The first draft of a final statement was read to participants of the Global Anglican Future Conference (GAFCON) in Jerusalem during a plenary session on June 27. Attendees have been asked to study the document and recommend changes.
 
While not in final form, there is already general agreement about a number of points, according to a release by conference organizers. At a Thursday press conference, Archbishop Benjamin Nzimbi of Kenya, chairman of the GAFCON statement committee, said the final communiqué would include the following themes:
  1. There is a passion for the gospel, a determination to stay true to the Bible, to continue the work of mission and to do so as Anglicans.
  2. There is a profound sadness about the current state of the Anglican Communion and a sense of betrayal and abandonment by the exiting leadership and communion structures.
  3. There is a determination to build on the experience of GAFCON and see it become a movement and not simply a moment.
  4. There is recognition that for this movement to continue to develop, it will require an agreed theological framework and appropriate structures to sustain its growth.
  5. There is also agreement that more permanent structures need to be established for those faithful Anglicans who live and serve in provinces that have abandoned the traditional teaching of the Bible.
  6. There is a genuine desire to continue to reach out to other Anglicans around the Communion who share our common faith so that we can grow in our witness to the world of God’s transforming power.
 
Reporting on the preliminary draft and comments from GAFCON leaders, the Church of England Newspaper reports that the final communiqué will likely call for formation of a “church within a church,” in which formal ties with the Archbishop of Canterbury would be maintained while ties with the progressive wings of The Episcopal Church and the Anglican Church of Canada would be severed. The final communiqué may also introduce new instruments of unity unrelated to four existing ones: the Archbishop of Canterbury, the Lambeth Conference, the primates’ meeting and the Anglican Consultative Council.
 

A GAFCON press release notes that the final version of the communiqué is expected to be released late Saturday night. 

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