Indabamized for Your Protection

Note to Catholic readers: I beg your indulgence.

This is how business will (not) be transacted at what is likely to be the final Lambeth Conference of the Anglican Communion.

At the heart of the Lambeth Conference 2008 are the fifteen indaba groups. After two days of meeting together, each group will be asked to nominate the member of their group whom they believe to be most capable of carrying their views and the fruit of their discussion into the reflections process in a way which expresses the aspirations outlined above. This 'Listener' will then join a Listening Group made up of all the listeners under the chairmanship of Archbishop Roger Herft of Perth, in Western Australia. Working with the summaries of the fruit of indaba arising from each group, it will be their duty to generate a common text which reflects authentically the indaba and is loyal to the considerations set out above.

That text will be tested by the conference through two main routes. First, preliminary drafts of the Reflections document will be circulated to the indaba groups as the work progresses at regular intervals throughout the conference. It will be possible for bishops to respond to the developing text through their listener and the discussions within the indaba groups.

Secondly, on four occasions the Listening Group will meet in open session before any bishop who wishes to attend to invite comment on and response to the developing text. These hearings are an advertised part of the conference programme, and will take place on the Monday, Wednesday, Thursday and Friday of the second week of the Conference.

It is hoped that in this way every bishop attending the conference will be given the opportunity to shape the Reflections document which arise out of the conference. The hope of the Lambeth Design Group is that this process will permit the development of a Reflections Document which will meet the objectives set out for it, and be available on the last day of the conference to be received as an authentic account of the engagement of the bishops together in the service of Christ.

Those of a certain age (en d'autres termes, moi) may recall "encounter groups," "rap sessions" and the like promulgated by high school administrators in the 70s, wishing to impose their will but in the guise of doing so democratically. My classmates and I (who represented a fairly broad range of perceptivity) were always able to see past the hippy-dippy blathering and recognize their words for the manure it was. It did not matter, however, to the cynical administrators we were onto their ruse: they would go through the charade, clap their hands and announce we had arrived, as one, at the same conclusion.

Similarly for the liberal autocrats staging "Lambeth: the Final Episode." They know bishops representing the majority of Anglicans are skipping it. They know those traditionalists who do bother to show will be "indabamized" and ignored. The liberals will blab on for days, issue their "Reflections Document" that calls for more "listening," "engagement," "dialogue" and such; return home, clap their hands and report to their flocks via diocese newsletters and the pulpit the brilliant success that was Lambeth; how it was infused with the Holy Spirit and served as a glorious paradigm of participatory democracy, that all is well.

And just as it has for years, the average Sunday attendance will continue its relentless plunge.