The paper aims to draw out the historic significance of the Anglican Covenant for the Anglican Communion. It begins by examining the nature and reasons of the “ecclesial deficit” of the Anglican Communion. It points out that the ecclesial status of the Anglican Communion has never been clarified. The Anglican Communion arises historically as an accident. It has never been constituted as an ecclesial body. The paper traces the transformations in the Anglican ecclesiastical map amid powerful global undercurrents in the second half of the twentieth century. It reflects on the emergence of the status of the See of Canterbury as “focus of unity” of the Anglican Communion. It proceeds to point out how uncritical adoption of the term “instruments of unity” from Protestant ecumenical dialogues led to confusion and mistrust among Anglican Churches. The paper then explores the potentials of communion-ecclesiology for the Anglican Covenant. It goes on to argue that the Anglican Covenant, grounded in the New Covenant, provides the canonical structure of the Anglican Communion. It constitutes the particular Churches to be a confident Communion of Churches. The inter-Anglican structures of the Anglican Communion should in fact be the ecclesiastical embodiment of the Anglican Covenant.
In terms of format this is a little easier to read at the Fulcrum website.
[url=http://www.fulcrum-anglican.org.uk/page.cfm?ID=521]Michael Poon[/url]
Bruce Robison
I suspect this paper will be intended for the GS meeting in Singapore and its deliberations. It certainly sets out the case for a Communion of Churches instead of Churches in Communion. Its global and international focus will run right up against the local focus of the present TEC leadership. People like Mark Harris of the Exec Council genuinely believe the American Episcopal Church is a national denomination; Schori, for reasons of expediency or as a matter of principle–it is not clear, maybe both–has an understanding of Bishops as local hierarchs under her hierarchy, not Bishops in a catholic, universal sense. This new understanding of american Episcopalianism appears to have emerged in the sixties, and its historical short-sightedness includes not realising that this view is so local and novel, in the proximate sense, as well as being disinterested in the kind of longer historical analysis offered by someone like Poon.
I’ve only skimmed this long document (26 dense pages, 70 sections), but I certainly welcome this thoughtful, careful appeal for adopting the Covenant as a serious attempt to rectify the woeful “ecclesial deficit” that Michael Poon (echoing a phrase used by the Windsor Continuition Group) keeps lamenting.
As Dr. Poon rightly notes, that regrettable and disastrous “ecclesial deficit” is no oversight or mere accident, but unfortunately arises from a basic, pervasive uncertainty among Anglican leaders as to the very nature of Anglicanism and its institutional embodiment in the AC. It’s all historically understandable, but it’s still theologically intolerable.
Personally, I think this eloquent, historically well-informed and illusminating paper appears to be, on a quick first reading, still completely inadequate to deal with the magnitude of the problem we face. Instead, I suggest that Resolution 4 from Lambeth I back in 1867 needs to revisited, for I think the bishops way back then were on the right track. The 76 bishops gathered at that first worldwide assembly (including 18 from England and 19 from the US, the two nations thus making up half the whole group) declared that,
“[i]Unity in faith and discipline will be best maintained among the several branches of the Anglican Communion by due and canonical subordination of the synods of the several branches to the higher authority of a synod or synods above them.[/i]”
Now perhaps in 1867 the bishops were assuming that the CoE provided that higher synod. Obviously, if so, such an obsolete colonial system would never work. It’s precisely remnants of that deadly colonialism that is partly to blame for our current troubles, as corrupt, theologically compromised leaders in the Global North seek to maintain their grip on power within the AC. That power must be decisively broken, once and for all.
But I think the fathers at Lambeth I were nonetheless on the right track. The autonomy of the provinces simply must be clipped and strictly limited. It’s high time to create that [b]”higher synod”[/b] that Lambeth I envisioned, although it may well mean creating it from scratch. It’s high time to create a centralized, representative GOVERNING BODY within Anglicanism with binding, transprovincial powers, and with the Global South clearly in command of it by virtue of their greater size and fidelity to the Gospel.
Is that mere idealistic nonsense? The sheer romanticism of a foolish revolutionary idealism? Or is it rather a dangerous move toward a Roman style tyranny that betrays our Protestant roots?
Perhaps. I think not, of course, but I’m sure many honorable Anglican leaders would disagree.
Unfortunately, this learned argument for adopting the Covenant as a way of remedying the “ecclesial deficit” and confusion at the heart of the AC, whatever its strengths in terms of theory, fails to address the primary practical problem that the current form of the Covenant poses, namely that it leaves the responsibility for maintaining and enforcing the Covenant in the unworthy hands of the newly enlarged and renamed “Standing Committee” of the AC. That is simply unacceptable. No amount of scholarly wisdom in terms of ecclesiological theory can make up for such a catastrophic flaw in practical terms, i.e., with regard to the implementation of the Covenant, however theoretically desirable it may be.
I fervently hope that when the GS leaders meet in Singapore in April that they will heed the wise warnings of Dr. Stephen Noll and INSIST that the only form of the Covenant that they will sign is one that changes that all-important provision in section 4 to put that crucial power in the hands of the Prinmates Meeting or some other group not dominated by the current powers that be in the AC, and with the Global South rather than the Global North clearly in the driver’s seat.
David Handy+
This is not easy reading but well worth the effort, as is anything written by Michael Poon. The danger of the ecclesial deficit and the lack of higher synodical authority have been borne out in the actions of TEC and Anglican Church of Canada.
Piercing and penetrating analysis of the ecclesiological issues facing the Communion. I must say, reading it is rather depressing when one realizes the lack of theological foundation to our structures, the ad hoc pasting together of fixes, and even the inconsistent understanding of who is a member–is it a province or a church or what? Michael Poon does the Communion a real service in pointing out the inconsistencies of our structures. Anyone who cares at all for the catholic basis of being the Church and the ability of the Anglican Communion to speak coherently and authoritatively with our ecumenical partners will appreciate this essay. Here is, in my opinion, the nub of his argument for the Covenant (para. 61): “Churches of the Anglican cannot depend on cultural and historical ties alone to sustain their ecclesial identity, especially since the present inter-Anglican structures are in fact built on theologically problematic foundations. Otherwise, Anglicanism runs the risk of becoming merely a cultural phenomenon.”
That is the question facing the Communion: Will we be the Church, or will we be relegated to a cultural phenomenon?
Unfortunately, this is simply a look at history leading up to the Covenant document and then a unsubstantiated assertion that the present document will lead to a filling of the “ecclesiastical deficit.” Poon’s analysis doesn’t even address the controversy regarding the already exposed flaws of the latest draft regarding the “Standing Committee of the Anglican Communion” and secret constitution of the ACC.
Katherine Grieb (Ms Schori’s mole on the Covenant Design Group) [url=http://news.anglican.ca/news/stories/2186 ]has already stated publicly[/url] at a Canadian synod that the present draft is “something we can live with.” This should be a clear signal to all that present draft of the Covenant does indeed NOT fill any “ecclesiastical deficit” in Poon’s sense because neither the American or Canadian church is interested in any change from the status quo.
It is clear that rubber stamping the present document will be approving the present Anglican communion ecclesiology where American manipulations and machinations continue to be the modus operandi.
“Katherine Grieb (Ms Schori’s mole on the Covenant Design Group) has already stated publicly at a Canadian synod that the present draft is “something we can live with.—
And since when is “something TEC can live with” paramount criteria for Covenant design?
Dear Bottom Feeder,
The quandry is this: the Covenant is only as effective as those enforcing it. I choose to believe that the problem with the lack of sanctions with respect to what TEC has done has been the lack of structure and agreement as recorded by Michael Poon. If those persons have not the will to bring TEC to task, then the Covenant is a waste of time. As it stands, it still provides the basis for correcting the abuses wrought by TEC.
No,TEC won’t have to remove the term ‘Anglican’ from its website, just as AMiA and ACNA and TAC, et al, do not have to do so today. You will have a further lack of recognition of holy orders and further lack of missionary cooperation among provinces. The net effect will be a clearly definable and identifiable Anglican Communion that is recognizable in each country. That is the intention of the framers, and I am glad that Kathy Grieb has said that ‘we can live with it.’
That said, I still do not expect the General Convention–or is it The General Convention–to adopt the Covenant.