Africa’s top Anglican bishops on Monday announced plans for a network of theological colleges to promote traditional beliefs after clashing with some Western churches over what one termed the ”abomination” of homosexuality.
At a news conference on the eve of the first-ever conference of Africa’s Anglican prelates, Nigeria’s Archbishop Peter Akinola took pains to stress that the bishops did not want their meeting to be dominated by sexuality, which he said is a fringe issue for a continent with much more pressing problems.
But afterwards, he was categorical in his denunciation of the Western dioceses that have ordained homosexual priests, blessed same-sex unions and, in one case, appointed an openly gay bishop.
”What we are saying is that the Bible says that this is an abomination,” he said, talking to reporters.
About 300 Anglican bishops from across Africa are gathering in the Nigerian city of Lagos for a week-long conference on issues facing the church and the people of religion and society.
The get-together has been planned since 2001.
Bishops said it had not been designed as a response to the recent bitter controversy within world Anglicanism over homosexuality, which was in the news again last week when church headquarters in London released a report on the dispute.
But the issue was clearly at the front of the cleric’s minds when they announced that, under the theme Africa Comes of Age, the conference would seek ways to build more of its own seminaries to protect young priests from the liberal ideas gaining ground in some Western theological colleges.
”The Western world is embroiled in a new religion which we cannot associate with, and we need to find ways and means to establish our own theology,” said Akinola, who is chairperson of the African council of bishops and who as primate of Nigeria leads 17-million Anglicans, the church’s biggest province. — Sapa-AFP