July 17 2008 Our first official full day of the Lambeth Conference began today. I am told by Lambeth veterans that this conference is already greatly different in tone from the one or two that preceded it. For instance, the 1988 Lambeth Conference did not begin with a retreat to set the tone for the time the bishops of your Anglican Communion gathered. This time we gathered at Canterbury Cathedral for the first of three day long sessions at which the Archbishop of Canterbury led us in a time of meditation.
The Archbishop’s first address was focused on Galatians 1:15 and 16. As he noted, it is often translated by those who are not brave enough to go for the more literal translation from the Greek, “But when God, who had set me apart before I was born and called me through his grace, was pleased to reveal his son to me, so that I might proclaim him among the Gentiles, I did not confer with any human being.” The Archbishop pointed out that the more literal translation is “… through his grace, was pleased to reveal his Son in me…”. This small but significant change became the crux of the Archbishop’s reflection. To be a place where God is revealed in me is to become a place where God revealed life, becomes a source of life within and through each of us who call him Lord.
On a more challenging note, the Archbishop observed that we do “love our fears and anxieties.” This was followed by an important reflection point for me: “God always creates a new situation when we pray.” Among the other challenging and encouraging words the Archbishop spoke were these, “We are bringing God’s future into existence in someone’s life each time we officiate at a confirmation, baptism or Eucharist.”
The Eucharist, according to the Archbishop, “judges us and heals us all at once.”
Following lunch and a very good conversation with a bishop from the Episcopal Church, we gathered again for the Archbishop’s second address. “The care we are called to give to God’s people” is our mission. We were charged to give thanks to those bishops in the past who had been the ones who confirmed and ordained us. I recalled Jack VanderHost, who confirmed and later ordained me as a deacon. I recalled Bill Sanders, who ordained me as a priest and who later joined Bert Herlong (Tennessee), Charles VonRosenberg (East Tennessee), Duncan Gray III (Mississippi) and the then Presiding Bishop, Frank Griswold, who were the chief consecrators for me as your bishop. I remember each one with fondness, appreciation and a sense of gratitude and responsibility for the trust they have place in me.
The Archbishop offered a closing prayer for the day in which he noted in passing that Christ is “bound to us as if nails hammered into wood.” With this powerful image of self-giving love, our first day of retreat came to a close.
Later that evening, I returned from Canterbury Cathedral, had dinner with Jeannie, and we finally found the laundry room, where I curled up with a book and washed clothes until midnight. Jeannie, showing her superior intelligence, went to bed early.
July 18, 2008 On this Friday, I left with the bishops for our second day of retreat at Canterbury Cathedral. The Archbishop gave two addresses today regarding the bishop as a “linguist” and the role of the bishop as a model of Christian community in relationship to his or her diocese and to other Christians around the world. He made a suggestion that I thought had great merit. Rather cautiously using the term covenant, the Archbishop suggested that one covenant bishops of the communion might make would be as follows: “combining rigor towards oneself (as did the Desert Fathers) and look on each other with a deep reluctance to condemn,” the Church might benefit if two or three bishops from around the world might adopt a common rule of life and hold one another in prayer and accountability to accomplish the rule that binds us together. He described this as a Benedictine model of community based on common discipline and the shape of prayer we are committed to offer in service to God.
Regarding the negative effects of fear on our lives as a communal people, the Archbishop observed that the only thing to do with fear is to put it in the presence of God. I might interpret this to mean that fear is overcome only if we truly entrust it and ourselves to God.
I had an opportunity to seek out a Franciscan monk for a bit of spiritual direction preceded by shared admiration of the Kentucky native, poet and essayist, Wendell Barry. Later, I met with another American bishop to continue the conversation I had started with Brother Sam of the Society of St. Francis. We returned to the nave of the Cathedral for our second night of evensong with the wonderful Cathedral men and boy choir leading the sung parts of the service. After we were dismissed for the evening, I met Jeannie and eight others who went out for an evening’s meal in Canterbury. We walked the thirty minutes back to the University of Kent from the town of Canterbury, and it is only now that I have had a chance to sit and compose thoughts on this day.
I know that there is another communication of images and reflections coming to you on a daily basis from the Episcopal Church communications offices. Jeannie is working on a reflection piece for you as well. I hope these will be combined to present a fair overview of an incredible experience of engaging Anglicans from around the world in the service of God in Christ. It is in this context that the importance of Communion makes most sense. We have one more half-day of retreat. This will take place on the University of Kent campus. Stay tuned.
July 19, 2008 Today was the final day of our Lambeth retreat. The Archbishop of Canterbury was brilliant in addressing the ways in which we need to let Christ lead us and the ways in which we need to follow. Prior to his address, I attended our daily Eucharist and the Bible study that followed. In the Bible study, our group heard and saw by way of a DVD the tragic tale of one of our brother bishops who, living in northern India, has had his village, churches, schools and homes of his parishioners destroyed. This was not the act of Islamic extremists. It was the work of Hindu extremists.
I received, as did others in our group, a cross from the three bishops in our Bible study who come from the various areas of the cyclone devastated area of Myanmar, Burma. The cross is made of mahogany wood from a tree destroyed by the killer storm surge, and it is simple in design but poignant in symbolism. The cross has a tear drop carved at the place where the two arms intersect. On either side of the tear, carved into the arms of the cross are carved waves of destruction. And yet, they may be waves of baptism and new life as well. It is a simple and cherished gift from brother bishops in a land not too much like our own except that we all seek the same Lord to follow in his way.
This takes me back to our closing retreat address this morning. The Archbishop of Canterbury spoke of the leadership of Christians in general and of bishops in particular. Citing Hebrews 10:19-25, he observed that Jesus has opened a new way before us. He has gone ahead of us through the atonement and cross to clear the way through the veil and curtain of his body, through which we are to pass into the holy place where God is to be found. He went on to observe that Christian leaders lead by following Jesus’ way. The issue is, “How do we discern that way?”
Powerfully, he observed what we already know: “Our mission is not taking Jesus where he has not been before, but going where he has gone before us.” He went on to observe that such following should thereby give us courage to go with him. In my own word, I would say that courage, a major theme of Christian leadership in any era, is certainly needed today. But it is in following Christ where he has gone before us that we find the way to his way.
Citing a quote from the 1978 Lambeth Conference (with apologies to the speaker on that occasion, but I did not hear the Archbishop’s reference), he observed that bishops are to have “insight as well as oversight.” He compared this to St. Paul who, going down the Damascus road, was overcome by insight so disorienting that it led to blindness for him leading to the “effacement of well known images of reality so that a new vision may be seen.” More was said of significance, but I end with another comment he made that seemed to hold my attention. It was to this effect: Leadership of bishops is about the “opening of a new way” where the emphasis is less about command and decision. Rather, as the Archbishop reflected, when we examine our conscience, what brings me to my knees is often the “failure to hope in Christ”… “the failure to believe there is a new way.” Asking in his closing prayer that we pray for a “grateful clarity” about what God has, is and will be doing, he closed by citing Hebrews 2:9-15 and 12:1-2.
After a lunch break, Jeannie and I took the bus into Canterbury and did some shopping, had a “pint” at a local establishment, and later went to dinner with friends from North Carolina. I returned home with a day full of images, experiences and hopes. Tomorrow we go to Canterbury Cathedral for the “official” opening service at the Cathedral. I look forward to the day, and I look forward to staying in touch.
Until then, blessings, +Don
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