The occasion will be witnessed by eight archbishops of the Anglican Communion, including Kenyan Archbishop Eliud Wabukala; Southern Cone Archbishop Tito Zavala; The Most Rev. Nicholas Okoh Archbishop, Primate, and Metropolitan of All Nigeria; The Most Rev. Dr. Onesphore Rwaje, Archbishop and Primate of Rwanda; The Most Rev. Stanley Ntagali, Archbishop and Primate of Uganda; The Most Rev. Dr. Mouneer Hanna Anis, Chairman of the Anglican Global South; Bishop of Egypt with North Africa and the Horn of Africa and President Bishop of the Anglican Church in the Middle East; The Most Rev. Stephen An Myint Oo, Archbishop of Myanmar; and The Most Rev. Ezekiel Kondo Archbishop of the Internal Province of Sudan and Bishop of Khartoum. Together they represent more than 50 million global Anglicans, the vast majority of Anglicans in the world today.

Also present will be two active, though retired archbishops, including Argentine Bishop Gregory Venables (former Archbishop of the Southern Cone) a close personal friend of Pope Francis and retired Archbishop Ben Kwashi of Jos, Nigeria.

Since its inception, the ACNA has grown to more than 112,000 members in some 27 dioceses in Canada, the U.S., and Mexico including the Armed Forces. The ACNA is now larger than the Anglican Church of Canada in average Sunday attendance with approximately the same number of dioceses.

The service of investiture marks an historic milestone and a first for the fledgling denomination, most of whose members left the Episcopal Church over unacceptable theological and moral innovations including the ordination of an openly practicing homosexual, one Gene Robinson, to the episcopacy in 2003.

Archbishop Robert Duncan, formerly Episcopal Bishop of Pittsburg and then the Anglican Diocese of Pittsburgh, pioneered the new denomination, steering it through its early years drawing together disparate Anglicans from across the North American continent into what has now become a growing, vibrant movement recognized by the vast majority of Anglicans, though not recognized by the Archbishop of Canterbury.

The denomination has grown by 40 percent in four years.

ARCHBISHOP FOLEY BEACH

By his own admission, Archbishop Beach spent 34 years as an Episcopalian, which included 12 years as an Episcopal priest, before coming to the full realization that he could no longer stay in that denomination. He wrote in 2004, "The Church which taught me to confess and repent of my sins has now embraced and endorsed certain sins which have become culturally accepted. The actions of the 2003 General Convention in approving the consecration of a non-celibate homosexual person to be a bishop in the Church, and its approval of a method by which liturgies may be used for same-sex unions in the Church is the presenting issue of a much deeper theological and moral problem within the Church.

"A revisionist philosophy has overtaken the ethos of the Church which interprets the Scriptures, Church History and Tradition not according to what they actually say, but according to how one is made to feel and in order to be pastorally sensitive. I cannot be a part of such forsaking of Christian teaching and morality.

"To remain in the Episcopal Church is on some level affirming the direction the church has taken whether I agree or not. To remain in the Episcopal Church is to pretend that I am not a participant in this abomination before the Lord."

He concluded saying that to remain in the Episcopal Church would be to knowingly violate his conscience, and that he could not keep his soul intact. "To remain in the Episcopal Church and take communion with those who teach and practice this false teaching would be a clear violation of the Scriptures."

ACNA AND THE ARCHBISHOP OF CANTERBURY

When Justin Welby became the 105th and current Archbishop of Canterbury, it was hoped that as an evangelical following in the Affirming Catholic footsteps of Dr. Rowan Williams, that he might be sympathetic to the ACNA as they are theologically closer to him than either The Episcopal Church or the Anglican Church of Canada whose theological innovations have moved them away from both Scripture and classical Anglicanism. Such has not turned out to be the case.

Following a panicked flight by Canadian Archbishop Fred Hiltz to Welby following his installation, Hiltz urged the new archbishop not to recognize ACNA. Welby apparently agreed not to.

However, in the ecclesiastical gyrations and topsy turvy world that has been the communion since the informal split that saw Primates from the Global South absenting themselves from the last Lambeth Conference, Archbishop Welby took Holy Communion from the hands of ACNA Archbishop Robert Duncan at the cathedral in Nairobi when he briefly made a cameo appearance at GAFCON II in October of last year. The irony should not be missed.

Again this past week he re-echoed his opposition to recognizing ACNA, even as he called for openness to more ecumenical partnerships.

In an interview with the editor of the Church of Ireland Gazette, Canon Ian Ellis, the Archbishop gave his opinion on what defines a church as part of the Anglican Communion, and therefore, by implication, what is critical for Anglican identity.

He said that on his tour around the provinces of the Anglican Communion, he discovered that virtually everywhere the definition of being part of the Anglican Communion is "being in communion with Canterbury." He was surprised to hear this, but undoubtedly glad to hear it.

In a later interview, he insisted that the ACNA is not a part of the Anglican Communion, but a separate church because it is not in communion with Canterbury.

Technically true, but in reality not true. ACNA is a member of the Primates Council of the Global South, all of whose primates are "in communion" with Canterbury.

As Sydney theologian Mark Thompson observed, "This is a gigantic slap in the face to the Primates who represent the vast bulk of practicing Anglicans around the world and who, meeting in London in April 2009, recognized the Anglican Church in North America 'as genuinely Anglican' and called on all Anglican Provinces to "affirm full communion with the ACNA".

The churches that make up this new province are very largely refugees from the Episcopal Church (TEC) and its liberal and extraordinarily litigious Presiding Bishop (Ms. Katherine Jefferts Schori), wrote Thompson.

True. So then who is and who is not an Anglican? In 2009, the Primates, who represent by far the majority of Anglicans worldwide, accepted ACNA as genuinely Anglican. They clearly believe that being "in communion" with Canterbury was not a deciding factor.

If Anglican identity is to be defined by anything, it is those who have remained faithful to the confessional formularies (the 39 Articles and the books of Homilies, the Book of Common Prayer and the Ordinal) or obedient to the Scriptures in matters of theology and Christian discipleship, says Thompson.

Archbishop Welby is playing his hand as a great reconciler, and while that may have worked for him in the secular sphere, it is not working in the ecclesiastical world he has inherited despite his noble intentions.

As Thompson observes, Welby believes in institutional inclusiveness as a more achievable goal than theological agreement and a common commitment to biblical patterns of discipleship. Hence his flip flop on homosexuality. He opposes gay marriage, but is for civil partnerships, but homogenital behavior is still a sexual misbehavior that the Global South will not accept or tolerate, however he parses marriage.

"We must deny categorically and in the strongest possible terms that communion with the see of Canterbury is the determining factor when it comes to Anglican identity. It is not and never can be. A church, diocese or national body does not have to be in communion with the Archbishop of Canterbury in order to be a legitimate member of the Anglican Communion, especially if a majority of other Anglicans around the world recognize it as part of our fellowship. Anglican identity is fundamentally a matter of certain theological commitments, anchored ultimately in the authority of Scripture as God's word written (Article 20), together with an agreement to operate with a common pattern of church government (the threefold order of bishops, priests and deacons)," writes Thompson.

We are a confessional body who subscribe to the Articles, borne in the time of Cranmer and still form the basis of Anglicanism globally.

Archbishop Welby may not recognize ACNA ever, but that will not stop some 3000 Anglicans declaring their faith in the finished work of Christ at the cross and in their Anglican heritage that holds them together and separates them from every other denomination in America. Many were born Episcopalian, but will now die Anglican; they will do so believing in the creeds, the 39 Articles and Holy Scripture which holds it altogether, Welby notwithstanding.

Ties to Canterbury are now little more than respect for the office and not the person. If Welby or any archbishop in the future chooses not to recognize the ACNA, then so be it. God is at work and we are seeing a separation of the wheat from the chaff in Anglicanism. Liberal, progressive, revisionist Anglicanism in North America is slowly withering and dying http://tinyurl.com/pns92fk on the vine and will continue to do so despite TEC's 2020 vision, TREC or any planned institutional fix. They have violated the first order of truth found in Article 34 that nothing can be "ordained against God's word."

On Thursday, joyful hands of 3000 North American Anglicans will rise in triumphant acclamation to hail a new archbishop, to proclaim God's transforming love with a never changing gospel in an ever changing world.

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