens today."

And Jane Williams said in her blog this morning:

This morning I met with some bishops’ wives from Congo. The news was both good and bad.

The good news is that most of the country is now relatively peaceful, apart from some areas in the north. There is a new president, and people are feeling cautiously optimistic.

The bad news is that after so many years of war and unrest, the rebuilding operation is daunting. It isn’t just physical building that needs doing, though roads, hospitals, schools, churches have been destroyed, both by fighting and by the earthquake in February. It is also that people’s trust and social relations need rebuilding, and that could take much longer. Many young people have been involved in the fighting, and bear the scars of that, visible and invisible. Many who have carried weapons for so long are not about to lay them and the way of life they have represented down without a struggle.

Many of the bishops’ wives have seen and heard unspeakable things because they were called on to help people in need. They have seen people executed, and had to try to help their families. They have seen women who have been so repeatedly raped that their bodies would need surgery to have any hope of recovery. Most of them will not get it. As for their minds and hearts …

"Bishops’ wives in the Congo are not well off themselves, yet they are trying to help, often whole communities, to basic health and education. They do not have the luxury of opting out of this ministry. The need is too great. All they asked me to do was to pray for them.

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Here's the new Compass Rose Communicator:

Download CRS_newsletter_July08.pdf

And finally, what appears to be an interesting trial balloon.

What do you think?

Meet you at the Old Buttermarket -- right across from the entrance to the Cathedral close -- and we'll discuss it.

 

 

Norris Battin

Compass Rose Society Communications Committee

Back to Business

The bishops returned to Canterbury last night with some good publicity for their march in support of the Millennium Development goals and still basking in the glow of royalty at the Queen's garden party (her third this week I'm told.) Here's one comment from the Thinking Anglicans Web site about the march:

"We marched not simply as well-fed bishops of the west but as bishops and spouses from (we were told) some 130 or so countries. Many of those marching live in places torn by war, depleted by poverty, threatened by climate change. They come from dioceses where children have no schools, curable diseases kill many and harvests fail. Physically it was a march of 1500 churchmen and women, symbolically it was a march of the 80 million Anglican worshippers we represent and a march for the sake of the billions in whose countries we live and work. Crowds lined the streets and applauded. Some stopped what they were doing and joined us as we journeyed past the great departments of state in Whitehall, past Downing Street and the Palace of Westminster, past the Abbey and over the river to Lambeth."

Our President +Philip Poole and his wife Karen and Secretary General Kenneth Kearon and his wife Jennifer were among those who met the Queen at the garden party. I'm told that there was some talk about, among other things, chapeaus.

I asked seveal bishops today rhe open ended question, "How's the meeting going?" One bishop of my acquaintance told me that his indaba group was having trouble "jelling" while another said that they had developed enough trusy in the group to begin discussing the "elephant in the room, sexual identity."

From the 40,000 foot level, however, two interesting reports: First this from The Guardian's Theo Hobson titled "The Anglican Communion Has Never Been Stranger" and this from the Times, Lambeth Voices: A Panel of Anglican Bishops Shares theirViews... .

I'm also told by a "highly placed source" that the pronouncements of the Windsor Continuation Group are important to pay attention to so I refer you here.

Norris Battin

Compass Rose Society Communications Committee

A Few Images Around Town

On Wednesday we Begin to Settle in

Here's a shot of our stand before work begins. The banners were designed and produced by Canon James Rosenthal at the Anglican Communion office in London. You can make out two piles of red disks, some other assorted give away material and the DVD which tells our story.

Just to show that bishops can be as bad at punning as the rest of us, one quipped today that the red disk should have emblazoned on the back, "I'm a fan of the Compass Rose Society."' Here endith the comments about the red disks -- I promise.

Our routine has been pretty well established. Morning tea time, the lunch break, the return for Indaba groups and afternoon tea time are when we have a chance to see our bishops. Here's what the crowd looks like and my are the fashions colorful!

We finished up this afternoon about 1630. Still not much news about how the political and theological winds are blowing. But the dust up around the comments of the Archbishop of the Sudan calling for Bishop Robinson's resignation produced this quote in the Times from Ruth Gledhill:

"...This represents the hard-line conservative-traditionalist stance at the Lambeth Conference and it is widespread. I wish I wasn't writing this but things here are really not looking good. The Anglican Communion seems to be falling apart in front of our eyes and it is not a pretty sight."

Media hype or reality? Hard to tell talking to our bishops today. It certainly wasn't top of the mind.

After we left the stand, Bob and I visited the "Marketplace", two large warehouse like structures housing  vendors that offer products and services to the Anglican Communion around the world. On the product side, there's a heavy emphasis on books and vestments; service are varied -- everything from Episcopal Relief and Development to Five Talents -- and there's also an admixture of interest groups ranging from Integrity to Episcopalians for Life. The diversity of our Communion is well represented. Bishop Schori was there when we were and we got a snap shot.

Tomorrow the Bishops are off to London to march in support of the Millennium Development Goals and attend the Queen;s Garden party. The stand won't be open, so I plan to send you some more images of Canterbury that I have taken since I've been here.

Tonight's featured pub is the Bishop's Finger -- see below.

 

Norris Battin

Compass Rose Communications Comittee

In the Dark

It's apparent that those working the stands at Keynes College will get their news about the progress of the Lambeth Conference from the same media that you do.  We're not authorized to go to any of the sessions, and the bishops are too busy -- at least at this early time in the conference -- to stop and chat about the latest in the ongoing political and theological drama. When they do stop, they seem focused on the events of the day that they are participating in -- their Bible study group or the "indaba" groups where they compare notes with other bishops about how they're dealing with the serious issues facing the Communion. Ask a bishop "How's the meeting going?" and you're likely to hear quite superficial but  positive comments, e.g.,"it's really quite good," or "very interesting, so far."

My favorite Web sites where I try to keep up with the "meta" issues of the conference are Thinking Anglicans where you can follow a number of other informative links  and Ruth Gledhill's reportage and her excellent and forthcoming separate blog in the Times. There are other good religion reporters here with varying points of view, but one can only invest so much time in the paper chase. If I get a good tip from a chat with a bishop, I promise I'll break the news here first and then Ruth can credit Compass Rose as her source! And for the news about the meeting as reported by the Anglican Communion news service, check here.

Bob and I had another successful day at the CRS booth. The logistical issues are mostly solved, although a yellow container belonging to Canon Rosenthal remains undelivered to our stand in Keynes. It holds some material that we'll be using after the red disks are gone as they keep flying out of the booth (pictures adjacent -- click to enlarge.)

Norris Battin

Compass Rose Society Communications Committee