Anglicans commit to social transformation

For broadcast on 2CH Sydney, 10 Nov 2013.

Five years ago the first Global Anglican Future Conference, or GAFCON, met in Jerusalem with significant support from the Anglican Diocese of Sydney.  A second GAFCON has concluded in Nairobi, Kenya.

With an attendance of 1352, including 30 Anglican Archbishops and 331 bishops, the conference featured wide-ranging discussion on doctrinal issues, marriage and family, Islam, children and youth, women, “gospel and culture,” and theological education.

Delegates reaffirmed the Jerusalem Statement of 2008, including a commitment to call on “all people to work and pray for the building and strengthening of healthy marriages and families,” and to “oppose the secular tide running in favour of cohabitation and same-sex marriage.”

Delegates also pledged “to work for the transformation of society through the gospel” of Jesus Christ, to “repudiate all violence” and to “work for the economic empowerment of those who are deprived,” and to be “a voice for persecuted Christians.”

I’m Rod Benson for the NSW Council of Churches.