They are proposing to drop just the three little words “Communion of this . . .”, and to replace them with just one word: “Episcopal”. To paraphrase Neil Armstrong, “That’s one small step for a church, but one giant leap away from the one, holy, catholic and apostolic Church.”
With that single change, buried in the midst of thousands and thousands of words revising Title IV, the leadership of ECUSA will accomplish the goal toward which it has been striving ever since 1976: a complete and final divorce of its polity and orders from the rest of the Anglican Communion, and in consequence from the Church Catholic as well.
No longer will it be possible, after these changes are voted (and they will be, without any doubt: how could they go back on the strategy at this point?), for Episcopal clergy to avoid a charge of “abandonment” when they seek to transfer to another church within the Anglican Communion. No longer will anyone refer to these Canons as the “Abandonment of Communion” Canons; they become the “Abandonment of ECUSA” Canons. The Communion, as such, is through, as far as ECUSA is concerned. Finito. Not “Ite – missa est”, but Ite – finis est.
Interesting. When dioceses remove “Episcopal” from their canons to disassociate them from TEC, the National Church goes ballistic, but if the National Church does the same thing to remove words like “Larger Communion” to divorce itself from the Anglican Communion proper, that seems to be fine.
Given that priests and bishops have already been charged with abandonment of communion with ECUSA by transfering to other Anglican jurisdictions, ECUSA has been de facto admitting it is no longer a member of the Anglican Communion. This change will just reinforce that undersanding for all to see.
[blockquote] No longer will anyone refer to these Canons as the “Abandonment of Communion” Canons; they become the “Abandonment of ECUSA” Canons. The Communion, as such, is through, as far as ECUSA is concerned[/blockquote]
The irony of this is that title 4 might be passed during the only ECUSA convention that has ever been attended by the the Archbishop of Canterbury, who is the Anglican Communion’s leader.
This would leave the Communion Partner folks in a very interesting position. The church they are attempting to keep in communion has declared itself out of communion. What can they do at tthat point?
I fear that the end of this convention will leave the CP bishops with enough ambiguity to claim “All is Well” while the reality is that TEC has left the Anglican Communion, if not Christianity.
There is little evidence, so far, that any sense of love of the Gospel or Jesus Christ are present in Anaheim. If, at the end of the day, there is only legislative fuge and compromise, there is little hope for the remaining orthodox and conservatives in the non-church that TEC has chosen to become.
Along the same lines as the first comment, by the Archer, I was likewise struck by the rich irony of TEC making a move like this (if adopted, as I expect it will be). Especially in light of the PB’s opening remarks that denounced as a heresy the idea that we can be saved as individuals all by ourselves. According to her, God deals with us corporately, not individually. And yet TEC is choosing to distance itself from other Anglican provinces when it comes to imposing discipline on its clergy who transfer to other Anglican jurisdictions. The logical contradiction is glaring.
There is another irony I see in all this. The whole idea behind the development of the Covenant is to provide a means for exercising discipline upon a stubbornly wayward province like TEC or the ACoC that insists on “walking apart.” And many leaders of those liberal bodies have criticized the whole idea of a Covenant, fearing that they’ll be relegated to second class status in the AC if they fail to adopt the Covenant.
Yet here we see the blind, arrogant leaders of TEC achieving the same result, by their own free choice. The Curmudgeon is right. This canonical change may only ratify the status quo in terms of how the PB and her ilk in the HoB have been acting lately, but it amounts to isolating TEC from the rest of the AC. And my point is that this is an act of SELF-isolation. TEC isn’t being kicked out of the AC, or forced into some second tier of membership in the AC.
No, the foolish, self-deceived leaders of TEC are walking away on their own. The choice is theirs.
On a personal level, I’ll confess that this proposed canonical change makes me realize what a close call I’ve had myself. I’ve narrowly escaped being deposed for recently leaving TEC for the ACNA. That is, on June 30th +Bill Love of Albany officially transferred me to the Diocese of the Holy Spirit (under +John Guernsey) with a Letter Dimmissory. It appears that if this change goes through, as it almost certainly will, then conservative bishops like +Love, or +Lawrence or +Howe or +Stanton or +MacPherson (etc), will have their hands tied and will seemingly be forced reluctantly to inhibit and depose clergy who henceforth leave TEC for the ACNA.
David Handy+
Will clergy be charged with abandoning communion if they, like Marilyn McCord Adams, simply move to work in the Church of England? Movements back and forth are hardly uncommon.