From biblical times Communion is a key word in church history meaning a fellowship of Christians devoted to the apostles teaching. The Anglican Communion, mirroring the Commonwealth, is a network of independent church provinces, giving a position of honour to the Archbishop of Canterbury, just as the Commonwealth sees the Queen as its symbolic focus of unity, and until now the Communion has relied upon strong bonds of mutual affection to hold it together.

Sadly, that seems no longer to be the case. There’s now talk of one province or another being expelled from the Communion if they don’t change their ways; and the argument that their ways make perfect sense in the context in which their church is set, no longer convinces all the members. There’s a demand for club rules, dignified by being called a Covenant. Fine perhaps, if they merely spell out the kind of behaviour expected in this family – less fine if they result in the stern demand – “Go and never darken our doorstep again” – for the family rules are not the family; as Groucho Marx also said, “A child of five would understand this – send someone to fetch a child of five.”

Read the whole reflection.

His five arguments are:

–Present Anglican polity has severe design flaws.
–Our doctrinal boundaries are too vague.
–Current “Instruments of Communion” are not up to current challenges.
–Liturgical chaos prevents unity.
–Doctrine trumps polity and Scripture trumps tradition, not vice versa.

Read it all.

Now hosts of such hypothesis, treated as certainties by some, have invaded or seek to invade the Anglo-Catholic synthesis: remarriage after divorce, contraception, abortion, intercommoning all around even with the unbaptized, a slippery understanding (the Porvoo Agreement) of apostolic ministerial succession; the priestly/episcopal ordination of women, same-sex blessings and more. Of course, Anglo-Catholicism was never completely uniform, especially when it came to Rome; but there was always an identifiable corpus and its exponents looked if not always leaned in a Roman direction.

So now we come to the contemporary “Catholic Anglicanism” espoused by The Living Church. What is it? What should it be? And where does it stand on these great issues confronting the Church? Once Lord Halifax (1839-1934), the life-long promoter of reunion, was asked what, in addition, he would be believing were he in communion with the See of Rome. He replied (I am paraphrasing), Nothing.

Catholic Anglicanism must mean the faith of the universal Church, East and West, and include the Roman primacy. It must support and promote all that the great Anglo-Catholic leaders collectively stood for and be looking, as they did and ARCIC II does in its recent statements, to reconciliation with the See of Rome.

Read it all.

Section 3: “Our Commitment to Confession of the Faith”
Reactions to this section are highly mixed, leading us to ask if this section is particularly necessary to the Covenant. Section 3: “Our Commitment to Confession of the Faith,” as it stands, incorporates a wide range of commitments many of which are broadly accepted but some of which imply agreement to as yet undetermined Communion-wide understandings. There seems to be little in this section that cannot be understood as growing from the positive affirmations of our Anglican Christian identity developed in Section 2: “The Life We Share,” or in Section 4: “The Life We Share With Others.” If Section 3 is to be retained, many believe that it needs considerable reworking.

While the commitments contained in Section 3 are commendable, the language used for some of them is subject to various interpretations and misinterpretations. It seems to many of us unwise to place language of this sort within the Covenant without having a clear and agreed-upon definition of what these terms mean.

For example, what does the phrase “biblically derived moral values” mean and how are such values determined? In the American context, the phrase, “biblically-derived moral values,” is fraught with baggage. On the individual level this phrase can convey a facile and judgmental approach to Christian moral ethics and decision-making not in keeping with the best of Anglicanism. Historically, some of the greatest national sins of conquest and subjugation have been defended by appeal to “biblically-derived moral values.”

Similarly, we might ask what understanding of human nature is operative in the phrase “the vision of humanity”? Clearly, Holy Scripture contains a very complex and, at times, paradoxical vision of humanity. Using a phrase like this in the context of the covenant seems to ignore these complexities and the difficulties that Christians have had through the centuries in understanding and applying this biblical vision of humanity to their lives and societies.

We would suggest that it is disputes over concepts like these that have led to some of the current challenges before the Anglican Communion. We doubt that using such terms in the body of the covenant without further definition would advance the interest of unity or a common understanding of what the terms mean and how they should be applied.

Read it carefully and read it all.

This debate is at the heart of the arguments in the Anglican Communion.

For some, being Anglican means belonging to a particular hierarchical Church organisation with a specific set of rules (canons). Those of “Anglo- or Liberal-Catholic” persuasion identify the church by the “Bishop at the altar”. The Bishop has a geographical jurisdiction. This Roman approach was settled at the Council of Whitby in 697. The Celtic Church “lost” the argument for having more flexible ways of working.

Since all Christians in a geographical area were presumed to be in fellowship with the Bishop round his altar, at the Reformation the Church of England accommodated those who took different views on matters that were not required by the scripture. It differed from some of the Reformation churches in distinguishing those matters required scripture, and those cultural matters which were allowable as long as they did not go against scripture. Elizabeth I insisted that she could not make windows into men’s souls. It was enough to subscribe to the articles of faith and the Book of Common Prayer.

But there is more to be said.

Read it all.

In a remarkable article in the London-based Church Times (13th April), Canon Gregory Cameron, the Deputy Secretary-General of the Anglican Communion, publicly distanced Anglicanism from Protestantism. Canon Cameron spoke of an Anglican “dialogue with the Protestant traditions,” making it clear that he regarded Anglicanism as lying beyond the pale of Protestantism. Many in Ireland will regard his views with puzzlement, and perhaps not a little concern. So will many historians.

We need to appreciate that the sixteenth-century Reformation was a complex phenomenon. There was no single Protestant ”˜template’. Rather, a variety of reforming movements emerged during the sixteenth century, whose specific forms were shaped by local politics and personalities, as much as by the broader commitment to a recognizably Protestant agenda. The forms of Protestantism which emerged in the great imperial cities (such as Strasbourg), territories (such as Saxony) and nations (such as England or Sweden) had their own distinct characteristics. Some, for example, retained the episcopacy and a fixed liturgy; others discarded one or both. Yet each represented a local implementation of the Protestant agenda.

Historians generally consider that one of the most remarkable and influential forms of Protestantism emerged in England, and has come to be known as ”˜Anglicanism’. Reformers in the reign of Henry VIII did not refer to themselves as ”˜Protestants’, partly because this was seen to have foreign associations at the time. (Henry VIII, it will be recalled, disliked foreigners having influence over English affairs.) Yet from the reign of Edward VI onwards, English Church leaders began to use this term to refer to themselves, and see themselves as being connected with the great reforming movements and individuals on the continent of Europe.

Read it all.

In my opinion, the old way is clearly inadequate. Even apart from the issues that have created the crisis, to try to maintain the old way of doing things is backward thinking ”” basically merely saying “But we’ve never done it that way before.” It is doing business this way that has brought the Anglican Communion to its current crisis. It doesn’t work any more. It hasn’t worked for more than 30 years. I find it more than curious that most of those who claim to be “pushing the envelope forward” in the Anglican world are the “backward thinkers” in the matter of Anglican decision-making.

The first view, proposed by the majority of Anglican leaders, is indeed a way new to Anglicanism. This does not make it automatically wrong. On the contrary, in my opinion it is wise, realistic, and essential. The realignment is moving in the direction of this view ”” creating a worldwide Anglican identity with mutual accountability and effectively recognizing that Anglicanism has become a world family and is no longer a loose confederation.

There are currently four instruments of unity in Anglicanism that define us as a world family: the office of the Archbishop of Canterbury, who is the symbol of unity and has authority to decide who is an Anglican; the Lambeth Conference of all Anglican bishops, which began in 1867 and meets every 10 years to take counsel; the Anglican Consultative Council, a deliberative body that includes clergy and lay people from around the world [TLC, Sept. 16]; and the meeting of primates, or bishops who are leaders of the 38 Anglican provinces. The latter two instruments came into being as recently as the 1970s.

Currently an Anglican Covenant is being devised by which it appears that the provinces will be asked to agree to be a worldwide family with mutual accountability and, when necessary, make binding decisions together on matters that affect everyone. It is a situation similar to the time after the original 13 American colonies had become independent from England and then had to decide whether to form a federal government. It is a rare situation in world history, and people do not easily or gladly cede authority to a larger body.

From where I sit, it looks as though a lot of Anglican provinces see this trend as the answer to a crying need. Whatever lies ahead, Anglicanism is in the throes of change and cannot go back.

Read it all.

Driven to the Internet, I see Richard Hooker described as the “closest counterpart in the Anglican-Episcopal denomination to Luther for Lutherans or Calvin for Presbyterians or Wesley for Methodists.” His books on the Laws of Ecclesiastical Polity explain every aspect of Anglican doctrine, and I’m sure the vicar of my little church in Roxboro, North Carolina, has read them all.

Hooker defined the essential character of our early church as broad, tolerant and inclusive at a time when it was threatened by Roman Catholicism on one side and Protestant extremism on the other. He’s credited with defending the Anglican cause against the Puritans who wanted to get rid of bishops and turn us into Presbyterians. When Hooker died in 1600, the pope said that his ideas would remain until the end of the world.

Even though I just met Richard Hooker and hardly know him, I’m struck by the way he acknowledged the diversity of ideas within the church as a strength, saying, “Carry peaceable minds, and you may have comfort by this variety.” I can’t help but think of Rowan Williams, Archbishop of Canterbury, who was recently quoted in TIME as saying that God intends that our church members “have something to learn even from the people we most dislike or instinctively mistrust.” The reporter said it’s a nice thought, but will it be enough to stop a split?

Well, I don’t know. What I do know is that I’ve been finding myself less and less willing to talk about controversial topics, including this one. Most people tend to rant these days, and I just don’t want to listen. I’m getting to be a lot like Dogbert who says in the Dilbert cartoon, “There’s really no point in listening to other people. They’re either going to be agreeing with you or saying stupid stuff.”

Read it all.

Q: How important a moment is this for the Episcopal Church and the worldwide Anglican Communion?

A: Well, from the perspective of the Episcopal Church it’s a very important time in our life to be very clear about who we are, you know, where we’ve been, and where we’re going to be going as a collective church. For the larger Communion, I think it’s a time to really reclaim what I think is the great activity and work of the church globally, and that is to say we have far more important things to do than to fight over these issues of human sexuality that we cannot resolve at this time and be engaged in the mission of the church, given the situation that is very much a part of the definition of the Global South.

Q: The bishops are going to be asked again to respond to the communiqué that was issued in Tanzania. What is your sense about where the bishops are heading on that?

A: We received that communiqué with a great deal of respect, but the House of Bishops has already spoken, and the other thing that primates need to understand, and I think other people even in our own church need to understand, is that the bishops, really, we can create “mind of the house” resolutions. We cannot change the direction or, in fact, speak to that kind of question as a defining moment in the life of our journey as Episcopalians. That’s up to the Executive Council, and so both the House of Bishops and the Executive Council have made it very clear that the scheme offered by the primates in Dar es Salaam was a scheme that we could not incorporate or accept.

Q: Remind people how the Anglican Communion works. The rest of the world cannot tell the U.S. church what to do, can it? The U.S. church is autonomous.

A: I don’t think autonomy is the right word. We’re a collection of very, very different provinces that in a sense are self-governed but in fact are connected to each other by the office and position of the Archbishop of Canterbury. We’re in communion with one another through our communion with the archbishop. And so even the discussions that have ranged for years about people not being in communion with the Episcopal Church — it’s really inaccurate. You are in communion with us unless the Archbishop of Canterbury says you are not. So I think the issue here in terms of where we are right now is that our church is very much a post-colonial church. It’s a bicameral legislative church, and a lot of folks don’t understand that in terms of the balance of powers, the check and balances systems that are retained within it.

Read it all.

Fr. Will Brown is one of the bloggers at Covenant, and he has a deep and thought-provoking blog entry posted simply titled “Ramsey and Unity.” The title might cause many to overlook the piece, but Fr. WB has some very interesting reflections on the current crisis, and questions for those of us on both / all sides of the current divide. Here’s the excerpt that most caught this elf’s eye:

[Note: The portion we’ve excerpted here in no way begins to do it justice (we’ve skipped over the meaty theological reflection and jumped to the conclusion, I confess… But the reflections on the meaning of the cross are particularly interesting given that ECUSA’s lectionary this week included 1 Cor 1:18: [b]18 For the word of the cross is folly to those who are perishing, but to us who are being saved it is the power of God.[/b]]

Anglicanism has become factious in the extreme, and one cannot help but wonder if the spirit of Christ-like gratuity, of self-effacement for the sake of the Body, has been quashed by a climate of hyper-self-consciousness. One wonders whether TEC might not be given pause by the non-recognition with which its “gifts” have been met by the one Body. One winces at the self-awareness of TEC’s rhetoric: “our church law”¦ our canons”¦ our autonomy”¦ our Constitution”¦ our founding principles”¦ our own liberation from colonialism”¦” etc. (cf. the TEC House of Bishops “Mind of the House” resolutions from March 2007). One would do well to ask whether TEC has not “succumbed to the peril of thinking of these gifts as possessions of their own and interpreting them in terms of human wisdom, knowledge, and individual ownership” (51) ”“ terms born of the spirit of Anti-Christ, as we have seen, inimical to the life of the Body.

Neither has TEC given an adequate theological account of how her innovative gifts bear witness to God in Christ. There has been much talk of “justice” and of the making-possible of our gay and lesbian brethren’s appropriation of what is theirs by right. But if the sexuality between persons of the same gender is to have a place within the one Body, it must be accounted for in terms of the given life of the one Body. It is not enough that it should be accounted for in terms of the autonomous life the Body’s members. We know something of the iconography and sacramentality of the gift of human sexuality. But the one Body has rooted human sexuality in the differentiation and complimentarity of the sexes, which our Lord himself placed under the rubric of creation and grace in one of his very few explicit teachings on the subject: “Have you not read that he who made them from the beginning made them male and female, and said, ”˜For this reason a man shall leave his father and mother and be joined to his wife, and the two shall become one flesh”¦?” (Mat. 19.4). And as intimated by St. Paul in Ephesians 5, the Body has known the gift (the datum) of sexuality within the one Body as complimentarity within differentiation, as iconographic of the mutual self-gift that takes place between the different but complimentary natures of God and man in the one flesh of Jesus Christ, the theanthropos ”“ the consummation of which is constitutive of the Body’s life.

How might Anglicanism gesture “toward the question mark of Calvary at the center of its teaching” (4), even amid the difficulties and disagreements we face? Here are some far-fetched ideas:

1. Assuming, for the sake of argument, that the liberals are right:

If, as TEC seems to be claiming, the gift of sexuality must be revised or elaborated, let this revision or elaboration take place within the context of the common life of the one Body, within the spirit of mutual recognition and self-gift which alone characterizes the love by which our Lord said we would be known (Jn. 13.35). Let TEC offer her gifts in patience and humility, knowing that love is patient, kind, and does not insist on its own way (1 Cor. 13.4-5) ”“ knowing that in autonomy she is nothing (1 Cor. 13.2). And if it is true that TEC’s interlocutors in the Communion at large are blinded and ignorant, as many within TEC have suggested, let TEC bear the burden of their brothers’ and sisters’ blindness and ignorance, and so fulfill the law of Christ (Gal. 6.2). Let TEC bear it “with all lowliness and meekness, with patience, forbearing one another in love, eager to maintain the unity of the Spirit in the bond of peace” (Ephesians 4.2).

2. Assuming, for the sake or argument, that the conservatives are right:

For the conservatives’ part, let them listen in humility for the voice of the Spirit in their interlocutors, knowing that the Spirit’s groanings are too deep for words, even traditionalist words. Let them be willing to suffer at the hands of the litigious. Let them be eager to be defrauded to keep the scandal of factionalism away from the consciousness of the unbelieving world for whom the Lord suffered and died. Let the conservatives prefer to suffer injustice for the sake of the souls of their brethren; let them know that whoever brings back a sinner from the error of his way will save his soul from death and will cover a multitude of sins (James 5.20).

Here’s the full entry.

In order to try to rectify this situation, the Primates – based on a number of Lambeth resolutions urging them to exercise greater authority in such situations – made the unprecedented step of proposing their own solution to the internal problems of the American province. This involves the establishing of a Pastoral Council of up to five members (chaired by a Primate nominated by the Archbishop of Canterbury and with two members nominated by the Primates and two nominated by the Presiding Bishop) to implement a Pastoral Scheme, facilitate and encourage healing and reconciliation, monitor TEC’s response to Windsor and ‘consider whether any of the courses of action contemplated by the Windsor Report § 157 should be applied to the life of The Episcopal Church or its bishops’. 14

The Pastoral Scheme is focussed on the group known as ‘Windsor’ or ‘Camp Allen’ bishops (and others who may join them). They may provide pastoral oversight to parishes who request it and nominate a Primatial Vicar who will be delegated powers and duties by the Presiding Bishop and be responsible to the Council. Crucially, this system is to be implemented whatever decisions are made by the House of Bishops prior to September 30 th this year and the Scheme is ‘intended to have force until the conclusion of the Covenant Process and a definitive statement of the position of the Episcopal Church with respect to the Covenant and its place within the life of the Communion, when some new provision may be required’. 15

The benefits of this solution are, first, that it prevents the establishment of a new province by creating a Primatially-sponsored and overseen interim structure within TEC during the covenant process. Second, it offers the hope of bringing an end to violations of this aspect of Windsor because, once the Pastoral Scheme is in place, ‘the Primates undertake to end all interventions’ and ‘congregations or parishes in current arrangements will negotiate their place within the structures of pastoral oversight’ set out in the scheme. 16 It is, however, noted that there are ‘particular difficulties’ with the more structured interventions undertaken by Rwanda (American Mission in America – AMiA) and Nigeria (Convocation of Anglicans in North America – CANA), both of which have consecrated former ECUSA/TEC priests as bishops. Third, it represents a conciliar way forward for the Communion agreed by the Primates as a whole rather than a unilateral solution offered simply by some of the Primates such as the Global South grouping or a part of that network.

This proposal therefore seeks to maintain the internal unity of the American church by providing much more robust structures of alternative pastoral oversight which are to be monitored by the wider Communion. In so doing, it hopes to encourage those currently identified with (or flirting with) Group I to become more communion-minded and align more clearly with Group II, just as elsewhere the communiqué seeks to encourage the American bishops clearly to distinguish themselves from Group IV by complying fully and unambiguously with The Windsor Report’s recommendations.

The Primates in Tanzania therefore managed not only to avoid any split within the Communion but also to take actions that uphold both Lambeth I.10 and the Windsor Report and that encourage bishops, dioceses and provinces to act in conformity with these and move away from Group I and Group IV (positions that increase pressure for fragmentation and realignment) into Group II or Group III. The question now is whether TEC will be able to give the necessary reassurances and implement the proposed Pastoral Scheme and whether intervening bishops from the Global South will then work with the Scheme. Each one of these conditions remains far from certain but were they to be met then there is the real possibility that there could be greater stability over the next few years as the covenant process unfolds and a new pattern of life in communion continues to develop in our Communion relationships, to be articulated in Communion statements and to reform the Instruments of Communion.

It is not short but please take the time to read it all.

Clearly, the debated vision of “communion” present in our Anglican turmoil is tied to this, not only historically, but conceptually and theologically. We are in the midst of a grand movement towards and through democratization: its gifts are potentially and really (in many cases) great, especially in terms of the kinds of democratic charisms that we rightly cherish here and wish to support elsewhere: individual freedoms, protection of rights, the coherent rule of law and appeal, and accountability. The Church’s place in this movement is not peripheral, however, since – at least as we believe, and indeed even as students of democratization recognize with or without a religious lens – the persuasive moral frameworks by which the violence of autonomy is checked and transformed are not only the special charism of the Church, but is also a divine imperative for human history’s ordering.

The current Covenant process can be seen in terms of those elements bound to the choices we earlier claimed face all democratizing movements: we can choose to move towards a retrenchment of confrontative blame, whereby the boundaries of a pure confessionalism deny the possibility of open discussion and engagement across local units; we can choose a path that leads to the dissolution of accountability altogether, through a kind of the federalist model of autonomous units that merely talk to one another across local divides, but that cannot hold each other accountable to some broader formative molding of the self and its assertions; or we can choose some kind of structure that can uphold dispersed accountability, where truth is bound to a way of life and to the persuasive moral framework of accountable actions. I would obviously argue for the last option as our calling as well. One can see that the Covenant proposal that was presented to the Primates in Dar es Salaam, and through them to the Communion at large, takes this last road. (And the Primates’ Communiqué from Dar falls squarely within this perspective.) One need only look at the current debate over human rights in Nigeria, and the Church’s proper duties within this debate, to realize that unless Christian Communion is able to bring its formative weight to bear upon these matters, the process of democratization will indeed become a weapon in the hand of forces whose destiny will simply be the re-expression of Cain and Abel’s long-standing conflict, where power means simply giving each brother a chance to have his say and do his thing, with whatever results.

In sum, I invite us to see the relationship of Communion to democratization in a special way: as the embodied work of transfiguring the violence inherent in the dispersal of power. We are aware of what this means Scripturally, if nothing else: it is, in the terms of Ephesians 2, the breaking down of a “wall” of separation, and of making what were once “two” hostile and estranged bodies, “one” body in the “one new man” who is Christ. But this reality, as Paul emphasized, is achieved through the Cross and the shedding of blood, Jesus’ own. Not surprisingly, Paul is here speaking of an act by which violence itself is exposed before the world to be seen for what it is, and then comprehended within the being and heart of God. If power is dispersed in this context, it is also given over to God, who bears its chaotic assertion. Only here is the seeming contradiction of Galatians 6, where each is accountable only for his or her own actions yet is also called to bear the burdens of others, resolved. If we are to think of Communion, it is from this base, and in the context of those seeking to see such a foundation exposed before the world. The buzz-words of “mutual accountability” and “interdependence”, so important to the Windsor Report, yet based on a long tradition of discussion dating to the 1960’s at least, are not mere jargon in this light. They go to the center of the Gospel’s particular summons to this age. And so I have no hesitation in commending this vision of Anglicanism. There are few gifts more filled with promise that God has given his people in this regard for the service of the nations, at this point in history most especially.

As a gift to the American church in particular, it poses an enormous challenge. We are loath to admit that pure autonomy embodies the violence of death. And few of us, in any context, are ready to admit that the death of self leads to the resurrection of the self’s life as a common life. Yet in such an admission lies the promise of God’s peace.

Read it all.

What are the two extreme ‘edges’ that the Anglican Communion needs defending against today? It seems to me that they are the ‘autonomous rootless liberalism’ that too often has undergirded the actions of The Episcopal Church and the ‘independent relentless puritanism’ that ignores the pivotal, gathering role of the Archbishop of Canterbury. Both positions, in effect, have tried to trump the ‘interdependence’ of the Communion with their pre-emptive actions and reactions.

Immensely learned and biblically founded, Hooker drew on a hinterland of classical literature, patristics and ‘natural law’. His works were read by Roman Catholic and Puritan theologians. Sounds familiar? Oliver O’Donovan is Professor of Christian Ethics and Practical Theology at the University of Edinburgh. Formerly he was Regius Professor of Moral and Pastoral Theology in the University of Oxford, and a member of the Anglican Roman Catholic International Commission. It was he who coined the phrase concerning the Windsor Report, ‘the only game in town’, and this was echoed by Rowan Williams in his speech to General Synod in February 2005.

Like Hooker, instead of reacting with an instant tract on the current crisis in the Anglican Communion, O’Donovan responded with a series of seven monthly articles for Fulcrum. They provide crucial, challenging and nourishing background reading for this week.

Our third central theologian on ‘edge’ is Samuel T Coleridge (1772-1834). In his Aids to Reflection, he referred to ‘the venerable Hooker’ and quoted him ‘on the nature of pride’.[5] On 26 October 1831, near the end of his life, the poet, philosopher and theologian of genius, had dinner with his friends. His son, Hartley Coleridge, recorded some of his conversation, which included discussion of the ‘point’ and the ‘edge’ as the difference between ‘Keenness and Subtlety’:

Few men of genius are keen; but almost every man of genius is subtle. If you ask me the difference between keenness and subtlety, I answer that it is the difference between a point and an edge. To split a hair is no proof of subtlety; for subtlety acts in distinguishing between differences – in showing that two things apparently one are in fact two; whereas, to split a hair is to cause division, and not to ascertain difference.[6]

In our present double-edged context of response after 30 September 2007, it may be that Anglicans in the USA are more called towards the ‘distinguishing between differences’ – staying and arguing from within The Episcopal Church[7] – rather than the ‘common cause of division’ – splitting and forming another church.[8] As we saw Andrewes echoing Hebrews 4:12, perhaps we can see Coleridge echoing Hebrews 5:14 – which in turn reinforces the text preached before Kings James I in 1607, ‘But solid food is for the mature, for those who faculties have been trained by practice to distinguish good from evil.’

Read it all.

What these past few weeks have taught us about the Church in North America is interesting, if painful. First, our parishes are filled with friendly, welcoming, loving people””people who really mean well, and want to do the right thing, the loving thing, as they believe God would have them do. Second, we are essentially Congregationalists, and then perhaps “diocesanists”, and finally, maybe, members of our national church. There is no real sense of being one church with other Anglicans throughout the world, no sense that we are truly closer, more truly related, to an Anglican in Botswana or Beijing than to a Baptist down the street. Oh, we may have companion dioceses in Africa or South America, but we don’t really think of them as part of us, nor do we feel responsible to them. There’s no need to ask what they think about decisions we make as a church in the U.S., because it has nothing to do with them””sure, we send them some money every year, but that doesn’t make them “us”.

But they are us. If the Anglican Communion is truly to be a single Communion, then we must recognize that the national, man-made boundaries which separate us mean nothing, for we are truly a single Church, a single Communion, whether we’re in New York or Nairobi, Arlington or Addis Ababa. What we do in one part of the Communion directly effects every other part of the Communion, and we ignore that fact to the Church’s, and our own, peril.

Pray for the Church, that we may be One.

Read it all (scroll down to second item).

With permission–KSH.

Synod Sermon
8 September 2007
St Saviour’s Cathedral, Goulburn, Australia

The Hymn to the Universe in Colossians, expressing the supremacy of Christ over all things, including the Church, must be one of the most confidently reassuring passages in the whole of scripture. I quote it often, not least to reinforce what I believe is fundamental, that is, environmental issues and ecological justice issues are core business to Christian people. Christ is not simply God’s word to fallen humanity; He is God’s word to the whole created order which groaneth in travail until now. These are not optional extras, this is not some trendy green thing, the sustainability and reconciliation of the whole created order is as core to us, as is our belief that Christ died for our salvation. For in him the fullness of God was pleased to dwell, and through him God was pleased to reconcile to himself all things, whether on earth or in heaven, by making peace through the blood of the cross. If Colossians 1: 15 ”“ 20 does not stir your blood, I do not know what will.
But what of verses 21 ”“ 23, the verses that follow, the verses we read this evening? What does it mean to be estranged and hostile in mind, doing evil deeds? What is the hope promised by the gospel which we have heard and from which we are not to shift?

Well, one of the great joys of Anglicanism is our lectionary. I am unapologetically disappointed to hear of parishes that do not use it. It is not simply that when we use it we are in unison with countless thousands of Christians who have reflected on the same passage, on the same day, which we are: nor even that it has saved us from constant recourse to the passages that suit us best, which it does: it invites us to read scripture against the backdrop of other scripture.
Now, the passage from Colossians chapter 1: 21 ”“ 23 has been read this evening against the backdrop of Luke 6: 1 ”“ 5; the first of two passages in Luke 6 in which Jesus directly challenges the prevailing teaching and practice of the Sabbath. You know that the sins of the religious were a favourite target of Jesus, in fact he used stronger language of them – “hypocrites”, than he did of the more colourful sins of the great unwashed. So are we being challenged this evening not to think of a “hostile mind and evil deeds” as referring to those things that the tax collectors and sinners do, but those things that the Pharisees do, the things, please do not hide under the pew, which religious people do. Are we prone to believe we are righteous and in the believing more likely to rest secure in our condemnation of those we consider to be more notoriously sinful? Are we, the people in Church, being called to consider our “hostile” minds, rather than preaching to those outside whom we think should change their hostile minds?

You are all familiar with Jesus’ challenges about the Sabbath. His fundamental problem with the teaching and behaviour of the ruling religious class was that they had turned a divine ordinance for the celebration of life, into an ordinance which essentially had become life denying. They had made the law a thing to be worshipped, rather than serving the principle that it was designed to celebrate. Celebrate is the right word. The Sabbath was never fundamentally about one day being holier than another, not even about religious observance per se; the Sabbath is no less than the celebration of creation itself, and a foretaste of its redemption. Wherever praise is offered, the Sabbath is celebrated; when the hungry are fed the Sabbath is celebrated; when the down trodden are set free the Sabbath is celebrated; when human work builds divine community the Sabbath is celebrated; when those who have been estranged are reconciled the Sabbath is celebrated; when a paddock is rested the Sabbath is celebrated; when debts are forgiven the Sabbath is celebrated; when ones preferred seat in high places is given to another, the Sabbath is celebrated; when the face of Christ is seen in a child on the street, or the woman selling herself that her children might be fed, the Sabbath is celebrated; when soiled and worn bodies are anointed with perfume, the Sabbath is celebrated. The Sabbath is not celebrated by simply creating space; it is celebrated by what fills the space. The Sabbath is about celebrating life. Hostile minds then are minds hostile to life, because life is of God and Sabbath celebrates God, by celebrating life.

What then is the “hope promised by the gospel which we have heard and from which we are not to shift”? Is it that Jesus has died for our salvation – well yes it is? Is it that he has taken away the sin of the world – well yes it is? I do not believe this hope can be expressed more clearly than by John. These (words) are written that you might believe Jesus is the Messiah, the Son of God and through believing you may have life in his name. Jn 20:31

Or
Beloved let us love one another, because love is from God; everyone who loves is born of God and knows God. Whoever does not love does not know God for God is love. God’s love was revealed to us in this way: God sent his only son into the world so that we might live through him. In this is love, not that we loved God but that he loved us and sent his Son to be the atoning sacrifice for our sins. Beloved since God loved us so much, we also ought to love one another. 1 John 4 7 -10
If this is truly the hope promised by God, the hope from which we are not to shift, is it possible to lose the prize, or perhaps to lose the opportunity of conveying the prize to others, by holding on to a lesser truth as if it were the main game.
Those about whom Jesus was extremely critical had taken a passage or passages of scripture and turned them into an idol. They had made their interpretation of the law of the Sabbath the litmus test by which virtue and righteousness was to be judged, indeed that by which all human behaviour, however virtuous or evil, was to be judged.

Are there parallels today? Are there examples of religious people taking a passage or passages of scripture and turning them into a litmus test for all? Are there examples of people taking passages of scripture and saying of them to the wider religious community “we say to you that these particular passages are the tests we will set to show whether you hold to the hope promised in the gospel, which we have heard, and from which we are not to shift”. Well sadly – yes.
In our beloved Anglican Communion a litmus test has been set and whether any of us like it or not we are apparently to be judged by it. In less than 12 months from now the 2008 Lambeth conference will have come and gone. In coming months you are sadly going to have an increasing commentary in the press about those bishops who are going and those who are not; those who have been invited, and those who have not; those who will stay away if others attend, and those who will attend if others stay away.

I say to the Anglican Communion please stop it. I say to the Archbishop of Canterbury, please tell us to stop it. Archbishop Rowan, please do not allow yourself to refer to this matter as core, even if others do. Please do not take as seriously as you seem to the cries, on either side, of those who make this debate, the debate on homosexuality, the core business of the Anglican Communion: by so doing you are disenfranchising the rest of us, who with respect, are concerned about far more important issues. By making this the litmus test, will the Sabbath be celebrated, as Jesus intended ”“ I do not see how? By making this the litmus test will we address the more important issues of the presence of Jesus amongst the poor and disenfranchised, please tell me how? Will the voice, the prayer of Jesus, for justice and peace in the Jerusalem, in the Middle East where the call of the mosque prevails, be more clearly articulated? A vain hope. Will the healing of those dying from Malaria and HIV AIDS be more urgently addressed? Sadly no. Even at home, by pressing this debate will it enable the voice of the gospel to be heard more widely in Australian society, to be respected more intensely, to be understood more thoroughly – I think not. Then please stop it. This does not mean that I think it is unimportant, or that I am not committed to the Lambeth 98 resolution, or that I do not think people have the right to strongly held views, but will this debate open wider the gates that lead to everlasting life ”“ I am afraid not.

All legitimate Bishops in the Communion should attend the Lambeth Conference. We need to be challenged by one another and to try to understand each other. To be honest, the Bishop I will find it hardest to understand is the Bishop of Harare, Zimbabwe, the Bishop who applauds, supports and encourages the activity and behaviour of President Robert Mugabe who has wreaked so much pain and evil upon his own people. How this Bishop can possibly reconcile his pronouncements with the “hope promised by the gospel” is beyond my comprehension: well not quite, he is, apparently of the same tribal grouping as the President, he is of those who currently hold power. We are called to share the company of those who do not have power. So, even he, perhaps especially he, needs to be present.

We are so blessed to have heard the hope promised by the gospel, the promise of life in his name, we are so blessed to be personally redeemed by it, may we never be without the humility of spirit, the compassion of heart, the confidence of mind, and the strength of will to live it, and proclaim it to others.

Check it out.

The claim of those who organized this is:

We are evangelical and catholic Anglicans, and fellow travelers from the wider household of God, assembled and summoned to a common labor in the ecumenical Church of Christ, not least through the present struggles and gifts of our communities.

We recognize that the Anglican Communion””the first instance of ecclesiality with which we, in this particular online assembly, wrestle for a blessing””is incomplete by itself, because we have seen with our eyes and touched with our hands the wounds of our Lord’s body: the countless factions and disputes that do not bring Him glory, leaving us all together far short of our call to “share,” as sisters and brothers visibly united, in the “partnership” of His offering (I Cor 10.14ff.).

In a sense it has ever been so. We recall St Paul’s outrage with the Corinthians, who “came together (synerchesthai) ”¦not for the better but for the worse,” a sobering point too-little reflected upon in our day by those, on all sides, who find the Church’s unity and orthodoxy uncomplicated””either simply given, or obviously taken away. Against both of these views, Paul insists that “there have to be factions (hairesis) among you, for only so will it become clear who among you are genuine” (I Cor 11.17-19). And yet the Apostle does not on that account “commend” the Corinthians for showing “contempt for the Church of God and humiliat[ing] those who have nothing” (I Cor 11:22). Rather, Paul’s argument devolves to his prior exhortation to learn from the “example” of “Israel,” “written down to instruct us,” “so that we might not desire evil” but instead the singular “blessing that we bless.” Only upon this, objective basis: the blood and body of Christ unveiled, will the Corinthians learn to “do everything for the glory of God,” that is, to “give no offense to Jews or Greeks or to the Church,” to “please everyone in everything,” and not seek their “own advantage,” so that “many”¦ may be saved” (I Cor 10).

The Rev. Philip Wainwright has recently
posted an article on “Biblical Reasons for Staying” in The Episcopal Church. As a fellow priest of the Diocese of Pittsburgh who has written on the issue of church discipline, particularly in our current Anglican crisis (see various essays at www.stephenswitness.com), I shall venture a brief reply.

First of all, let me appreciate the fact that Philip Wainwright is seeking God’s will from Scripture. That puts us on a common footing and, frankly, out of step with many of the leaders of the Episcopal Church today. Secondly, I am going to assume, although he does not say so directly, that Wainwright agrees with Lambeth Resolution 1.10 that “homosexual practice is contrary to Scripture” and that he agrees with Paul that those who persist in sexual immorality will not inherit the kingdom of God (1 Corinthians 6:9; Galatians 5:21; Ephesians 5:5).

So what is at issue is not a question of doctrine or morals but of discipline, what to do when a fellow Christian or a Christian leader openly violates the clear teaching of Scripture. Philip’s reply is, in essence, “do nothing that would cause an overt break in fellowship or church order.”

Let me agree with him that the apostolic church had a liberal attitude toward those who fall into error. It hardly exercised what one would call an “off with his head” mentality. Many of Wainwright’s examples from the New Testament illustrate this pastoral liberality. However, this is not the whole story. The apostles, following Jesus’ teaching, did have two principles with which they guided the church. The first had to do with patience in timing. Jesus puts it this way:

“If your brother sins against you, go and show him his fault, just between the two of you. If he listens to you, you have won your brother over. But if he will not listen, take one or two others along, so that ”˜every matter may be established by the testimony of two or three witnesses.’ If he refuses to listen to them, tell it to the church; and if he refuses to listen even to the church, treat him as you would a pagan or a tax collector.” (Matthew 18:15-17)

Jesus urges his disciples to be deliberate in approaching an erring brother, to avoid shaming him in public, if possible, and to make sure that any final judgement was shared by the wider community. So yes, the Christian is to be careful and patient in disciplining a brother, but there is a final word of exclusion: treat him as you would a pagan or a tax collector, which in the Jewish context means, shun him. Wainwright asserts without evidence that these words do not suggest separation from the church and its assembly and sacraments. I would argue, on the contrary, that given the specific reference of verse 17 to “tell it to the church,” it is precisely excommunication which Jesus has in mind.

The apparent contradiction between Jesus’ command with his own practice of dining with publicans and sinners is resolved when one understands the second principle of church discipline, which has to do with levels of accountability. This principle is expressed succinctly by Paul to the Corinthians in the case of the man who was found sleeping with his mother-in-law.

I have written you in my letter not to associate with sexually immoral people– not at all meaning the people of this world who are immoral, or the greedy and swindlers, or idolaters. In that case you would have to leave this world. But now I am writing you that you must not associate with anyone who calls himself a brother but is sexually immoral or greedy, an idolater or a slanderer, a drunkard or a swindler. With such a man do not even eat. What business is it of mine to judge those outside the church? Are you not to judge those inside? God will judge those outside. “Expel the wicked man from among you.” (1 Corinthians 5: 9-13)

Paul distinguishes several levels of accountability. There are the pagans, those who make no claim to be Christians. He says, “who am I to judge them? leave it to God.” The proper attitude to such people is to witness to them that they might come into the light. Then there are those who call themselves Christians but who clearly violate God’s holy will. Toward those who sin, Paul implies there is a necessity of judgement, and toward those who persist in their sin there is a necessity of exclusion. To be sure, this exclusion is not eternal, and it is restorative in intention: Paul hopes that through the pain of excommunication (“destruction of the flesh”) the man at Corinth may repent and be saved. (Wainwright’s speculation that this man was received back without repentance, having married his mother-in-law, is quite a stretch.)

These two Scripture texts have been expounded at length and convincingly in an essay by Robert Gagnon of Pittsburgh Theological Seminary titled “Church Policy As Regards Homosexual Practice: Membership and Ordained Ministry” (see www.robgagnon.com). Dr. Gagnon concludes that these texts justify exclusion of openly practicing homosexuals. In my opinion, there is no difference between an openly practicing homosexual and a church leader or a church body openly advocating the practice (see Matthew 5:19).

Quite possibly, the brother in Matthew 18 and the man 1 Corinthians 5 were simply lay Christians in the church. How much less then does Paul tolerate impenitent false teachers? (Again, I find hard to swallow Wainwright’s identification of Anglican bishops like Jack Spong as “babes in Christ” who need milk, not the rod.) Once again, Paul does not rush to judgment and assumes that godly leaders like Peter can be temporarily led astray and brought back with a firm rebuke. But this is not his attitude to the Judaizing teachers in Galatia, about whom he says: “Cast out the slave woman!” and “I wish they would emasculate themselves!” (Galatians 4:30; 5:12). Indeed, to say “let them be anathema” (Galatians 1:8-9) means, let them be delivered to divine wrath for destruction (anathema being the LXX translation of the Hebrew herem or sacred destruction). In Romans 9:3 it refers to being separated from Christ. In the Pastoral Epistles, which some attribute to the sub-apostolic period, one can find a similar “intolerant” attitude toward false teachers like Hymenaeus and Alexander, of whom Paul says “I have handed them over to Satan to be taught not to blaspheme” (1 Timothy 1:20).

St. John’s attitude toward false teachers is no different from St. Paul’s. In a recent private letter, Rodney Whitacre of Trinity School for Ministry notes an overarching principle of discipline:

First John is written so that the folks John addresses will remain in fellowship with God, with the truth, and with John himself as he is in fellowship with God (1 John 1.3). The antichrists were claiming to be Christians, but John says they have departed from the teachings of Christ (i.e., about Christ and His teachings about the Father) and thus have departed from God and the disciples should not have fellowship with them. I think this is the point of 2 John 9. The “progressives” have progressed right out of the faith. Now, I think when these teachings first arose in the community John remained in fellowship with the community members who were embracing the ideas as he sought to correct their error, but when they became clear in their error and settled in it, the fellowship was broken. At least this seems to be the way it worked for Paul, and I haven’t seen anything in John to suggest this was not the basic pattern in his communities as well. In both cases the union with Christ is what determines the fellowship on the ground.

The principle then would seem to be that there is a time for discussion and continued fellowship as new ideas are sorted out. But if someone comes up with a new idea that undercuts the foundation of the gospel, and they persist in this view and reject the apostolic teaching against their view, then there is separation. This is Paul’s way of dealing with the opponents behind Galatians – he argues with the Galatians who are tempted, but he anathematizes the teachers who have embraced this false teaching and are promoting it. So also John with the antichrists — they are worshipping false gods (1 John 5.21), they have sinned the sin unto death, apostasy (1 John 5.16-17).

Now, how these principles worked out institutionally in the first century is not entirely clear, and our institutional structures are certainly more developed. But the principles remain.

Philip Wainwright claims that when the apostles rebuked false teachers, they did so with no sanctions of any sort. This claim, repeated throughout his essay, is an argument from silence. True, we do not know exactly how they carried out the separation from heretics, but that is far cry from assuming that they actually sat on their hands and did nothing other than “jaw, jaw.” It also creates a chasm between the practice of excommunication in the patristic church down to 500 AD, as described by church historian William Tighe of Muhlenberg University:
I honestly can’t think of any examples of “official tolerance” either of heresy (once it was taken and acknowledged to be such, which did not usually happen clearly or quickly) of what the Church regarded as “ungodly behaviour;” and of course there never was any tolerance of “apostasy” (which was then the public and clear repudiation of Christian Faith). Of course, none of us really can say what sort of tolerance individual bishops might have given to individuals who exhibited patterns of ungodly behaviour that we might consider today to be “addictive.” I am thinking of those 4th century canons which laid down long periods of exclusion from communion of those who indulged in sexual sins, whether fornication, adultery or unnatural vice (a.k.a. homosexual sodomy), but which seem to imply that those who had become accustomed (habituated) to loose living before becoming Christians and who “fell” from time to time might be accorded some degree of lenience considering their past history. It seems to me that however lenient a bishop (the usual source of advice and admonition with regard to sins and behaviours that were not of public knowledge) might be, once the matter became public or once “sinners” started to defend their actions, or “errorists” their errors, then all lenience ceased immediately, and condemnation/exclusion followed forthwith (although restoration upon repentance, public confession of fault and public absolution, followed by a period of penitential exclusion from the Eucharist, was always possible). The thing is, that bishops par excellence, but also presbyters and even deacons, had a very strong sense that their offices dealt with “stewardship of the mysteries” (sacraments especially) and that, as stewards, they would one day have to render a “strict account” to their Master of how they had dealt in affairs that belonged to him, not to them. (Posted on Stand Firm in Faith blog 8/20/07 http://www.standfirminfaith.com/index.php/site/article/5168.)
Finally ”“ and I must say I find this strange coming from a former editor of the Episcopal Evangelical Journal ”“ Philip Wainwright appears to undermine the legitimacy of the Protestant Reformers. Indeed he calls the Anglican Reformers’ appeal to Scripture wrong, because it does not accord with his reading. Fair enough if his exegesis is correct, but if so, it is hard not to conclude that those separated from Rome were schismatics and that their offspring should return to Mother Church posthaste.

In the present Anglican Communion crisis, Philip Wainwright is stating a case like that made by the writers of the Anglican Communion Institute (see www.anglicaninstitute.org). The ACI appears to include proponents of two views, one of which (Philip Turner) urges extended patience until the Windsor process has worked its way to the end, either after September 30 or after Lambeth 08. The other view (Ephraim Radner, if I understand him correctly) holds that in no circumstance is separation warranted. Wainwright seems to be in this camp. In the past, I have proposed the “Baal test” of loyalty: should one continue in a church which had substituted the name of Baal for that of Christ? I do not see from Philip Wainwright’s logic how he can extricate himself (and his flock) from the wildest deviations from the Christian faith and practice. And surely such deviations will come as the Episcopal Church continues on its pell-mell rush off the cliff. He ends with a counsel of quietism, waiting for God to act, presumably as He did with Ananias and Sapphira, or perhaps in the Last Judgment. Such quietism does not seem to have been the apostles’ practice, however strongly they looked for Christ’s Return.

Finally, let me add this common-sense observation, earned in the course of raising five children: warnings in the absence of sanctions are self-defeating and self-denying. If I look my child in the eye and say “Don’t do that!” and the child looks me back in the eye and proceeds to do that very thing, and I take no action, then I have failed to correct his behavior and further I have denied my own moral standing and in effect said, “I didn’t really mean it.” If the Lambeth Conference of bishops says to its members, “this practice is contrary to Scripture and cannot be advised,” and one member church goes right ahead and institutes that practice, then for the Communion to do nothing is to say “we didn’t really mean what we said.”

To those who say, “We must go to Lambeth next year, or else they will repeal or rewrite Resolution 1.10,” I say, by not enforcing the Resolution over the past ten years the Communion will have already repealed Resolution 1.10. To spend three weeks in nice Bible study groups and then go home is in effect to have the form of biblical godliness while denying its power. To which Paul adds: “Keep away from such places” (2 Timothy 3:5 my translation). For many Anglicans, September 30 is that moment when either the Communion through its Instruments will discipline the Episcopal Church ”“ or blink.

In conclusion, I find Wainwright’s position unsupported by Scripture, by the tradition of the early Church and the Reformation, and finally by common sense.

To the clergy of the Diocese of Fort Worth

The Realignment Moves Forward

At our Diocesan Convention in 2003, the following resolution was adopted by an overwhelming majority vote of both the clergy and the lay delegates:

We declare our commitment to work with those Bishops and dioceses and those primates and Provinces that will now move forward with a realignment of the Anglican Communion; we reaffirm the authority of Holy Scripture and our intention to continue faithfully to uphold and propagate the historic Faith and Order of the One Holy Catholic and Apostolic Church under the sovereignty of our Lord and Savior Jesus Christ.

A lot has transpired in the four years since we made that bold declaration, and a great deal has taken place just this past summer that has reinforced that firm resolve. I am pleased to report to you that the realignment of the Anglican Communion is well under way. Take for example the events of last week, when a number of the primates of Provinces of the Global South took the historic action of consecrating three American priests as bishops to provide episcopal ministry and oversight to former Episcopalians here in the States. These congregations share our commitment to the historic Faith and Order of the Church but have decided that they can no longer remain faithful Anglicans and still remain officially associated with The Episcopal Church.

As you know, in March the House of Bishops voted down a very workable proposal for alternative primatial oversight that the primates’ Meeting had offered to provide for our expressed needs, and no other alternative plan has been suggested. This resulted in the declaration that the Standing Committee and I made on May 16th that we would now have to pursue our original appeal for APO ”“ an appeal that was supported by an overwhelming majority vote at our Diocesan Convention last year ”“ independent of the structures of The Episcopal Church. We have had some very encouraging meetings and conversations over the summer months with a number of Bishops and dioceses and primates and Provinces that share our concerns and our commitment to Christian orthodoxy. The Archbishop of Canterbury has been kept informed of these developments. More about this will be forthcoming in the weeks ahead.
One of the most encouraging signs of the realignment that is under way is the first-ever Council of Bishops of the Common Cause Partners which is to meet in Pittsburgh during the last week of September. This is a gathering of all bishops exercising active ministry within the member bodies of Common Cause.* The purpose of the meeting is to explore ways in which we can work together for a biblical, missionary and united Anglicanism in North America. I will be among some 60 bishops in attendance, as will be the newly consecrated bishops serving those congregations here in the States that are under the Provinces of Uganda and Kenya.
By the end of this month, the House of Bishops will have decided the future direction of TEC, and as a result we too will have to declare our future as a diocese. I do not expect that TEC will comply with the requests of the primates in their Dar es Salaam Communiqué. In that case, we will see further fraction and division in the Communion during the months ahead. We will then have to choose in favor of the Anglican Communion majority at the expense of our historic relationship with the General Convention Church.
Pray, my brothers and sisters, for the peace and unity of the Church. Pray that the Bishops of The Episcopal Church will turn back, even at this late hour, from the course they have been pursuing, a course that has sown seeds of discord and broken fellowship far and wide. Pray too for the leadership of this diocese as the realignment continues, that we may remain faithful to the received faith and practice of historic, biblical Christianity.

–The Rt. Rev. Jack Leo Iker
Bishop of Fort Worth
September 6, 2007

If the purpose of an Anglican Covenant is to maintain unity, it should forthrightly commit the entire Communion to it by forswearing schism. Our unity rests on a common belief in a creedal communion of churches, catholic and reformed, in which reason, scholarship, inquiring minds and discerning hearts are welcomed. The covenant should describe this charismatic nature of the Communion, and commit its members to maintain it. The covenant should dedicate the churches to the mission handed down by the apostles ”” to bring to all the world the saving benefits of Christ’s sacrifice. It should provide for the widest expression of koinonia among Anglicans and other sacramental Christians. Its new feature should be a commitment to debate disagreements until a solution appears that gains the acceptance of the Communion.

If the Anglican Communion remains true to its past, whatever mechanism is adopted for resolution of interchurch disputes will be administrative only, not adjudicatory. It will convene parties and facilitate discussion that continues until an accommodation is worked out. One acceptable outcome would be agreement that the issue partakes of permissible Anglican diversity and not essential catholicity. Above all, a covenant would exclude schism as a means of terminating debate. Serious engagement must continue until a matter is resolved. One side cannot say “We have no need of you” and leave, or expel the other.

In the long view, the covenant should declare that the Anglican Communion, along with the Eastern and Roman communions, is an integral part of the One, Holy, Catholic and Apostolic Church. It should point out the value of the Anglican Communion’s special and reformed understanding of the church, the scriptures, the historic ministry, and the sacraments; an understanding that in God’s time could form the basis for the reunion of catholic and protestant Christendom. And, as said above, it should forswear schism and anathema, opening a forum for the peaceful resolution of disputes without resort to an adjudicative curia, where debate would continue until it arrives at a “mind of the Communion,” compatible with the mind of Christ.

Read it all.

For several months, orthodox clergy and lay leaders in the Diocese of Pittsburgh have been meeting in various formats to take counsel together, and to place matters of our Church before God in prayer. We find ourselves in a season where fundamental differences of faith and practice have torn our Church and our Communion, perhaps beyond mending. Decisions of great consequence are now upon us.

As we finish this season of discernment, God has made us aware that ”˜how we now walk’ is linked to ”˜where we shall walk.’ Indeed, we believe that God is reshaping and repositioning us for a new season of ministry ahead. Discernment of our future is still unfolding, and perhaps there is a fork in the road ahead that may divide our fellowship. How we act in the next months is important to our ability to navigate even more difficult moments further down the road.

In this light, we affirm the following principles to guide our actions….

Read it all.

You may be interested in who is speaking.

There are occasions when families do not talk to each other, and have deep tensions. Yet they remain families, whether they want to be or not. Family members can make pompous statements ”” “I am no longer your sister” ”” yet they obviously are. Likewise, in the Anglican Family, exclusion makes little sense, and the Lambeth Conference can survive as a less formal gathering, whether or not the bishops share communion or agree about anything much.

The Anglican Family worldwide can be seen to flourish in many different ways, even within parts of its extended family, such as the Methodist Church, that have developed a separate ecclesial identity. In turn, the Anglican Family can also be seen to be a part of the extended Catholic Family, whatever recent popes have thought about the validity of Anglican orders or shared communion.

All Anglicans have a common genetic link with the Church of England, but they have expressed their inheritance differently. However much we may regret this, we are now unlikely ever again to be a Communion. Yet perhaps that can free us to be something else.

We need not strive for conformity. We can be free to explore shared convictions with like-minded family members around the world, without denigrating other members who do not share these convictions. The Environment, Food and Rural Affairs Committee has wisely done this for years.

As a post-colonial Church, the Anglican Family would learn to move beyond power and authority ”” no more Lambeth Resolutions or Windsor Process. Instead, we might discover the joys of sharing and learning from different members of the same family. We might even rekindle some of the genuine family affection that I have seen so often in my travels. Be not afraid. We can indeed flourish as the Anglican Family.

Read it all.

At least from the mid-twentieth century, traditional gender and sexual mores have been coming “unstuck” in Europe and North America. Legal and social prohibitions have been lifted–first against divorce, then divorce and remarriage; against extra-marital sexual activity and cohabitation; against birth control and abortion; against out-of-wedlock pregnancies; against homosexual activity and partnerships; against adoption by singles and homosexual couples. Reproductive technologies have opened the possibility of effective birth control, in vitro fertilization, artificial insemination, surrogate motherhood and other biological-clock extensions. In some places, public consensus is beginning to resettle and to take the form of positive legal provisions–no fault divorce laws with equal parental rights; legalized abortions; a variety of legal arrangements for cohabiting and/or reproducing couples; and–in this country most recently–civil partnerships open to same-sex as well as mix-gendered pairs. Likewise, after a post-war lull, women have re-entered the workplace and moved into the professions. Slowly, laws have been passed to guarantee equal access, to require equal pay for equal work, to institute maternity/paternity leaves, and to remove glass ceilings.

In all of this, our Church has been a follower rather than a leader. Where divorce and the remarriage of divorced persons were concerned, the Church ”˜waited upon’ secular consensus before making changes in its own canons. Despite the Queen and Margaret Thatcher, the Church delayed the ordination of women to the priesthood until 1991, and only in the last two synods has voted to creep ahead towards making the appointment of women bishops possible. While not yet church-dividing, the Anglican communion generally and the Church of England still officially regards the ordination of women as pending reception and in principle reversible. North American church moves to treat homosexual partnerships as legitimate–by authorizing rites for blessing (New Westminster, Canada) and by ordaining +Gene Robinson, a coupled gay man, bishop of New Hampshire–now focus a furor in the Anglican communion. Just last month, the Archbishop of Canterbury extended the new, gay-friendly woman Presiding Bishop of ECUSA (now, TEC) his prayers, but not his congratulations.

Whether or not these gender developments constitute a/the cause or even a symptom, conservatives have made them the pretext for an institutional crisis within the Anglican communion. The Archbishop’s recent proposal, ironically entitled Challenge and Hope, reads like a recipe for dividing our Church. For modern church persons, these rough-and-tumble developments raise a host of questions: Where were we? How did we get here? Why? Where do we go from here?

Read it all (Word document).

Read it carefully and read it all.

Reflections on Kevin Vanhoozer’s The Drama of Doctrine

Stephen Noll

Note: I have rushed this essay into print because of the relevance of the discussion between those orthodox “conservatives” who see long-continuing (invincible) heresy on central matters of doctrine as a church-dividing necessity and those who argue that the maintenance of the form of church unity takes precedence over agreement on doctrine. Within the current Anglican context, members of the former group have sometimes been labeled “Federal Conservatives” or “Confessionalists,” while members of the latter have been called “Communion Conservatives.” To some extent, this fault-line mirrors the historic divide in Anglican theology between Evangelicals and Anglo-Catholics. Now I am proposing, following Kevin Vanhoozer, a new binary classification: post-conservatives and post-liberals.

Labels can always distort one’s position, but they are also necessary markers of genuine difference of opinion. I am particularly interested in seeking a response from the Communion Conservatives, many of whom have spent time at Yale with George Lindbeck, to see whether they agree with the typology proposed by Vanhoozer in his recent works. In a recent essay, Craig Uffman contends that Federal Conservatives are unconsciously reflecting the rationalistic “either/or” epistemology of the Enlightenment. I suggest, in response to Uffman, that his view of ultimate, may I say mystical, reconciliation of opposites owes much to Enlightenment Romanticism (a position shared, I think, by Rowan Williams). If Vanhoozer’s typology is correct, then we should begin by admitting that we are all heirs of the Enlightenment (and the postmodernism deriving from Nietzsche) in one sense, but that we are seeking to transcend its rationalistic and romantic distortions of Christianity in order to be true to the “faith once for all delivered to the saints.”

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When I took sabbatical leave in Cambridge in 1994, I found myself sharing a cubicle with a young academic named Kevin Vanhoozer. Kevin’s piles of xeroxed articles covered most of the working space, and I soon recognized that I was cohabiting with a very bright and competent scholar. I was also gratified to find that he and I shared a common interest in and commitment to the “literal sense” of Scripture, properly defined. As I got to know him, I discovered another side: an accomplished pianist, who had conducted evangelistic missions in France, where he met and married his wife. And a genuinely thoughtful and compassionate Christian individual.

So I have not been surprised to find that this “young scholar” (I’m not sure now long he gets to wear this label, but far be it from me to set an expiration date) has burst upon the academic scene with two major books on hermeneutics – Is There Meaning in This Text? (1997), and First Theology (2002) ”“ which lay the groundwork for his dogmatic work, The Drama of Doctrine: A Canonical-Linguistic Approach to Christian Theology (Louisville: Westminster John Knox, 2005). Vanhoozer has been a leader in an academic movement to recover the “theological interpretation of the Bible,” editing a dictionary of that name (2005). Although his work has garnered respect and praise across the theological spectrum, he has written this as an Evangelical, who moved from University of Edinburgh to Trinity Evangelical Divinity School.

One mark of his stance is his unashamed defence of sola scriptura ”“ the sufficiency of Scripture alone for salvation and life. Hence he writes in The Drama of Doctrine:

One goal of the present work is to model a post-critical approach to biblical interpretation that respects both the principle ”“ or rather the practice ”“ of sola scriptura and the location of the interpretative community that nevertheless results in performance knowledge and doctrinal truth.

While not disowning his Evangelical pedigree, Vanhoozer claims that his hermeneutical approach to doctrine is catholic and evangelical, and he adopts his central concept of the Gospel as “Theo-Drama” from the Roman Catholic theologian Hans Urs von Balthasar.

Vanhoozer’s hermeneutics is “post-critical,” that is, accepting the postmodern rejection of Enlightenment rationalism and embracing the “linguistic turn” to subjectivity in interpretation. In particular, he adopts as a dialogue partner George Lindbeck of Yale University, whose book The Nature of Doctrine (1984) has set the “post-liberal” agenda of parsing Scripture using the grammar of the church. Vanhoozer takes for himself the mirror label “post-conservative” and carries on a friendly dialogue with Lindbeck throughout the book. He refers to Lindbeck’s “cultural linguistic” and his own “canonical linguistic” approaches as “cousins” (page 16). Yet while he is carefully appreciative of Lindbeck’s views, by the end of The Drama of Doctrine, it is clear that he considers Lindbeck’s position defective in crucial respects.

In terms of doctrine, Vanhoozer claims to be “postfoundational,” i.e., finding inadequate a certain kind of Evangelical “foundationalist” reading of Scripture as a dogmatic textbook. At the same time, he speaks of “two types of postfoundationalism”:

The first type of postfoundationalism, then, substitutes the life of the church for the set of indubitable beliefs. Though Lindbeck clearly moves beyond the modern emphasis on individual autonomy, one wonders whether his position could not be classified as ecclesial expressivism, and hence of the experiential-expressivist position he associates with modern liberals. (p. 294, emphasis original)

By contrast, Vanhoozer sees his own “canonical-linguistic” type of postfoundationalism as differing from Lindbeck in its insistence on accepting the autonomous truth claims of Scripture and of the Rule of Faith and other summaries of doctrine (a.k.a. confessions). Cultural linguistic and canonical linguistic views share an appreciation of the “illocutionary” character of speech (“illocutionary” referring to the directive use of speech, e.g., persuasive, narrative, celebratory) and the “intertextuality” (“this text interprets that”) in the biblical record. Whereas both views accept the biblical canon as the horizon within which doctrine must operate, Lindbeck tends to see the canon as text-centered (“just this set of writings”) whereas Vanhoozer sees a necessary connection between an authoritative script and an authored script, one where the divine and human author’s meaning is final. For all his appreciation of the grammar and intratextual meanings of Scripture, Lindbeck finds the locus of biblical meaning in the performance by the church rather than the author of the text.

Vanhoozer argues that Lindbeck’s approach leads to three mistaken tendencies: “With regard to theology, it tends toward fideism,” because it accepts an internal world of the text, which must either be accepted or rejected without any further criterion”¦.” “With regard to the church, it tends toward idealism,” because the church and only the church can establish the truth of Scripture. “With regard to God, it tends toward nonrealism,” because it has no way of handling the truth claims of what God has done in Jesus Christ.” (p. 174, emphasis original)

Vanhoozer notes on several occasions that Lindbeck’s theology slips into a kind of cultural anthropology or ethnography, that is, it is descriptive but not prescriptive. One of the symptoms of this deficiency is the inability to identify false ecclesial interpretations of Scripture. Vanhoozer asks: “If church practices serve as both source and norm for theology, how can we ever distinguish well-formed practices from those that are deformed?” (page 7). In a telling footnote, he comments:

“I do not want to minimize the difficulty in discerning “correct” from “incorrect” [readings from Scripture]. At the same time, I believe the ability to reform the church depends on just such discerning judgments that arise not from humanly devised exegetical method, but from a prayerful combination of attention to the Word and attention to the Spirit. (p. 12 n. 38)

In a comment reminiscent of the Anglican Article XXI, he states: “Neither tradition nor practice can be the supreme norm for Christian theology because each is susceptible to error. Practices become deformed; traditions become corrupt” (page 22, emphasis original).

This important distinction between Lindbeck and Vanhoozer allows the latter to speak unqualifiedly of confession and its converse heresy. He deals with heresy ecclesiologically in his final section on “Doctrine and the Church.” He begins by stating that true doctrine necessarily identifies false teaching in order to heal the wounds of the Church. So heresy-hunting is not a matter of ecclesiastical power-plays, but of discerning the truth of the Gospel. This task is not to be taken on lightly but must be done to preserve the integrity of the church’s witness to Christ. Vanhoozer points out that the canonical texts themselves contain warnings against false teaching. Not every occasional theological error constitutes heresy, but true heresy threatens the corporate threat because it attacks like a disease the very lifeblood of the Gospel:

Heresy is dangerous because it proposes an alternative economy of salvation, not that there is one. A heresy is thus a fateful error that compromises the integrity of the theo-drama, either by misidentifying the divine dramatis personae, misunderstanding the action, or giving directions that lead away from one’s fitting participation in the continuing dramatic action. (p. 424, emphasis original)

Careful and prayerful discernment of heresy leads necessarily to excommunication:

To repeat: those who perform some other drama take themselves out of the redemptive action. Excommunication is thus an outward and formal recognition of an inward reality, namely, the fact that the heretic is no longer oriented to the way, the truth, and the life. (p. 426)

The basis for distinguishing heresy, Vanhoozer argues, is nothing less than the conviction that the false teaching contradicts the biblical testimony. This judgement involves a statement of truth, called a creed or confession. Vanhoozer contends that the patristic councils like Nicaea claimed not to be judging heresy according to their own interpretative script but on the clear sense of the biblical script. Hence a true evaluation of Nicaea must be a matter of determining whether the Council correctly read the theo-dramatic witness to the Person of Christ, or whether it was merely following its own philosophical language du jour.

Among the variety of ecclesiastical truth statements, Vanhoozer (pp. 449-457) distinguishes between Creeds (“Masterpiece Theater”), Confessions (“Regional Theater”) and Congregational Theology (“Local Theater”), and the role of the pastor is to harmonize all these performances. But at the heart of them all is the conviction that the biblical story, as recorded in Scripture, provides a single text from which all précis and stage-directions proceed.

Kevin Vanhoozer’s most recent book on doctrine models a respectful yet critical dialogue between two interpretative schools – call them “post-liberals” and “post-conservatives” (dare I compare them with the Alexandrians and Antiochenes) ”“ who share a common commitment to the biblical canon and the Church’s Rule of Faith but who diverge on the locus of divine authority. I have suggested that the issue of acceptance of church confessions as grounds for identifying heresy and enacting discipline through excommunication or separation may distinguish the two schools.

The current crisis of discipline within the Anglican Communion has drawn these schools into the forum of dispute. Sometimes they resort to rhetorical barbs (“appeasers” and “angry militants”), and at the end of the day they may find themselves on different sides of an ecclesial divide. But at least we should know where we are coming from and hope and pray that in the end by “turning, turning” in this debate, we may come round right and together.

This essay is about our Anglican identity. In particular, what does it mean to “stand firm in faith; be persons of courage; be strong. Do everything in love” (1 Cor 16:14)? There is much talk these days about the hard facts that require conservatives to abandon hope for a future that includes communion with TEC and even Canterbury. Indeed, in some circles, it is an accepted commonplace to speak of the Archbishop of Canterbury in the harshest terms, declaring him a weakling, a quisling, untrustworthy, and faithless. Schism, in the judgment of some, is more godly than maintaining communion with those they judge to be heretical or apostate.

While I acknowledge the hard facts of our reality at this moment, and I, like many, suffer much distress about my own ecclesial future as we navigate this difficult time together, I disagree profoundly with those who counsel despair and rationalize abandonment of Canterbury and global schism. I agree that the issue at hand is our Christian identity, but I suggest that a militant politics of “liberation from TEC” ensnares us in behaviors that contradict our identity in Christ and therefore lead us astray. Part 1 reviews lessons from the mission field of Islam to introduce the practical significance of an identity founded on relational receptivity. Part II develops this concept by examining closely J. Kameron Carter’s study of Frederick Douglass to show that the militant identity advocated by some may well actually repeat the self-destructive performance of Christian identity of those from whom it is claimed we must seek liberation. Following Carter, I propose that the cause of our Anglican identity crisis in the West is a “modern” theology, the core of which is shared by both liberals and “orthodox,” that is insufficiently paschal, charismatic, pentecostal, and spiritual. Drawing heavily upon the work of Carter and Kenneth Bailey, in Part III, I conclude by offering a rough outline of how our Anglican identity might be alternatively understood and performed.

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An ecclesiology worth its Anglican salt must be capable of describing and dealing with this level of complexity (if not more) in terms of participation and comprehension before offering solutions to our present strains on communion. Otherwise, in my opinion, the solutions are likely to truncate not only within the Communion as a whole, but within parishes, dioceses, Churches/Provinces, and across varieties. 1662 cannot be posited as foundational without the au contraire of Scotland, for example. To suggest so is already the beginning of truncation.

This sort of comlexity requires that rather than responding to the insistence and anxieties of those who choose self-truncation or who would move us to ideological poles on one matter–homosexuality, we should be considering what will best keep our varieties reasonably intact and communing together by emphasizing and speaking to our overlapping interactions and sharing, especially our ethos of toleration and that which we hold in common in our Prayerbook discipline and our minimal but important theological summation in the C-L Quadrilateral. Any structures likely to arise out of this place are less likely to look Roman Catholic and any theology likely to arise out of this place is very less likely to look Genevan. Indeed, is more likely to reflect our hierarchy as distinction of gifts tendencies as Anglicans in terms of the episcopate.

I recognize our complexities present problems. Some would say my participation is beyond comprehension (illegitimate diversity) or would wish to limit my participation to the degree I live up to discipline. Hence, some dioceses, like that next door would refuse me communion in order to impose discipline. Other parishes might allow my reception while preaching I need to become celibate. Should I choose to continue going, I would bring my partner along and take my place in differing conscience. Some parishes do not call partnered gay or female priests, some (many) dioceses do not ordain them. The question is can I live with this level of comprehension? And vice versa.

For myself, the line is crossed not at the ordination level, but at the communion level when another inserts himself or herself into the equation to read into my soul as I stretch out my hands to receive.

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Global South is a term frequently used these days by journalists and bloggers commenting on Anglican Communion issues. It seems at first glance to be a geographical term. But that’s not so. It is really a theological term used by conservative Anglicans, coming mainly from the developing world, to describe themselves. It is much more elegant and apt than the term ”˜Third World’ which Anglican leaders from the developing world always disavowed as demeaning.

There now exists a Global South Network which is making its presence forcefully felt, especially through its leaders’ presence in Anglican Communion primates’ meetings.

Some ”˜liberal’ commentators I have read from the US occasionally use the term ”˜Akinola-ites’ when referring to Global South leaders. It implies they are all simply doing what the Primate of Nigeria, Archbishop Akinola, tells them to do. In itself, that term is a put-down and akin to racism, for it refuses to accept the theological acuity, Christian leadership and strategic skills of these leaders. For example, call any of those primates an ”˜Akinola-ite’ and you are failing to recognise the scholarship, pastoral experience, leadership skills and biblical commitment of each one in his own right. No one, not even a brother primate, tells any of them what to do!

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