U.S. Episcopal Breakaways Add to Homophobia in Africa
The swing of U.S. clerics to alliance with African Anglican churches that are widely known for anti-gay activities strengthens and bolsters a homophobic rampage in Africa that is sweeping across nations. Fiercely anti-gay African clerics are, in some cases, the leaders of anti-gay movements and measures in Africa. The African clerics are consolidating power and prestige by consecrating American clerics who breakaway from the U.S. body because they wish to pursue anti-gay policies which had been softened in the U.S.
African governments, often at the insistence of Anglican bishops, have adopted increasingly harsh anti-gay measures, Vives wrote in an article distributed through the Inter Press Service (IPS).
Adding fuel to the fire are anti-gay U.S. clerics in the Episcopal union who are defecting to an association with anti-gay churches in Kenya, Uganda, Rwanda and Nigeria rather than be associated with the U.S. body of churches, which, to their dismay, permitted the consecration of the Right Rev. V. Gene Robinson, a gay man, as bishop in New Hampshire.
One key figure in these machinations is Nigerian Archbishop Peter Akinola. Vives reports:
There are 3.5 million Anglicans in Kenya, 15 million in Nigeria, and 77 million worldwide. The Anglican-affiliated Episcopal Church in the U.S. has 2.3 million members in 110 dioceses and 7600 congregations. Thirty-two U.S. congregations are now affiliated with churches in Africa, reports Vives, and another 23 have voted to leave.
The head of the Anglican Church in Kenya, Bernard Nzimbi, "entrenched his anti-gay position by consecrating Angilican Clerics Bill Atwood and Bill Murdoch as bishops," wrote the Johannesburg, South Africa Mail & Guardian Online in a September article headlined "Africa welcomes US gay-bashers."
In a September meeting in New Orleans, the Episcopal bishops condemned these `boundary" violations but also agreed to avoid choosing anyone for bishop whose "manner of life presents a challenge" to the wider church, although it called for "unequivocal and active commitment to the civil rights, safety and dignity of gay and lesbian persons." It's a compromise that may not last, notes Vives.
A gay and lesbian advocacy group that has monitored the situation expressed alarm at the continuing African consecreation of U.S. clerics, according to South Africa's Mail & Guardian.
U.S. Episcopal Breakaways Add to Homophobia in Africa | 5 comments (5 topical, 0 hidden)
U.S. Episcopal Breakaways Add to Homophobia in Africa | 5 comments (5 topical, 0 hidden)
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