Sunday 28 July 2013

Offshoring politics, ideology, Christianity? The example of GAFCON

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So far as I can tell, the only solid hope for the the future of real Christians in the Church of England and for the Anglican communion generally, is the organization GAFCON - Global Anglican Future Conference

http://gafcon.org

Which is led from Africa by the Bishop of Kenya.

Is this an example of what real Christians may have to do, and perhaps reactionaries more generally - accept leadership from outside not just their own nations, but their own cultures - to offshore 'ideology' including spiritual leadership?

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It would not be the first time - because for much of the twentieth century Leftists subordinated themselves ideologically to the Soviet Union: swapped their own national identities of Socialist Internationalism (hence the ritual singing of The Red Flag all over the world, including the Labour Party and Trades Unions in the UK).

George Orwell wrote a lot about this - how British Leftists were a subversive fifth column for Soviet interests, whether officially (via Communist Party membership) or unofficially due to their personal convictions.

(This view of Orwell's was treated as paranoia by Leftists for many years, but it turned out to be the literal truth - many British politicians, intellectuals, unionists really were taking orders from Moscow: there really were Reds under the Bed!)

So that is one precedent, and an effective one - albeit a badly misdirected one! 

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Another more relevant example is Roman Catholics who - wherever they may dwell - obviously take their leadership from Rome. The problem is that 'Rome' (i.e. the senior Catholic hierarchy) is part of the problem, not part of the solution.

What is needed is to seek leadership wherever it is best, which is going to be outwith the scope of Leftist Internationalism - or, at least, where that ideology is weakest.

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GAFCON may emerge in the next few months or years as the basis for a new Anglicanism which is a real Christian faith in contrast to the subversive Leftist anti-Christianity of the mainstream Church of England leadership and pastorate.

(And if it does not, then I don't see much hope of the survival of Christianity in the Anglican communion.)

Maybe GAFCON provides a lead for other Western social systems which have - like the Church of England - been subverted, hollowed-out and inverted by decades of Leftism?

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2 comments:

Sylvie D. Rousseau said...

"The problem is that 'Rome' (i.e. the senior Catholic hierarchy) is part of the problem, not part of the solution."

In fact, no. Senior hierarchy is part of the problem in roughly the same proportion that local clergy and all Catholic people are: all of us are sinners and a majority is not interested to convert and be faithful to the Commandments. And this certainly does not apply to the Popes of the last 150 years. If what you are pretending were true, the Church would have died a long time ago, and all the rest of 'Christianity' would not even exist.

Bruce Charlton said...

@SDR - There is a great deal of inertia in large and complex social systems, so effects are delayed in relation to causes - and the Roman Catholic church is indeed dying astonishingly fast. Which is tragic.