Time wakes up
Even Time, whose coverage of Archbishop Peter Akinola of Nigeria has been credulous at best, is now aware that the man is advocating the legalization of human rights violations. The story is here.
Glad as I am to see a major news magazine call the archbishop to account, I find the piece perplexing; it is difficult to tell whether the revisionism at work here is deliberate. Bishop John Bryson Chane had an op-ed about the proposed Nigerian law published in The Washington Post last February. The Rev. Martyn Minns, rector of Truro Church, and now a bishop in the Church of Nigeria, responded on the church's Web site shortly thereafter. The Anglican blogosphere, in which members of Truro and the Falls Church are active participants, was abuzz with charge and countercharges. So the notion advanced in this piece, that the good people of Northern Virginia just recently found out about this law and are now owed an explanation is difficult to take seriously. As is the notion that Akinola ever, at any point, actually "softened" his support for the legislation. As is the notion that white Americans, rather than gay Nigerians, are the people to whom the archbishop owes his explanation.
Time declared Akinola one of the 100 most influential people in the world a few months back, and it has been covering its backside, and his, ever since. Even in calling him out, the rump coverage continues.
I find it outrageously shocking and scandalous that Truro, et al., American members, clergy and lay, of CANA, have not credibly responded to this issue. If there have been back-room conversations with ++Abuja they need to be brought to light.
TIME and the NYTimes...Is this the sort of evangelistic PR they want? Is ++Akinola "Windsor compliant?" Is this Christian?
By their silence they lose any smidgen of credibility they *may* have had.
Posted by PadreWayne | March 8, 2007 11:41 PM
Based on the Op/ed in the Washington Post by Rev. Yates and Os Guinness, I believe the Virginians were sold on the notion that TEC really wasn't a "Christian" church anymore. And as Christians they had to vote to leave. I think they weren't told a lot of things about the true nature of and reasons for the move, including CANA's attenuated position vis a via the AC, or that their clergy would be inhibited and there was a good chance they wouldn't get the property unless they paid a fair price for it. Now they're shocked to learn that for the most part this whole schism has come down to being a nasty business about hate and power. And they've hitched their star to someone who far from being seen as a bright light for Christianity is seen as against human rights. Perhaps, this reversal is the best thing that could happen. Perhaps, it will cause some (if not many) to re-examine how and why they came to be in this position in the first place. And Minns, Yates et al. will have some explaining to do.
Posted by C.B. | March 9, 2007 9:26 AM