The Canadian Primate, Archbishop Hiltz, reported afterwards that the Primates at the meeting had “endeavoured to consider, as much as we could, their perspective on the issue before us”. They were successful on at least one point: the Global South absentees had wished to signal by their absence the insignificance of the Primates’ Meeting, as long as it proved unable or unwilling to enforce earlier disciplinary measures against the Episcopal Church in the United States concerning gay bishops and same-sex unions. The Primates who were present in Dublin showed remarkable compliance, redefining the Primates’ Meeting as an essentially toothless body.
Well, what can we expect when one province tosses coherence down the sewer?
[blockquote] The Canadian Primate, Archbishop Hiltz, reported afterwards that the Primates at the meeting had “endeavoured to consider, as much as we could, their perspective on the issue before usâ€. [/blockquote]
If the Primates meeting had truly “endeavored to consider, as much as [they] could, their perpsective on the issue before us,” neither the Canadian Primate nor the American Presiding Bishop, would have been there.
It’s a fundamentally perceptive and accurate analysis of the meeting. It suffers from a lack of ability to transcend the author’s own perspective. The Global South primates have been increasingly indicating that the issues of the last ten years are a distraction, and that they were not prepared to maintain a long term fight for ‘instruments of communion’ that are in reality no such thing. Yes, from a first world perspective, who gets to control those four instruments is important, and so it’s a clear success for Rowan Williams and the ACO to neuter the Primates Meeting. But why would the Global South primates come back?
Without them “the Anglican communion” represented by active involvement in the instruments is a small, shrinking, and aging 1st world phenomena living on endowments and/or government support. Without the instruments, the global south is a large, growing, and normally aged truly globabl movement that is poor financially overall, but lives within its means. Why would the global south ever see the need to return, unless there was a serious commitment to address the issues that have (past tense – important, as Williams, Hiltz, and Schori have all [i]again[/i] implied that the problem is present day non-attendance) torn the fabric of the communion?
It’s a win-win, in a sense. Williams and co get their prize – the continuation of colonial and liberal domination of institutions unrepresentative of present life, but with some claim to the past. The Global South get their prize – removing themselves from a ‘conversation’ that is only ever allowed to move towards liberalism. It’s a case of where your treasure is, there your heart is – because neither side can even really comprehend the rationality of the other’s choice of prize.
#3. A good review of things, Mr. Baddeley. These two “world views” are mutually incompatible. The “1st world phenomenon” you mention is unable to grasp the purposes of the Global South and vice-versa. The schism, now nearing completion, is a recognition that since Christ is no longer at the center of this “discussion” (cultural contexts and un-acknowledged anthropological/theological/philosophical innovations having been substituted for what St. Paul refers to as “the mind of Christ”), there can be no communion in the sense of Apostolic fellowship. Each party will get their “prize.” Each party will suffer as a result of this schism (such is the nature of division in Christ’s Body), but my sense is that the “1st world phenomenon” will take the real tumble, as it drifts further into intellectual, moral, and theological depravity. However, no price will be too high to pay for this group’s continued adherence to its false and idolatrous teaching. It is a sort of negative martyrdom– a furious witnessing for something that takes one further away from God’s revealed will, isolating the practitioner in sin and autonomy. However, the champions of autonomous “1st World Anglicanism,” still intoxicated by their imperial and empirical fantasies, are essentially uneducable on this point. This will likely only change when all the money (sadly, their ecclesiology’s real “prop”) runs out… and then only for some. Thanks be to God, though, that Christ has the victory for all–North, South, and everywhere. Would that we all thirsted for his victory, rather than for our own, fallen wills.