New Bishop of Bangor

[yrieithydd]

Well after the rumours about Jeffrey John, they've gone in a completely different direction!

Andy John is evangelical and married with 4 kids who are I think between 11 and 19 or so. He was a good vicar and very cheery. Not quite sure I can see him as a bishop though.

Comments

[curig.livejournal.com]

That Andy John? Good grief. An interesting choice after recent events in the Diocese of St David's.

[yrieithydd.livejournal.com]

Yup. That Andy John. There's a picture of him now on the link I posted which has been expanded since they posted it. But the Geography dept of the BBC has gone barmy -- it says 'Mr John grew up in Aberystwyth, Powys.' Did you know you'd grown up in Powys?

[curig.livejournal.com]

They're going crazy with counties at the moment because the postcode databases have recently caught up with the idea we're not Dyfed anymore, but they assume that means we're all Carmarthenshire or Pembrokeshire or whatever, but I've never seen Powys down before!

[yrieithydd.livejournal.com]

It is an interesting one! SY = Powys obviously.

I do remember filling in a HC1 form in my first year and giving my county as Ceredigion and getting back saying Dyfed because their systems hadn't caught up.

Still failing to see Andy John as a bishop. But maybe that says something about my ideas about bishops and them being serious.

[ex-robhu.livejournal.com]

What happened at the Diocese of St David's?

[curig.livejournal.com]

The Bishop was forced to resign after much speculation about his private life and allegations of inappropriate conduct with his (female) chaplain. Nothing was proved but various clergy in the diocese, including AIUI Andy John, were extremely vocal in campaigning for his removal.

[yrieithydd.livejournal.com]

Was Andy John one of those? I know that one of the instigators of the letter was one of his predecessors at Holy Trinity.

[curig.livejournal.com]

So I am informed but it is only hearsay, hence my AIUI.

[rev7-17.livejournal.com]

merciful thing, too, to have that "different direction." Last thing the Communion needs (or ++Rowan, for that matter) is another conflagration to deal with. Things are precarious enough as it is, what with the disintegration going on here in North America.

[yrieithydd.livejournal.com]

I'm not sure Jeffrey John would have been the right choice politically given the situation, though I think he could do a good job there. But they could have chosen someone else on the more catholic side, but maybe it was felt that an evangelical would bring balance. I knew Andy well when he was my vicar but I haven't seen him since he moved on and that's 9 years ago now. I've got higher in that time which possibly colours my views. I suppose having been an archdeacon for the past 3 years will have given him a good grounding in Church politics. At least he's pro-women; he had a female NSM curate in Aber and his wife is a deacon. Not entirely sure of the history there, but I think she was deaconed before they had children and then by the time women were first priested in the Church in Wales she had not been exercising her ministry to a great extent as she was looking after the children and so she wasn't priested.