News Release
For immediate release
17 February 2016
‘No unity at the expense of truth’: a response to Justin Welby’s Presidential Address
Andrea Williams, chief executive of Christian Concern and a member of the Church of England’s General Synod, has issued the following statement in response to the Archbishop Justin Welby’s Presidential Address to the General Synod on Monday (15 FEB):
The Archbishop of Canterbury’s presidential address at Synod addressed the aftermath of the recent Primates’ gathering in Canterbury, in which a compromise was reached between two diametrically opposed groups: those who hold to the Bible’s teaching on marriage and sexuality – and those who do not..
Real unity can only grow in the soil of truth. No amount of institutional scaffolding can substitute for healthy soil...
The underlying issue is whether the churches will submit to God’s Word.
An approach to unity which, as long as the institution is upheld, allows an ‘agreement to disagree’ on Scripture’s authority, is counter-productive and doomed to failure.
Unless there is a shared submission to God’s Word, we are not on a shared journey to a shared destination, and no amount of institutional scaffolding will take us there..
He is right in reminding us that Jesus came to set us free. Yet true freedom is freedom from sin, which is found in repentance and the surrendering of human desires to the work of the Holy Spirit. It is not freedom to continue holding to disobedience of the Word...
he Archbishop spoke of the picture of humility that Jesus painted through the washing of His disciples’ feet. But in that humility and servant-heartedness, we must point people to truth. Archbishop Justin failed to speak of truth or of objective revelation from God. It is as if truth has been relegated to a ‘process of discernment’ not a matter of scripture, canons and creed.
This is a capitulation to the ‘spirit of the age’, not the Spirit of God who has spoken in Scripture.
Please read more here.
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