The Archbishop of the West Indies, Drexel Gomez, is chairman of the committee working on the covenant.
He claims that although the bishops in Canterbury did not want to adopt a Roman Catholic-style hierarchy, they did now accept the need for some mechanism to hold the Communion together.
“I’ve spoken to several bishops who were opposed to it, and who are now willing to give it a try”, he said.
In the past the centre ground of Anglicanism has seemed paralysed, unable to act decisively for fear of losing the liberal Americans and their allies altogether.
But the aim of the new strategy appears to be to isolate the radical liberal and conservative wings of Anglicanism, and create a new, more organised and directed, Communion with or without them.
The Rev Dr Graham Kings, of the moderate evangelical group Fulcrum, said the strategy was one of “intensification”.
The new Communion would be more active, have a corporate presence around the world, more high-level meetings, and possibly regional representatives among the archbishops.
It seems that the plan is to save the AC by sacrificing the orthodox in North America. I guess this is noble, but don’t expect those being sacrificed to be grateful.
“The new Communion would be more active, have a corporate presence around the world, more high-level meetings, and possibly regional representatives among the archbishops.”
They will also have about 58 Million fewer members.
This covenant thing still bothers me greatly. All it is going to do is limit action by godly bishops.
Does anyone read “covenant” anywhere in Holy Scripture?
Every single time that some unifying attempt is made, from “Pope”, to Lambeth, to ACC, to anything else, all it ever accomplishes is to give legitamacy to forces alien to Christianity. GAFCON has shown the power of the Epicopate, please do not dilute that power.
Don
thanks for the article, it seemed quite in-depth. i happen to agree that rw did not have much choice but to do this. i am willing to see how it plays out. i love my denomination, i converted to it and would not leave it easily. perhaps at the 11th hour the communion can be saved after all.
#3 DonGander:
Speaking from the other side of the aisle, I’m not a huge fan of the covenant idea either. But:
I seem to recall that it gets mentioned a couple of times 🙂
5. Ross:
I appologize; I often speak in “halves”.
I meant to ask, Does anyone read “covenant†anywhere in Holy Scripture with regard to the associations of the episcopate?
I know the whole of Scripture is a covenant from God. I am looking for leadership in the making of covenants among men.
I hope that this helps.
Don
Don, Covenants are mentioned several times in scripture. They are contracts and require both parties to agree. I see no chance of a covenant where the two sides could ever agree, thus any covenant will only involve a fraction of the current communion.