The appointment of Cherry Vann, Bishop of Monmouth, as the new Archbishop of Wales has come as a disappointment to many of the faithful followers of Jesus who remain in the Church in Wales. They had hoped and prayed for a leader of the church who would at least be orthodox in Christian belief and lifestyle. The role of a bishop and an archbishop is to teach the Bible and to seek to live an exemplary lifestyle in the light of it. Cherry Vann, as a person in a civil partnership with another woman, has chosen an alternative path which disqualifies her from both roles.
Sadly for many who have already left the Church in Wales, this appointment does not come as a surprise. We have no interest in commenting on or criticising Bishop Cherry as a person, by all accounts she is extremely competent. Nor are we highlighting her gender as a problem. Faithful Anglicans take different views among themselves on the ordination and even consecration of women.
The issue is that Bishop Cherry, from her teaching and lifestyle, has shown consistently that she holds to a different understanding of the Christian faith from that held by faithful Anglicans down the ages. Her understanding is aligned, not with the Bible and the agreed teaching of the church according to the historic Anglican formularies, but with the prevailing ethos and worldview of progressive secularism. Her appointment once again signals clearly that the Church in Wales leadership is confused and has no confidence in the clear moral guidance which the Bible gives to us, and as a result the denomination can only continue to decline, as well as strain and damage relations with much of global Anglicanism.
To those dismayed by this appointment within the Church in Wales, and to those who have already left the church as a result of the decades-long drift away from the gospel in Canterbury-aligned Anglicanism, we want to emphasise: the choice is not a binary one between liberal, humanistic Anglicanism represented by the appointment of Ms Vann, and Bible-believing churches of other denominations.
With the formation of the Anglican Network in Europe (ANiE), under the auspices of Gafcon, the global renewal movement of faithful Anglicans, it is possible to remain Anglican without being in the Church in Wales. Our Diocese which operates in Wales, called Anglican Convocation in Europe (ACE), is offering a warm welcome to individuals and fellowships who can no longer be part of the CiW but wish to retain connection with our denominational heritage, and the vibrant and growing Anglicanism found in many regions around the world.
The Chairman of Gafcon, Archbishop Laurent Mbanda, has made also statement in which he says “we cannot sit on our hands and let this apostasy continue. We must take a stand”. Read more here: https://gafcon.org/communique-updates/archbishop-of-wales-election-shatters-the-communion/