IS SOMEONE SPOILING FOR A FIGHT?

From Andrew Brown at the Guardian:

The fact that Jeffrey John has been nominated as Bishop of Southwark is intriguing. That it has been leaked reveals a great deal about the civil war within the church of England. Seven years ago Rowan Williams' attempt to get his old friend into the much less important job of Bishop of Reading led to his first – and, it seemed, decisive – defeat at the hands of hardline evangelicals. He cracked after two months of pressure and asked John to withdraw his name, establishing his reputation as a man who could be bullied. If he is beaten again, he is finished. If he wins, he will have shot the rapids and the Church of England will finally emerge from the turbulence of the last 30 years with a fairly clear and fairly coherent doctrine about sex.
....

So: a church in which gays are all right if they are celibate, and women are accepted if they tolerate the people who can't stand them. Will that be the settlement of the fuss of the last 20 years? Perhaps not. Whoever leaked John's name made his appointment almost inevitable. But my sources suggest that the leak came from Evangelicals, not from the liberals. Someone is spoiling for a fight.

Please read Brown's words in between the excerpts I quoted.

Intrigue! Fighting! In the church? Heaven forbid!

Also in the Guardian by Riazat Butt:

Conservative parishes in the Church of England could seek alternative leadership from abroad if a gay man is appointed as bishop of Southwark, clerics warned today.

The argument over homosexual clergy in the Anglican communion was reignited at the weekend when it was disclosed that Dr Jeffrey John, the dean of St Albans, is among nominations for the post vacated earlier this year by the Right Rev Tom Butler. In 2003, John was forced to stand down from his appointment as suffragan bishop of Reading because of his sexuality after protests from traditionalists.

Reform, a conservative evangelical group, has warned the church could split if John, who is in a civil partnership but celibate, is made bishop for the south London diocese.
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Writing in the Church of England newspaper last week, the Rev Ray Skinner, a rector in Morden, south London, said it did not take "a huge leap of imagination" to predict what would happen should John get the job. "As in North America, with its shrinking liberal Episcopal Church, and growing orthodox Anglican Church, there will be a formal divide. Maybe not immediately, we tend not to rush things. There are two new groups already within the Church of England, one called Inclusive Church, the other the Fellowship of Confessing Anglicans linking with other Anglican provinces."

Perhaps, the Archbishop of Canterbury thinks it's time to call the bluff of the Reform folks, but why now? The whole scheme for appointing Dean John at the present time makes no sense to me, but I'm no insider. The ABC may yet come to see for himself what it's like to have foreign bishops invade his territory.

As for the Rev. Ray Skinner's words:

"As in North America, with its shrinking liberal Episcopal Church, and growing orthodox Anglican Church, there will be a formal divide."

Methinks the good Reverend is taking the words at the ACNA website too much at face value.

H/T to Thinking Anglicans for the link to the article by Riazat Butt. I found Andrew Brown's article on my own.