Australian evangelicals: new Anglican home

GAFCON Australia is planning a new Diocese for Anglicans who feel they have to leave their existing denominational home.

In November 2020 the Appellate Tribunal of the Anglican Church of Australia (ACA) found no canonical objection to the Diocese of Wangaratta continuing services of blessing for same-sex unions. It used similar reasoning as the Church of England project Living in Love and Faith (LLF) – that theologians are divided over what Scripture says, and that sexuality is not central to the Christian faith.

In doing so, the Appellate Tribunal declined to follow advice they had requested from … the House of Bishops and the Board of Assessors … (who) unanimously affirmed the historic and Biblical teaching on personal sexual ethics’. The Tribunal, GAFCON claimed, relied upon a disputed definition of the meaning of ‘doctrine’ rather than on a wholehearted and glad embrace of the life-giving word of God.