An Exclusive Interview with Bishop John Chane of the Diocese of Washington

The Good Hope spoke to Bishop John Chane during his visit to Cape Town in November. He spoke of his vision for the partner relationship between the two Dioceses as well as the future of Christianity and the importance of Africa.

Miles Giljam: It’s obviously been a very whirlwind tour. What are your first impressions of Cape Town and South Africa?

Bishop John Chane: The city of Cape Town is what I think I expected it to be, because we went through a series of significant briefings before we came. Everybody said that it was one of the most beautiful cities you will visit, ever anywhere and that it will fool you because when you come to it, it will show you what appears to be great wealth and a pretty static infrastructure. So we were well prepared to engage CT. I was also pretty much aware of the poverty that surrounds the immediate area of Cape Town. In many ways it just reflects the poverty that exists in what we as the first world arrogantly call the third world.

MG: You can obviously be briefed about poverty, but did the briefings adequately prepare you for the sight of all the shacks as you came over the bridge from the airport?

JC: The briefings certainly didn’t, but having served in Santiago and having done a lot of work in California and Mexico, its not surprising to see that as part of the growth of a new city. In so many ways Cape Town is both an old and a very new city. It’s not easy to see though. It’s painful. Then to drive out of Cape Town and to do some of the touring that we did and to drive by elegant horse farms and homes that by any standards would be multi multi million dollar homes, recognising that the horses may be better cared for than many of the people who live on the edges of the city and in the country and in the broad rural sections of the Diocese. It’s hard to figure out, but at the same time we have the same conditions in the United States. Poverty is poverty wherever it exists and poverty tends to be ghettoised. And so for me to speak about poverty I have to address it from my own countries perspective because we haven’t done a very good job either in addressing it. My country needs to put as much energy and money into the war on poverty as it is putting into the war on terrorism. If we make that commitment to human growth and development then we are able to partner with other countries and especially South Africa and the continent of Africa. I certainly believe that this is where the global future of the world is going to take place.

MG: When you say the global future, are you thinking that something new is coming out of Africa?

JC: There is a book that was written by an English Scholar on the faculty of Penn State University, his name is Dr Phillip Jenkins, and the book is called “Christianity for the 21st Century”. It is an interesting book and everybody ought it read it at least to better understand where the growth of Christianity will be in this millenium and the kind of growth that will be experienced in Christianity and within Islam and the impact that that will have on the political stability of countries and continents. It also is a wake up call for those of us who in a sense represent European theology; to recognise that what we call the southern church is where the action is going to be in the future. We need to not only understand it but we also need to engage in it.

MG: One of the aims of this trip was to create a bond between our two Dioceses. Do you feel that the north and south will be able to get over our differences in culture and theology to be able to work together? What will we need to do to be able to do that?

JC: We had some very good conversations about that with the Archbishop. My country, and my church, has been almost anesthetized by inter-Nicene conflict over theological and biblical interpretation. I think [Anglicans] around the world believe us to spend a lot of time talking about sex, which in fact is not true. But it seems to be the focus of how we are seen by the larger communion. We have absolutely got to find a way in which we can respectfully disagree with one another and respect each others cultures and then through that respectfulness claim that disagreement as dissonance. I like to think of it as if you have an orchestra of 110 pieces, if you just play the part of oboe or French horn by itself, it may not be the most pleasant thing in the world. So there’s that dissonance. But if all those instruments in the orchestra play at one time the differences become united into a common sound which is pleasing and which makes wonderfully beautiful music. We have got to find that place where we can respect each other and also live, with a sense, the dissonance and work towards that time when we can be engaged together and working on that common objective which is living into the very clear and concise directives of the gospel. We can disagree about Biblical theology all we want. We are never going to agree on who has the correct take on the interpretation of scripture. It is just the nature of who we are and the cultures that define who we are. What we cannot disagree about are the clear teachings of Jesus Christ. Those just aren’t open for interpretation. Those teachings are very hard, but if our communion really took seriously the teachings of Jesus and less seriously our desire to be right about what we think Holy Scripture means then I think we can move beyond dissonance into a place of great harmony. I think that’s what has to happen right here. I have talked to a number of Bishop’s outside of South Africa, both bishops from Africa and elsewhere, asking them to consider being respectful of our culture and our cultural differences if we in fact will be respectful of the cultural differences that exist in Africa and elsewhere. If we can’t do that we are not going to be able to engage these huge problems that destroy the creation of God.

MG: Where do you see our major common vision in the relationship at the moment?

JC: I think first of all you have to look at leadership. I think leadership is the key. Njongonkulu has emerged, at least within the communion, and I have been talking to President Wolfenson [President of the World Bank] and others in government, as a key player in raising the consciousness of this continent and more importantly the consciousness of the world in addressing the issues in Africa which are literally destroying the creation. So this part of the world has lifted up great leaders, most of whom have come out of the Apartheid experience and its that spirit of leadership that must now drive the unity of the communion in ways that we have not really thought about before. And that leadership has to have great vision. And I think that the Archbishop has great vision. In our country we are in the same position. We are critisised for not having utilised our resources to engage the larger communion. So what we hope is that from this relationship will emerge strong leadership that will engage the Anglican communion, the Episcopal church of the USA and the Diocese of Cape Town and will begin to live into the mandate of Jesus Christ

MG: You mentioned resources. Do you see resources as the greatest gift that you can give to Africa, or do you think that there is something greater than that?

JC: I think it is much greater than that. This is not the Marshall plan. It is trying to learn from the experience of South Africa, how the church can live with so little and yet achieve so much. When one thinks of the things we have in the US and what we complain about not having, the incongruity of that is absolutely insane! I think what we see is a common vision to work for a global economy, for instance, that does not demean the human condition and does not denude the environment. We both need to work together for a vision of a world that is not divided by violence and war. I say those things, although we have heard them before, we are at a point or a convergence where the world has to make some decisions about where it’s going to move forward. I don’t believe that governments, politicians or diplomats are going to be able to solve the problems that demean and destroy the creatures of God, whether its in the middle east or Northern Africa or where ever it is. The changes that have to occur that will redeem God’s people are changes of the heart. They don’t come from political process or action although the church has to be engaged in it. And I think that this is the great gift that the church in Sa has. It has that sense of change based not only on political involvement, if you will, but also from a change of heart. And I think that might come from Apartheid. When one looks at what happened here at this country how could that change have occurred as dramatically as it did, even with outside forces impacting on it. It was a unique change and I believe that it was a change of the Spirit, a change of the heart. It is a great gift that this country has to offer. It also presents great problems. But I really believe that from an economic point of view, and I know that Jim Wolfenson, President of the World Bank, agrees, that if South Africa does not make it in the sense of being able to define developed infrastructures in its major cities, then the world isn’t going to make it. The very future of this planet rests here with what is happening in this country.

MG: So we are a microcosm of what is happening elsewhere?

JC: Absolutely. And I’m not sure that the people of South Africa know that. As an outsider, I said in the Cathedral this morning, “Do you realise the responsibility that has been placed upon you as a Diocese and as a people”. It is a great responsibility and for what every reason you have been asked to bare that and you have been asked to be a leader in that, and we in convergence would like to be your partners. But you have to call the shots, you have to be the ones who name the names and point the direction and then we will follow.

MG: What has been the highlight of your trip here so far?

JC: The people. Unbelievable spirit, unbroken by poverty, unbroken by disease, unbroken by theological differences, unbroken by race or race division. It’s amazing. I don’t think that we were taken to specific sites where that is the case. That is truly unique. That is a great gift. We could talk about places and events and things that we’ve seen, but wherever I’ve been that is the great gift of your church, its people.

MG: What was the lowest moment?

JC: I’m not sure that there was a low moment.

It was at St James Soweto, we had had evening song, which is somewhat different to our evening song, and then we had a community dinner and a lot of wine and great food and then the dancing and the singing started. Then dancing went on and the singing continued. I realised that the church I grew up in, in the United States in not representative of where the world is today. That sounds like a harsh comment because there was so much joy though in the loves of those people, who have so much less than we do. It was to say how blessed we are and how fortunate we are, but how selfish we are not to be able to understand that! How poor in soul and spirit we are and we think we have a great culture and country and we do, but from the churches perspective we are in so many ways poorer in spirit.

MG: Do you have a hope that this relationship will expose your Diocese to that sort of attitude to life?

JC: I pray so and I think when the Archbishop and I met last May before my consecration and I met him for the first time I immediately took a liking to him because he made no bones about who he was, who the diocese was, and where his vision for the diocese, Africa and the communion was going. But he did it in such a way to engage our relationship so that it would be a partnership and not a companion relationship. I think a companion relationship to my way of thinking is somewhat colonial. A partnership means that we stand together, we walk together, we bleed together, walk the walk together, share resources together - we don’t just do the nice things anymore. We deal with the messiness that exists within each one of our lives and I think that is a big shift from what we used to talk about in terms of companion relationships. This is not going to be a companion relationship; and he and I have been very clear about that in our conversations with one another.

MG: So where do we go from here - that will take very strong leaders?

JC: Well first I think that we have got to preach the gospel. And we also need to be able to share information with people back home that too often is overwhelming. Whether we are talking about pandemic disease or poverty or cultural diversity, we have to deal with those issues in our own country and they are certainly complex. We also tend to be somewhat complacent. So my role is to be utterly unflappable wherever I go in speaking about the importance if this relationship, the importance that it has in what I call the development of the global community and the importance that is has in bringing together a very broken Anglican communion. And we are a very broken Anglican Communion. That piece is as important dealing with the whole issue of pandemic disease and poverty. If it is not going to happen here and we can’t partnership here then I’m not sure where it’s going to happen. Simply because of all the things that bring South Africa into a place of prominence. So it’s like this is the crossroads of the new millenium.

MG: Structurally what is the road you are going to take when you get home now?

JC: It is going to take a lot of money and so we are going to do three things:

One is to begin to share some technical resources and clearly those resources are those resources requested by the [Cape Town] diocese. We have resource people in the Diocese of Washington who we are willing to send over here to work on one of the concerns you have, being able to hook all the congregations up so that you’re online. That means equipment and some technological presence to get that done. Another thing is to help with however the diocese wishes to structure and maintain a very current and evolving website which not only connects the diocese to the diocese, but the wider church to this diocese. That is really important.

Another thing is to start looking at the common issues we have that are prominent in this diocese and in Washington and beyond. They are ministry to young people, college students, women’s issues, domestic violence, violence against children, these are issues that are not separated by the ocean or by our cultures. They are real and they are painful.

The other is to be in partnership with this diocese so that the American church can begin to partner with this diocese. My Bishop [Presiding Bishop Frank Griswold] has really tried to put the onus on the Diocese of Washington to be the leader. The other thing is to set up a foundation for South Africa. We aren’t setting up a companion relationship, but we are setting up a partnership, with a partnership committee. We also set up a foundation for South Africa who’s sole intent is to raise money. People will not give money to the Episcopal Church. People who aren’t Episcopalians won’t give money but they will give us money for issues that affect the global community. What better way to acquire that money than to go out and preach it and seek it for what are significant issues that affect the lives of people here in this country. So we are going to do that.

The other thing is to keep this close people to people contact. If we loose that and kind of stay in email contact, once the relationship is gone all you have left is the formality of the relationship. And so that means we have to find ways to make it possible for us to exchange people. For example I’d love to bring you over some time. We don’t do communications that well in the Diocese of Washington. But to look at that and what your vision is and how you work in the Diocese. In Washington we have to be very aggressive because we have to be responsible to legislation all the time. We have a government office that works in Washington that represents the Episcopal Church with a small staff of five. But they keep us abreast of legislation that not only affects the Episcopal Church but Africa, in particular South Africa. So they have been very helpful to us. So Communications is another key.

Another piece is working more directly with the Bishops in Africa. When the Archbishop came to Washington in May he wanted to develop a relationship so that we could work on educational issues and possibly build bridges that have separated the American church from the African Anglican Church. I’ve been seen as a liberal or even a revisionist or even lots of other bad words. But at the same time in Washington we have been able to work with the most conservative elements of our church without having them simply walk away from the table. I think that comes from taking a tremendous amount of time being patient listeners respectful of our differences and honouring those differences as real. We are always coming back to that central point, which is what we are supposed to be about anyway. We are supposed to be about the gospel of Jesus Christ.

MG: What have you learnt that you are going to take away from here?

JC: That anything is possible. That human spirit is far more powerful and far more resilient than any pandemic, than any political unrest or any level of poverty that would wish to drive it into the ground. That the human spirit that exists in this part of the world cannot be crushed, and as a Christian I base that on people’s faithfullness to God and their understanding of their place in the gospel. That is a great learning, at least it is for me.

MG: Thank you very much.

JC: You’re very welcome. Thank you Miles.

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