Author

Maybee, Maylanne (Whittall), 1949-

Material Type

Journal Article

Journal

Ministry Matters

Date

2008 Fall

Volume

14

Issue

1

Page

10-12

Notes

The author, Ecojustice Coordinator for the Anglican Church of Canada, describes her participation in two global Anglican Communion events. In March 2007 she attended "Towards Effective Anglican Mission (TEAM): an International Conference on Prophetic Witness, Social Development, and HIV and AIDS" in Boksburg, South Africa. "In September 2007 I attended a meeting of Anglican Peace and Justice Network (APJN) in the Great Lakes region of Africa, on the theme of post-conflict resolution and reconciliation".

Speaking of the TEAM Conference and the MDGs (Millennium Development Goals) she comments: "I have been a slow convert to the MDGs. They are neither so clearly rooted in our scriptural tradition, nor do they have the same emphasis on God's economy of abundance and sufficiency. They have been criticized for reflecting the approach of people who think they already know the answers, who regard poverty as an engineering problem that needs only a technical solution, who impose their own response to the 'problem' of poor countries." Hellen Wangusa, the Ugandan-born Anglican Observer at the United Nations, addressed the TEAM conference and "reminded us that the Anglican Communion's commitment goes far beyond 2015, and that its mandate is not only to tend to the poor, but also to address the responsibility of the rich. In her wisdom, she understood that the power of the MDGs lies in the fact that that they name distant and abstract realities, making them specific and direct".

At the APJN meeting which took place in both Rwanda and Burundi, participants toured places of remembrance for acts of genocide committed in 1994 and 1997 and heard stories of "courage, witness and reconciliation from [meeting participants from] Uganda, Kenya, the Philippines, and Korea ... In every case, I was deeply impressed by the role of the Anglican church -- a role of social analysis, prophetic witness, of healing, and compassion. The factors that define God's mission are not the same in every place. They do not have a deadline and cannot be quantified or monitored. Hellen Wangusa expressed this recently at an American conference called 'Everyone, everywhere'. She said that to her MDGs have always stood for the 'Mission Driven Goals' of the Anglican church in her part of Africa. These MDGs were the kind that shaped Sunday school and catechism classed, ensuring that 'everyone, everywhere' learned to read and write. These MDGs shaped communities that gave rise to the likes of Archbishop Janani Luwum, Stephen Biko, and Archbishop Desmond Tutu, helping to form them and given them the courage to speak truth to power, and inspire those around them".

Subjects

Towards Effective Anglican Mission (2007 : Boksburg, South Africa)

Millennium Development Goals - Religious aspects - Anglican Communion

Anglican Peace and Justice Network. Meeting (2007 : Rwanda and Burundi)

Missions - Anglican Communion - Congresses

Wangusa, Hellen (Hellen Grace Akwii), 1956-

Rwanda - History - Civil War, 1994

Rwanda - Religious aspects - Anglican Communion

Location

General Synod Archives

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