First Things: The Last Stand of Rowan Williams
By Jordan Hylden
Thursday, August 30, 2007

Summer is almost over, which for most of us means putting away the beach umbrella and suntan lotion and getting back to work, however much we dread facing the mountain of paper piled up in our inboxes.

But if you’re one of the many who wishes that the daily grind could be postponed for just a bit longer, it may at least be some small consolation to know that Rowan Williams feels your pain. Although, in his case, it is probably increased by several orders of magnitude—for when he gets back to his drafty old medieval office on the banks of the Thames, he has waiting for him an Anglican Communion that may soon explode into a million tiny pieces. And, what’s worse, it nearly all depends upon him.

Before he left on holiday, Williams had sent out an invitation to next year’s Lambeth Conference, the decennial worldwide gathering of Anglican bishops. It’s an important gathering for Anglicans, even crucial, since it’s the only opportunity that Anglican bishops have to gather as a worldwide body and make decisions about their common life. Williams’ problem is that hardly anybody has written back to tell him they’re coming. In fact lots of bishops (representing about a third of global Anglicanism) have told him that they probably won’t be coming.

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