Mark Dawes, Staff Reporter
The Anglican Archbishop of the West Indies, the Most Rev. Drexel Gomez, 68, was in the island earlier this week to
officiate at the consecration and ordination service for Suffragan Bishop of Kingston, the Rt. Rev. Dr. Robert Thompson. The
archbishop is the leader of what he estimates to be 700,000 Anglicans in the Caribbean. Though archbishop for the West Indies, he continues to hold the office of Bishop of the Diocese of the Bahamas. While here, Archbishop Gomez shared with The Gleaner some of his perspectives on a range of issues affecting Anglicans. The following is an edited excerpt of that interview.
GLEANER: Is the Anglican Church in the Caribbean on the incline?
GOMEZ: As you know, the province of the West Indies is divided into eight dioceses ... It is difficult to generalise to describe the situation in each territory. But, I think it is fair to say that numerically over the last decade or so we have been in the decline. There are at least two major factors for that.
First, there is the increase internationally of the Pentecostal movement and the Charismatic movement ... that has had a
serious impact on us.
Secondly, our heritage, our English background, our colonial heritage, has in certain circles become a disincentive for people to associate with us. One of the features of Anglicanism is the sense of order ... and the mood of the time tends to go against that drift.
At the same time, despite the numerical decline, in several of our dioceses we have the positive sign of outreach to the community in education and in terms of lay participation. There is a very strong movement to equip the laity to fulfil their role in the Church.
GLEANER: You have been Archbishop of the West Indies for the past seven years. What have been able to accomplish on your watch? What do you hope to accomplish for the
rest of the time that you are
archbishop?
GOMEZ: We have had a very successful Anglican Congress, which was the first of its kind. We met here in Jamaica in 2000 - the eight Dioceses and 13 persons from each diocese plus the bishops of the region. That was so successful that we will be having another one next year in Barbados. It provided an opportunity for the ordained and the non-ordained to get together to discuss the mission of the church.
We have also had activity in our provincial committees. Our provincial synod which meets every three years. The committees of the synod are becoming far more active. The committees are drawn from the membership of the dioceses.
We also opened a provincial office, i.e., a secretariat in Barbados a couple of years ago to coordinate the work of
the province. In terms of
accomplishment, I would list the opening of the secretariat for
we had been discussing that for about 20 years before we
actually got it implemented.
In terms of challenges for the future, it is a provincial objective to get an increase in the number of persons being trained for the sacred ministry.
GLEANER: With most churches having to share a rector and the general decline in persons enrolling in seminaries to be trained as priests, how do you hope to influence young people to choose the way of the priesthood?
GOMEZ: It will vary from place to place, according to the mood of the society. The
attractiveness of what is going on in the world will make it a disincentive for some persons. A lot of it depends on what
happens in homes. There will be parents, for example, who will discourage young people who may have an interest - who may say 'there is no money in that, there is no money in that, go and look for something that will allow you to enjoy a higher standard of living.'
What we do in The Bahamas is to encourage young people to be around the altar from a very early age. This has contributed immensely to reaching the standard - of staffing churches mainly with Bahamian clergy. (There are 140 Bahamian churches and a rector for each cure. All but four rectors are non-Bahamian. These four are however, Caribbean persons.)
Bishops and other clergy should make their presence felt in youth ministry. This will help to make the ministry more attractive to young people. The priests themselves must model the priesthood to young people.
GLEANER: The Anglican Church in Africa seems to be on the incline while its counterpart in Europe seem to be in decline. What accounts for this?
GOMEZ: Secularism. The biggest factor in European and North American scene is
secularism. As a society becomes more secular there is a strong temptation to remove God out
of the equation and to feel self-
sufficient.
I attended the installation of the new pope and I was speaking to some people who told me that only five to six per cent of the people of Rome go to church on a regular basis. That is the picture in western Europe. People are comfortable with that because they feel they don't need God and they don't need the Church because all of their needs are supplied - the materialism which walks in the wake of secularism is very rife.
In North America, church attendance is still high, but there are signs that there are more people who are not going to church. That group is on the increase. In Canada, the percentage of persons who regularly attend church is much lower than for the U.S.A.
In Africa it is a totally different picture. The Anglican Church and the Roman Catholic Church are very strong in Africa. Evangelism is a ripe field and there is strong commitment evoking participation in evangelism across the board. They have lay people and priests working together and are very active in spreading the gospel. They also have the
challenge of the spread of Islam. I think that helps them to redouble their missionary efforts.
GLEANER: Mr. Archbishop you were a signatory to the Windsor Report, the study commissioned by the Archbishop of Canterbury in the wake of the ordination of the openly homosexual Gene Robinson as Bishop of the Diocese of New Hampshire and the blessing of same-sex unions by sections of the Anglican Church in Canada. Critics of this 2004 report have said the recommendations do not go far enough. Critics say the report is merely a slap on the wrist of errant churches and that the Anglican communion is sacrificing truth to preserve unity. As a member of the team that submitted the report to the Archbishop of Canterbury, how would you respond to these critics?
GOMEZ: We concluded on the basis of who we are and on the basis of our own Anglican self-understanding that the actions of the Church in the United States and the Church in Canada have departed from the Anglican way of doing church. We said it (homosexual behaviour) is not only un-Anglican but contrary to Scripture. In that context we called on the churches involved to express 'regret'. The language was chosen deliberately. Some of us wanted to put 'repent.' But we felt, let us put it in the language that is the lowest common denominator to get response. To express regret and say you won't do it again is very close to what the New Testament calls
repentance. We felt that if we went that way we had a far better chance of evoking a response as opposed to just coming up them and saying repent. We asked them to have a moratorium - not to do it again. And to explain the theological reasons why they acted that way. We are still awaiting those responses. The Church in America will hold its general convention in June of next year and then they will respond formally. The Church in Canada holds their general convention in 2007.
There are many of us who feel homosexual practice is contrary to the teachings of the Bible. In every reference to homosexual practice in the Bible it is condemned. Some people make the mistake and say what we have been fighting is homosexuality. That is not true. Homosexuality has been part of the human condition for centuries. What we are fighting against is the homosexual practice.
GLEANER: Do you think the Anglican Communion will split over the homosexual practice issue?
GOMEZ: I think it is a distinct possibility. I think there are too many hard-liners on the North American scene who are promoting this (homosexual) agenda. I don't detect any significant movement in North America that would
indicate that persons are willing to admit the biblical position is one to be upheld. That's going to be how the rubber hits the road.
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