"I loved every minute of it. The drama of the actual installation complete with a powder-wigged Nigerian judge administering instructions for ministry to American Bishop Martyn Minns with Nigerian Primate Peter Akinola looking on, overseeing the whole occasion, was both authoritative and solemn. I was deeply moved," he told VOL.

"The truth that was visible and echoed through the room was the real face of Anglicanism - Black, Charismatic/Pentecostal, filled with and celebrating the presence of God and his gift of grace."

With all the nastiness he has gone through and is continuing to go through with the Bishop of Colorado, with the lies and allegations he has had to face, this was a moment of true rejoicing for the feisty evangelical priest. "I was among 1,000, mostly Black African faces with women in colorful head dresses, beautiful, awesome music, dancing Primates and a leader who has an almost rock star celebrity like status among his people both here and in Nigeria -- this is the true face of the Nigerian Church in the United States now reaching out to others while protecting their American brothers and sisters from the false teaching of the Episcopal church and its heretic leader," says Armstrong.

Mostly Nigerians are in CANA - the Convocation of Anglicans in North America. Instead of white liberals using blacks to make conservatives feel unworthy, this was unity in truth, neither black nor white, Jew nor Greek, simply God's children enraptured with God's loving salvation and spending an afternoon glorying in his power, commented Armstrong.

For Armstrong it felt like old home week--a who's who in the fight for orthodoxy.

Although Archbishop Akinola was supposed to have preached, Bishop Minns did the honors and delivered the sermon. Armstrong said that "Bishop Minns is a dynamic and dramatic preacher and made clear that CANA would not be about moving forward by driving with one eye in the rear view mirror fighting old battles with a beleagured and failing TEC, but that CANA would about a radical inclusivity, that everyone was welcome, but that no one would remain unchanged--a gospel of transformation--this is a church that plans to be about its about its Father business, about Jesus and his resurrection."

When Archbishop Akinola handed the pastoral staff to Bishop Minns on the stage and asked him to show himself as "a true apostle of Christ" Armstrong was elated with a sense of relef, saying, "In The Episcopal Church you feel the spiritual drain literally sucking the life of Christ right out of you--but here the drain was plugged and you were filled to over flowing. It was one of the most spiritually powerful events I have experienced since being ordained nearly 30 years ago into a church that has been in conflict and struggle ever since."

CANA is not in conflict, it is about the Lord's business and he will bless it, of that I am absolutely certain, says Armstrong, who must return to a still uncertain legal future even though he has now left The Episcopal Church to become part of CANA.

"How could one not be impressed with more than 1,000 people cheering and clapping when Archbishop Akinola handed Bishop Minns his gold crozier -- symbolizing the office of bishop," continued Armstrong. "This is unlike anything I have attended in all my years of ministry there is no Episcopal Church parallel. Here Jesus was real, in Episcopal consecrations it is about form and ritual with little or no spiritual life. Here there was life abundant."

The event was made more poignant by the knowledge that at the eleventh hour, even as Akinola's plane was touching down on U.S. soil, the head of the Anglican Communion, Dr. Rowan Williams made a last minute appeal for Akinola not to go ahead and preside at the ceremony. Akinola ignored it. Neither the African archbishop nor Minns made mention of the letter in the service.

Clearly irked by the letter, Archbishop Akinola responded the next day in a letter to Rowan Williams http://tinyurl.com/ypvgpq Akinola told the Anglican leader that we are a deeply divided Communion. "As leaders of the Communion we have all spent enormous amounts of time, traveled huge distances - sometimes at great risk, and expended much needed financial resources in endless meetings, communiques and reports - Lambeth Palace 2003, Dromantine 2005, Nottingham 2006 and Dar es Salaam 2007. We have developed numerous proposals, established various task forces and yet the division has only deepened. The decisions, actions, defiance and continuing intransigence of The Episcopal Church are at the heart of our crisis."

Akinola said many ways have been sought to respond to the situation. "As you well know the Church of Nigeria established CANA as a way for Nigerian congregations and other alienated Anglicans in North America to stay in the Communion. This is not something that brings any advantage to us - neither financial nor political. We have actually found it to be a very costly initiative and yet we believe that we have no other choice if we are to remain faithful to the gospel mandate. As I stated to you, and all of the primates in Dar es Salaam, although CANA is an initiative of the Church of Nigeria - and therefore a bona fide branch of the Communion - we have no desire to cling to it. CANA is for the Communion and we are more than happy to surrender it to the Communion once the conditions that prompted our division have been overturned."

Akinola commented that he and Minns had sought to respond in a measured way. "We delayed the election of our first CANA bishop until after General Convention 2006 to give The Episcopal Church every opportunity to embrace the recommendations of the Windsor report - to no avail. At the last meeting of the Church of Nigeria House of Bishops we deferred a decision regarding the election of additional suffragans for CANA out of respect for the Dar es Salaam process. Sadly we have seen no such respect from the House of Bishops of The Episcopal Church. Their most recent statement was both insulting and condescending and makes very clear that they have no intention of listening to the voice of the rest of the Communion. They are determined to pursue their own unbiblical agenda and exacerbate our current divisions."

Akinola went on to say that in the middle of all of this the Lord's name has been dishonored. "If we fail to act, many will be lost to the church and thousands of souls will be imperiled. This we cannot and will not allow to happen. It is imperative that we continue to protect those at most risk while we seek a way forward that will offer hope for the future of our beleaguered Communion. It is to this vision that we in the Church of Nigeria and CANA remain committed."

END