David Ould reports from the first day of the GAFCON III Conference in Jerusalem

It’s day G-1 here in Jerusalem and we’re all getting very excited about #GAFCON2018 which begins tomorrow morning! The hotels are full and the venue is in the last stages of preparation. I’ve spent the morning here as part of the livestream team, getting all the final things lined up. We’re looking forward to streaming 8 hours of content each day covering what is, without a doubt, the largest and most comprehensive global gathering of Anglicans ever assembled. Tomorrow we’re going to have almost 2,000 delegates (bishops, clergy and lay), representing the vast majority of the Anglican Communion, meeting for 5 days.

It’s a huge event (indeed the biggest the Anglican Communion has ever seen) but somebody seems to have lost the memo. If you go to the website of the Anglican Communion News Service there is no mention of it. Zero. Nada.

What they do have is a piece about the “excitement” of Lambeth 2020. That’s right, a feature article about the conference of bishops that’s going to happen in more than 2 years; a conference that it’s more than likely will not have bishops from all the largest provinces in the Communion.

But nothing’s there about GAFCON. A more cynical man than me might suggest that there’s a certain element of denial there…