It does make some detailed statements, but my point is that it is credal - as in those creeds indeed - but with the addition of consequences. The important point is the consequences. Already, even without the Covenant, decisions have been made that state that TEC and the Southern Cone cannot be represenative of Anglicanism in ecumenical relationships.

Anyway, to move this on a little, it is interesting that liberal voices within the C of E are making themselves heard. Many of them gave a lot of wind to the Covenant, whereas I never did, but now there seems to be more co-ordination against it. The usual liberal strategy for things is to 'carry on' locally and via nods and winks, but this time the sense of perhaps betrayal over these last years and lack of balance in the liberal direction has led to this greater sense of visible pressure group response.

I should again make it clear I am not Anglican now, and I was motivated to 'return' perhaps against better judgement simply by wanting to respond to Jonathan Clatworthy's remarks about historical Puritans.

Pluralist,

Welcome back.

You describe the covenant as credal as opposed to what? You refer to Hooker and the words Anglican, balanced and rational spring to mind but perhaps there is a better term for what you favour. The covenant is only credal in the sense of accepting the Catholic creeds. There is nothing like the confessions of the reformation and puritans. The BCP is only affirmed in general terms. The approach of the covenant is relational or organic. In biblical terms it recognises the church as the body of Christ.

Incidentally can someone confirm that the correct version of the covenant ishttp://www.anglicancommunion.org/commission/covenant/final/text.cfm

David

Pluralist's reading of history is interesting, but the reference made to a document which is 'credal with consequences' takes us back in history to some of the early councils of the church, where the credal statements of positive affirmation were accompanied by anathemas, condemning contrary positions. In liturgical use the Nicene Creed was separated from the anathemas.

In the Church of England the 39 Articles have some negative statements, but the descendants of the anathemas were found in the 1603/4 Canons (the 20th Century revision of the Canons removed the strong negative statements).

"Relational consequences", which seems to be the most contentious concept, are therefore related, in Anglican history to Canon Law rather more than "Covenant".

But theologically "relational consequences" belong to the doctrine of sin, and for me there is a disjunction between the theological understanding of sin, and the concept of relational consequences in the Covenant document, in that the Covenant does not take 'relational consequences' seriously enough - they sem to be a kind of bureaucratic inconvenience.

Those resonances might help to explain why the Covenant document generates resistance.

I'm back to make some limited comments, and now from a position as a Unitarian who has not attended an Anglican church since leaving New Holland and coming to Hull.

My general view is along with that of Jonathan Clatworthy. You don't vote for what you don't want, if you don't want 'relational consequences'. The Covenant will be a football for kicking by disputants and make things worse. However, I am going to quibble with his historical analysis.

He wrote that the "apparent fragmentation of Anglicanism is caused not by a lack of ecclesiastical procedures but by a clash of beliefs about religious truth." He goes on about the flexibility of Richard Hooker and the inflexibility and schismatic nature of the Bible only Puritans.

It's not so. The Puritans were the excluded as regards the Book of Common Prayer, and were an extreme lot in Anglican terms. But they were a peculiar constituency, because they had some breadth to them as well, particularly in a 'parish' sense, and one of the writers Richard Baxter wanted subscription limited to the Apostles Creed, the Ten Commandments and the Lord's Prayer.

By being Bible only, the Calvinists soon realised that the Bible was not quite as reliable as they thought. Some Puritans, like Independents, adopted creeds and more, and retained Calvinism for longer, whereas the English Presbyterians started to liberalise and moved towards Arminianism (of the head), some Arianism (Anglicans were more likely to be Arian) and occasionally Universalism. Wealthy merchants don't exactly want strict religion. Their congregations were in effect boosted by new ideological liberal Unitarians who were also biblical literalists - biblical criticism and its methods came to a different school of Unitarians and later.

The point is that when the Bible only Puritans liberalised, the others would go off and form their own congregations - the schisms were those of conservatives and credalists.

Hooker was different, a person of a balancing act between Scripture, tradition and reason. The Puritans in effect became evolutionists of religion, changing because they had been Bible only and also were not able and did not want Presbyterian structures, despite the name.

For Unitarians, tradition is the information of history and the inheritance of language. Scripture became a critical device, and then was superseded by individual conscience.

What is 'wrong' with the Covenant is that it is credal with consequences. It shows that the present creeds and the nod towards the 39 Articles is weak, at least weak in terms of the whole of Anglicanism. The Church of England is culturally sensitive to its place, as are all Anglican Churches, and each innovates or does not as it sees fit. What this Covenant does is impose another's cultural outlook on an Anglican Church with the effect of slowing down any of its responses to its own situation.

As for freedom to believe and just to join for worship, that is something that does have boundaries. I do not believe in the incarnation or resurrection, for example, and I am not a religious realist. So in the end the liturgical stretch gives way, whereas the Unitarian setting is freedom to believe and just to join for worship, even if it has a Puritan shadow across it and would seem 'thin' to many an Anglican.

Thanks for the comments on my article. Thanks especially to you, Jonathan Clatworthy, for engaging on this Fulcrum thread, since you at Modern Church, together with Giles Goddard at Inclusive Church, prepared the original advert against the Covenant.

In my article I did not respond point by point to the advert since I knew Andrew Goddard was preparing a long article, which Fulcrum has now just published, and I linked into his earlier shorter response. Tony, I think it is worth having a separate thread on Andrew's new article since that relates specifically to the advert.

Jonathan, on the other points you raise:

1. Agreed, yes the Covenant is part of the outworking of the Windsor Report. If people did not like the Windsor Report - as is clear IC and MC don't - then it makes sense that they are against the Covenant.

2. Concerning Richard Hooker, I am very surprised at the irony of you  - and Simon Barrow at Ekklesia - trying to coopt him, with his central concept of integrating 'law', to your case against the Covenant. Yes, at the end of the 16^th century, Puritans in the Church of England were indeed pushing to impose Presbyterian order and lack of ceremony on the Church of England, but this is hardly the case with the Covenant. Presbyterian? Lack of ceremony? Richard Hooker answered this serious, polemical controversy with massive hinterland learning, something on which I commented in reviewing Rowan Williams's, Anglican Identities. Last Wednesday I had dinner at Hooker’s Rectory, in Boscombe a few miles north east of Salisbury, where he was Rector from 1591-1595 and where he wrote most of his multi-volume work ‘The Laws of Ecclesiasitcal Polity’. Benjamin Guyer has recently written a fine article 'Law, Liturgy and Wisdom: An Introduction to Richard Hooker', published on the Covenant site, and is currently preparing a response to those who use Hooker against the Covenant.

Andrew Goddard has now provided is with very nearly 15000 words to explain why those who have read the covenant document and concluded that it its punitive -- and all the rest of it -- are quite simply wrong. Like Don Alfonso, one might simply growl 'finem lauda' -- but by then it will be too late. Come on Andrew, just a bit of candour about disciplining churches you disapprove of would not be out of place

When comprehensiveness develops into anythingness (a.k.a. the widest possible variety of opinion), centrifugalism is blessed and any possibility of identity is given up.

Are there any limits to "widest"? Is the only content of Anglicanism the decision of anybody to call their opinions Anglican?

If anythingness leads us to wooliness we might soon find that the best definition of Anglicanism is actually "nothingmuchness'

Jonathan hi

I agree with you that the covenant may cause scisms and splits, and where Richard Hooker believes that disagreements should be allowed to take their course.

However i ask the question whether that has to be the route in order to achieve unity. It is also true that the perception that Anglicans will no longer be Anglicans if they accept the covanant,. Rather they will be Anglicans working under the new covenant in the same way as when people changed from the  older version of Common book of Prayer to the newer one.

There is change , resistance to change, there is God and the truth; and there is a perception of the truth. Selective choosing of biblical passages to support a position of oppression of anyone will always be unacceptable, and a large obstacle in evangelicism.

The real issue though is one of fear and grief, and sometimes tyranical belief.To inform someone that to steal from or murder another is a basic principle of all that makes society an environment to be safe in. If an individual chooses to stand at the alter on his head with a goldfish bowl on his feet  whilst reciting the psalms 'then thats clever, unconventional, but certainly is not going to cause a schism. It would not put members of the general population at risk or deny them a relationship with God, by virtue of personal prayer.

I remember the prayer book changing and i understood how some felt they had lost God in the transition because they could not relate to the way it was being communicated, so they were faced with losing the familiarity of the people and the comfort of the building or accepting a form of service which made it hard for them to tune in on the same wave length. (they should be like me on their own planet it would never be a problem lol) But seriously i hope you understand my point, that the covanent has not been suggested or drafted to minimise the faith but to maximise it for leaders and congegation as a whole body of Christ. Schisms may be inevitable in some quarters but not nessesarily bad. Most growth is found at such times, unless doors are closed because people die in transition.

Waterangel

We all have been aware for a long time of strong diverging centrifugal forces in both the Anglican Communion and the CofE.

What are the commonalities that could keep together the Anglican Communion, and the CofE? 

As soon as anybody attempts to answer that question, you've got a form of Covenant in the making.

Laissez faire, laissez passer is not an answer. It is just the renunciation of commonality.

And renunciation of identity is not a form of identity.

Outside the CofE the question feels more urgent. They do not have the (false?) sense of security that too many clergy in this country seem to derive in practice from being the Established Church --for how long?

Thank you, Mark. That is pertinent and very helpful. It would also be a help if those who are so keen to promote the covenant were a bit more frank. As I said in a separate thread, to suggest that all remain equal in any system where some but not others have an 'enhanced' position (as the ACO text does) is nonsensical. Otherwise I could have enhanced pay and my colleagues would nevertheless feel that they were being treated as complete equals. Enhanced means different.  And I think it  is simply disingenuous to claim that no attempt is made to intervene in the governance of another church while at the same time making it clear that any failure to fall into line will have 'relational consequences'. Maybe these won't be enough to keep GAFCON in the Communion, but it's hard to accept that siuch a prospect of 'consequences' isn't actively designed as a means to prevent some developments from happening at all! There are political nuances, as you say, but as some of my conservative friends here at fulcrum are keen to remind us, there is also plain sense.