A Commentary on the Archbishop of Canterbury’s Article:
The Challenge and Hope of Being an Anglican Today.

This article is in the form of a Commentary on the Archbishop of Canterbury’s article, The Challenge and Hope of Being an Anglican Today. Excerpts from the Archbishop of Canterbury’s basic text are in black, I have highlighted significant points in red, and my comments in blue. ~ The Rev. Dr. Rob Smith

The Archbishop says:

“And, to make clear something that can get very much obscured in the rhetoric about 'inclusion', this is not and should never be a question about the contribution of gay and lesbian people as such to the Church of God and its ministry, about the dignity and value of gay and lesbian people. Instead it is a question, agonisingly difficult for many, as to what kinds of behaviour a Church that seeks to be loyal to the Bible can bless, and what kinds of behaviour it must warn against - and so it is a question about how we make decisions corporately with other Christians, looking together for the mind of Christ as we share the study of the Scriptures.”

My comments:

The actual issue is biblical authority and its relationship to the Lordship of Christ. Views on sexuality are derivative, but the remark of ABC [Archbishop of Canterbury] is correct: what kind of behavior is biblically acceptable, what kind is not? Somebody said, “By their fruits you shall know them.” The underlying and more serious issue raised is Salvation itself. According to TEC [The Episcopal Church] it is no longer necessary for the Divine Agapé to embrace both Mercy and Justice and come down to our world to reconcile man to God. I think Anselm would be appalled.

The decisions undertaken in the areas we are concerned with are sociological in nature and not biblical. It’s and old problem reflected in a couplet by Alexander Pope, “Presume not God to scan, the proper study of mankind is man.” The reality is that humanism and its variants provide a poor and unstable basis for decision-making.

”It is saying that, whatever the presenting issue, no member Church can make significant decisions unilaterally and still expect this to make no difference to how it is regarded in the fellowship; this would be uncomfortably like saying that every member could redefine the terms of belonging as and when it suited them. Some actions - and sacramental actions in particular - just do have the effect of putting a Church outside or even across the central stream of the life they have shared with other Churches. It isn't a question of throwing people into outer darkness, but of recognising that actions have consequences - and that actions believed in good faith to be 'prophetic' in their radicalism are likely to have costly consequences.”

Actions have consequences? Yes. What I worry about is timing. Currently some conservatives are in headlong flight from The Episcopal Church. Irenaeus said, “Where there is order, there is also harmony; where there is harmony, there is also correct timing; where there is correct timing, there is also advantage.” What order, what harmony, what timing, what advantage, what consequences? The number of dioceses seeking alternative primatial oversight [they want the Archbishop of Canterbury, or the

Primate of some other province to provide pastoral oversight] is increasing. Many conservatives at this point believe that they recognize that the moment of inevitable separation has arrived, and that separation is proceeding. Today at Apostles we communicate with our friends from Diocese of Quincy; Christ Church ~ Overton Park, Kansas, and in a parish in New Hampshire. What was previously said in secret places is being shouted from rooftops. Even though we have passed the point of no return we must be careful where we place our feet in order to cross the river safely. Stampedes don’t often end well.

The Archbishop goes on to say:

”… no local Church and no group within a local Church can just settle down complacently with what it or its surrounding society finds comfortable. The Church worldwide is not simply the sum total of local communities. It has a cross-cultural dimension that is vital to its health and it is naïve to think that this can survive without some structures to make it possible. An isolated local Church is less than a complete Church.

The Anglican Identity

But we have tried to be a family of Churches willing to learn from each other across cultural divides, not assuming that European (or American or African) wisdom is what settles everything, opening up the lives of Christians here to the realities of Christian experience elsewhere. And we have seen these links not primarily in a bureaucratic way but in relation to the common patterns of ministry and worship - the community gathered around Scripture and sacraments; a ministry of bishops, priests and deacons, a biblically-centred form of common prayer, a focus on the Holy Communion. These are the signs that we are not just a human organisation but a community trying to respond to the action and the invitation of God that is made real for us in ministry and Bible and sacraments.”

We have here a partial move towards a New Anglican Reformation which in its fulness should be Biblical, Sacramental, and Growing in the Spirit. One of the difficulties with some conservative responses is that they are reactive by nature and on the surface not particularly conscious of the Holy Spirit. On the other hand the revisionists tell us that they are being led by the Holy Spirit and that “God is doing a new thing” [Gene Robinson at GC2003].

The ABC mentions

1. common patterns of ministry and worship
2. a community gathered around Scripture and sacraments
3. a ministry of bishops, priests and deacons
4. a biblically-centered form of common prayer
5. a focus on Holy Communion

These elements clearly outline some of the fundamentals of Anglicanism.

Our Anglican background emphasizes three classic elements in Anglican Spirituality: Daily Offices, Habitual Recollection, and Holy Eucharist. At the moment we no longer have a “biblically-centered form of common prayer” but what is increasingly in TEC becoming a Loose-leaf Book of Uncommon Prayer. As I prepare to go to Uganda I have been using the “current” 1662 BCP Morning Prayer Office. The result is that our American multi-option format in TEC [even though I have used the contemporary version for years] is drastically different. One element of a New Anglican Reformation would have to be some agreement on what a Book of Common Prayer actually is.

With the militancy of the liberal leadership of TEC [The Episcopal Church] it is going to be very difficult to have any empathy with “liberal Protestant pluralism.” The very phrase is antique. In this post-modern age we have moved beyond into the language of goddess driven feminism, with a new deity, “Our mother Jesus.” While there is historical precedent for this in the Song of Julian of Norwich, the timing and context of the new Presiding Bishop’s remarks are in the very least provocative. Quoting Julian of Norwich doesn’t make it correct. It has long been a principle of Anglicanism that we go back, not to the late medieval writers, but rather to the early Church, and ultimately to Holy Scripture itself. The real issue is very basic; in a recent interview Time Magazine (7/10/06) asked, “Is belief in Jesus the only way to get to heaven? Jefferts Schori answered: “We who practice the Christian tradition understand him as our vehicle to the divine. But for us to assume that God could not act in other ways is, I think, to put God in an awfully small box.” Her opinion is in accord with General Convention 2006, which dismissed and would not consider the resolution affirming that it “declares its unchanging commitment to Jesus Christ as the Son of God, the only name by which any person may be saved” (jmstanton.com). This trend is not new. In 2003 the 74th General Convention refused to affirm the Thirty-Nine Articles, and the authority of Holy Scripture. In doing so they are the heirs of several decades of unchecked doctrinal apostasy. Obviously for TEC, Church History does not exist. Is TEC saying, “What have you to do with me, Jesus, Son of the Most High God? I adjure you by God, do not torment me?” (Mark 5:7).

”Future Directions

The idea of a 'covenant' between local Churches (developing alongside the existing work being done on harmonising the church law of different local Churches) is one method that has been suggested, and it seems to me the best way forward. It is necessarily an 'opt-in' matter. Those Churches that were prepared to take this on as an expression of their responsibility to each other would limit their local freedoms for the sake of a wider witness; and some might not be willing to do this. We could arrive at a situation where there were 'constituent' Churches in covenant in the Anglican Communion and other 'churches in association', which were still bound by historic and perhaps personal links, fed from many of the same sources, but not bound in a single and unrestricted sacramental communion, and not sharing the same constitutional structures. The relation would not be unlike that between the Church of England and the Methodist Church, for example. The 'associated' Churches would have no direct part in the decision making of the 'constituent' Churches, though they might well be observers whose views were sought or whose expertise was shared from time to time, and with whom significant areas of co-operation might be possible.”

I believe this a fundamentally sound approach, and an approach to a New Anglican Reformation. The issue however is timing. One reservation is in accepting even an associate relationship for those who have so ravaged the Anglican Communion. There is a principle involved here. “What fellowship can light have with darkness?” People are asking “Who will deliver me from this body of death?” (Romans 7:24).

The Archbishop says:

“We do have a distinctive historic tradition - a reformed commitment to the absolute priority of the Bible for deciding doctrine, a catholic loyalty to the sacraments and the threefold ministry of bishops, priests and deacons, and a habit of cultural sensitivity and intellectual flexibility that does not seek to close down unexpected questions too quickly.”

This statement gives us a clear definition of what Anglicanism actually is at its best and provides a sound basis for the development of a covenant. That is precisely what so many of us “signed on” for in coming to the Anglican Communion through the Episcopal Church. I have always said, “We’re Anglican first, and Episcopalian second.” Although today what “Episcopal” means is open to question. Is it TEC or PECUSA, or something else entirely?

The Archbishop next outlines the extreme positions that would leave some unable to affirm the proposed covenant:

The different components in our heritage can, up to a point, flourish in isolation from each other. But any one of them pursued on its own would lead in a direction ultimately outside historic Anglicanism The reformed concern may lead towards a looser form of ministerial order and a stronger emphasis on the sole, unmediated authority of the Bible. The catholic concern may lead to a high doctrine of visible and structural unification of the ordained ministry around a focal point. The cultural and intellectual concern may lead to a style of Christian life aimed at giving spiritual depth to the general shape of the culture around and de-emphasising revelation and history.”

I would agree with ABC that we don’t need to go to any of the extreme positions. True balance is part of the genius of Anglicanism. But quite obviously this is going to create great difficulty for the “liberal Protestant pluralists” in TEC.

“Pursued far enough in isolation, each of these would lead to a different place - to strict evangelical Protestantism, to Roman Catholicism, to religious liberalism. To accept that each of these has a place in the church's life and that they need each other means that the enthusiasts for each aspect have to be prepared to live with certain tensions or even sacrifices - with a tradition of being positive about a responsible critical approach to Scripture, with the anomalies of a historic ministry not universally recognised in the Catholic world, with limits on the degree of adjustment to the culture and its habits that is thought possible or acceptable.”

Personal history and experience inevitably enters in at this point. What on earth is “ a responsible critical approach” to Scripture? All my training was in a thoroughgoing liberal critical approach to Scripture that was a based on several presuppositions: God is [dead?]. God does not communicate through Scripture. Jesus is not the communication of God. And thoroughly humanistic miracles like the ordination of practicing homosexuals do happen. Oh, I know the conservative alternative, but even that can be warped and often is. Ultimately I agree with Smith Wigglesworth: “God said it. I believe it. That settles it.” If the man in the moveable, stackable, contemporary church seats can’t open his Bible and hear God speak in the depths of his soul Lectio Divina becomes utterly irrelevant. [Lectio Divina is a classic four-step approach to meditation. Read the Scripture. Reflect on its meaning. Respond to God in prayer. Rest in his presence.] One of the fruits of the Reformation is that the man in the contemporary pew seat by and large operates on the basis of Smith Wigglesworth, not on the basis of contemporary biblical scholarship.

”Conclusion

All that I have said above should make it clear that the idea of an Archbishop of Canterbury resolving any of this by decree is misplaced, however tempting for many. The Archbishop of Canterbury presides and convenes in the Communion, and may do what this document attempts to do, which is to outline the theological framework in which a problem should be addressed; but he must always act collegially, with the bishops of his own local Church and with the primates and the other instruments of communion.”

I would take it from this that the ABC would be of the opinion that he has no direct authority to assume primatial oversight. In any event primatial oversight is not part of the Constitutions and Canons of the Protestant Episcopal Church in the United States of America. What would be more appropriate is to appeal to the ABC for a direct pastoral relationship and for assurance that those who will affirm the covenant will remain in communion with Canterbury. This needs to be clear even as revisionists within TEC refuse to affirm the covenant and their relationship with the larger Anglican Communion,

There are actually Four Instruments of Unity: The Archbishop of Canterbury, Lambeth Conference, The Anglican Consultative Council, and the Primates. The apparent problem is that these are unequally weighted. The ABC tells us, probably correctly, that he doesn’t have that kind of power and the ACC acts in an advisory capacity and facilitates communication in the Anglican Communion. That leaves Lambeth and the Primates. Looking at it from that perspective the Global South bears a tremendous amount of weight in determining what will happen with Lambeth. There is a Global South Primates meeting scheduled for this September, which will point the way towards the actions of the meeting of all the Primates in February 2007.

To whom should we look for the establishment of a Covenant? The weight ultimately falls on Lambeth and the bishops of the worldwide Anglican Communion. An interim solution may need to be given in the form of a preliminary Covenant that could provide a basis for who would be invited to the next Lambeth meeting. This may be particularly important in light of the growing flight of conservatives.

Personally I distrust stampede mentality. Fear is the wrong motivation. Jesus says, “"Why are you afraid, O you of little faith?" The next Lambeth Conference is in mid-July, 2008, but the invitations to it will be sent in 2007. I see no sign of Global South bishops rejecting any conservative diocese or parish either before, or after that date. I feel personally very secure in my relationship with the Anglican Communion, with our parish relationship and acceptance in the Anglican Communion, and with our Diocese and Bishop’s acceptance in the Anglican Communion. Waiting may not be comfortable, but it makes more sense to me than joining a stampede because we are angry and afraid.

The ABC has the final word:

”That is why the process currently going forward of assessing our situation in the wake of the General Convention is a shared one. But it is nonetheless possible for the Churches of the Communion to decide that this is indeed the identity, the living tradition - and by God's grace, the gift - we want to share with the rest of the Christian world in the coming generation; more importantly still, that this is a valid and vital way of presenting the Good News of Jesus Christ to the world. My hope is that the period ahead - of detailed response to the work of General Convention, exploration of new structures, and further refinement of the covenant model - will renew our positive appreciation of the possibilities of our heritage so that we can pursue our mission with deeper confidence and harmony.”

My remarks © Rob Smith 2006

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