Reports of Lambeth's demise greatly exaggerated

It has been reported and repeated on Anglican blogs and websites over the last couple of weeks that the anticipated 2018 Lambeth Conference was cancelled.  This rumor began with an interview with the Presiding Bishop of the US Episcopal Church who said as much.  It seems Presiding Bishop Katherine has not got things quite right.

HERE is an article with excerpts from an interview with the Archbishop of Canterbury, Justin Welby, stating emphatically that the event was not cancelled - how could it be, since it has not even been called yet, no date was ever set, and no invitations have been sent - but that he would decide in conjunction with the other primates (presiding bishops and archbishops of Anglicanism's nearly 40 provinces) when and where to hold the next Lambeth Conference, rather than unilaterally controlling the schedule and the agenda as if he were an "Anglican pope."
The previous Archbishop's tight control over the agenda at Lambeth 2008 ensured that the Conference would make no major decisions and, as a result, a large portion of the world's Anglican bishops declined to even attend (a very costly enterprise for many from poorer nations).

The second part of this same interview also addresses a report that had emerged recently that Justin Welby was actually an agnostic.  When you read the full context of what the Archbishop said after he said "Yes" to the question, "Have you ever had doubts?" then the idea that the reported could turn around and report that Welby was agnostic is quite ridiculous; and that this reporter did so (and that other news outlets picked the story up and repeated it) will reinforce once again how the secular press often is either deliberately mis-representing someone's words for the sake of a "juicier story" or simply having no idea what theological and philosophical categories (like 'agnostic') actually even mean.

As the saying goes, "the press...just doesn't get religion..."  The saying has certainly proved true in this instance, and raises the whole question of responsible journalism since there will be folks who will read that headline about Canterbury being an agnostic, and that is what they will believe for life - and it may even affect decisions like whether they would ever consider attending an Anglican Church.

In fact, when Welby speaks of the tough - sometimes angry - questions hurled at God's feet by the Psalmists, when he speaks of asking "Why?" in the face of losing a child, yet still finding God to be faithful, what Welby actually upholds is a Biblically-grounded and moving account of a grown-up faith that lives in the real (very fallen) world and can ask the hard questions that come with that.