More Waging Reconciliation

BREAKING: JI Packer threatened with suspension
Author: Michael Daley

28 FEB

As evidence of the escalating crisis in the global Anglican Communion,
today one of the of the world’s most esteemed Christian theologians, Dr.
J.I. Packer, received a letter threatening suspension from ministry by the
controversial Bishop of New Westminster, Michael Ingham. Bishop Ingham
accused Dr. Packer, hailed by Time Magazine as the "doctrinal Solomon" of
Christian thinkers, "to have abandoned the exercise of ministry"after the
church where he is a member voted to separate from the diocese and join
the Anglican Province of the Southern Cone under the oversight of Anglican
Archbishop Gregory Venables. Dr. Packer, who was ordained in the Church
of England, is the author of the Christian classic, "Knowing God," and
joined Billy Graham and Richard John Neuhaus as one of Time Magazine’s 25
most influential evangelicals in 2005.

Dr. Packer, who received his theological education at Wycliffe Hall, Oxford,
was ordained a deacon (1952) and priest (1953) in the Church of England.
He was Assistant Curate of Harborne Heath in Birmingham 1952-54 and
Lecturer at Tyndale Hall, Bristol 1955-61. He was Librarian of Latimer House, Oxford
1961-62 and Principal 1962-69. In 1970 he became Principal of Tyndale Hall,
Bristol, and from 1971 until 1979 he was Associate Prinicipal of Trinity
College, Bristol. In addition to his published works, he has served as
general editor for the English Standard Version of the Bible. He currently
serves as the Board of Governors’ Professor of Theology at Regent
College in Vancouver, British Columbia. He will be 82 in July.