May 7, 2007

Nigerian Primate Peter J. Akinola rejected requests from both Archbishop of Canterbury Rowan Williams and Presiding Bishop Katharine Jefferts Schori by proceeding with the May 5 installation of Bishop Martyn Minns as leader of the Convocation of Anglicans in North America.

Williams and Jefferts Schori had sent separate letters urging Akinola to reconsider his visit to the U.S. for the purpose of installing Minns, an action which the Presiding Bishop had said "would display to the world division and disunity that are not part of the mind of Christ" and would "not help the efforts of reconciliation."

Although the text of Williams' letter was not made public, Anglican Communion communications director Canon James Rosenthal confirmed the letter had been sent on May 4, but Akinola had already arrived in the United States and responded to Jefferts Schori's letter outlining CANA as providing "a safe place for those who wish to remain faithful Anglicans but can no longer do so within The Episcopal Church."

Akinola also responded to Williams on May 6 saying that he had not received his letter until after the ceremony. "CANA is for the Communion and we are more than happy to surrender it to the Communion once the conditions that prompted our division have been overturned," he told Williams.

The installation service, held at the Hylton Memorial Chapel, a nondenominational Christian event center in Woodbridge, Virginia, officially recognized Minns as bishop of CANA, a conservative "missionary effort" in the U.S. sponsored by the Anglican Church of Nigeria.

In his sermon, Minns reportedly said that the Anglican Communion "is wrestling with irreconcilable truths" and offered CANA as a "gift" to those in the Episcopal Church "who crave a different theology."

An English-born former Mobil Oil executive and former rector of Truro Parish in Fairfax, Virginia, Minns was elected and consecrated by the bishops of the Anglican Church of Nigeria to serve as CANA's missionary bishop.

Among those attending the service were Pittsburgh Bishop Robert Duncan, moderator of the Network of Anglican Communion Dioceses and Parishes (NACDP), which consists of 10 dioceses and individual congregations who object to various positions taken by previous General Conventions.

Events such as Minns' installation are often described as "interventions" or "boundary crossings" by official councils or representatives of the Anglican Communion. The Anglican Primates, at their February meeting in Tanzania, acknowledged that such actions have heightened "estrangement between some of the faithful and the Episcopal Church," which has "led to recrimination, hostility and even to disputes in civil courts."

During Minns' installation, Akinola said the ceremony was "simply the first step" in a long road, the New York Times reported.

"The Church of Nigeria itself has almost nothing to offer," Akinola told those gathered. "We are doing this on behalf of the Communion. If we had not done this many of you would be lost to other churches, maybe to nothing at all."