Last week, IRD’s Barton Gingerich had the opportunity to sit down with the Rt. Rev. David Hicks, bishop of the Diocese of the Northeast and Mid-Atlantic of the Reformed Episcopal Church (REC). This is Part 2 of a two-part series.
IRD: Attendees and speakers dealt at length with Islam. What are some important highlights for American Anglicans to keep in mind?
BDH: I didn’t have the opportunity to attend the mini-conference on Islam, although I’ve heard Michael Nazir-Ali and Patrick Sookhdeo speak on these topics before. Here’s another area where I believe the western church is able to learn from our brothers and sisters in the Global South. They deal with Islam on a daily basis. This is something new to us. Not that Islam has not been here; it has been for quite a while. But we’re now at the point where it’s noticeable force within our society and Christians in the West are grappling with how do we interact and how do we live in a culture in which Islam has a significant presence.
From the discussions that I have had and the interaction on some level at GAFCON, I think the important thing for us to recognize is that Jesus loves Muslims. And it’s very easy for us to take an adversarial role and, because of violent acts that have been perpetrated by certain segments of the Islamic community, we may want to look at Muslims as the enemy and not see them as people who need to hear the Gospel and who need to shown the love of Christ.
There was one interesting story at GAFCON about a church in Pakistan that was being threatened by a Muslim group. And the Muslim people in the community formed a human chain around the church to indicate that, if something was going to be done to the church, that these particularly violent people needed to go through the Muslim citizens of the community around that church. I think that says something about the way that Christian community was able to interact with its larger context that it had gained the respect of the average Muslim person in the town so that they felt a sense of solidarity with the Christians in speaking against the violent acts that were taking place. Had the Christian community there taken an adversarial position with Islam as a whole, I don’t think that respect would have been there. The testimony, obviously, was very clear and was something very becoming to those who professed to follow Jesus.
IRD: As an episcopal leader at GAFCON, what notable decisions and discussions did you and your brother bishops have that you can share with us?
BDH: The main discussion is around the issue of how GAFCON moves forward. As I said earlier, the first GAFCON was a response to a crisis, particularly the North American crisis and how was the Global South going to show support and solidarity with that part Anglicanism in North America that was true the Gospel and its way of life. That crisis has passed. There is a province in North America now. Now, granted, we have things we need to work out. It’s not all smooth sailing, but nevertheless, these are internal matters that we are capable of handling and resolving ourselves. But the issue of “Is there going to be a province in North America?” has been settled.
So the question now remains, “How does that support continue?” and then, “What about other parts of the western church that are facing similar issues and a similar crisis that we have dealt with here in North America?” And so the bishops have determined that we need to be more organized as an entity, to be more thoughtful and purposeful in how we respond to the issues in the western church. And so the bishops decided that the primates of GAFCON would take a more organized and more purposeful role in providing support and encouragement to other parts of the globe in which help may be needed. In particular, the situation in England is in the mind of the bishops. And so they supported the formation of the Anglican Mission in England, which is a mission that seeks to remain within the Church of England but nevertheless provides support for those who are in tune with the GAFCON message and Jerusalem declaration.
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