It may be helpful to distinguish two questions in relation to the JSC Report:
1. Has it been faithful to Windsor and Dar in the criteria it has set by which to judge
TEC?
2. Has it been accurate in its interpretation and assessment of the HoB’s response?
On the first question, it is clear that the JSC have not stuck to the letter of TWR or Dar. The HoB could have embraced the Windsor/Camp Allen Bishops’ resolutions which took this path but they refused. However, it is also clear that JSC have sought to determine whether or not, in practice, TEC has made a commitment to the two requested moratoria. Furthermore, their report understands the moratorium on same-sex blessings in a stronger sense than simply whether or not there is in existence an authorised rite. It appears to be requiring a moratorium that would mean (whatever the private and pastoral response to gay and lesbian Christians) there are no longer any public liturgies of blessing known to be occurring within TEC. Its test, in other words, is captured in the instruction of the Bishop of Hawaii ”“ there must be the bringing to an end of “any liturgies in our churches that might be construed by the reasonable outside observer as a formal public“blessing” or “marriage” of a same-sex couple”.
On the second question, the interpretation and assessment offered was undoubtedly a very generous one. The rejection of the Dar Pastoral Scheme and Council was largely passed by and TEC’s replacement proposals of Episcopal Visitors and wider consultation accepted as a viable alternative model. In addition, there was a willingness to accept the claimed constraints on the HoB due to the alleged supremacy of General Convention in TEC’s polity and a strong and maximalist reading of their commitments (especially in relation to same-sex blessings) that depended more on reading between the lines with a very strong presumption of good faith than on any evidence in the HoB statement (or apparently discussions) itself or any evidence on the ground in many dioceses of TEC. While it will, perhaps, be some time before the generous reading of B033 is tested, it is already becoming clear that the assessment in relation to same-sex blessings was overly optimistic and that a good number of bishops and dioceses have no intention of ending their current practice. What should have been evident from the wording of the statement is now crystal clear in the light of subsequent statements ”“ nothing in the HoB statement is likely to alter the assessment of the Communion Sub-Group Report (para 17) that it is “not at all clear whether, in fact, the Episcopal Church is living with the recommendations of the Windsor Report on this matter” and the Primates’ statement at Dar (para 21) remains as true after NOLA as before ”“ “we understand that local pastoral provision is made in some places for such blessings. It is the ambiguous stance of The Episcopal Church which causes concern among us”. The proof of the pudding will, as always, be in the eating but it seems almost certain that liturgies blessing same-sex unions will continue being conducted in the face of the congregation with the explicit or implicit authority of the bishop in a significant number of dioceses. Furthermore, though contrary to JSC’s maximalist interpretation of the HoB response, this outcome is quite compatible with (indeed perhaps the best understanding of) the intended and plain sense of the HoB statement itself.
In summary, although it may be argued that the JSC slightly lowered the bar set by Windsor/Dar, on the whole they kept faith with the developing Windsor process in terms of the criteria they used. However, the more serious problem is that ”“as has become increasingly obvious since its report was published – they gave the HoB credit for clearing the Windsor/Dar bar when, in fact, they have demonstrably fallen short. That failure at New Orleans sadly means the Archbishop of Canterbury must now face even more difficult decisions than those JSC have already outlined in Part Two of their report.
I guess it means “a bringing to an end of “any liturgies”” like the one announced by Susan Russell for the same-sex blessing this coming Saturday at All Saints Church, Pasadena.
I think Ms. Russell can be persuaded to promise that such same-sex blessings will be incrementally be brought to an end … over the course of years … as long as same-sex marriage takes its place.
The only reason that so much analysis, discussion, clarification, consultation such as the long analysis above is even necessary is that TEC has no intention of complying with the request of the Primates, but is trying to make it the HOB response and the JSC response sound like compliance.
TEC is not and will not comply with the request to stop SSB, consecrating gay Bishops (although they may wait until GC 09), stop the lawsuits, or agree to a PV. This much is clear. The only open item for discussion is how the ABC and the Global South chooses to respond to this will full non-compliance.
Dr. Goddard of the Anglican Communion Institute (ACI) makes a valiant attempt to sort through the confused process by which the Anglican Communion’s Joint Standing Committee (JSC) report was produced, and the equally confused reports of both the JSC and The Episcopal Church (TEC) House of Bishops (HoB) meeting in New Orleans this September.
In the matter of same sex blessings (SSB’s), Dr. Goddard finds no fewer than five (5) possible interpretations of what the HoB report says about SSB’s.
[blockquote] This final interpretive option [#5] is, I would suggest, the most plausible. As nothing is said by the HoB to change the situation described in [TEC’s resolution] C051 on any normal understanding there is not currently “a moratorium…on all such public Rites†(TWR [The Windsor Report], para 144) and the HoB has not responded adequately to the Dromantine [meeting] Primates’ request asking “our fellow primates [of the Anglican Communion] to use their best influence to persuade their brothers and sisters to exercise a moratorium on public Rites of Blessing for Same-sex unions†(para 18). [/blockquote]
Although Dr. Goddard perplexingly uses the Dromantine meeting as a measuring stick rather than the Dar es Salaam meeting, it nevertheless appears that ACI would give TEC a failing grade (or at least a D-minus) on at least one of the requirements of the Primates’ communiqué at their more recent meeting in Dar es Salaam.
But ACI give the JSC a pass, which is absolutely ridiculous. The JSC Report was an obvious railroad job.
The ACI is losing credibility and fast.
“Gives”, of course.
Actually, Newbie, Dr. Goddard of the ACI refuses to give the HoB report a “pass”, notably on SSB’s, while noting that the JSC report does attempt to give it a “pass.” Here is Dr. Goddard’s salient passage:
[blockquote] It was, in short, rather presumptuous for the JSC to claim that the first of the urgent needs identified by the Primates [i.e., SSB’s] had been addressed (especially given that the Primates at Dar took a different and less optimistic view of the situation from that offered in the Communion Sub-Group’s report on GC’s response). [/blockquote] In my view, Dr. Goddard himself invites ridicule for the JSC report.
Newbie can judge for himself by actually reading what we have written in our analysis of the New Orleand response/statement of the House of Bishops. We conclude:
“[…] the response, though showing some signs of progress, in our view falls short of what the Primates were seeking and for which many have hoped and prayed in recent months. […] the flaws in its final response signal that when faced with a clear choice, the local audience was ultimately still more determinative than the global one and the demands of being an American denomination triumphed over the disciplines of belonging to the Church Catholic. Either a majority of bishops did not wish to do as they were clearly requested to by the Communion in order to repair the tear in the fabric of the Communion (the Windsor Bishops presented motions that would have enabled this) or, if they did, they did not wish to do so in a manner that would lead to dissent from those many bishops, clergy and laity in TEC who are conscientiously convinced that the demands of the gospel prevent acceptance of any moratorium on same-sex blessings or the ordination and consecration of those in such unions.
Dr. Goddard, in consultation with others at the ACI, concludes the following with respect to the JSC Report:
“However, the more serious problem is that –as has become increasingly obvious since its report was published – they [the JSC] gave the HoB credit for clearing the Windsor/Dar bar when, in fact,
they have demonstrably fallen short. That failure at New Orleans sadly means the Archbishop of Canterbury must now face even more difficult decisions than those JSC have already outlined in
Part Two of their report.”
Thank you, Dr. Radner.
Unfortunately, the path forward looks just as muddled as the path that brought us to where we are now.
Then why the strange statement that the JSC report “kept faith with the developing Windsor process?”
If the JSC is a railroad job (and it is) and a joke (and it is), then say so! This is not the time to speak with forked academic tongues.
With all due respect, Dr Radner, it is time for clarity. When I read the HOB response, the JSC report, the reports about the reports, etc the language is intentionally vague and nuanced so that any reader may find the conclusion that he prefers.
How about something along the following lines.
TEC has and will continue to perform and condone SSB, regardless of whether they are defined as public or private rites.
TEC has said that they may, or may not, confirm gay bishops. At GC09 they will revisit, at which point they will likely agree that it is OK to consecrate gay bishops.
TEC will not stop suing departing parishes.
TEC will not agree to a PV plan as outline in DES.
It is also clear from all of the comments and actions that TEC is going to press forward to pressure and convince the rest of the AC that its new theology is prophetic, God is doing a new thing, and so forth.
TEC has clearly rejected the request of the primates at DeS. The issue for the Primates and the ABC from here is what do they want to do about it?
The HoB did yield ever so slightly in acknowledging that B033 applied to homosexuals. The ACI collectively, Bp Howe individually, and others give the TEC far more credit than is deserved. By the acknowledgement, B033’s fate is sealed. It will be repealed in 2009 (after the tea party). Thus, for the next year and a half only, B033 is in effect. And the only bishop candidate that might be affected is Tracy Lind, the lesbian candidate for the diocese of Chicago. Otherwise, it makes no difference whatsoever. Thus, statements like Bp Howe’s comment about “coming much closer [to compliance] than I ever thought we would” is nonsense. [b]The B033 clarification was a crumb of no consequence. The TEC truly has not conceded anything.[/b]
That is a statement that needs to be echoed by all orthodox.
Andrew Goddard knocks the factual and logical underpinnings out from under large portions of the JSC’s report while keeping a civil tongue and preserving British understatement. That he did the latter is an advantage, not a disadvantage. The cumulative effect of his painstaking analysis, trying way after way to make sense of what the JSC majority wrote, is devastating.
Granted many of the shortcomings of the JSC’s product have been noted elsewhere (including on this blog), but nowhere as carefully and comprehensively, or more effectively, than in Dr. Goddard’s paper.
As these comments prove, Dr. Goddard’s exhaustive analysis is badly in need of an executive summary. My candidate, partially quoted by Dr. Radner above is the following:
(Part Two of the JSC report dealt with issues relating to the pastoral scheme and foreign interventions.)
I think the point here is that the problem is not with the criteria that the JSC was using in its evaluation — these were, by and large, drawn from the common agreements of the larger Communion, the “Windsor process”. The problem was that the the JSC seem to have measured the HoB statements far too generously — and thereby misleadingly and probably falsely — according to these criteria. The distinction here is important: Dr. Goddard’s essay is, on this basis, arguing with the Report on its own terms; and the task is a persuasive one, not one of simple accusation (there is no shortage, it seems, of those willing to take up the latter). Furthermore, it is that because we still believe that there are those — members of the JSC, Lambeth, the Primates, the Ch. of England Synod, even members of our own House of Bishops — who accept these terms, but are confused about their application in this case and elsewhere, and are therefore persuadable according to sound reasoning — it is because of this that we think continued arguments like Dr. Goddard’s serve a good purpose. Some may choose to assume that none of these people are open to persuasion, of course. That, I believe, would be a serious mistake.
#9 Newbie — I read Dr. Goddard’s analysis as careful, thorough, and unmistakably negative. I’m not at all clear where you find him “giving a pass” to either the JSC or the HoB. Mark & Dr+ R quote the summary; in what respect is it inaccurate or excessively generous?
Professor Radner puts it well that the task at hand is to persuade the persuadable. Some of the already-persuaded grow impatient and prefer terse conclusionary edicts as to what to them is obvious. But careful and thorough reasoning of the sort exhibited by Dr. Goddard, Professor Radner and their ACI colleagues has a chance of achieving persuasion where it can make a difference. The already-persuaded can benefit too by becoming better equipped to be persuasive in such circumstances themselves.
Agree with Ephraim, Craig and Mike. This is a cautious essay, meant to stir the pot, but just enough for the timid fence sitters (Who exactly is that audience? Is there anyone out there that hasn’t taken sides? If there is, this is a rapidly dwindling remnant.)
Take some issue with Dr. Goddard:
[blockquote]This account appears to have fuelled rumours and suspicions of a ‘fixing’ of the outcome. These have focussed on two areas. First, that in their briefing from TEC bishops, the JSC agreed to respond positively if TEC’s HoB took certain courses of action or used certain words. Second, that there was a clear conflict of interest as the Presiding Bishop of TEC is a member of JSC and signed the final report and appears to have been involved in assessing the actions of her own province’s HoB. Although the reality was messy, neither of these allegations has been substantiated with any evidence and both have been strenuously denied.[/blockquote]
First of all, where was any denial publically made? Are we denying that KJS “signified her assent electronically” or that she was involved in the creation of the JSC report? She certainly is recorded in doing the former. If she had (properly) recused herself, do not we all agree that that would have been noted in the report? The absence of any such annotation speaks loudly.
Finally, Dr. Goddard states there was no quid pro quo: if certain words were used then the report would be favorable. Of course, such quid pro quo is impossible to prove. ABp Orombi, a member of the primates standing committee states that occurred. Regardless, inappropriate coaching most certainly did occur. We have the bishop of Montana’s being quoted at their diocesan meeting:
[blockquote]He said several members of the JSC advised them on what ‘words’ they needed to use – which he said was ‘very helpful’.[/blockquote]
One of the interesting features of Andrew Goddard’s paper is his account of the interaction of the JSC members with the U.S. House of Bishops in New Orleans and the process by which the JSC’s report was written and released. He notes an allegation “that there was a clear conflict of interest as the Presiding Bishop of TEC is a member of JSC and signed the final report and appears to have been involved in assessing the actions of her own provinces’s HoB.” But he concludes that there is no evidence substantiating that allegation. Here, he must mean that there is no evidence substantiating that she involved herself in the crafting of the language of the report, because clearly she did (as Goddard notes) provide information to the JSC which were part of the basis for its deliberations in New Orleans and later assented to the report. At least the latter amounted to involvement in assessing the actions of the House of Bishops.
Dr. Goddard also relates that late on Monday, October 1 Mouneer Anis asked for more time (two extra days beyond the deadline that had been set for Tuesday at 9 am) to provide his comments on the JSC report. (Note that a complete draft had not been circulated by the ACO staff until Friday, September 28.) Then, Goddard relates, “[f]ollowing discussions with Lambeth Palace, it was agreed that the JSC report would be submitted to the Archbishop if the point was reached where 2/3 of the JSC had signfied assent.” He does not say by whom this was agreed, but it does not sound as though it was the Committee.
So what emerges is a rushed process with the ACO staff writing the draft and (I assume) controlling subsequent versions, comment solicited from JSC members by email during an abbreviated period consisting mostly of the weekend following their return from New Orleans, and no procedures to facilitate the interaction among members that would normally be expected. The result was a process below standards applying, for example, in a U.S. corporate law setting where a board or a board committee can take action only at a meeting or by unanimous written consent.
Although it is known that Archbishop Orombi declined to attend the meeting with the House of Bishops because he thought it was inappropriate, as far as I know it has not been made clear whether he declined to participate in the JSC’s evaluation of the HoB’s response or whether he was not afforded the opportunity.
It is also interesting that the 2/3 threshold that was set for the report’s release after Bishop Mouneer Anis asked for more time did not distinguish between members from the Primates’ Standing Committee and the ACC Standing Committee. If the threshold had been set so as to apply to each group, it would not have been met. Of the five JSC members from the Primates’ Standing Committee, only two disinterested members gave assent. This has some significance, since it was the request of the Primates to whom the HoB was to respond.
I think in his section on Background, Dr. Goddard is being somewhat gentle in his treatment of the role of the ACO and process considerations. The facts laid out, however, tell their own story.
(The above was written before I saw Robroy’s comment above, which covers some of the same territory.)