Bishop's News from Peru

The Diocese of Peru sends it’s loving greetings and congratulations to the Community of the Holy Cross at Rempstone, Nottingham, for the purchase of their new property, and for being bold and doing the best of things in the worst of times.

The Community at Rempstone prays for us regularly and we are delighted to receive the news of their new home-to-be in Costock. They bought the new property in April and it will take two years for work on it to be completed.

The Rev’d Mother Mary Luke writes about a religious community taking such an adventurous step at a time when numbers in traditional communities are dropping. She tells of an inscription in Staunton Harold Church, Leicestershire, which was built during Cromwell’s time in 1653, which reads: ‘Sir Robert Shirley, Baronet, founded this church, whose singular praise it is to have done the best things in ye worst of times.’

"Jeremiah" she says, "was told to buy a field... just before the people of Judah were taken into captivity, as a sign that the Lord would restore the fortunes of Israel and Judah. She continues, "So we are looking towards the future [and this church's inscription] reminds us that sometimes it is good to be bold. I hope it will be that we have done the best of things in the worst of times and it will be the presage of a new growth in the religious life for us and for the whole Church."

What a wonderful reflection! May God bless the Community.

Please support the Sisters’ building fund: Holy Cross Convent, Ashby Road, Rempstone, Loughborough LE12 6RG, UK

[The photo is of Sisters of the Community praying the Divine Office in one of the barns they have bought.]

The Diocese is blessed to have some modern day "heroes of the faith". Juan Carlos, one of them, working in one of the poorest areas of Lima north, in St Patrick's Mission, Cerro Cachito. He leaves his work at 2.30pm and travels by public transport to be with his people - on one of those "combis" packed with people - a two or three hour journey. Then his real work begins, sharing the love and compassion of Christ in any way he can, visiting homes and running Bible study groups for the families and activities for the children.
It's a mission which lacks funds. They used to run a soup kitchen, but the support came to an end. He told me that he could feed about 70 children every day for less than US$300 per month, and asked if I could help.
Sarah Tester, a SAMS GB missionary, runs a play scheme for the children on Saturdays. There's a photo of her with some of the children on the Outreach page of the new web site. David Gonzales, one of our deacons, works there as well.
There are about 80 people in his congregation, not counting the children, all of whom live in wooden shacks and most of whom don't have enough to eat. It is an area designated by the Government for physically handicapped people, and there are a number who need wheel chairs, almost impossible to push in the sand on which the houses are built.
Besides his work in the mission, Juan Carlos is a seminarian and will finish his studies at the end of this year. He says, "I want to be a priest, but whatever happens, I will go on working with my people."
Pray for him and his future. Pray for the people of the Mission. Pray for Sarah and Deacon David. Pray for the land, that the Council will allow us to stay. And pray that the funds will come in, not only to allow us to start feeding the children again, but also to build the facilities needed to develop the mission.

Anderson Sanchez, Ruben Mancilla and Pastor Zevallos were recently ordained to Holy Orders in the Cathedral. In a joyful ceremony the new ministers - two priests and one deacon - were greeted with applause following the ordination prayer.
For the consecration of the priests, the Bishop was joined by his clergy for the laying on of hands. He also anointed their hands and forehead with the Holy Oil of Chrism, a sign of their being consecrated - set apart - for God's work.

All three were given Bibles, as a sign of their authority to preach the Word of God. (In the photo the newly ordained ministers are kneeling: Padre Anderson is at the far end, Deacon Pastor in the centre receiving his Bible, and Padre Ruben nearest the camera.)

All the ordinands were accompanied by family and friends and the Diocese gave thanks and praise to God for the gift of more workers for His mission field. At the end of the liturgy the new priests gave the blessing, and the new deacon dismissed the people, telling them to go in peace and joy to serve the Lord.

Both new priests presided at the Holy Eucharist for the first time in the days following their ordination.

PASTORAL RESPONSIBILITIES: Padre Anderson will continue to minister in the Cathedral as an assistant priest; Padre Ruben has been posted to Juliaca on the Alteplano (Peru's highland region), near lake Titicaca, as priest in charge of the Mission of St Mary Magdalene; and Deacon Pastor continues as the Deacon of the NGO "Comunion-Peru", responsible for the encouragement and development of social action in the Diocese.

When I arrived in Peru in April 1998, there were 4 Peruvian priests and 1 deacon, looking after 9 congregations . They were helped by two ordained missionaries from overseas, a Canadian and a Cuban-American.
Now there is Anglican worship in 41 congregations, led by 24 priests, 8 deacons and 23 lay ministers; and in our two seminaries there are around 60 seminarians, preparing for the work to which God is calling them.


This amazing growth has come about by an outpouring of God’s grace, for which we praise and thank Him.

Numerical growth must, of course, be matched by growth in faithfulness to Jesus, obedience to the Father's will, and the fruit of the Holy Spirit. As we prepare to push out in new mission, in Ica and Trujillo, it is so very encouraging for us to see that God is preparing His mission team ready for His new work.

If you think God may be calling you to join us and work in Peru, please write or call us, so that we may initiate a discernment process.

If you would like to give financially to support our mission work, please contact Patrick Mackie (UK) or Susan Kerr (USA). Their details are on our NEW web site, www.anglicanchurchperu.serifweb.com, on the SUPPORT page.

More than 15,000 Christians marched to the Congress Building in Lima on June 11th to ask for Religious Equality. Although granted religious freedom by the Constitution, Peru's none Roman Catholics suffer in many ways on a daily basis, and there are no laws to back up their cause. While the Roman Catholic Church receives financial support from the government, other confessions are penalized.

Since the creation of a Register of Non-Catholic Confessions in 2004, things have been changing. A paper is now before Congress' Constitution Committee and following the March on Thursday it has been put in first place for consideration.

It is hoped that it will give other confessions the right to have chaplains in hospitals, schools, prisons and the armed forces; to enable non Roman Catholics to have a religious education other than Catholic; to liberation from taxes; and the right to enter into agreements with the State, for example on issues of education, relief and development. Attitudes will have to change in the country, but there has been a huge step forward.

For example, for us the possibility of the State paying for our school teachers, as happens with the RC Church, would be an enormous benefit.

I have been involved as one of the assessors to the Ministry of Justice on religious matters, specifically the registration of confessions and on the working group which produced the first draft of the proposed legislation.

We are also in the final stages of a new constitution for the Interreligious Committee of Peru, which will provide a forum for all confessions and their NGOs to meet and talk together. Much is already happening, in areas such as the Bible, justice and peace, relief and development, HIV/AIDS, micro-finance, religious dialogue - but this will bring it all together at national level. There are to be three co-presidents of the new body, the Archbishop of Huancayo, the President of the National Evangelical Council of Peru, and me. Let us pray for God's blessing as the new body begins its work.

Amazonas, Peru
The deadly conflict between the Indigenous Peoples of Amazonas and the Peruvian Government has been coming to a head since 2008. President Alan Garcia issued several decrees allowing foreign companies to look for gas and oil on lands specially reserved for Indigenous Peoples. Although 70% of Peru’s rain forests are already designated for exploration, the President's decrees opened up even the lands reserved for the native peoples.

The Indigenous Peoples considered this as an assault on their rights and a betrayal by the Government of its formal commitment before the United Nations. The Government responded with a law which criminalized protests. Many people have been imprisoned and forcibly removed from their lands, and there have been accusations of torture and the ‘disappearance’ of people (killing people and hiding their bodies).

The government defends its decrees, saying that the lands must be opened to attract investment and stimulate the economy. They accuse those working with the Indigenous Peoples of manipulating them on behalf of external powers, like Venezuela and Bolivia.

Talks with the Government have been requested since August 2008, but the situation finally exploded at the beginning of June 2009. For some time the indigenous peoples had blocked rivers and roads used for transporting heavy machinery, and when finally the police tried to disperse the protesters, 22 are said to have died, and 23 police and 9 civilians, and over 100 people have been injured in a fierce and bloody confrontation.... of spears versus rifles.

As news has leaked out it has rocked the country. Local people were called "savages" by Ministers, but finally the Government has had to take a step back and has temporarily suspended the legislation giving rights to the oil and gas companies, to allow talks with the indigenous peoples to take place.

It is very difficult to get a clear picture of what is happening and the Government has denied access to outside observers to see what is really happening. What the crisis clearly shows is the deep divisions in society and the need of a system which offers to its most vulnerable peoples respect for their basic human rights, and their fair and equal treatment as citizens.

In my opinion government centralised in Lima very often fails to value Peru’s unique ethnic and cultural diversity, to neglect the needs and rights of those who have lived here from time immemorial, and to overlook the decimation of its rain forests, which are central to the survival of the planet. There will be progress and change, but a way has to found for it to go forward, with respect and values, and without trampling down the little ones, the vulnerable, and the beauty of God's creation. There must be new vision and a radical change of heart..... Thy kingdom come. Thy will be done.

[Several people asked me for something on this situation in northern Peru.]

The Diocesan Web Site has a new look!

After several years with the yellow background we are moving to a cleaner, simpler look. Not all the pages are ready yet and to begin with some of the content will be the same as before, but now we shall be able to manage it ourselves and have much greater accessibility.

The key to news will be the blogspots and we hope our readers will find them useful to keep up with what's happening.

Some of the photos on the new site are stunning and we are grateful to those who make them available to us. I love the one we have on our home page, which is taken of the church notice board outside St Andrew's Mission in north Lima.

At the same time we are working on a parallel site in Spanish, which will have some things in common, but others which are more suited to the Spanish-speaking world. For example, where many of our English-speaking readers already know what the Anglican Church is, many of our Spanish-speaking readers are looking for more basic information about us, who we are and what we believe, and how we compare with churches they know.

As the old site is still up, the address of the new one has changed and is: www.AnglicanChurchPeru.serifweb.com

With God's blessing for all our readers, Bishop William Godfrey

It was a very great privilege to take part in the recent meeting of the Anglican Consultative Council in Kingston, Jamaica, 2nd - 12th May, 2009, and to share with delegates from Provinces around the world.
Not every thing went the way I had hoped, especially the delay in sending the proposed Anglican Covenant to the Provinces for their decision. But there are very many good things happening in the Communion, and many good men and women working on them, for which I rejoice, and I have come back even more enthused about our Anglican Church and wanting more than ever to serve faithfully our Lord and Saviour.
About the vote on the proposed Covenant, in which I played a part and did my best to find a way through, if all the conservative provinces and bishops who could have attended had been there and cast their votes, the matter would have been decided in favour - the decision was lost by only two votes. When there is a battle to be fought, all must take their part. Despite the decision to delay, I have come away from the meeting believing firmly that the Gospel will prevail and the Covenant will go through, with its important Section 4. The Church is the Bride of Christ and we need have no fear for our future.
[Photo: I presided on Sunday 10th May at the Eucharist in the Cathedral of St Yago (James), Spanish Town, and am in the photo with the Bishop of Kingston, the Priest in charge of the Cathedral, who was chaplain to the meeting of the ACC, and the Bishop of Spain. The Cathedral is the oldest in the Anglican Communion outside England, the building dating back to 1611.]

Representatives of the Mission in Juliaca came to Diocesan Synod on the weekend of 18th April. The lay people were proud to bring their new full time minister, Deacon Ruben Mancilla, and he was proud to bring them..... members of his first parish! At the same time they gathered with Luis Vizcarra, the lay minister who will work with Ruben. He is in the final weeks of his seminary training and will have to travel to Arequipa on a weekly basis for his classes. It's a short five hour journey on the bus and he's full of enthusiam to be working there.
One of the first priorities for the team in Juliaca is to put a water tank on the roof, so that they have a supply of drinking water. A second will be to build a bathroom!
Juliaca is a city of commerce and there are markets everywhere. As soon as the two lay reps. arrived at the synod, they got to work selling chocolate to the other participants and raisning funds to cover their bus fares! They'd travelled over 20 hours to get there and had their first experience of Peru's capital city. Both of them are called Celestina - Heavenly.
It was announced at the synod that Ruben will be ordained priest on 23rd May, so we ask your special prayers for him.

Missions in the north of Lima celebrated Palm Sunday in different ways. None of them have churches, yet, but were able to conmemorate Christ's triumphal entry into Jerusalem with a freshness and vigour which is contagious. Children of the Holy Spirit Mission gathered under a tree for a photo. Padre Stephen and Pastor Zevallos are standing behind them. The children of St Andrew's Mission carried their palms, and Padres Jorge and Jesus, led the celebration of St Matthew's Mission and School.

It is with great joy that we share the news that our dear friend and co-worker in Christ, the Rev Gilberto Porcal, has been elected Suffragan Bishop of Uruguay. Although the election took place on December 12th, the ratification by the Provincial Executive and House of Bishops had to wait until the Provincial meetings in Paraguay in March.
Gilberto came into the Anglican Church a few weeks after our arrival in South America in February 1986. He worked as my assistant in our ministry among street people in Montevideo's Old City and was eventually ordained in 1990, during the visit of the Most Reverend Robert Runcie, the then Archbishop of Canterbury. Several months later Padre Gilberto was sent to work in Salto, where by God's grace he brought to life St Luke's Church, one of the oldest Anglican churches in Latin America. He also founded the mission church of the Holy Spirit, now a parish.
He will make a worthy bishop and his deep faith and spirituality will be a great blessing to the Diocese of Uruguay and the Province. We look forward with great anticipation to his ordination on May 26th, the Feast Day of St Augustine of Canterbury, who was himself a bishop and missionary.

Deacon Ruben Mancilla has moved this week to Juliaca to take up pastoral responsibility in the St Mary Magdalene's Mission. At over 13,000 feet, Juliaca is a thriving market town high on the Alteplano near Puno and Lake Titicaca. It is a far cry from Villa El Salvador in the South of Lima, one of the capital's largest municipal areas in the desert sands of Peru's coast, where Ruben comes from.
He's excited by the challenge and looking forward to being the resident minister the congregation of St Mary Magdalene has been waiting for several years.
He will be joined in July by Luis Vizcarra, one of the seminarians from Arequipa who has travelled the four or five hours to Juliaca most weekends to care for the congregation. He is due to finish his theological studies and ministerial training in July and will go straight to Juliaca to work alongside Deacon Ruben.
Let us pray for these two young men as they give their lives in the service of the Gospel and of our Lord Jesus Christ and his people.

I was greatly honoured to be made a Doctor of Divinty, honoris causa, by Nashotah House Seminary last October, and deeply moved. It was a wonderful occasion at which I was accompanied by my wife Judith and son Matthew, and surrounded by many Nashotah House friends.
The citation at the ceremony finished by saying, "For his dedicated service and leadership, exemplifying the meaning of a "missionary bishop" and his inspiration to generations of priests..." Thank you to you all at Nashotah House, very, very much.
My relationship with Nashotah House has grown over the past few years, with staff and seminarians, and I cannot imagine an award I would rather have. Bishop Jackson Kemper, the first missionary bishop in North America, was the founder of Nashotah House; and Archbishop Michael Ramsey spent some of the happiest moments of his retirement there - both being heroes of the faith for me.
We now look forward to a mission team of students coming to visit us in the Diocese after Easter.

Two of our most devoted missionaries are Father Benjamin and Livia. They began St Andrew's Mission almost two years ago in one of the poorest shanty areas in the north of Lima, and they faithfully visit and care for the people there every day. It takes them two hours by bus from their home in Lima south to get to the mission, and of course two hours back in the evening. Of course the people know they are loved, and the congregation is growing.
They are an example to us all and the smile in the photo is a real image of the love and kindness they bring to their people.
Fr Benjamin was a deacon of the RC Church for many years, but he never lost his sense of calling to the priesthood and was deeply moved when the time came for him to be ordained as an Anglican priest. Livia is working with the women of several areas near St Andrew's, teaching them skills which will enable them to earn their own living. A project has recently been presented to the Mothers' Union in London, which would enable this work to grow, and we all pray for support for the project.