Photos, programs — and Amazing Grace

The Conference continued with the ordinary schedule on Friday: Bible study; Indaba; self-select classes in the afternoon and a lecture in the evening; and worship, throughout the day. Like most of the bishops and spouses, I am very glad for my small group Bible study. Like many, I have had some frustration with the Indaba group process. But the heart of the Conference continues to be the opportunity for forming relationships with other bishops as we pray and study and deepen our trust with and respect for one another. I cannot begin to list all of the bishops with whom I have entered into deep conversations over these last ten days, but they come from all over the Communion; from Madagascar to Mexico; from Tasmania to Tanzania; from Ireland to India. They all love our Lord and they all love their Church.

It has been profoundly humbling and deeply sobering to encounter bishops and spouses who minister in places of great poverty and hardship, under the threat (and, sometimes, the reality) of violence and persecution. They need our prayers and support and we need their witness to remind us all of the mission to which we are called and our oneness in that mission. Indeed, that may be all that we have in common. But our mission is of Christ, and He is all we need have in common.

Friday's program included a presentation by Professor Chris Rapley, Director of the Science Museum in London and an expert in climate change. His words were sobering, indeed, as he reviewed the great dangers we are in due to, among other things, the transforming of the atmosphere by carbon emissions. In order to "decarbonise" humankind we need worldwide action. We need moral leadership. It seems a good reason in itself to uphold our worldwide Communion — to steward the gift of creation, in which all of us are interdependent, to be sure.

In the last week I attended three "self-select" classes on "Human Sexuality and the Witness of Scripture, " led by the Rev. Dr. Richard Burridge, Dean of Kings College, London, assisted by the Rev. Canon Philip Groves, facilitator for the Listening Process on human sexuality for the Anglican Communion. Dean Burridge is the author the commentary on John's Gospel that the Archbishop of Canterbury selected for pre-Lambeth reading by all the bishops. Canon Groves is the editor of The Anglican Communion and Homosexuality: A resource to enable listening and dialogue, which was also sent to all the bishops.

These three classes included bishops from all over the Communion. The atmosphere was sometimes very tense as some bishops disagreed with the speakers and made their views known. But the classes were also places of grace and growth as we each struggled with radically different hermeneutics by means of which we interpret the Word.

On Saturday we had the traditional Lambeth photograph. As all 650+ bishops assembled on risers on a grassy field, we all sang Amazing Grace together. It was a singular moment. I was privileged to end up next to Bishop Romero. We were on the very top row, so we shouldn't be too hard to pick out!

Thursday, at our Walk for Witness, many of us received a Bible, entitled "the poverty and justice bible," in the Contemporary English Version (British and Foreign Bible Society, 2008).

I am very wary of the "theme" approach to the sales and marketing of the Scriptures, but this edition substantiates the claim that there are more than 2,000 verses of the Bible that make reference to the poor, to poverty and to justice. In fact, the editors have highlighted (in bright orange) nearly 3,000 verses that point to the concern of our God for poor and oppressed people. Tony Campolo is quoted on the cover: "Here's proof that faith without a commitment to justice for the poor is a sham, because it ignores the most explicit of all the social concerns of Scripture.”

Again, I beg you to continue to uphold this Conference and our Communion in prayer. Come, Holy Spirit. Amen.

Faithfully yours in Christ,

+George