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Permalink: http://www.fulcrum-anglican.org.uk/455
Fulcrum Subjects: Anglicanism, Windsor Process / Canterbury, Archbishop of Other articles by Graham Kings are available from this site Discuss this Article on the Fulcrum Forum See the 45 comments on this article Federation Isn't Enough:
Fulcrum Newsletter, August 2009
by Graham Kings
Bishop of Sherborne and theological secretary of Fulcrum
copublished, with permission, with Comment is free belief, The Guardian online, 5 August 2009 Desmond Tutu has often talked of the crucial support of the Anglican Communion when he was under pressure from the Apartheid regime. Robert Runcie, the Archbishop of Canterbury at the time, commented that it signaled to the regime, ‘Touch Tutu, and you touch the whole Anglican Communion.’ Tutu was not isolated. David Gitari experienced similar world-wide solidarity following an assassination attempt on his life. During the night of 22 April 1989, thugs attacked his house in the foothills of Mount Kenya. He managed to climb to the roof and raise the alarm. Neighbours came running. The thugs ran away. Gitari had taken a courageous stand on issues of local, national and international justice. At the nearby college in Kabare, where I was teaching theology, the phone rang with the news and I drove to the bishop’s house. Soon the Anglican Communion Office in London had alerted people across the world for the need for prayer and the government in Nairobi knew that Gitari was not isolated. The year before, at the opening sermon of the 1988 Lambeth Conference in Canterbury, where Gitari was the chair of the Resolutions Committee, Robert Runcie said: As you enter this cathedral, your eye is caught by its massive pillars. In their strength, they seem to stand on their own feet, symbols of strong foundations and sturdy independence. Yet their strength is an illusion. Look up and see the pillars converting into arches, which are upheld not by independence but through interdependence... So, the Anglican Communion is interwoven and intermeshed in its personal relationships. The concept of ‘communion’ emanates from the eternal intensity of love within God - shared between the Father, the Son and the Holy Spirit. This participation and interlacing with each other, in the one God, is the model for our being together as a world-wide Communion. The Son ‘doing his own thing’, in contradiction to the Father and the Spirit, is an abominable thought. Breaking the bridges of love in the Holy Trinity is unthinkable. Some prefer to relegate ‘Communion’ to ‘Federation’. The latter seems to me to be more related to ‘function’ than to ‘being’ – more like a bag of marbles than a bunch of grapes - and stresses isolated autonomy over personal interdependence. Rather than close, intimate, interconnected relationships, provinces of an Anglican Federation would be able to ‘do their own thing’ – whether that be authorizing lay people to preside at Holy Communion or proceeding with official public blessings of same-sex unions. At its General Convention last month, The Episcopal Church faced a defining moment in its full membership of the Anglican Communion. Tragically, perceptibly and decisively - in spite of a personal visit by the Archbishop of Canterbury - it moved in the direction of isolation and relegated itself, within the Communion. It gave the green light to the consecration of more bishops who are in sexual relationships outside the marriage bond and started the official process towards the liturgical blessings of same-sex unions. The Presiding Bishop said that this was more ‘descriptive’ than ‘prescriptive’ but it seems to me, and to most of the secular and church media, as being in fact ‘permissive’. A change has been sensed and people are incensed. In spite of expressions of commitment to the Communion from General Convention, when the choice came over interdependence or autonomy, the latter came out trumps. The pillar preferred to stand alone and ignore the linking arches. Is it now on track to being transformed into a flying buttress? Well, not quite. In response to the decisions taken at General Convention, The Archbishop of Canterbury, has outlined a 'two track' future for provinces in the Anglican Communion, with a choice of covenantal or associate status. One track is for those who are willing to intensify their relationships of interdependence in the Communion, through signing the proposed Anglican Covenant, and the other is for those who prefer federal autonomy, not signing the Covenant. The Anglican Communion is involved in 'intensifying' its current relationships and those who do not wish to continue on that 'intensifying' trajectory may remain where they are, which will become track two, while the centre of the Communion moves on with glacial gravity into track one. Not exclusion, but intensification: not force, but choice. Who cares? God does: for Communion mirrors the love of the Trinity better than a loose Federation - the Federation of the Holy Trinity? Hardly. Who cares? Those in the precarious positions of Tutu and Gitari, in Pakistan and Sudan today, and all those who support them in solidarity, such as the 36-year interweavings of the Episcopal Church of Sudan with the Diocese of Salisbury, in which I now serve. __________________________________________________________________ Dr Graham Kings is Bishop of Sherborne and theological secretary of Fulcrum Discuss this Article on the Fulcrum Forum Forum Posts About This Article:Posted by: Celinda Thursday 20 August 2009 - 10:50pm Iconoclast--it's not a question of winning and losing, in my opinion, in some sort of time frame in which limits have been set up. The faith isn't like that. The only reason for +Lawrence to be "giving up" at this point seems to be the resolutions on sexual issues passed at the last GC. Important though they are, the Christological issues are crucial also. The Forrester consecration issue was an opportunity for Christological witness, and several bishops wrote eloquently against the changes Forrester was putting through in that regard in the liturgies he was writing. I haven't seen any evidence that those ready to leave TEC have read those statements in defense of the faith of the creeds and of the Book of Common Prayer. Posted by: Celinda Thursday 20 August 2009 - 10:43pm Pageantmaster--crossed wires again. I was talking about the Forrester issue, which has to do with Christology and Prayer Book theology on baptism and other essential teachings. I was not talking about the resolutions on sexuality passed at General Convention. So again: have you read what +Marshall and +Breidenthal said in their arguments against consecrating Forrester+? Posted by: Iconoclast Thursday 20 August 2009 - 05:17pm Nersen, if the orthodox continue to leave--or don't attend meetings like the provincial one +Lawrence is implying he won't participate in--how can their voice be heard? Is it not because the orthodox voice is disregarded and ignored by the TEC leadership? Then what is the point in attending? Posted by: nersenpaul Thursday 20 August 2009 - 10:57am Hi Celinda, I guess I can understand people who have tried for decades to make the orthodox (and AC) voice heard in TEC(USA) giving up....for many reasons: -(principles) because TEC(USA) openly accepts people in teaching/leadership positions who do not fit with what "the mind of the Communion" thinks is compatible with scripture......hard to be united with such people (in the light of the apostles teaching to the early church eg 1 Cor 5:9-12) - (pragmatism) the ineffectiveness of being am orthodox minority in a TEC(USA) which is way out of line with most of the AC.....people like ++Duncan would be quite middle of the road in the CofE (certainly "left" of me, you will not be surprised to hear!) but what can he do to get TEC(USA) to change, especially given equal representation to the tiniest of dioceses (eg 700 people nearly giving the AC its first Buddhist bishop)? Sure, that particular election did not go through (they may try again to elect Genpo)....but look at GC09 - the effectiveness of orthodox voices (even loyal ones) is no greater or less than it was in 2003 with more orthodox people still there i.e. it is ineffective....the polity of TEC(USA) makes it vulnerable to takeover by interest groups - that is why it is determined to walk apart now (or do its own thing regardles of the "mind of the Communoin" but stay in...if it can). I do not see the biblical principle to support staying in (i.e. united) when TEC(USA) is, according to the ABC or at least +Durham's (reliable and trustworthy) interpretation of the ABC, walking apart....that is rejecting key common ideals and beliefs. The issue is, at heart, all about the authority of scripture - I can understand people who cannot be united with TEC(USA) leaders who have a low view of scripture eg the PB rejecting Romans 10:8-9 as "heresy" (her word) or some pushing on regardless of "the mind of the Communion" on other issues and I think St Paul and St Peter would have supported them.....hard to read 1 Cor 5-6 and come to a more accomodating conclusion, I think. I must say that I admire people who do stay in despite the seemingly unstoppable drift of TEC(USA) to some sort of rights-based ideology .... it cannot be easy speaking up for the orthodox voice there. I just do not think they have or will achieve anything as TEC(USA) goes in a revisionist direction and I am not sure they are right to be united with people pushing revisionist teaching.....but I admire their patience and do not doubt them in any way whatsoever. I just think there is a time to throw over the tables in the temple yard if things whch ought not to be happening are happening.....and a time (1 Cor 5) to not eat with people who have decided, regardless of the mind of the Communion, that repentance on certain issues is optional. Posted by: Pageantmaster Thursday 20 August 2009 - 04:35am Thanks Celinda. Once again we appear to have crossed wires - my post referred to the votes of these two bishops at General Convention.. Bishop Marshall of Bethlehem voted Yes to Motion D025 and Yes to C056; Bishop Breidenthal of Southern Ohio also voted Yes to Motion D025 and Yes to C056, the motions that open the way to election of active gay partnered bishops in the Episcopal Church and to dioceses conducting same-sex unions, both of which are inconsistent with the "moratoria". As we have seen there are now 3 candidates in Los Angeles and Minnesota who fall into this first category. Frankly as far as orthodoxy goes in the Episcopal Church I have stopped accepting what people SAY, only what they DO, and what Bishops Marshall and Breidenthal have DONE is not “orthodox”. http://anglicanprayer.files.wordpress.com/2009/07/bishops-votes-gc09.pdf Posted by: Celinda Wednesday 19 August 2009 - 04:44pm Nersen, if the orthodox continue to leave--or don't attend meetings like the provincial one +Lawrence is implying he won't participate in--how can their voice be heard? Posted by: Celinda Wednesday 19 August 2009 - 04:42pm Pageantmaster--yes, I know how they voted. Have you read their reasons for voting no? They got right to the theological issues which Forrester was denying and expanded on the importance of them to the faith, issues that were essential to the Christian faith. It sounds as though you are speaking from generalities which others have made, rather than from knowledge of what they actually said. Posted by: nersenpaul Wednesday 19 August 2009 - 08:25am Hi Celinda. Sure, there is a minority in TEC(USA) which is orthodox - but can they change it and get it signed onto the letter and spirit of the Covenant? Yes, objections were raised to a particularly wacky choice from a diocese of around 700 people who were only given the choice of one candidate....but what has really changed in TECUSA post consents not being received in that case? GC09 was very happy to hear orthodox voices (even the ABC) but then followed its own agenda regardless..... and,given the way that TEC(USA) leadership structures are dominated by revisionists, it is likely to continue on its own way (while demanding to stay in the AC too, of course)....even the ABC's huge reserves of patience seem to be somewhat tested post GC09. Do the orthodox just end up being cover for a revisionist leadership pushing forward? Posted by: Pageantmaster Tuesday 18 August 2009 - 07:33pm Hello Celinda Actually the Forrester consents issue was very interesting: it united opposition from both left and right. The right who couldn't accept his unitarianism, universalism and a number of other heresies; and the institutional left who could not accept his rewriting of their precious baptismal covenant, make-it-up-as-you-go-along Buddhist collects and the Iranian-style election. There also seemed to be some local issues of how he deals with people, quite apart from the considerable number of those who were worried about the outside reaction to TEC consecrating the Communion's first Buddhist bishop. You will have to ask Bishop Lawrence for his views on the statements of Bishops Marshall and Briedenthal. I would be guessing. We have come to quite a state when our expectations of TEC are so low that we have to be surprised that they will not approve a Buddhist as a Communion bishop, or regard it as evidence of a strong orthodox voice within TEC. We saw with the actions of General Convention that this is not the case. Do you know how Bishops Briedenthal and Marshall voted? Posted by: Celinda Tuesday 18 August 2009 - 05:48pm Sorry for the crossed threads, Pageantmaster. When you said "they" I thought you were talking about Bishops Breidenthal and Marshall, whom I mentioned on this thread earlier on. The question I hope someone--maybe you?-- will answer is why +Mark Lawrence--and other theologically conservative bishops--don't seem to take into account those bishops' comments on refusing consent to Forrester+'s consecration. +Lawrence sounded in his talk as though he despaired of a strong orthodox voice in TEC, but those responses were quite orthodox and I thought very well written. Posted by: Pageantmaster Monday 17 August 2009 - 05:51pm Crossed wires I am afraid Celinda. I was talking about the South Carolina address - and yes I was having a little gentle fun. Posted by: Celinda Saturday 15 August 2009 - 07:01pm Pageantmaster--in all seriousness, their statements were not "descriptive" and they were not subjective. They were prescriptive, authoritative statements on Christian doctrine: not "in my opinion," not "I think...," and so on. They were speaking in their capacity as bishops, as guardians of the faith. Please let me know if you have read them. I am at a loss as to why they have not been better publicized. Posted by: Pageantmaster Saturday 15 August 2009 - 11:24am Kurt - an easy jibe to throw out from beautiful Brooklyn - SC is the ONLY growing diocese so perhaps there is something you can learn from. Posted by: Kurt Friday 14 August 2009 - 08:55pm If I were some folks on this site, I wouldn’t get too excited about Bishop Lawrence and South Carolina. If memory serves me (and I was a small boy at the time) South Carolina had some of the most racist Episcopalians in the country in the 1950s and 1960s. They were also the state that began the American Civil War 150 years ago. As one wag famously put it: South Carolina is too small to be its own country, but too big to be an insane asylum. Posted by: Pageantmaster Friday 14 August 2009 - 05:51pm Celinda, irony? Probably just a statement of where they stand - descriptive rather than prescriptive, do you think? Posted by: Celinda Friday 14 August 2009 - 12:59pm Pageantmaster, do I detect a note of irony? ("They are just saying who they are.") Posted by: Pageantmaster Friday 14 August 2009 - 11:34am I expect they are just saying who they are Celinda. Posted by: Dave Friday 14 August 2009 - 11:17am Celinda, On sending links: I think your success depends on the browser you are using. At least you should be able to copy and paste the address from the top of the screen. Some browsers will auto format this for you. For example, the article and commentary are linked from Thinking Anglicans - http://www.thinkinganglicans.org.uk/archives/003945.html I think I detect in his opening remarks a difference in the history of the American and English churches. The English dioceses have arisen as plants from a central missionary agency (Canterbury) working as part of the universal church (Rome). The American churches on removing the yoke of British bondage organised into dioceses and the diocese joined TEC as a federal body. Is this good history or am I reading a myth into his words? His solution seem to be that they won't leave TEC but will ignore it when it is acting unlawfully by acting against the instruments of unity and historic orthodoxy. Is this a diocese, united with a mission "To respond to the Great Commission by so presenting Jesus Christ in the power of the Holy Spirit that all may come to know Him as Savior and follow Him as Lord in the fellowship of His Church" WOW David Posted by: Celinda Thursday 13 August 2009 - 08:07pm Could we include a discussion on this thread of the address +Mark Lawrence of the Diocese of South Carolina made today (Aug. 13) to their clergy? I just printed out its 10 pages and hesitate to comment on it before I've read it all. He is proposing a "third way" for those who question the drift of TEC leadership for the past couple of decades which is going to take some time to puzzle out. I don't know how to send a link, but the best source of the full address is the website of the Episcopal Diocese of South Carolina (not to be confused with the Episcopal Diocese of Upper South Carolina). It's being discussed right now on the Titus One and Stand Firm blogs (probably among other blogs). -- I was disappointed to find no reference in his address to the well-written, theologically clear statements by Bishops Breidenthal (Southern Ohio) and Marshall (Bethehem, one of the Pennsylvania dioceses) of their reasons why they voted not to consent to the consecration of Kevin Thew Forrester--the reasons had to do with his faulty theology on baptism, the atonement, and other essential Christian beliefs. Other bishops must have felt the same way because Forrester will not be consecrated. Surely that creates a different picture of TEC as a whole than the one +Lawrence portrays. Posted by: Timothy Sherratt Thursday 13 August 2009 - 05:47pm Most of the posts on this are a few days old but I thought I would go ahead anyway. I much appreciate +Kings illustrations of Anglican “communion” as evidence for that sort of solidarity over mere association. Would that it were such a simple choice. Once one declares, “God wants Communion over Federation,” however well that argument is supported, one becomes aware of what’s left out. Surely God does want this, but once one inserts another issue into the equation, like faithfulness to basic Christian teachings, then things become much murkier and the preferences, however carefully weighed, start to look unstable. I may prefer Communion to Federation but Doctrinal Faithfulness to Communion (recall those “schism is worse than heresy” articles from the TEC PR machine?) if “communion” may only be sustained at the expense of core Christian beliefs. The original preference for Communion over Federation then belongs to a simpler, more abstract, situation and may be less helpful than it appears to be. +Kings decries autonomy but it has its uses! When congregations or individual believers have left TEC, some may well have treated the importance of Communion too lightly, but I would urge caution before generalizing such a conclusion. More than a few of those who left counted the cost and paid the price by making a prudential decision between unattractive options. For the vast majority, I think this was a judgment call (and for some also a Judgment call). I think this was true of the congregation in which I am a parishioner, which left (leaving buildings and endowment as well as the TEC diocese) two years ago for Kenya and is now an ACNA parish. One man’s autonomy just might be another’s Christian conscience. (And yes, I think that’s also true of those who weighed, yet stayed.) But enough of that. How much, I wonder, will Covenant supporters make common cause with ACNA in the process of “intensification,” that +Kings hopes will now ensue, following GC2009, albeit with “glacial gravity?” The former want a stronger, faithful Communion and the latter want a faithful, stronger Communion. Neither view federation as an attractive long-term outcome. Both are “Track One,” with the ACNA folks hoping that this means renewal and not just status quo, and the Covenant’s supporters, as I read them, hoping the disincentives of Track Two will eventually put TEC’s brakes on and slow the self-exclusion from the Communion now evidently underway (to all but the willfully blind!). Common cause can’t be that hard, can it? Of course, making common cause is going to require work—plenty of humility, repentance, deflation of egos, and conversation, which is what Christians do, right? But that work, the overcoming of differences on strategy for the sake of common cause on matters of basic Christian belief and practice, just might constitute ordinary Christians’ way of intensifying their solidarity with fellow believers. That sort of communion will be good for the Communion, for precisely the sorts of reasons +Kings cites in his article. Tim Sherratt Posted by: Celinda Saturday 8 August 2009 - 11:32pm Something happened to my computer and I couldn't finish the last post (commenting on +Kings' quadrant and other parts of the Fulcrum Newsletter of June 2008). I don't know whether that post got added or not. In that newsletter, +Kings says something that may be more helpful than a discussion of the political meaning of the terms "federation," "confederation" and "communion" (I don't think the latter is a political term): "'realignment would probably lead to a destructive 'splitting' of the Communion and to setting up an Anglican Federation without a center at Canterbury." It's that "center at Canterbury" which I hope holds. I've read ++Williams' _Anglican Identities_, among other of his writings, and I think he has a solid grasp of the theology of the church at large--which includes complexities and respect for differences, as well as strong support of essentials-- and I think is in the tradition of other ABCs. I feel as distant from +Chane as I do from +Duncan in their attitude to that center. About the Windsor Report: we studied it for six weeks in our Adult Study group and I don't have it in front of me now to look at. But I don't remember the "bottom line" being getting TEC in line. What I thought was the most important thing about the report was the necessity of acting together--not in a tight legal sense, and not with any deadlines, and not in a sense of winning and losing, but in a sense of careful study (which includes patient listening--and I disagree strongly that the time for listening is past). Posted by: Celinda Saturday 8 August 2009 - 11:16pm In +Kings' "Reading and Reshaping the Anglican Communion" (Fulcrum Newsletter, June 2008)--which has a reference to the quadrant referred to below, in which attitudes to the Windsor Report divide "Federal" from "Communion" and attitudes to Lambeth 1.10 divide "Liberal" from "Conservative"--there is another comment, which perhaps makes it clearer what +Kings means by "federal" and "conservative" than the quadrant does. That is the following paragraph, commenting on realignment: "'Realignment' would probably lead to a destructive 'splitting' of the Communion and to setting up an Anglican Federation without a center at Canterbury, which would lead to more 'splitting'. 'Reshaping' would involve imaginative new relationships which build on the historic link to Canterbury, while also recognising, and responding to, the reality of world-wide Anglicanism." +Kings uses the phrase "non-Canterbury centered federation" elsewhere in the document. I think looking at it this way gets us out of the political terms discussion which Pluralist (logically) is engaging in. The quadrant is useful, in a sense, for people like me who feel just as disapproving of +John Chane as of +Bob Duncan (both of whom don't care much right now for Canterbury) Posted by: Deleted user 1222 Saturday 8 August 2009 - 09:55pm The communion of people is a relationship, across something that is similar, and there are meeting places and offices where paperwork can be done. But the entities that have common canon law are the Churches, and they may interact but they have autonomy. And this is a confederal system, where sovereignty, so to speak, is with those Churches. The Churches decide what is local and what can be centrally shared. A system where the centre decides what is central and what is local is a federal one, and the Anglican Churches are not federal. These are political names that badly parallel religious names, but there is one thing quite certain: the Communion is not a Church, nor is it nearly a Church. 
Posted by: Graham Kings
Saturday 8 August 2009 - 06:02pm
Thanks, Laurence. But why, then, is the Anglican Communion Office not called the Anglican Federation Office? Why does the Archbishop of Canterbury, the Lambeth Conferences, the Primates' Meetings and the Anglican Consultative Council refer repeatedly to the Anglican Communion and not to the Anglican Federation? As I mentioned in my suggested quadrant, there are people to treat the Anglican Communion as a Federation - in the past both Peter Jensen and Marilyn McCord Adams come to mind as examples - but that does not make it into a Federation. Posted by: Deleted user 974 Saturday 8 August 2009 - 04:01pm The 'Anglican Communion' has never been more than a federation, Graham. And at times not even that. Posted by: Deleted user 974 Saturday 8 August 2009 - 03:59pm No ! Celinda I am unshockable ! And I have no problem with psychologists helping people, to be and to become their true self -- including a self which is 'celibate'. And follow their own ideals and goals, including that of celibacy. It has to be the genuine desire of the individual (and not of the Other). What I know to be unethical is professionals suggesting courses of action and pressurizing patients to do what they (the powerful professionals) desire. Btw How many of these psychologists can speak and advocate from their own experience of celibacy ? Or it it a case of, "Do as I say, not as I do ?" Posted by: Celinda Saturday 8 August 2009 - 01:08pm I have to agree with Simon Sarmiento, who says (on Thinking Anglicans) that it makes no sense to split over same-sex unions, partly because we are already in communion with churches who bless them (Church of Sweden, others). All I could find on the Titus One set was the horrific threats to Christians in Pakistan and Nigeria, with the cry for unity in the face of these threats. I think Christians are able to speak with a unified voice on such issues, although many voices speak instead of one particular authoritative voice. Although I think the sexual issues are important, I have never thought they were church splitting issues. I don't think the church has to speak "as one" on them, although I understand that makes a problem for some, both those who would like the church to speak "as one" in favor of same sex blessings (an example is L Roberts, who thinks it's unethical for any psychologists to help gays who want to be celebate, and is shocked that the APA has broadened its position while adding guidelines) and those who want the church to speak unequivocally against same-sex blessings. I don't think we have to be in union on the sexual issues in order to be in union against persecution, injustice, poverty, cruelty, etc.
Posted by: Graham Kings
Saturday 8 August 2009 - 12:36pm
Let's return to the theme of this thread: Communion or Federation? There have been some comments on the Thinking Anglicans, Guardian, TitusOneNine and Covenant threads on this article. 
Posted by: Stephen Kuhrt
Saturday 8 August 2009 - 11:58am
Overall its 579 posts (by Nersen) plays 249 posts (by Liddon) I believe. Posted by: Pageantmaster Saturday 8 August 2009 - 11:12am We want the Anglican Communion because it follows Christ. Posted by: John Saturday 8 August 2009 - 10:54am Liddon wrote of Nersen You monopolise this site, with an opinion on every matter, so that it seems more often to be Nersen's blog, rather than the Fulcrum site. Site statistics reveal that far from the above being true others have made more comments on this forum than Nersen. In particular Liddon has made more comments than Nersen. Posted by: liddon Saturday 8 August 2009 - 10:01am Graham, Robert Runcie was, I think, correct. We do want the Anglican Communion. But, knowing what he felt about other things, I do not believe that he wanted it at the cost of what the Anglican Communion stands for. We want the Anglican Communion because it follows the way of justice, toleration, intelligent and scholarly understanding of the Bible, human rights, partnership, engagement with the world, a regard for litugical tradition (when asked to describe the sort of Christian he was Runcie said he was a theological radical and a liturgical conservative - that's the Anglican tradition, what we're facing at the moment is a move towards theological conservatism and liturgical radicalism, not Runcie's thing at all). What we see with the proposed Covenant is exactly what Runcie feared and spoke against, the triumph of the culture of one set of provinces against the unity of the Communion. Don't forget, it is not the TEC which has refused communion it is the African bishops who refused to share. By all means let's bring Runcie into the argument, but only if we represent his views fairly, and we don't take one piece of his teaching out of the context of his whole life's work and teaching. He would be no friend to those who seek to tear the Communion apart with their Covenant and their refusal to recognise the Holy Orders of their brothers and sisters.
Posted by: Graham Kings
Friday 7 August 2009 - 10:48pm
In the present context, it may be worth re-reading 'Stretching and the Spirit: the Anglican Covenant' which I wrote with Jonathan Clark, Rector of Stoke Newington and then on the steering committee of Affirming Catholicism on 1 July 2007. He is now chair of Affirming Catholicism. We concluded with a quote from the opening sermon of the 1988 Lambeth Conference - different from the one I cited in 'Federation Isn't Enough': Robert Runcie, in his opening sermon at the Lambeth Conference of 1988 asked prophetically: Are we being called through events and their theological interpretation to move from independence to interdependence? If we answer yes, then we cannot dodge the question of how this is to be given 'flesh': how is our interdependence articulated and made effective; how is it to be structured? Without losing a proper - but perhaps modified - provincial autonomy, this will probably mean a critical examination of the notion of 'dispersed authority'. We need to have confidence that authority is not dispersed to the point of dissolution and ineffectiveness... Let me put it in starkly simple terms: do we really want unity within the Anglican Communion? Is our worldwide family of Christians worth bonding together? Or is our paramount concern the preservation or promotion of that particular expression of Anglicanism which has developed within the culture of our own province?... I believe we still need the Anglican Communion. (Adrian Hastings, Robert Runcie, London: Mowbray, 1991, pp154-5) So do we. In the midst of this current crisis, the pattern of our friendship and collaboration in London has been encouraging and we are committed to worshipping, learning and proclaiming the gospel together. As our Communion is being stretched by the Spirit, a similar commitment to an Anglican Covenant, realistically and theologically, is the constructive way forward. Posted by: nersenpaul Friday 7 August 2009 - 09:50am liddon - my post engaged with your reference to 1 Corinthians....and by referring to the context of your reference, showed how selective and misleading your reference to the letter was as you tried to use it to make a point about "diversity".....we have to look at texts (eg about the body having many parts) in context...it is misleading just to mention the body with many parts to talk of "diversity" but ignore what St Paul says in the very same letter about those who will not repent but demand a place in the church regardless. Ironically, but not surprisingly, your post is not engaging with the argument.....I am sure you would engage if you had a strong point to make. Posted by: liddon Friday 7 August 2009 - 08:37am Nersen, I probably ought to tell you why I am not going to reply to you, rather than just ignoring your post to me. You never seem to me to engage on any topic you post about. You just peddle your own rigid interpretation of a few texts, rather than listen and respond. You seem to me to be always argumentative, rather than willing to discuss. You monopolise this site, with an opinion on every matter, so that it seems more often to be Nersen's blog, rather than the Fulcrum site. You respond so quickly to everything that it strikes me that all we ever get from you is a knee-jerk response, rather than a considered reply. I get no sense that you have ever sat down and thought about another person's point of view before you dash off your opposition. All of the above lead me to think that it is not a good thing to engage with you, and I have no intention of encouraging you by doing so. I hope you will understand that I do not mean to be rude when I ignore you, just that I think that to do so would be pointless and unhlpeful and would only lead to a situation where posted even more on this site than you already do. Posted by: Deleted user 974 Friday 7 August 2009 - 12:38am The Anglican Communion has never been much more than a kind of federation --except in some recent fantasies. It is proving disastrous all round to try to transform it from a simple loose federation into a version of the RC denomination -- it'll never work. It dowsnt even work for the Romans. The C of E is not at liberty constitutionally to do whatever Rowan likes. Posted by: nersenpaul Thursday 6 August 2009 - 10:19am liddon - I am sure you are aware that they also had much to say on repentance and holiness..... and St Paul was quite specific on qualifications for church leadership and even membership..... St Paul writes of a single body, as you say, in 1 Corinthians....but in the very same letter, he also writes about excluding those (1 Cor 5-6) who will not repent but seek to justify sins .....but, as I say, I am sure you are well aware of that, even if you do not mention it and reject some of what he says in favour of "diversity" Posted by: Deleted user 1543 Thursday 6 August 2009 - 10:06am Graham - you are too hung up on names. The Anglican Communion has, in fact, been a federation of independent churches, each with their own constitution and canons, sometimes one province sometimes more. They have a generally common history stemming from these islands - though, as you well know, sometimes it has been mediated: so TEC from Scotland, Congo from Uganda and so forth. Almost all of it was a development from the rise and fall of the British Empire, and during its waning the independent structure of the communion as we know it came into being. Those independent churches have forged particular alliances arising out of the love and trust that they have shared. Interestingly, those are not always church to church. Your exmaple is Church to diocese. But it doesn't seem to matter - these partnership links provide a wonderful way of love. care. interest. support and learning across the federated structure of the Anglican Communion. This structure has also had the capacity to live with and incorporate very significant differences in the polity and practises of different members. Until now. When. for some reason which no one has really properly explicated, this issue has become a deal breaker and there has been a great rushing to judgement and a setting up of parallel structures. I am with liddon. I don't think that what the Anglican Communion needs is to be more heavily regulated so that we become either a more confessional church or a more policed structure. African efforts to deal with their marital problems in ways that would not suit us don't mean that we fall out of fellowship with them - some provinces consecrate and ordain women, from the side of those that do we don't end our fellowship with them that don't - divorce among the faithful is more or less acceptable in differenct parts of the world; no one has gone to the barricades over this - some Anglicans drink alcohol; others think it is of the Devil and would never dream of so doing. But we stick together even when we disagree strongly. I don't think the structures need fiddling with - let people come and go as they will if they can't handle the diversity that exists and that is in the process of being refined by the graciousness of God and the passage of time. People who shout "the cows are in the garden" make others rush round putting up fences - but the garden was a park anyway, and the cows look good. Posted by: liddon Thursday 6 August 2009 - 09:02am Graham uses the image of a bunch of grapes. And he uses the expression 'doing one's own thing'. He does this point out that the two are imcompatible. Why? If we look at the biblical origin of the bunch of grapes image, then there's every reason to accept that 'doing one's own thing' is part of the point. If Jesus is the vine and we are the branches, then we are intimately linked. But the vine does one thing, the roots do another, the branches do another, the leaves do another, the grapes do another. And, even with the the grapes, the skin does one thing, the flesh does another, the seeds do another. Diversity of purpose everywhere, yet one plant. St Paul's image of the body is exactly the same. All the parts have different functions. Being and function are not opposed in the way that Graham suggests. I see no problem in understanding TEC as the seeds of the future of the Church. I see no problem with understanding TEC as the fingertips of the body, delicately sensing the world around them. As I see it, some evangelicals in the Church have taken it upon themselves to say that they are the head, not the members, and they are telling the other members what to do. Let the TEC get on with doing what it is doing, within the communion. If all provinces are to be the same, then you're expecting a leg to be an eye, and an ear to be a foot. That's not what the biblical imagery demands, nor is it the experience of history. Whenever a centralised power in the church has demanded uniformity then schism always follows. Jesus and Saint Paul counselled diversity. Let it happen. Posted by: nersenpaul Thursday 6 August 2009 - 07:54am Thanks Graham....and I am glad to see your glacier get a mention too! I wonder if Guardian readers need more explanation for why we do nto want to deviate from "traditional" teaching. They would not like the "traditional" views expressed in the piece..... but might be sympathetic to the church not being open to small numbers of people forcing changes ("putting facts on the ground") and demanding to stay in Communion at the same time. It is so good that the revisionist doublespeak, which has allowed the simultaneous swearing of loyalty to the AC and tearing the fabric of the Communion while never doubting its own integrity, is being refuted in public eg the comments on Schori's spin re GC09s "walking apart" from "the Church Catholic"....."permissive" is a good word- as may be shown quite soon in TECUSA elections to the episcopate. Glad the ABC rejected the doublespeak too. The Kings Glacier is moving. But what about those who say the CofE will be in track 2? IC,AC et al are now actively working to get more seats in GS and get the CofE into that more loosely related zone...... there is a risk that we end up in track 2. As GWB might say, never "misunderestimate" what people can achieve with political skill and organisation.... As +Durham said re the Covenant, we have to keep in mind the Communion Partners and ACNA too. In the CofE, that means it would be a good thing if Fulcrum and FCA people could get united on the Covenant and work together...... because clever, determined people are working hard to get the CofE into track 2. Time for Fulcrum leaders to reach out to FCA leaders and build unity based on the Ridley Draft of the Covenant. Time for building bridges. Posted by: Deleted user 1222 Thursday 6 August 2009 - 05:36am All this quoted useful mutual support from the Anglican Communion took place without any Covenant and without any further centralisation. My point to this is that again confused here is federation and confederation. It is federation that the Covenant proposes: where the centre decides what is central and what is local. That's a federal system. A confederal system is where the current decentralised arrangement and its centres decide what is trans-Churches and what remains with each Church to connect the essentials of doctrines etc. and what is a proper on-the-ground response to needs. It is the latter where relationships build whereas a federal system - a Covenant and all its instruments - creates a formalised centre. The centre is based on bureaucratic values, such as bypassing the needs of minorities in order to serve the greater bureaucracy - and this is precisely the intention of the Covenant. Associating the Covenant with 'relationship' as in the Trinity seems to me to be a case of special pleading, a 'God on our side' statement when, surely more so, Churches working together is the argument about giving a relationship room to breathe, the working of the Holy Spirit they say as part of its function within the Godhead (but I'll leave that to others to flesh out). I extend the argument here. Posted by: Clare Thursday 6 August 2009 - 12:14am As has been mentioned several times on other of these threads, the arguments against TEC for going it alone - lone pillar style - could equally well be applied to all of those churches - the C of E included - that ordained women to the priesthood. Ordaining women to the episcopate as several anglican churches do (and we might soon do) is another 'go it alone' action. Yet we have felt it right and proper to do the former and are actively contemplating the latter, even though this is contentious. I like the image of pillars and arches. But why this image leads us to rebuke TEC I don't know. The cathedral is composed of both separate pillars and unified arches - neither one can exist without the other - unity in difference etc etc. Of course communion is better than federation. But, why can't we have a communion where some churches do one thing re gay relationships and one another - just like we do with women in ministry? As for the two tracks- I can imagine a situation where one by one each church realises that it needs to hold on to something that few other churches can yet agree with - say Sydney re lay presidency, TEC re the gay thing, us re women bishops etc etc, until there is no church who can actually make it to the final cut! We find ourselves all outsiders yet join hands together for mutual support. There are two tracks yet the 'inner' track is empty! And even if this were not the case and a few churches managed to agree to 'intensify' I would hope that the appropriate Christian response was to stand with those on the periphery and forego any 'more orthodox' status that went with being 'intensive', whether those on the periphery were so because of convictions I agree with (like TEC) or disagree with (like Sydney). Posted by: Celinda Thursday 6 August 2009 - 12:09am I have to agree with Jeremy, who on another thread just asked why this particular issue is a communion breaker of the sort which must prevent us from acting together against injustice (as Bishop Kings so movingly told of in his newsletter). Or other things we do together as Christians. Yes, it is important that the church work together as a whole on the theological and Biblical aspects of the issue, and that one part of the church not act as though the discussion has ended. But completely breaking communion is too strong a weapon. Posted by: Art Thursday 6 August 2009 - 12:01am Thank you Bp Graham. Simple, direct, and may I venture, persuasive. And lastly, deeply theological as opposed to views based on either human power or pragmatism.
Posted by: Graham Kings
Wednesday 5 August 2009 - 10:33pm
We have just published on Fulcrum my August 2009 Fulcrum Newsletter, copublished with permission with Comment is free belief, Guardian online, 5 August 2009, 'Federation Isn't Enough: Only Communion Properly Reflects the Spirit of the Church'. Looking forward to the discussion. |
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