March 2005 Brakes and Breaks The Covenant Statement from ECUSA’s House of Bishops meeting in Texas applies the brakes to avoid breaks. For fifteen months, till the General Convention in June 2006, a moratorium has been declared on consecrating any bishops, not just those who live in a sexual relationship outside of marriage. The bishops … Continue Reading
Sin, sex and skullduggery. That is what this Report, and this debate, are not about. When the Lambeth Commission began work a year ago, it was not asked to discuss the presenting issues which, in late 2003, had begun to pull the Anglican Communion apart. It was asked, rather, to report on unity and communion … Continue Reading
The Primates’ Statement, like the Windsor Report, manifests long term solutions, rather than precipitous dissolution, for the Anglican Communion. We welcome their statement which builds on the profound theological insights of the Windsor Report, provides sensible provision for voluntary discipline in terms of a 3 year withdrawal of the provinces of ECUSA and Canada from … Continue Reading
Download the article as a PDF. Michael PoonMichael Poon is canon of Saint Andrew’s Cathedral, Singapore, and former director of the Centre for the Study of Christianity in Asia, Trinity Theological College. He is a member of the Standing Commission on Unity, Faith and Order of the Anglican Communion, and Anglican member of the Anglican … Continue Reading
1. The Lambeth Commission was asked to make a theological and legal discernment of a particular situation, describing that situation in an analytical way that would prepare for a practical decision by the Primates and A.C.C. Their work, we may say, is a service rendered to the episcopê of the Anglican churches, aimed towards an … Continue Reading
The main reason the Lambeth Commission was asked to talk about communion life and structures rather than about sex was because there would have been no point in doing the latter. The Lambeth Conference 1998 had already reaffirmed the church’s stance on the subject, by a very substantial majority; and this had in turn been … Continue Reading
We consider this to be a very significant, thoughtful, in-depth, report with vital recommendations which could hold the Anglican Communion together. Clearly, it has teeth and is not a fudge. It is a much more conservative than liberal document. It is against excessive provincial autonomy, and the ‘pre-emptive strikes’ of the dioceses of New Hampshire, … Continue Reading
Fulcrum welcomes the fact that the Primates have found a way to keep the global Anglican Communion together, even if it is simply “a holding job”. A lot can be accomplished in a year and we hope the promised Commission will have an important educational role, both about issues of leadership and sexual ethics in … Continue Reading
A paper written just prior to the Primate’s Meeting at Lambeth Dr David Jenkins, a former Bishop of Durham, is disillusioned with the Anglican Communion and suggests its dissolution (The Times, 13 October 2003). He considers that the churches should concentrate on mission and serving the flock within their national boundaries. This emphasis on nationalism … Continue Reading
In addition to material that is already in the public domain from other sources, Fulcrum would add two comments about this week’s Primates’ Meeting at Lambeth: The importance of prayer. Pray for the Archbishop of Canterbury and his fellow Primates that wise counsel will prevail and the gospel will not be compromised. It is Mission … Continue Reading