Perhaps one of the greatest privileges of being part of the Compass Rose Society is the annual opportunity to be in the presence of Rowan Williams and to absorb the gentle grace, sharp wit, and tested faith he brings to the office of Archbishop of Canterbury. One just gets the sense he was born for such a time as this and that his name will be writ large in the future annals of Anglican Church history. That he would humbly if not vigorously resist such a high sentiment says something about his widespread appeal.
I want to briefly share a few gems from the presentation he gave the Society regarding the recent Lambeth Conference, but I want first to refer to the opening address he gave at that conference last July. In the address, Rowan refers to Galatians 1:16 where St. Paul speaks of the God ‘. . .who set me apart from birth, called me by his grace, and was pleased to reveal his Son in me.’ “Everything starts here,” Rowan writes, “because every calling—every vocation in the Church of God—is a calling to be a place where God’s Son is revealed.”
Rowan asks that we think with gratitude of those situations and persons in whom we have seen “something of that vision of the end, the purpose, where all things are going, those rather rare human faces where you can say, ‘That’s what it’s about: that’s what I pray I shall grow towards; that is the image of God.” In personal terms, Rowan goes on to say that the moments he has most deeply felt himself to be judged by the Gospel have not on the whole been moments when someone has told him how wrong he is. They are rather, “those moments when I have seen such an abundance of love and generosity in someone else that I know how far away I am, and how much I must change.”
Now that’s an eloquent description for me of the kind of realism and faith that I, and I am sure countless others, experience in the presence of Rowan as Archbishop and as fellow traveler on the way of Jesus. There is in Rowan joyful recognition of the transforming power of the Gospel and at the same time a recognition of the Gospel’s judgment and demand. Rowan inspires his listeners to grow, to go deeper, to have hope in the surprising future of God’s full world—just the kind of leader we need for such a time as this.
More from Rowan’s presentation tomorrow.
