What about the definition of Anglican? In the October issue of First Things, I expressed the hope that last summer\u2019s Lambeth Conference, and particularly the leadership of Archbishop Rowan Williams, gave strong evidence that the center of the Anglican communion intended to hold together; that the Episcopal left and the GAFCON right would not, in fact, carry the day and so lead the communion ever-further down the road to fragmentation and incoherence. Since that time, most of the action has been on the GAFCON and Bishop Duncan side; and the more influence they have, the less chance there is of an eventual coming-together of things.<\/p>\n
But the ball is now in center court, as it were\u201d\u201dthis February\u2019s meeting of the Anglican primates will be crucial, as will the meeting of the Covenant Design Group in April and the Anglican Consultative Council\u2019s meeting in May. If Anglicanism is truly to mean something beyond the local, these meetings will carry forward the Lambeth vision of a genuinely covenanted \u201cglobal\u201d\u009d and \u201ccatholic church,\u201d\u009d with its ministry, faith, and sacraments \u201cunited and interdependent throughout the world,\u201d\u009d as Rowan Williams has put it.<\/p>\n
There are, of course, no guarantees. The forces of dissolution and division right now are strong, and it is always much easier to pull apart than it is to hold together. The question \u201cAnglican or Episcopalian?\u201d\u009d may always be with us; but at the least, we may still be able to hope that the question \u201cWhat kind of Anglican are you?\u201d\u009d will not become just as common.<\/p>\n