The Vatican, which is sending representatives to the July 16-Aug. 4 gathering of the world’s Anglican leadership, will be closely following its deliberations to see what direction it takes on such crucial questions as internal unity, authority, the role of the bishop and Anglican identity.
What has pushed these questions to the forefront is the ordination of openly gay clerics, the blessing of gay unions and the ordination of women bishops in some Anglican provinces.
Those developments have threatened to split the Anglican Communion. For the Vatican, they have raised new questions about the future of the 40-year-old dialogue with the Anglican Church.
“It’s very important for Anglicans to understand the depth of the change in our relationship that, in a sense, is being forced on us by the positions they are taking,” said one Vatican official, who asked not to be named.
In the Vatican’s view, it’s not just a question of ethical and sexual issues. Above all, it is seen as a problem of ecclesiology, as the new tensions in the Anglican Communion have weakened the bonds among the provinces.
Patience is wearing thin in Rome. RW will be lucky to get 5 mins with HH next time.
Actually the Holy See is being quite diplomatic in their public comments, which is nothing new. But behind the scenes there is really no one left in Rome who does not realize that the dream of restoring communion between Rome and Canterbury is dead. The fact that some are even willing to say as much out loud these days is a real indication of the state of affairs. Another telling sign is that Rome is giving very serious attention to a request for communion from the Traditional Anglican Communion (TAC). Under the reign of Paul VI and even JP II this would have been a nonstarter. Clearly the Vatican has come to accept that the AC has gone beyond the point of no return and they are moving on.
ICXC
John
I would suggest that one of the oberservers sent by the Vatican to Lambeth should be an exorcist.
#3 Daniel,
ROTFLOL…..LOLOLOLOLOLO 🙂 That was great! Thank you
I am disturbed by the lack of concern about what the Vatican has to say. I am disturbed that TEC cares so little. I am disturbed that the readership on this blog doesn’t have much to say either. Perhaps we’re just swamped with our own lives, or perhaps we’re so far into thinking of “catholic” as a lower case, adjective, and not a noun that we don’t care. Catholic is a noun, and “we” used to believe it applied to Anglicanism–at least the likes of John Jewell did. Perhaps our more Protestant friends could educate me on when Anglicanism decided, or just started acting like, catholic is an adjective describing a church more or less connected to the ancient, universal, tradition, but not really “The Catholic Church in England.”
No. 5 – I, for one agree completely with your well-expressed posting. Thx. The “small c” designation is thrown around by committed Protestants as well as by careless Catholics..