Welcome to the Lambeth Conference edition of the IC Newsletter.

There is a bright-and-shiny version (in .pdf format) available from here.

Please feel free to print and copy the .pdf version of this newsletter to distribute / leave at the back of your church.

Spread the word!

As the 2008 Lambeth Conference draws near it has never been so important that the voice of loving Christian inclusion is heard.

URGENT - Women as Bishops

The Synod debates on women as bishops are imminent. WATCH, one of our partner organisations, is stongly supporting a single-clause measure which simply enables women to be consecrated as bishops. A code of practice would be attached to ensure that proper provision is made for those who cannot accept the episcopal ministry of bishops.

PLEASE write to or contact your synod members encouraging them to support a single clause measure. They'd need to have received that by 15th July though, so it's quite urgent. Also there is still time to sign the PETITIONS - which are at www.gopetition.co.uk/online/19569.html for male clergy and www.gopetition.co.uk/online/19571.html for lay people.

So it's a split.   The final communique from the "GAFCON" conference of in Jerusalem has set up alternative structures within the church.   It's a complicated document and clearly needs more unpacking that that!  But over the long term,  the aim must be to seek to impose a rigid and exclusive understanding of scripture on the rest of the Communion.  In the short term it provides a safe space for those who embrace that particular view of scripture.  The theology of GAFCON owes more to Calvin than to Anglicanism.     However it does mean that those of us who celebrate the historic breadth,  inclusivity and welcome of Anglicanism can now continue to communicate our message of Christ's unconditional love.  We look forward to a healthy and creative Lambeth conference.   More on all this in the next newsletter but if you want to keep up to date on developments in the Communion,  Thinking Anglicans is always good to visit. 

URGENT NEWSFLASH FROM THE COORDINATOR: (1) Under new security procedures for the Lambeth Conference it has just been announced that everyone hoping to attend one of the Fringe Events should give their full name and title to the Coordinator of that event. Please would you use my mobile 07504 577210 to let me know by voice mail or text if you intend to come to the Eucharist and Party at 7.00pm on Saturday 26th July in the Keynes Lecture Theatre or the Inclusive Imperative Anglican Welcome Seminar at 6.30pm in the Darwin Suite. Please include the news of friends who may be coming with you. (Sorry if you have already let us know - please would you kindly repeat the exercise to be sure of getting in.)

URGENT NEWSFLASH FROM THE COORDINATOR: (2) Volunteers at Lambeth - In addition to the Training Sessions (at St Peter's Church, Liverpool Grove at 11.30am on Saturday 5th July or 12.45pm at Southwark Cathedral after the morning service on Sunday 6th July - if you cannot come don't worry - we will send you a small training pack…) you may also want to come to a preliminary meeting for all volunteers - at 4.00 pm in St Stephen's Church Hall, (the Communications Centre for the Inclusive Church Network throughout the Lambeth Conference) St Stephen's Church, where we shall be praying daily at 5.00pm; and the Communications Centre , where we shall have an informal supper at 6.00pm, are in Hales Place, Canterbury , about a mile's walk downhill from the University of Kent Campus. You will be very welcome to this first meeting, which all those volunteering for more than one day will find particularly helpful.

Inclusive Church have 50 volunteers coming to the Lambeth Conference (pick up your security tag on the Inclusive Church Stall as soon as you arrive - A6 in the Charities Marquee). This is a fabulous number of people! Thank you! The volunteers timetable and the Lambeth Prayers are here

INCLUSIVE EUCHARIST: If you can, please come to the Inclusive Eucharist on Saturday 26th July now at 7.00pm in the Keynes Auditorium, followed by a party. WE NEED NEMBERS AND VOICES! But please let us know your name, as we have to do a recount for security purposes. Similarly the Inclusive Imperative: Anglican Welcome Seminar on Thursday 31st at 6.30pm in the Darwin Suite. Please give names to Clare Herbert on 07504 577210. We are sending invitations to both these events to all the Bishops in the Anglican Communion!

We are extremely fortunate to have our Patron the Archbishop of Mexico presiding for us on 26th and the Revd Canon Lucy Winkett preaching for us on the theme "Strangers to Friends”. Lucy's talk at Drenched in Grace is now on the Website here -

- Clare

There are other ways to help if you are not a stall volunteer. If you are unable to make the conference itself, you can still support Inclusive Church. Please use our daily prayers, which have been produced by subscribers to Inclusive Church. Please print, copy and circulate these prayers as widely as possible. Please pray with us, and encourage others to join in. You may want to put on a service in your own local church or use special prayers in one of your services in during the week so we include the Eucharistic Rite we are using on Saturday 26th July at 7.00pm as the Inclusive Eucharist.

Church services to uphold, support and/or bless gay and lesbian partnerships has hit the headlines in recent weeks. At the heart of headlines was a human story, of the celebration of the love between the Revds. Peter Cowell and David Lord, who we warmly congratulate.

Giles Fraser spoke on this subject on BBC Radio 4's 'Thought for the Day' (Wednesday 18th June). The full text of this is reprinted below, and is available in the .pdf version of this newsletter in an easy 'cut-out-and-paste-into-your-parish-magazine' format.

SERVICES OF PRAYER AND DEDICATION FOLLOWING A CIVIL PARTNERSHIP - CLARIFICATION!

Inclusive Church has published a paper by Revd Brian Lewis, a member of General Synod and of IC's Executive Committee on the law in relation to services after Civil Partnerships. The paper demonstrates that under the laws of the Church of England - especially Canon B5 - clergy have far greater liberty in this area than is commonly thought. They are permitted to carry out services of prayer and dedication following a civil partnership so long as they are not deemed to be "Services of Blessing". The paper is at http://www.inclusivechurch2.net/?id=6317

Canon Giles Goddard, Chair of Inclusive Church, said, "We very much welcome this long overdue clarification of the law. It makes the distinction between marriages and civil partnerships and sets out what is permissible within the terms of Canon B5. We hope it will be helpful for clergy wishing to provide public services which respond prayerfully and pastorally to the needs of their congregations.”

Revd Lewis makes the comparison with the Service of Prayer and Dedication following a Civil Wedding (popularly described as a "A Church Blessing"). In these services the individuals are blessed without the service becoming "a Service of Blessing".

Giles Fraser: Thought for the day: Wednesday, 18 June 2008

A few weeks ago two Anglican clergymen celebrated their civil partnership in a famous London church. Newspapers called it a gay wedding. A number of friends of mine were present at the service and told of a happy and wonderful occasion.

But more conservative voices have been upset, complaining that it threatened the very fabric of marriage itself. So what, then, is the Church of England's theology of marriage? Back in the sixteenth and seventeenth centuries, as the Book of Common Prayer was being put together, marriage was said to be for three purposes: First, It was ordained for the procreation of children … Secondly, It was ordained for a remedy against sin, and to avoid fornication .. Thirdly, It was ordained for the mutual society, help, and comfort, that the one ought to have of the other, both in prosperity and adversity.

How do these three concerns relate to the prospect of gay marriage? Let me take them in reverse order - only because the first is the trickiest. The third priority insists that marriage is designed to bring human beings into loving and supportive relationships. No one can surely deny that homosexual men and women are in as much need of loving and supportive relationships as anybody else. And equally deserving of them too. This one seems pretty clear. The second priority relates to the encouragement of monogamy. The Archbishop of Canterbury has rightly recognised that celibacy is a vocation to which many gay people are just not called. Which is why, it strikes me, the church ought to be offering gay people a basis for monogamous relationships that are permanent, faithful and stable. So that leaves the whole question of procreation. Clearly a gay couple cannot make babies biologically. But then neither can those who marry much later in life. Many couples, for a whole range of reasons, find they cannot conceive children - or, simply, don't choose to. Is marriage to be denied them? Of course not.

For these reasons - and also because contraception became fully accepted in the Church of England - the modern marriage service has shifted the emphasis away from procreation. The weight in today's wedding liturgy is on the creation of loving and stable relationships. And this, I believe, is something in which gay Christians have a perfect right to participate. I know many people of good will are bound to disagree with me on this one. But gay marriage isn't about culture wars or church politics; it's fundamentally about one person loving another. The fact that two gay men have proclaimed this love in the presence of God, before friends and family and in the context of prayerful reflection is something the church ought to welcome.

It's not like there's too much real love in the world to be dismissive of what little we do find. Which is why my view is we ought to celebrate real human love however and wherever we find it.

 

Inclusive Roadshow: Over the coming year Inclusive Church will be carrying a Roadshow about our work to different parts of the country. If you would like us to come near you, and can provide invitations to a local network of people with a room for a small reception please let us know. We are starting on "home ground” at Southwark Cathedral in September but moving on to Gloucester in December. In addition to introducing ourselves we are willing to expand on a theme which our hosts particularly welcome so we start in Southwark with "Including Women”. You are very welcome to these events - RSVP to the IC office.

Wed 24th September Southwark Cathedral Library, 6.30pm - 9.00pm An Introduction to Inclusive Church, Giles Goddard and Clare Herbert, with guest speakers Rosemary Lain-Priestley and Christina Rees - developing the theme of the roles of women in Church and Society with the state of play re Women in the Episcopate in the C. of E.

Saturday 4th October St Mary's Putney, 10.30 - 2.30pm - 5th Anniversary Celebration of the work of Inclusive Church 10.30am Festival Eucharist, 11.30 am Giles and Clare lead a plenary "Where are we as a Church and organisation post the Lambeth Conference - questions from the floor and directions for work " (during this period there will be a special activity for children as we hope families may be able to come to this anniversary service and picnic) 1.00pm - picnic lunch, please bring something savoury or sweet to share for lunch and a paper plate/bowl to put it on! Drinks will be provided.

Thursday 4th December - Inclusive Church Seminar and Supper at Gloucester Cathedral - an evening introducing ourselves and our work emphasising the Broad and Inclusive Tradition of Anglicanism

For your diaries: Saturday February 7th - Day Conference with Workshops -- "The Challenge of Inclusive Language - its Breadth and its Importance” London venue, times t.b.a.

There's been a brilliant response to our request for prayers for each day of the Lambeth Conference. The prayers are based on the themes of the programme the bishops will be following. Our hope is that you will find them helpful as you pray for those who will be attending as well as those who will be absent. Contributors to the prayers reflect the breadth of Inclusive Church's membership and include Jenny Thomas of the Association of Black Clergy, London WATCH, Mary Robins, Paul Oestreicher, Rosie Miles, Wendy Prezzey, Trevor Donnelly as well as others. Also included is a prayer from Sebastien Bakare, bishop of Harare in Zimbabwe. Please feel free to use these prayers in your own reflection or in public worship. They're also at http://www.inclusivechurch2.net/?id=7149

BEFORE LAMBETH: Inclusive God, with those gathered at the Lambeth Conference, we pray for people we feel are strangers. They do not behave like us; they do not read the scripture like us; they can feel like enemies. We would proclaim your justice, for you invite all to your table. We would live your love, opening our hearts to your grace that those who are strangers may become friends. Amen

20 JULY: SUNDAY CELEBRATION IN CANTERBURY CATHEDRAL: All-loving God, we give thanks for the rich diversity of your world, and especially the diversity within our Anglican Communion. Help our bishops, and each one of us to use our differences as a source of inspiration, keep us humble and open-hearted, willing to learn from one another. And may all our conversations be seasoned with Christian love.

21 JULY: CELEBRATING COMMON GROUND: THE BISHOP AND ANGLICAN IDENTITY: All-loving God, your Son said that it is by our love that the world will recognise us as his disciples. Help our bishops to love one another, even when they disagree passionately. And may their conversation be a witness to their faith in Christ.

22 JULY: PROCLAIMING THE GOOD NEWS: THE BISHOP AND EVANGELISM: All-loving God, we thank you for the Good News of your love for us, and we thank you for those that proclaim that love. Help us not to build walls around the Gospel - walls to make us safe, walls to exclude others. Give us the vision to break down every barrier that divides us from one another and from you.

23 JULY: TRANSFORMING SOCIETY: THE BISHOP AND SOCIAL INJUSTICE: Lord Jesus, we talk glibly about your suffering but rarely stop to think what it involves. It was not so easy to imagine the physical, mental and spiritual suffering you had to bear on our behalf. You underwent all this in the company of your Father, although at a time you felt abandoned but not forsaken (Psalm 22).

The physical, mental and spiritual anguish we are going through in Zimbabwe, meted by non-God fearing police officers and their superiors is not hidden from you. We believe that we are with you here on earth as in heaven. We believe that those who believe in you are never forsaken. Send your Holy Spirit to guide and strengthen us as we go through the challenge of being denied to meet together in your name. Your Kingdom come. Amen. + Sebastian Harare

All-loving God, Christ was born not among the rich but with the poor and homeless. Christ did not limit his hospitality to the righteous but shared his bread with sinners. Christ did not live with the respectable but with sinners and outcasts of all kinds. Help us never to forget in our prayers and thought and actions all of your children who are in need. Grant us tender consciences, inspired minds and willing hands.

24 JULY: LONDON DAY (THE BISHOPS WILL VISIT LAMBETH PALACE AND BY HER MAJESTY THE

QUEEN AT BUCKINGHAM PALACE): All-loving God, we pray for all people in sacred and secular authority. Help them to make just and merciful decisions. Help them to resist the temptations that come power, rather following the example of Christ, our Servant King, who bent to wash our feet.

25 JULY: DISCERNING OUR SHARED CALLING: THE BISHOP, OTHER CHURCHES AND GOD'S MISSION:

Eternal GodYou created all that is good and holy, be close to those gathered for the Lambeth Conference, enable them to reach out lovingly to everyone, help them to show awareness and understanding, comfort and consolation, justice and equality, so that we participate fully in the abundance of your life. May we always witness to the ministry of Christ who welcomed all regardless of age, gender or ethnic background. Every person is created by God, each one of us is loved by God and nobody should be diminished by the words and actions of another. Amen.

26 JULY: SAFEGUARDING CREATION: THE BISHOP AND THE ENVIRONMENT: O loving God, we bow before you in penitence for our misuse of your creation. We ask that you look in mercy on us as we endeavour to live in accordance with your Holy Will. May your Holy Spirit guide, strengthen, empower and sustain us to use aright the

resources you have given us so that your world will be an acceptable portrayal of your Kingdom. Dear God, help us to see in each other the image of your Son, our Saviour, Jesus Christ and to show forth your love that unites us all as one. In the name of Jesus Christ we pray, Amen.

All-loving God, we thank you for rich diversity of life with which you have blessed your creation. Forgive us when we are ungrateful, uncaring or wasteful. Inspire us to defend these blessings from all that threatens them. May our bishops voices be heard as they remind us that the world belongs to you, and we are but stewards for a season.

27 JULY: CANTERBURY DAY: Eternal God, in you justice and mercy have embraced for Love has no boundaries, except the ones we make. Help us to follow in the steps of the one who shows the Way to Life. Amen.

28 JULY: ENGAGING WITH A MULTI FAITH WORLD: THE BISHOP, OTHER RELIGIONS AND CHRISTIAN WITNESS: Father and Mother of us all in this broken world may we pray not for Moslem, Christian or Jew, Palestinian or Israeli, rich or poor, young or old, gay or straight, torturer or victim, saint or sinner, but for ourselves that we may not divide them but hold them together in our hearts as your children for whom Jesus died and in whom he lives.

29 JULY: EQUAL IN GOD'S SIGHT: WHEN POWER IS ABUSED. (THIS DAY WILL BE HELD JOINTLY WITH THE SPOUSES' CONFERENCE.) Great God of all, who has created us all alike in your image and called us equally to your service: we ask that all who seek to serve you in the ministry of your church may be free to do so to the fullest extent of their calling. We pray for those who struggle to bring light and freedom into your church by prising open closed doors and shuttered minds, dismantling barriers and overturning old prejudices. Give them strength to continue their work with courage, tenacity and an unquenchable sense of purpose and justice. We pray for those who have been wounded on the way, asking you to restore their hope and dignity and continue to lead them in your service. Especially we pray for those who restrict the freedom of others through their own ignorance, fear, greed or arrogant certainty. Soften their hearts and widen their understanding, so that they may see that allowing others to play a full part in building your kingdom does not threaten or diminish their own contribution.

Hear our prayers, O God, which we make with all the women who have witnessed and worked for you through the ages, and in whose glorious tradition we stand, through your son, our Saviour Jesus Christ.

All-loving God we thank you that all people are equal in your sight. In you our divisions become small, divisions of wealth, gender, sexuality, age, race, and ability. God look with mercy on those who dare deny the equality of your children, and lead them to see all people as our sisters and brothers. May our bishops use their authority with courage and gentleness, and may all your church use its influence wisely and for the flourishing of your Gospel.

30 JULY: LIVING UNDER SCRIPTURE: THE BISHOP AND THE BIBLE IN MISSION: All-loving God, we give you thanks for your Holy Word. Give us open hearts and minds as we read Scripture, give us willingness to be changed by our reading, and make us hungry for new truths. Help us to be generous with those who interpret the Bible differently, and save us from cold certainty.

31 JULY: LISTENING TO GOD AND EACH OTHER: THE BISHOP AND HUMAN SEXUALITY: All-loving God, your Son challenged us, asking if we cannot love our brothers and sisters who we can see how can we love our God whom we cannot? Forgive us when we lack love. Do not let our hunger and thirst for justice drive out love. Even when we are hated, may we love in return. Make us more like Jesus every day.

ENDING: Heart of our own hearts, in these days we have been invited over the threshold of our fears and into the warmth of your love, we have been embraced by justice and mercy, as we travel may we remain forever in your love and follow in the steps of the one who shows us the Way to Life. Amen.

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