There may be good reasons for opposing the adoption of the proposed Anglican Covenant but an appeal to the perpetual independence of the Episcopal Church and a characterization of the Anglican Communion as an incursion of ambitious archbishops of Canterbury seeking to snare unsuspecting Americans certainly is not one of them. On the contrary, American Episcopalians should look with pride on the role that they have played in the creation of the Anglican Communion. The repeated American initiatives over the middle decades of the 19th century have much to do with the existence of the Anglican Communion. And the idea that Anglican Communion bodies might be appropriate fora in which to discuss matters of common theological concern is hardly a new concept created in order to combat American views on sexuality; it was an idea already present in the thinking of some American Episcopalians well before the first gathering of the Lambeth Conference in 1867.
A number of Church of England clergy American Loyalist refugees were in England living on CofE pensions. Some of the eventually got jobs in England, Scotland and Ireland; many did not. Their presence may have contributed to the thinking behind the restriction on foreign-ordained clergy.
The English bishops were not convinced that Seabury, as a former Loyalist Army chaplain, would be accepted as a bishop in Connecticut. Seabury was the son of an SPG missionary. White, who had family in London, and Provoost, a Cambridge graduate, had connections and were known. Seabury was not known, but his seeking English consecration helped prepare the way for White and Provoost. Edward Gantt and Mason Locke Weems of Maryland were ordained deacon and priest in England after the Peace and the act which allowed their ordinations also helped prepare the way for White and Provoost.
Tom Rightmyer, Asheville, NC
[blockquote]And the idea that Anglican Communion bodies might be appropriate fora in which to discuss matters of common theological concern is hardly a new concept created in order to combat American views on sexuality; it was an idea already present in the thinking of some American Episcopalians well before the first gathering of the Lambeth Conference in 1867.[/blockquote]
I do not think the anxiety over the Anglican Communion Covenant is about “appropriate fora†for theological discussions. The question is a matter of jurisdiction and church discipline across provincial lines. It was this very possibility of colonial interference in the Colenso case that caused Abp. Longley to establish a Lambeth “Conference†only, i.e., a forum for discussion (now indaba). The current version of the Covenant offers faint likelihood that any effective Communion discipline will ever happen, which is why the Covenant is such a non-starter on both sides of the theological divide.
Amen, Dr. Noll (#2).
I couldn’t agree more. But perhaps I would go even further than you would. See my comment on the thread below this one. Any discipline worthy of the name has to be IMPOSED.
We simply must develop the means to ENFORCE orthodoxy across provincial lines. And I think the creation of a new Instrument of Unity that would resemble an ecclesiastical Supreme Court is the way to do it. We Anglicans simply can no get along without real checks and balances in our polity at the international level. IOW, the time has come when we simply MUST limit provincial authonomy, and create acceptable means by which the unbiblical legislative or canonical actions of rogue provinces like TEC are ruled null and void, and whose judicial decisions are final and binding worldwide. It is high time to cease to be merely a family of little national or regional churches and to mutate into what we should become, a true Anglican Church (singular), with various regional branches around the globe.
And if that seems utterly unlikely, or a hopelessly impractical suggestion, well, I can only reply that this is what desperately needs to happen. Not that it is what will happen.
As I’ve said so often here at T19, our basic problem is NOT the threat that we might be taken over by some pale imitation of the Roman Curia and thus subject to very unProtestant tryanny. No, on the contrary, our problem is precisely the opposite. Anglicanism has become like pre-monarchic Israel, in the days of the Judges, when “[i]everyone did what was right in his own eyes[/i]” (Judges 21:25). IOW, our real and present danger comes precisely because we are suffering from Protestant anarchy, or unlimited provincial autonomy run amok.
It is often said, with some justice, that Anglicanism is inherently “concilial” in its dispersing of authority. But what may have still worked in 1867 certainly did not work in 2008, when the Lambeth Conference was a total bust, and utterly useless (by design, just as the untrustworthy ABoC and the corrupt ACO intended). But since when does a Church [b]Council[/b] worthy of the name meet merely for consultation?? No, councils issue canons, and those canons are binding.
That is what we need in Anglicanism today. And nothing less will suffice. And if that seems revolutionary, so what? That is what Reformations are made of, drastic, sweeping, rapid changes, not gradual, incremental, evoutionary ones. And what we need in Anglicanism today is nothing less than a full-fledged New Reformation. One that will make even the glorious Evangelical Revival of the 18th century and the equally splendid Catholic Revival of the 19th century look tame and mild by comparison.
David Handy+