zimbabwe bishop nolbert kunonga should resign, says botswana bishop

By Trevor Grundy (Episcopal – Life)

September 28, 2007: Bishop Nolbert Kunonga of Harare in Zimbabwe should resign his post following his attempt to withdraw his diocese from the Anglican Communion's Central Africa Province.

This is due to his opposition to the granting of what Kunonga described as "Christian rights" to homosexual Christians, says Botswana Bishop Musonda Trevor Selwyn Mwamba.

Speaking from his office in Gaborone, Mwamba told Ecumenical News International: "The decision taken by the Bishop of Harare is tantamount to a schism. The next logical step is for the Bishop of Harare to resign."

Mwamba added: "The See of the diocese of Harare will then be declared vacant and a new bishop elected to replace Kunonga. The schismatic group should not be under any illusion in thinking that they have title to the properties and various trusts legally vested in the diocese of Harare."

On September 8, Kunonga proposed a resolution at a synod of the Anglican Church of Central Africa held in Malawi that the Harare diocese should withdraw because some of the synod's bishops supported full "Christian rights" for homosexual people.

"What a shock it was for most delegates, who until then believed that all the bishops, clergy and laity in the province were of one mind on the issue of homosexuality, namely, that the province holds to the Lambeth Conference resolution ... which calls for a listening process, dialogue and reconciliation," Mwamba said.

Mwamba noted that the issue of homosexuality raised at the Malawi synod was "simply a cover for the real underlying issue: a quest for personal power."

He added, "The vicious slander that was being spread to tarnish the reputations of some bishops in the province was and is intended to ensure that when the electoral college meets to elect the next archbishop of Central Africa, these bishops will stand little chance of success."

A statement by Kunonga in the State-controlled Herald newspaper in Harare on September 15 that said Mwamba is "an avowed homosexual" was libellous, said the Botswana bishop. He said that in an interview in the Herald, Kunonga was quoted saying that Zimbabwe's eastern diocese of Manicaland supported his plan to withdraw Harare from the Central Province, a claim denied by the Rev. Eston Dickson Pembamoyo, provincial secretary of the Church of the Province of Central Africa