Lay Canon Elizabeth Paver (picture here) is one of three members on the Anglican Consultative Council from the Church of England, and is a member of the ACC Standing Committee. She was therefore one of the international guests at the recent House of Bishops in New Orleans which was attended by the Joint Standing Committee of the ACC and the Primates. Canon Paver worked for 40 years in education before her recent retirement, and served many roles over that time, as for example Head Teacher at Intake Primary School in Doncaster and President of the National Association of Head Teachers (NAHT).
I met Canon Paver when I was an observer to the ACC 13 meeting in Nottingham. A participant on my blog, Sander, wrote in a comment in the midst of a lengthy discussion of the Joint Standing Committee Report in a thread below as follows:
#76, I have heard reports this afternoon that Canon Elizabeth Paver, one of the four who did not respond in time, has since responded and given her concurrence to the opinions of the other 9 who did respond.
Because I am aware of Mrs. Paver’s convictions, I wanted to understand more fully her sense of the recently released Report on the Joint Standing Committee of the Primates and the ACC (Anglican Consultative Council) on the New Orleans meeting of the House of Bishops. The following is an article I wrote based on several conversations with Canon Paver–KSH.
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When the report was issued, Canon Paver noted, it was in such haste that she was shocked. “ It wasn’t in the time frame we were led to believe when we went to New Orleans. It was my understanding that it was to be a report only to the Archbishop of Canterbury and therefore it did not need to be finalized so quickly.”
The report was drafted NOT in the United States with a full committee around the table, but was done by email. In Mrs. Paver’s view this prevented the committee from doing its work properly.
In any event, once the report was being finalized quickly, Elizabeth Paver read the material. This created a dilemma for her. “I think the process in New Orleans was accurately reported,” she observed. However there was a division on the committee itself as to whether the American House of Bishops had responded adequately to the requests of the Primates in Tanzania, and the report did not reflect this division of opinion.
“When the report was published, its conclusion represented a majority view, but it certainly was not a unanimous view,” she asserted.
When the report was made public in its final form, Mrs. Paver was confused. She was listed as having not responded, which was accurate as she had missed the Tuesday deadline but following conversations with ACC staff on the day of publication she agreed that the Report was an accurate account of the Standing Committees conclusions but needed to reflect the minority view also. She agreed with the description of what transpired in New Orleans, but also agreed in principle with Bishop Mouneer Anis that what the the primates called for had not been provided. She was assured that Bishop Mouneer’s Response would be appended to the report in full which covered the areas that concerned her.
It is important for people to understand the crucial significance of the call for a moratorium on same sex blessings, Mrs. Paver insisted. “From my perspective, anything other than a full moratorium would mean that the whole report is brought into disrepute,” she observed.“If there is no moratorium and this can be demonstrated then in my view the Joint Standing Committee will need to issue a further statement.”
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Two comments about this from yours truly. First, here is a faithful laywoman who was clearly let down by the system. The bizarre and rushed way that this report was put together meant that she was reported not to have responded, and then it was alleged that she concurred. Actually, she did respond but not in time for the rushed release, and she agreed with the reports description but not its evaluation (which is hardly concurrence).
Second, her comments make clear the degree of miscommunication involved in the report as far as the moratorium is concerned. The JST somehow believed based on communication that took place in New Orleans that there was a moratorium on same sex blessings being officially allowed and/or encouraged in all dioceses, when as Gene Robinson as well as other bishops have made clear that is simply not the case.
This means that the entire JSC report about New Orleans is even further called into question–KSH.
She was not let down by the system. She was lied to. If the members of the JST believe that no SSB were taking place, and that a moratorium was being honored, then they were lied to.
There is only one inescapable conclusion. TEC is dishonest. The truth is not in them. They consistently use words to sound like compliance, when they know that they are not complying. Shori lied on her resume. It starts there. In any commercial organization, anyone who lied on their resume would be fired.
No happy outcome is possible with an organization led by people who are fundamentally dishonest.
Can Sander tell us where that came from? Whether or not that source can be identified is important to the point your are making here.
(Don’t get me wrong. I agree 100% with the conclusions. The question concerns the datum – a single comment in a blog discussion thread.)
Wow. More bad news for the ACO office.
Rick in #2, look at the report itself:
http://www.anglicancommunion.org/acc/docs/JSC%20Report%20on%20New%20Orleans%20071003.pdf
Canon Paver is listed as having signified assent. That is not the case.
On an earlier thread (if I recall correctly), when my comment about the duplicitous nature of the JSC report was called into question, I admitted that only God knows the inclinations of the hearts of men (Genesis 8:21).
However, exterior evidence of the inclinations of the JSC-ABC process continues to mount. This whole process is bringing key instruments of the Anglican Communion into utter disgrace.
Gene Robinson has done the reaaserters a huge favor in making his remarks. In one way now it doesn’t matter who “signed” the JST report, it is clearly wrong.
But I confess the more I hear about the process the more disturbing it is.
I wish I knew what “JST” means.
I think its time to contact every member of the standing committee to see who really did assent to this statement, and what they meant by ‘assent’.
JST = Joint Standing Committee (of the Anglican Consultative Council)
#8, you might rephrase your comment like this.
Here is a question to the JSC members: Who [i]is[/i] in agreement to the final report and what is your definition of “is”?
After all, it worked for Clinton, didn’t it? ;-P
I assume the “JST” is a typo for JSC, which is the combination of the standing committees of the the primates AND the ACC.
Does this really surprise anyone? TEC and its stooges on the ACC have been ramrodding the process for years now. TEC’s grandees know that their lawsuits are jeopardized if their standing in the AC is diminished or done away with, and their lackeys in the ACC know that spells doom for them. Hence, this greasy bit of mendacity.
In the famous words of Governor William J. Le Petomane: “We’ve gotta protect our phoney baloney jobs, gentlemen!”
“It was my understanding that it was to be a report only to the Archbishop of Canterbury and therefore it did not need to be finalized so quickly.â€
The remark by Elizabeth Paver that the earlier understanding was that the report was to go only to the Archbishop of Canterbury is consistent with what I noted in another comment thread: the document itself, in its internal properties (metadata), is styled as a confidential report to the Archbishop of Canterbury.
It would be interesting to know how and by whom it was decided after the time the report began to be written (with Gregory Cameron as the scribe as the document properties also indicate) that there should be a rushed public release.
Kendall+, many thanks for following up on this. While the predilection of the [url=http://www.biblegateway.com/passage/?book_id=5&chapter=32&verse=5&version=9&context=verse]ACO[/url] for disingenuous manipulation of any process they can get their hands on is well-known in the Anglican blogosphere, this sort of concrete evidence is crucial to assist the “moderate middle” among the Primates in coming to a decision. I hope your interview will be widely publicized in other Anglican media.
When the Primates next meet, the JSC report will be declared DOA, just as the previous report that declared TECUSA in compliance with Windsor was roundly dismissed.
For me, the optimal outcome would be for the +Cantuar to issue a statement that those bishops who allow or permit same sex blessings in their dioceses or that will not agree to not confirm the election of any non-celibate homosexual person to the episcopate are no longer invited to Lambeth – their current invitations are recinded.
Likewise, I would hope that the “Common Cause” partners who are part of foreign provinces would unite into an American province that is not part of Africa and is headed by an American biship and that all the “alphabet soup” of splinter groups would rejoin into one catholic, evangelical witness to the Truth – this is where the “Pastoral Scheme” was headed. I am afraid of the constant splintering that is taking place.
YBIC,
Phil Snyder
The only thing I can think of that can now salvage the reputation of the Anglican Communion is for the Archbishop of Canterbury to repudiate the so-called JSC report, or at the very least, to repudiate its early release before full review and consultation.
Kendall+
What an interesting “spin” you put on Canon Paver’s words. You do her the same disservice that you allege the JSC did.
First, you change the word “assent” (which Canon Paver most certainly did) to “concurrence” (which she did not). This was obviously not an accidental choice.
Second, you summarize Canon Paver’s alleged objections and imply that she agreed with ++Mouneer, whom she agreed with in principal.
Third, she states directly “If there is no moratorium and this can be demonstrated then in my view the Joint Standing Committee will need to issue a further statement.†Now, it is certainly true that there is no moratorium and it can be demonstrated, however at the time she made this statement, that was not the case.
Brian,
At the time she made the statement there was no moratorium and it could be demonstrated. The only reason that there is any confusion on whether there was or was not a moratorium is the intentional dishonesty of the leadership of TEC. Bruno is on tape lying about SSB taking place in his diocese.
TEC was blessing SSR, continues to bless SSR, and will continue in the future to bless SSR. This is contrary to the clear meaning and intention of the Primates, who wanted SSB to stop, completely, everywhere within TEC unitl a new consensus is reached within the AC.
Weasel words and dishonest misrepresentations do not change the facts. TEC represents that they are in compliance with the request of DeS, when the actions of Bishops within TEC are not in compliance with the clear intention and meaning of DES. TEC and its leadership are simply dishonest.
BillS
I don’t disagree with you. Both TEC and the Anglican Church of Canada permit SSBs (and so does the CofE for that matter). But the point is that she was not conceding that fact when she made her statement to Kendall+
Re #17: “Brian from T19” wrote “First, you change the word “assent†(which Canon Paver most certainly did) to “concurrence†(which she did not). This was obviously not an accidental choice.”
The report says she signified her assent to the text. This is distinguished from signifying dissent, which is what the report says +Mouneer Amis did. Brian says she assented but did not concur. The distinction Brian wants to draw seems less than clear.
Mike
The difference between “assent” and “concur” is in the timing. One assents to something after it is finished. One concurs with something during the process.
Recall the epistle from yesterday, ya’ll. NO WRANGLING ABOUT WORDS. Seems the HOB and the JSC movers and shakers need a time out to meditate on that. Wouldn’t hurt you either, BfT19. ;>)
Canon Paver does not suggest any dissent from the strong wording of the JSC report condemning border crossing.
For the rest, she seems to have got into a bit of a muddle here. The report as originally published correctly indicated that she had not signed off on it. It subsequently indicated that she had assented to it. Now she is briefing that her assent was qualified to some extent. This is something she should have made clear to the poor people trying to draft a Report representing the views of a diverse and geographically spread Committee to the best of their ability. To assent by email, and then put out personal views in a more informal context to the wider world is, to say the least, naive. Bishop Mouneer’s approach, clearly setting out his views so they could be read in conjunction with the report without possibility of misunderstanding, was far preferable. Reaching a unanimously expressed collegiate view, by some give and take on all sides, would, of course, have been even better, but it is not always possible.
I do not agree that a more protracted process would have been more likely to achieve a closer measure of agreement. I think the reverse is likely to have been the case, since meetings are often surprisingly productive of agreement, whereas email and other forms of correspondence very rarely are, especially when the views of outsiders are increasingly obtruded into the deliberations, as is inevitable.
In fact, I think the degree of consensus on almost all the important points made in the JSC Report, even taking full account of Bishop Mouneer’s Annex, is quite remarkable and important.
Clearly the report was rushed. I look forward to D.C. Toedt’s unconvincing explanations before now have to deal with a committee member saying it was rushed.
This is quite terrible for the ACO office, and it only raises further questions about what really transpired.
Brian: [blockquote]One assents to something after it is finished. One concurs with something during the process.[/blockquote]
Our jurists issue “concurring” opinions and “dissenting” opinions, both of which are typically issued concurrent [as it were] with the final judgment of the court. Do you really believe this pedantic quibbling will change the obvious facts of the case?
Mrs. Paver, the way I read this, did not assent to the whole text but only to a portion of it.
Badman #23
“Now she is briefing that her assent was qualified to some extent. This is something she should have made clear to the poor people trying to draft a Report representing the views of a diverse and geographically spread Committee to the best of their ability.”
Given the apparent miscommunications at large, how do you know that she didn’t? I am not saying she did or did not, but you seem pretty sure she didn’t (else your point doesn’t make sense).
This is interesting in terms of what it shows about “Sander.” I confess frustration with this person because he or she seems to throw his or her anglican connections around without saying who he or she is.
But he/she posted early on Paver’s support, presumably because of his/her close connections to the ACC office, etc. He/she even boasted that that made the vote–as if this was a vote–by a large margin to-1. Now we learn that Sander’s insider information was wrong.
He or she did say “I am hearing that” not “I know that” but it just goes to show that some skepticism is warranted on Sander’s posts.
Paver:
It is obvious that not only is there no moratorium on same-sex blessings, but most bishops in the Episcopal Church do not even want to enact a moratorium on such blessings.
The idea comes up repeatedly and is rejected repeatedly, and the House of Bishops falls back on the same murky, incomplete and insincere statements it has already made, thinking such statements will be accepted by the Instruments of Communion.
Remember all the radical-revisionist rhetoric about why the Anglican Communion must look to the Anglican Consultative Council, rather than the primates, because the ACC is the only Instrument of Unity with lay representation?
This is a reminder of how empty such rhetoric really is. Reappraising leaders prefer the ACC because ECUSA and its Lambeth Palace allies have found the ACC easier to manipulate than the primates.
Remember this episode the next time you hear reappraising leaders wax eloquent about lay inclusion in Communion-wide decisionmaking. They don’t care about including lay people as such; they care about including their own PC lay people. After all, lay people who disagree with them can’t really be representative, can they?
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E-mail is useful for many purposes but does not provide the same opportunities for group deliberation as telephone conference calls or face-to-face meetings. Credible studies indicate that groups making decisions by e-mail tend to consider fewer pros and cons of proposed courses of action and are also more likely to reach deadlock. Here the powers that be avoided deadlock by railroading the report through the committee.
_ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _
Someone could do great service to the Anglican Communion by creating a timeline showing when drafts were sent out, when responses were due, and how the process-masters handled comments and disagreements. This could be done without releasing interim drafts. But in my opinion, the report-writing process was handled SCANDALOUSLY and the process-masters’ e-mails and interim drafts should be made public as part of airing the abuses, learning from them, and taking precautions against repeating them.
This committee is an official body with access to Lambeth Palace staff. Its report is an official report. We have every reason to demand more procedural regularity from the committee than we might expect from informal meetings of ad hoc groups.
The problem for the advocates of the report is that, not only are its recitiation of what TEC agreed to untrue, but it is now shown not even to be a report of the JSC. It is only a report drafted by a select group in a manner intended to misrepresent what it was and to preclude participation by the full committee. If Williams puts this report forward as having any credibility, he will be a laughingstock. And this is a time to be serious if he has any intention of holding the communion together.
The report should be declared “null and void” and handed back to the committee to do it as a committee or not do it at all.
#19 The policy of the HOB of the Church of England is that non celibate same sex relationships cannot and should not be blessed. Lambeth 1.10 is explicitly affirmed within their guidelines.
I’m not sure, but I wonder if Sander was reporting about Elizabeth Paver’s response to the report based on Ruth Gledhill’s blog? I seem to recall that Ruth posted one line saying Paver had responded to the report, and I was frustrated because no links or details about the substance of her response was given. I had intended to contact Ms. Gledhill to get clarification, and then other stuff intervened and I forgot.
Kendall, thanks for this clarification and the interesting perspective from Canon Paver.
This is quite terrible for the ACO office, and it only raises further questions about what really transpired
It is only terrible if people who support the ACO (namely us revisionist Americans and revisionist CofE people) think it is terrible. We’re OK with it.
It is only a report drafted by a select group in a manner intended to misrepresent what it was and to preclude participation by the full committee.
Unlike say something written by ++Akinola on behalf of CAPA and later actually repudiated? Stop living with a double standard.
All 13 were consulted in New Orleans. 11 of 13 are represented in the current report. The select group represented only 87% of the JSC in attendance.
Look at the practical side: Those who disagree with the report already know they do. Those who agree already do. The others are insignificant. Kendall+ and the liberal spinning Bishops seem ro lose sleep over a report that is obvious in its intent. ++Mouneer has been heard from. Canon Paver has made no clear statement. The other 2 presumably have met an unfortunate end or are in a monestary with no electricity.
driver8
The policy of the HOB of the Church of England is that non celibate same sex relationships cannot and should not be blessed.
The policy of the HOB AND the General Convention of TEC is that non-celibate same-sex relationships cannot and should not be blessed.
And yet…
From 2004: Ceremonies by Anglican priests blessing lesbian and gay partnerships increased by 10 per cent last year to 300 in England alone reports the newspaper.
http://www.ekklesia.co.uk/content/news_syndication/article_041122tim.shtml
Have there been 300 in the US to date, let alone 1 year?
Kendall, as usual, is too kind. And Brian, as usual . . . well never mind.
Anyway, this exposes the JSC report as the railroad job it is. Funny that the Panel of Reference never worked so fast.
The whole so-called “Windsor Process” is now rigged for all to see.
You know, for a TEC agenda that is supposedly “inclusive” and “godly”, there sure is a lot of manipulation, collusion, coercion, and intimidation going on.
The whole thing just reeks…
#37 The Guidelines concerning same sex blessings by the CofE HOB were produced in 2005. (Civil Patnerships only came into force in England in December 2005).
There is considerably more ambiguity in the TEC HOB statement than in the CofE (ie the space for a ‘private’ local pastoral option is explicitly ruled oput in the CofE guidelines).
Of course, as in all matters, clergy may disobey their bishops’ instructions. They are also, of course, then potentially open to action under the Clergy Discipline Measure.
Brian: Your comments 35 & 36 verge on Lah-dee-dah. So what if the Lambeth bureaucracy manipulates the work of an official committee? They work for us reappraisers and we don’t mind. So what if the committee didn’t properly deliberate and reappraisers rushed the report through? We like the result and it was in the cards anyway. Besides, Akinola had signature problems on his reports. And if his organization operates on a shoestring budget with no staff to support (and subvert it), that’s his tough luck. Aren’t we sitting pretty, eh?
Aren’t we sitting pretty, eh?
Not really. We still run the risk of discipline or expulsion and the AC will be destroyed either way. The difference is in a pragmatic approach versus a philosophical/ideological exercise.
No, the difference is between treating the thing as a joke and a game, and taking it seriously.
One observation which should be made is that I believe the JSC intended to meet all day Monday together and work on their private observations to Rowan Williams collaboratively at that time. As people in New Orelans can tell you, that didn’t happen because the TEC response was not done by then. Something about the scheduling got garbled up there, so the JSC couldn’t physically meet to do the response, and hence had to do it electronically.
It would be interesting to me to know who on the JSC left when. It is my understanding that some left Tuesday before the TEC Bishops deliberations and the final statement of the TEC bishops was completed.
Canon Harmon
Matt Kennedy reported as follows in his live blog midday on Tuesday while everyone was waiting for the final text and vote:
http://www.standfirminfaith.com/index.php/site/article/6316
“Something about the scheduling got garbled up there, so the JSC couldn’t physically meet to do the response, and hence had to do it electronically” —Kendall
Fair enough. But they didn’t need to rush it out nor did they need to rely on the likes of e-mail alone.
E-mail is a poor substitute for conference calls or face-to-face meetings (as I note in comment #30), particularly when participants have differing views and do not all know each other well. The group is more likely to deadlock. It is also more likely to make mistakes. Group deliberation helps us overcome our individual quirks and blind spots.
Two rules of corporate law offer relevant insight.
–1- A corporation’s board of directors can have all the electronic meetings it wants as long as ALL board members CAN SIMULTANEOUSLY HEAR EACH OTHER. That enables the board to deliberate in a way that’s difficult by e-mail. A properly functioning conference call can serve as a “meeting.”
–2- A board of directors can act without a meeting only by UNANIMOUS WRITTEN CONSENT of all members.
There is wisdom in these rules—wisdom confirmed by many studies of group behavior (e.g., people deliberating in a group are likely to make mistakes than they would as individuals).
Surely the Lambeth bureaucracy could have managed to arrange a conference call (or series of conference calls) so that standing committee members could have deliberated with the same care as in a face-to-face meetings. And if days or even a few weeks went by before the report appeared, then so be it.
Busy schedules and geographic separation in no way excuse such a shoddy process. The process has helped discredit the report and heighten tensions in the Anglican Communion.
Looks to me like pro-ECUSA committee members and their Lambeth allies used departures from New Orleans, plus an artificially short self-imposed deadline, as pretexts for a process that cut short deliberation and assured them the report they wanted.
The middle paragraph of my comment #46 should read:
“There is wisdom in these rules—wisdom confirmed by many studies of group behavior (e.g., people deliberating in a group are *LESS* likely to make mistakes than they would be as individuals).”
Irenaeus
Re: “There is wisdom in these rules—wisdom confirmed by many studies of group behavior (e.g., people deliberating in a group are *LESS* likely to make mistakes than they would be as individuals).â€
On the other hand:
http://www.despair.com/idiocy.html
Mark [#48]: One of my Despair.com favorites. At least that group is internalizing the costs of its own folly.
PS: Does the image of that group bear an ironic resemblance to a crown of thorns? Well, it’s been a long day.
I think Despair has really gone down hill lately. (Spoken like a true curmudgeon.) Dr. Kersten is looking positively respectable these days, not nearly as smarmy as in the old days. Despair just isn’t what it used to be.
Think about this: Our friend POLITY does not exist in abstract Platonic splendor. It is a way of describing how a group of human beings make decisions and relate to one another. Good polity is a PROCESS value. Hence the irony of ECUSA and its allies using rotten process to defend ECUSA’s vaunted polity.
All but one of the members of the JSC present in New Orleans attended the late night meeting that Monday to craft the Bishops statement, which was adopted by the bishops with amendments the following day.
Bishop Mouneer was late in returning from Dallas and was there for only part of the session, while Kumara Illangasinghe the Bishop of Kurunegala had already departed.
#42 Brian: “We [TEC] still run the risk of discipline or expulsion and the AC will be destroyed either way.”
Not quite. If TEC is not seriously disciplined (or preferably expelled), the AC will in fact be destroyed: Several very large Provinces will distance themselves from the Communion (at the very least), “moderate” Provinces will take note of the fact that AC doctrinal uniformity is subject to the whims of any Province and that both Lambeth Resolutions and Primates’ Statements are in practice totally meaningless, and even liberal Provinces like Australia and NZ will note that manipulation and disingenuous responses to Communion requests are richly rewarded. (Can you picture ++Aspinall’s quandary — and impotence, without the clout of Communion teaching behind him — if Sydney behaved with respect to lay presidency as TEC has behaved with respect to same-sex blessings? Do you think ++Aspinall is unaware of this?) Even if the GS Provinces do not leave outright, the cohesiveness of the Communion will have been dealt a fatal blow; it will have become a cordial bridge club when earlier it constituted a family.
If TEC is disciplined, on the other hand, the AC will have been strengthened in its unity, its ecumenical relations improved, and its willingness to defend basic Vincentian Christian doctrine demonstrated. The only downside is that the staff of the ACO will accumulate their Frequent Flier miles somewhat more slowly and Canon Kearon will have to get used to buying his own lunch. Sounds like a good deal to me.
Having spent an hour yesterday talking with Elizabeth, I would encourage someone like George Conger to call her and determine just what she does think and say.
It is easy to claim Elizabeth to any “causeâ€, she is indeed a thoughtful and devoted servant of the Church with a great respect and love for its clergy. I could see how her words could be easily adapted to serve a position completely at odds with that offered above.
She was appalled when I read her some of the comments that had been generated by this report.
Elisabeth naively (but in the spirit of generous honesty) said I could share what she said with others, in more gentle times she would be understood, but I fear today she would just become the tool and then the victim of those who would use her.