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Patience and Urgency
Lambeth Conference 2008
Fulcrum Newsletter, August 2008
by Graham Kings
vicar of St Mary Islington and theological secretary of Fulcrum
 Dear Fulcrum friends,
Africa’s wisdom emerges especially in her proverbs. I love this Kiswahili saying which comes from the market place: haba na haba hujaza kibaba. It translates literally as ‘little by little fills the tin’. Its meaning concerns patience.
An ironic Kikuyu proverb, also from Kenya, runs: mubundi mwega no kinyothi. In its literal sense, it is intriguing: ‘the only good craftsman is the barber’. Its meaning is evoked by comparison with others. For example, the cobbler takes your shoes and repairs them in his own time. The barber, however, can’t take your head off, and so has to cut your hair there and then. Its meaning concerns urgency.
Patience and urgency came together in the substance and context of the Lambeth Conference. The Windsor Process and the Anglican Covenant, the GAFCON shadow conference in Jerusalem, and the three Presidential Addresses by the Archbishop of Canterbury, including the announcement of the Pastoral Forum, were all closely related.
European wisdom often emerges in aphorisms. One of my favourites is by Francis Bacon (1561-1626). In his essay ‘Of Studies’, he stated succinctly: ‘Reading maketh a full man; conference a ready man; and writing an exact man.’ Key features of Lambeth 2008 involved all three of these.
Reading together from the Gospel of John in bible study groups set the tone at the beginning of each day. Small, pondering, hermeneutic communities, gathered from around the world, were filled with the Word of God.
The indaba groups were based around ‘conversation’ (the meaning of ‘conference’ in Bacon’s day) and – despite some misgivings in anticipation - prompted prompt, memorable, and poignant stories from multicoloured contexts. ‘Conversation’ is different from ‘talk’ (some journalists had dismissed these groups as just ‘talk’) and involves deep listening. In the second week, these developed into discussions on the Anglican Covenant and the deliberations of the Windsor Continuation Group.
The exacting task of writing included the publication of principles of Canon Law, recommendations of the Windsor Continuation Group, comments on the Covenant, the Conference Reflections, and the three Presidential Addresses. Exactly what was needed was provided – even if the Reflections, running to 44 pages, were somewhat less exact…
‘Intensification’ was the key strategic word in the first Presidential Address. Rowan Williams stated: ‘That's why a Covenant should not be thought of as a means for excluding the difficult or rebellious but as an intensification - for those who so choose - of relations that already exist. And those who in conscience could not make those intensified commitments are not thereby shut off from all fellowship; it is just that they have chosen not to seek that kind of unity, for reasons that may be utterly serious and prayerful.’
This was a clear sign, very early on, that not all were likely to agree to the Covenant. Its content would not be just bland – there would be ‘teeth’ - and eventually a ‘two tier’ Communion would be likely to emerge, of those in the centre who will sign, and of those on the edge who will not. 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 – there is no force - while the centre of the Communion moves on. Not exclusion, but intensification and no group can veto this movement forward.
In developing my own thinking on this word, perhaps Jesus Christ could be seen as the 'intensification of the Word of God'? The crowd followed him, and the intensification of the call to discipleship meant that some remained in the crowd and did not become disciples. The ‘Sermon on the Mount’ was addressed to the disciples, not to the crowd (Matthew 5:1-2). Some within the wider group of disciples were later shocked by Jesus' words and remained where they were, but the relationships of The Twelve with Jesus, and with each other, intensified (John 6:59-69).
In his second Presidential Address, the Archbishop stated that he hoped that Lambeth 2008 would ‘speak from the centre’, which is not ‘the middle point between two extremes’, but ‘the heart of our identity as Anglicans’, which ultimately is that ‘deepest centre which is our awareness of living in, and as, the Body of Christ.’ He went on, riskily and imaginatively, to enter the world of the ‘innovator’ and the ‘traditionalist’ concerning sexuality and tried to describe them from the inside and their respective calls for generosity. Surprisingly, and perhaps deliberately, he left little room to develop the depth of the ‘centre’.
This was left for the Concluding Presidential Address, on the last Sunday. At the end of a conference without ‘resolutions’, it was magisterially resolute. The Archbishop not only held the Communion together but moved it deeper into Christ and forward in intensification. Intriguingly, he used the phrase ‘Anglican Church’ several times, and time will be needed to elucidate this hint.
Bishops from The Episcopal Church USA who wanted to press ahead with their ecclesial sexual inclusion project and ignore the Windsor Process and the Anglican Covenant, had been carefully ‘minded’ by their media advisers not to react in anger. They went away tight lipped. They were angry, but not in public. Their thoughts were expressed by Susan Russell, the President of Integrity USA, when she called this address an ‘11th-hour sucker punch’.
The Archbishop lucidly expressed the mind of the Lambeth Conference, drawing on the reflections from the indaba groups, and clearly articulated the central way forward, which is the continuation of the Windsor Process and the Covenant. On the two key subjects of sexual ethics and ecclesiology, he reiterated the vital importance of three moratoria: on the authorisation of same-sex blessings, on the consecration of bishops in same-sex unions and on cross provincial interventions.
These interventions by some conservative Primates from Africa and the Southern Cone of Latin America had been declared by them, from the beginning, to be ‘temporary’ until something officially was set up. Something official has now been announced and is being urgently set up - the Pastoral Forum, ‘strengthened by arrangements like the suggested Communion Partners initiative in the USA’. There is no real need for them, on their side, to be angry or tight lipped. In fact, there is encouragement in the Archbishop’s final words concerning inviting ‘those absent from Lambeth to be involved in these next stages’ and of looking for ‘the best ways of building bridges’ with GAFCON.
A crucial question will now be how they will react and there is a meeting of the GAFCON Primates’ Council in London ‘towards the end of August’. To the Pastoral Forum, will there be disbelief and rejection, or relief and rejoicing?
Some may ignore the potential of the Pastoral Forum and consolidate their interventions, continuing to argue for a ‘non-Canterbury centred Communion’. This would be very sad, and in reality would first be a ‘vacuum-centred Federation’ which then would lead to power struggles to fill the vacuum, and finally end in fissiparousness. It would be walking away from success.
Others, including perhaps those who were present at the Lambeth Conference, may see the advantages of a Communion authorised central Pastoral Forum, over a myriad of unofficial, competing intervening jurisdictions. Much depends on the character of the Chair of the Forum, who is likely to be a Primate of significant distinction. If it is someone who is conservative on sexual issues and is keen to hold the Communion together – a ‘Communion Conservative’ in the terms of my previously suggested ‘quadrant’ – then there is intense hope for proverbial patience and urgency.
Yours in Christ,
Graham
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Canon Dr Graham Kings is vicar of St Mary Islington and theological secretary of Fulcrum
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Posted by: Clare
Saturday 6 September 2008 - 11:43am
Immediately after posting this, I went to read tomorrow's gospel (Matthew 18:15-20). It is dealing with what to do with a fellow believer who sins against you. first we chat to them privately, then with a couple of other folk, then bring the matter to the church at large. if none of that works, what we are to do then is to treat the offender like a pagan or a tax collector. and how did Jesus treat pagans and tax collectors? invited them to dinner, healed their loved ones and praised their faith. Words we should all try to live by, whichever segment of the quadrant we inhabit! (Jesus does ask a lot of us, doesn't he!).
I shall be dispatching an invitation to Akinola forthwith, praying for the health of his family and acknowledging his faihtfulness forthwith. And perhaps receiving similar invitations in return.
Posted by: Clare
Saturday 6 September 2008 - 10:00am
I feel so torn when I read John Chane's article. I suppose that is because I would be a 'communion liberal' in GK's model. Lesbian and gay people are being scaegoated so that the rest of us can feel a sense of togetherness. But, then again, we have a responsibility as a family to listen to one another, to allow others time to understand why we are passionate about what we believe - and vice versa, and an epistemological humility that understands that we might just be wrong and need always to be open to that possibility.
The language of 'scapegoat' is increasingly gaining theological currency. I think we all need to pause and reflect a bit before we accuse other people of scapegoating. The Christian understanding (via Girard) is that Jesus is the defnitive scapegoat and the defining mark of being a Christian is our penitent admission that we are the ones who scapegoat. In this consists our unity- we are a band of violent, hypocritcal, scapegoating self deceivers who are, through the grace of Christ, being led somewhere else. Instead of defining ourselves over and against' those wicked scapegoaters' we define ourselves as identical with them in what really matters - our sinfulness.
At the moment we have the scenario that us liberals accuse the conservatives of scapegoating lesbians and gays, while at the same time scapegoating Rowan Williams and forward in faith types. Liberals and the TEC in particular are scapgoated in turn by nearly everyone else, while nearly everyone else scapegoats Gafcon. Maybe we could redraw GK's quadrant and draw lines to indicate who is scapegoating who! This is a pile of self righteous nonsense! What seemed to be gift of Lambeth is that this stopped for a short while as people encountered one another as people.
Eschewing justification by the faith of Christ, we seek to justify ourselves either as righteous through our doctrinal purity or as justified through are experience of being victimised. We think ourselves holy either because we have the 'right' beliefs or because we have suffered at the hands of others in some way.
We do however, need to think about people who are suffering as a result of all this. Lesbain and gay people suffer. The poor of the word suffer as we waste our energy blaming each other. This does not make them holy or better than anyone else but it does make them in need of our urgent assistance. But we need to find ways of witnessing to this and doing something about it without recourse to denouncing one another. (answers on a post card...)
Posted by: Graham Kings
Saturday 6 September 2008 - 08:43am
John Chane, the Bishop of Washington, has published an article, 'Lambeth and the Life of the Communion', in the September edition of Washington Window, which was also published on the Diocese of Washington site this week.
Riazat Butt yesterday reported his article in 'Archbishop accused of marginalising homosexuals', The Guardian, 5 September 2008.
In my 'Patience and Urgency: Lambeth Conference 2008', I mentioned:
Bishops from The Episcopal Church USA who wanted to press ahead with their ecclesial sexual inclusion project and ignore the Windsor Process and the Anglican Covenant, had been carefully ‘minded’ by their media advisers not to react in anger. They went away tight lipped. They were angry, but not in public.
In the 'quadrant' diagram in my 'Reading and Reshaping the Anglican Communion', I included John Chane in the Federal Liberal section. His article confirms this suggestion. It is worth reading as an indication of his views of the outcomes of the Lambeth Conference.
Posted by: Deleted user 1222
Thursday 28 August 2008 - 03:21am
I don't dissent from Pete Broadbent in that things are more complicated: they usually are, but it depends how they line up. I agree the Last Rites book was polemical, but its swep had a core truth in it about moving from relative stability to instability, that the paradox was inclusion by its exclusion led to instability.
John Robinson had quite a critical view of theology, of course he later was seen as more orthodox because of early dating of the NT. But he was going for some pretty central metaphors, and his changes did affect, for example, how to understand prayer. Jenkins, however, was Barth and Bonhoeffer influenced, and arguably more sound on God. The difference was Jenkins was more focussed on details not the big scheme, and people were worked up on details that had been ordinarily accepted in the theology world for decades and decades.
GAFCON made statements about the Bible not contradicting itself which were ridiculous, and there has been the rise of the hard selective literalist, a tiny minority in Western Anglicanism that has managed to make itself more noticed than it deserves.
Liberalism grew in the Anglicans from long roots, but in modern times rose along with the rise of Anglo-Catholicism: the Broad Church always had a radical wing. Nowadays it has become more identifiably "liberal" because the other branches are more identifiable, though the traditionalist Catholics are falling off the edge.
No I don't want it to be simple, but sometimes in a short piece you have to be able to summarise what is going on. Another swift statement is to say that the more you put up the defences, the bigger the gap there is between Church and society, and the more the Church becomes a sect. I don't know how important that it is. Another sweeping point is that a lot of parish life goes on regardless, though this is in a situation of measured decline.
Posted by: Pete Broadbent
Thursday 28 August 2008 - 12:00am
Sorry - note to self - use spell-checker. For faut, read "faux". [ed. now corrected]
Posted by: Pete Broadbent
Wednesday 27 August 2008 - 10:38pm
I'm not sure Pluralist should remain unchallenged about this latest piece of faux-sociology. Hampson's account is hardly objective - more a piece of bitter polemic than a clear analysis. The ins and outs of catholic and evangelical in-fighting, though sad, are much more subtle than Pluralist would allow. The problem for splits in the Church of England is that there are a number of different fault-lines, with alliances being formed over different issues - ConEvos and TradCaths against the ordination of women; a large swathe of diverse catholics, evangelicals, and MoRs affirming the received understanding of the creeds and formularies; a similarly diverse (but not coterminous) group affirming traditional understandings on sexual ethics.
The doctrinal disputes over Robinson were never the same as those over Jenkins. Nor has evangelicalism in the CofE been literalist since well before the 2WW. Robinson was attempting to restate a fairly traditional faith in a different conceptual framework; Jenkins, on his own admission, was being a cuckoo in the nest.
Similarly, the vast majority of the CofE has held to a traditional view of lifelong marriage between two people of the opposite sex until influenced by the gay rights movement of the last 30 years.
On the question of the ordination of women, the debate among evangelicals has been primarily about scripture, not about human rights.
The common agent of division is of course liberalism, which is by definition parasitic on the body politic. If you wanted to devise a Graham Kings type paradigm of where the CofE is splitting, you could quite easily draw it with liberalism as an invasive tide, lapping simultaneously on a number of different beaches, where different opponents would either, in Pluralist's terms, be engaged in Canute-like activity, or in my terms, be building flood defences and diverting the waters off back whence they came! I'm sure Pluralist would like it to be as simple as he portrays it, but such a view would be as naive as saying that because some bishops all talked to each other, we can solve everything by "intensification" (whatever that means), or that because some other bishops met together and agreed credally in Jerusalem, they've solved the problems. None of this stuff is susceptible of simplistic analysis...
Posted by: Deleted user 1222
Wednesday 27 August 2008 - 03:42am
There is this view that a few decades back all Anglicans thought more or less one way (with tendencies for worshipping) and it has all unravelled. It isn't so. When John Robinson wrote Honest to God he received thousands of letters that showed a wide variety of belief, that much later Robert Towler classified into types that were at some variance from official belief. When twenty years on David Jenkins said considerably less the storm seemed all the greater. Now we have influence seen as never before by selective literalists even over an Archbishop and that Advent Letter of 2007. The arena seems to be narrowing all the time.
Michael Hampson in Last Rites shows that this strife we have now has arisen because the demise of the traditionalist Anglo-Catholic has led to something like a straight fight between conservative evangelical and liberal. What sociologists (after George Simmel) call a triad, which is stable, has become a dyad, which is unstable. The actual situation, however, is that the conservative evangelicals pick on other evangelicals as a means of clearing the way to taking on the liberals.
But as the ordination process goes on, the tendency towards the liberal group will recover; the support for women's headship is broader than the liberals of course but the upshot could be that the division comes to the open evangelicals as a result of this divisive and unstable dyad.
What the shrinkage will do is have a smaller triad, possibly, particularly if the Conservative Evangelicals have gone and do their own farming.
Posted by: + Andrew
Sunday 24 August 2008 - 07:53am
Though I broadly agree with Pluralist, I must gently protest about the phrase 'extreme traditionalism' being used to describe those who believe what the whole Anglican Church officially believed until a generation ago and the two largest communions in the world continue to believe in. He is, however, substantially right: either there is the paradox of the narrowing of the boundaries by the full inclusion of women in holy order or there is the full breadth of inclusion whereby all who ever have been included continue to be included, however contradictory their views (which has been the predicament of Anglicans since the sixteenth century).
There is a kind of paralysis in this position: one wonders, for instance, how far the World Council of Churches will manage to get with its new procedure for consensus decision making. But, as I have said, there has been a major decision for open evangelicals: how 'open' is 'open'? I think we have passed the mark in the sand on, for example, divorce and re-marriage and now on the ordination of women bishops. The next one is the gay thing and, I guess, thereafter, gender language about God and the uniqueness of the Christian revelation.
+ Andrew
Posted by: Deleted user 1222
Saturday 23 August 2008 - 03:36pm
Every so often an impasse is reached, a zero-sum that you have to face. I canot see how any open evangelical can end up excluding women from being bishops, except on a delay basis. That's for them. However, if an existing group says the principle of women as bishops is an impossibility and that therefore they will leave, then you either pass this point or you don't. In the end they exclude themselves, if some don't leave no one will require them to go. What they want, of course, is a new, separated off associate Church, but after GAFCON (but anyway) that would seem to be an invitation to a formal division.
Let's be clear: the expansion of the full ministry to include women is a narrowing too - the boundaries are coming in. The effect is the placing outside of an extreme traditionalism, or the completion of the division that happened in 1993. Women's ministry tends to be more moderate and even liberal. This is the direction of travel, and has implications for all the other issues under discussion, including gay inclusion and the nature of any Covenant that the Church of England might want to consider (if the law allows).
Posted by: + Andrew
Saturday 23 August 2008 - 08:18am
This should perhaps be on the Cardinal Kasper and Anglican Orders thread - and I mention Ken Petrie and John Martin's postings on that - but I think it is, overall, a 'Patience and Urgency' matter. The patience and urgency of deciding what the Anglican Communion is, how it should govern itself, and what are the limits to theological diversity, is upon us and this, I believe, is a godly time to sort them out. ++Rowan's guiding principle - I hazard a guess - is something like John 6:39: 'lose nothing - nobody - of all that' the Father has given the Son. I have heard him speak movingly about the little people of TEC, saying their prayers and singing their hymns, and, of course, about Christians in straitened circumstances, politically and economically, in Africa. But we do have to look at what kind of a Church - or churches - Anglicanism is or constitutes. There is the beguiling vision of 'Reformed Catholicism' - the Rome of Augustinian theology, high art and disciplined liturgy, rather than the barely-baptised paganism of much peasant spirituality. But, as Newman saw, this will not quite fit the Erastianism of the Established Church (nor, as he would have foreseen, the various evolutions of Anglicanism emerging from the competitive ecclesiologies of the nineteenth century mission field).
Ken Petrie writes (on the Kasper thread), with regard to Rome's 'role as discerning what are changes in contemporary understanding requiring the reformulation of doctrine and what are attempts to change the underlying "deposit of Faith"' the 'we must keep talking until Rome concludes we mean the same as them, even if it looks different'. He also says that 'in the meantime they will keep reiterating their current position because that is the current standard by which everything else is judged. For the rest of us this is sheer frustration.' Isn't this the same both ways round? In other words, aren't Fulcrum Evangelicals simply repeating what they believe to be the "deposit of Faith" revealed in Scripture and waiting for Rome to realise that this is the Faith?
As for John Martin and Cardinal Kasper's scratched record, all Christian denominations have their scratched records. Baptists insist on believer's baptism, Methodists take us back to the Priesthood of All Believers, Orthodox to the Church of the Seven Councils - and so on. The issue in question - women in holy orders - is, for the Roman ordinary magisterium, an issue similar to the elements of Sacraments, the books of the Bible and the articles of the Creeds. However logical changes might look - using rice instead of grain, beer instead of wine, rearranging and editing the canon of Scripture, amending the Creeds - it simply cannot be done.
The important question, raised by Ken Petrie, is 'what (then) about the ministry of women'? For me, the issue is, urgently, 'how can an ecumenically creative way be devised of mobilising the ministry of women'? Support for the revival of the diaconate for women - embraced in theory by all the Orthodox in Cyprus in 1979 - has not been matched by Rome, which maintained a studied silence until, in Papa Ratzinger's final years at the CDF, they ruled that the sacrament of Order is indivisible, and that the diaconate - qua holy order - is not therefore open to women. We might conclude that the initial enthusiasm of the Orthodox - no great innovators, they - and the studied silence of Rome were - signs of great attentiveness to the Anglican experiment with women's diaconal (deaconess) ministry. Could this be done without accelerating demands for women to be admitted to holy order?
The de facto ministry of women in the Roman Catholic Church - as catechists, eucharistic ministers, lay pastors and lectors - has been an encouragement but there are issues of power and resourcing. Is the ministry of women inevitably non-stipendiary? Here the Church of England has a fairly unimpressive record itself: there was an explosion of non-stipendiary ministry, and a hasty rearrangement of categories of selection, when women were ordained. There have been examples of women unable to gain stipends because of their husband's income - would that happen in reverse? - and women obliged to take non-stipendiary cures as substantial as the stipendiary cures of male neighbours.
I'm not suggesting - I don't know - any way back or forward on all this. It's no use Anglo-Catholics continually saying 'we warned you that this would be the result'. I raise the dilemmas. Rome does evolve: Dei Verbum is some considerable advance on the position at the time of the Modernist crisis, and I imagine most open evangelicals find the hermeneutic approach of Dei Verbum congenial. Similarly there will be rejoicing at the advances in mutual understanding with regrard to Justification. But they aren't going to modify bread, wine, water, oil, the gender of ministers, the books of the Bible orthe doctrines of the Creeds. Talk of the next pope but one has always been absurd...
So my guess is that it's 'Goodbye ARCIC' and a recognition all round - not just by Open Evangelicals - that the Anglican Communion is, after all, a Church of the Protestant Reformation. The old romantic (!) Anglo-Catholic ecclesiology, like the Romantic Movement has finally died. We're left with what Michael Vasey used to call 'the Laudian Takeover' of Anglican liturgy and - perhaps - as Alister McGrath has said presciently with a new Roundhead ascendancy just ahead of us. Open Evangelicals are walking blindfolded into women bishops: it is fairly clear to this friendly observer that the unifying feature of Evangelicalism - classical, conservative and open - might have been a male episcopate and men and women presbyters and deacons, with male rectors for those who insist. Had you gone for that, and insisted that the liberals didn't exclude us from their vision of 'Inclusive Church' you would have had many of us Anglo-Catholics around longer. But that would have hindered the recognition that we are, after all, a Church of the Reformation. That said, what are, I repeat, the limits of theological diversity in Anglicanism post- Lambeth 2008?
Prayers and greetings.
+ Andrew
Posted by: Celinda
Friday 22 August 2008 - 07:15pm
Update on the discussion on StandFirm: Fr. Matt Kennedy's response to my comment about "raw power" was further discussed. We were really talking at cross purposes. I was talking about forcing a mixed-opinion parish in a small town with an orthodox rector in a realigning diocese to take a vote on whether to stay in TEC or realign, when such a vote would destroy the parish (there not being enough people in any of the 3 camps to keep the parish as a viable entity). I was not talking about confronting false teaching. The discussion on StandFirm went on for a number of posts, and I think perhaps we now understand each other better.
Posted by: Deleted user 1143
Friday 22 August 2008 - 09:17am
Matt Kennedy's reply makes perfect sense within a tradition that believes the Sacrifice of the Mass was a bad idea.
If we take RW's statement below,
"I concluded that an active sexual relationship between two people of the same sex might therefore reflect the love of God in a way comparable to marriage, if and only if it had the about it the same character of absolute covenanted faithfulness…"
we wouldn't do any injustice to Erasmus if claimed that he said something like:
"I concluded that the Sacrifice of the Mass might therefore reflect union with Christ in a way comparable to the Lord's Supper as instituted by Jesus, if an only if it were supported by centuries of Church tradition"
(Erasmus wrote to Bucer: 'I never approved of the abolition of the Mass', 11 Nov 1527).
There are times when error comes to 'the citadel' (Calvin) and it's time to come 'outside the camp' because that's where Jesus is (Heb 13:13).
I'm have yet to hear from the 'communion centre' why the present situation is so very different from the one in the 16th century.
Best,
Steve
Posted by: nersenpaul
Friday 22 August 2008 - 07:35am
Sergei - the problem is not the "middle" but the extreme left which tore the fabric of the Communion in 2003 but still insists on being in the Communion (since without it, all that is left is a very small and declining US denomination)
Matt Kennedy's responses are excellent and biblical, showing that accomodating false teachers is not Christian. If we read Galatians 2, we see that St Paul confronted St Peter when he was in error. He put truth ahead of institutional unity. He did not say, "Let's have 2 integrities" and wait for years without saying what is right and wrong. Throughout the whole bible, there has been only one right response to false teaching and it is not accomodation of it...... remember, the issue is the authority of scripture and what it says on who is fit to be a leader / teacher / pastor in the church. There is absolutely zero support in the bible or the early church for having leaders who do not hold to sound doctrine because they will end up leading others astray....they destroy communion. We were not told that if we find wolves dressed as sheep, we should respect their integrity, let them be leaders in the church and talk endlessly without ever rejecting their false teaching, while they push their agenda in the church. Not confronting and rejecting false teaching is not the Christian way....it is not what the Lord or his apostles did or taught, they always stood for truth and were disliked by many religious leaders for doing so.... religious institutionalists never like those who rock the boat..... those who cry "peace, peace" while clinging to shreds of comfort in the AC "slow train wreck", show more concern for institutional unity than the truth....this is not what Jesus Christ did and he definitely did not regard all division as wrong -
"Do you think that I came to bring peace on earth? Not at all, I tell you, but rather division!"
Luke 12:51
Posted by: Graham Kings
Thursday 21 August 2008 - 11:26pm
Various people, on various blogs, have been asking for evidence that liberal Anglicans, who support same-sex blessings and the consecration of openly gay bishops, are depressed about the outcome of the Lambeth Conference.
Jean Mayland, who helped administer the Modern Churchpersons Union (MCU) stall in the Lambeth Conference market place, has written an article on the MCU site, 'Holding Together But Going Nowhere', 18 August 2008. [Hat tip to Adrian Worsfold, aka Pluralist] The following is an extract:
Now we can read the results of Lambeth – in my case with great depression. We are told the Communion held together (for the moment at least) but it is not going anywhere. There are no plans or processes to facilitate moving forward together but in different ways according to our culture and mission. There is the threat of a covenant, which is a thoroughly un-Anglican concept, and a promise of a moratorium on gay blessings and consecrations but no mention of a time limit. We are threatened with a Communion based on fundamentalist interpretations of scripture to please the Africans and a hierarchical system of control to please the Roman Catholics. We want neither for neither are Anglican. It seems to me that a vital role for the MCU is to continue to keep an eye on the Covenant process and maintain steady flow of good theologically based critical comment.
Adrian Worsfold has posted reflections on his Pluralist site, 'Reacting and Pragmatism', concerning comments on this Fulcrum thread.
Posted by: Graham Kings
Thursday 21 August 2008 - 11:06pm
Thanks, Mark. Good point. Celinda has now posted this comment on Stand Firm:
Matt--I don’t think we have to play TEC’s game in order to witness to the truth. That is, we don’t have to use “raw power” just because some in TEC leadership may have done so. “Raw power” as used by some conservative leadership, in my opinion, is forcing congregations to take a vote which may destroy them as individual parishes--forcing people in parishes to take sides against each other on whether to leave TEC or stay, on the grounds that since conservatives at present aren’t adequately successful on the national level in their witness to the truth within TEC, they never will be. (The more conservatives leave,of course, the more difficult that will be). “Raw power” is also trying to fore the ABC to take a stance I don’t think is within his power to do. I understand one interpretation of the Windsor Report is that he can take such a stance, but in my opinion, the report did not (and did not have to power to) equip him to do it. He can ask for moratoria, but he can’t force it.
Matt Kennedy has replied on Stand Firm with this comment:
Celindascott,
“I don’t think we have to play TEC’s game in order to witness to the truth. That is, we don’t have to use “raw power” just because some in TEC leadership may have done so.”
Since when is the use of ecclesial authority for the purpose of guarding the deposit of faith and/or discipline of the church (Matt 18; 1 Cor 5; Gal 1; 2nd John 9-11) an exercise of “raw power”? Do you recognize no difference between the exercise of ecclesial authority in guarding the church against false teaching and the use of raw political power? If you do not then you disagree not with me but with most of Christendom not to mention the apostles themselves. Church is serious business. It is not some college coffee house debating society. Souls are at stake. The ABC did not need to resort to raw power, he merely has to exercise the authority of the office he possesses by disinviting those who refuse to adhere to communion teaching.
As for this:
““Raw power” as used by some conservative leadership, in my opinion, is forcing congregations to take a vote which may destroy them as individual parishes--forcing people in parishes to take sides against each other on whether to leave TEC or stay...”
well, that is somewhat of an amusing take. Imagine that a husband brings home a mistress and moves her into the master bedroom. He tells his wife that he cannot understand why the three of them can’t simply share the same bed together and when the wife refuses, he scratches his head and says that he cannot understand why she is being so divisive, breaking up the family and all. When the wife decides that this is probably not a good environment for her and the children and leaves, a third party comes along and accuses her of “forcing the children to choose” between the mistress and her.
Of course the analogy breaks down here because no parishioner is being forced to leave anything or anyone. Those who choose to stay with the mistress may do so, but it is certainly the responsibility of rectors and bishops to protect the souls under their care and that often must mean separating from false teachers.
This also is an interesting take:
“on the grounds that since conservatives at present aren’t adequately successful on the national level in their witness to the truth within TEC, they never will be.”
Speaking personally here, I never expected to be “successful” in persuading TEC to change course. The orthodox in TEC are a tiny minority. So the “failure” to do what I never thought possible in the first place had nothing to do with our decision to leave. More important were the souls in my charge. I do not think I am unique in these considerations.
And finally there is this:
““Raw power” is also trying to fore the ABC to take a stance I don’t think is within his power to do. I understand one interpretation of the Windsor Report is that he can take such a stance, but in my opinion, the report did not (and did not have to power to) equip him to do it. He can ask for moratoria, but he can’t force it.”
The idea that the ABC does not have the authority to discipline is utterly unfounded. He is the only one with that authority and it rests in his power of invitation. The ABC could end this crisis tomorrow by simply disinviting the PB to the next primates meeting. He could have ended it last year by disinviting the consecrators of +VGR and those who have permitted ssbs in their dioceses. The ABC has a good deal of authority and power and could very easily end the drama. He simply chooses not too.
What do people make of this exchange? At least it is on the same web site...
Posted by: Mark Bennet
Thursday 21 August 2008 - 08:55pm
The stark juxtaposition of truth and raw power has various possible sources - but it would be interesting to see a Biblical justification for "in a church without discipline grounded in truth, raw power rules."
Amongst other things, we seem to pray for the reign of Christ rather often, and for raw power not at all.
It is comments like this which indicate that a particular discourse has detached itself from its biblical foundations, and located itself in some other place.
Posted by: Graham Kings
Thursday 21 August 2008 - 06:36pm
Matt Kennedy, of Stand Firm, has commented here on Celinda's post on this Fulcrum thread. Amongst other things he says:
No Celinda. In a church without discipline grounded in truth, raw power rules.
Marcus, whose comment on Stand Firm I quoted earlier this morning on this Fulcrum thread, has posted another comment on the TitusOneNine thread this time. It is very perceptive indeed:
Perhaps one thing which needs to be teased out a little is the idea that because the Lambeth Fathers didn’t take a vote and there were no set piece debates, the Conference therefore did not decide or determine anything.
There are a number of issues which I think need development.
1) The problems with previous Lambeth Conferences were manifold, but the biggest two seem to have been (a) that people retreated into self-selecting ideological groups and only really interacted in set piece debates when (b) there was a tendency towards thoroughly unchristian behaviour (such as booing and hissing).
What this meant was that people were able to walk away from Lambeth and completely ignore any votes taken or “decisions” made.
Anyway, enough decisions had been made in previous conferences which were then completely ignored for those who disagreed (in whole or in part) with a motion, to continue the habit of disregarding what they don’t like.
2) Decisions are not always made by vote. They might be easier to disseminate to the outside should a vote be taken, but that isn’t the same thing. The way ahead (covenant etc) was mapped out very clearly with everyone accepting that there was a significant majority in favour of going in that direction. The absence of a vote or a resolution doesn’t alter this fact, which is recorded in the reflections document.
3) The Lambeth Fathers didn’t claim to themselves any powers which they didn’t have. They didn’t “pass” the covenant because it isn’t in their remit. What they did do was discuss the current draft, suggest ways of making it more palatable and demonstrate in indaba group after indaba group that the vast majority of the bishops of the Communion wanted to take the process further.
4) The conference removed an awful lot of dissembling from the table, particularly on the liberal side. They simply couldn’t go away and claim that those with theological differences were mindless bigots. Similarly they couldn’t go away claiming that the majority of the rest of the Communion wouldn’t sign up to the Covenant. There was, it seems, significant learning on the other side too - especially about the value of homosexuals as individuals and Christians.
5) In conclusion, while the absence of a vote makes it more difficult for the laity to know exactly where everything stands, what the Lambeth Conference did was decide significantly to move forward with the Covenant process with or without the Americans. It is now up to the various bodies which can actually make decisions on these matters to do so.
These are my thoughts, although they probably need somebody wiser to disentangle them!
Posted by: Sergei
Thursday 21 August 2008 - 04:23pm
Nersen, I too dislike the labels but do wonder if some inherent differences that are indeed smaller now would become larger in a 'pure' church. But I still wonder what happens to those of us who sit in the middle if the two churches scenario you paint comes to fruition. But then perhaps as Nye Bevan once said about the Liberal Party - if you sit in the middle of the road you get run over!
Posted by: Celinda
Thursday 21 August 2008 - 03:25pm
Thanks to Graham for posting Marcus' comment from StandFirm. Sadly, Matt Kennedy's reply to Marcus has the "only force works" attitude, and some sarcasm directed toward the ABC. According to Matt, the "liberals" really won because the ABC only asked for moratoria and didn't take stronger action; "revisionists" will soon realize that, and push for further inroads on orthodoxy. Patient study and scholarship and their careful expression, worship, prayer, and real communication, in Matt's world, don't work: only force.
Posted by: Deleted user 1222
Thursday 21 August 2008 - 02:26pm
Oh I don't think there is any doubt about that: that there are liberal leaning bishops and others who would line up with Greater Anglicanism and those liberals who would be focussed on the issues at hand for their own important purpose. The majority go with structures and always do. After all, in a sense, that is what Rowan Williams has done, if he can be called liberal at all. He has ditched the importance of his own theological findings on the one had in order to promote a Greater Anglicanism and, on top of that, promoted his own theological findings of Catholicism - because he can. That doesn't mean Greater Anglicanism will succeed, it just means promoted institutional people make up the majority of institutions.
I've also suggested recently that once the Church of England ordains women bishops that it will become more narrowly defined, and that shrinkage in its boundaries will be noticed in that the traditionalist Catholics will have gone or be bust, the evangelicals will have split over GAFCON and all that (and further frustrations as the Covenant gets into the mud) and leaving a narrower Church in which the more radical liberals will be required to toe the line by their own side, that side currently united because it is under consistent attack. The liberals though won't stretch out until the evangelicals split.
Posted by: nersenpaul
Thursday 21 August 2008 - 01:13pm
Sergei - I think you overestimate the differences between "open" evangelicals and "conservatives" etc. I guess it is all a matter of definition but "open" evangelical does not really mean "communion liberal" if you are defining the term that way......"open" evangelicals are still evangelical, by definition, and are not very different to "conservatives" on the big issues facing the AC in the last 5 years. It seems to me that the differences between the groups are often more personal or to do with personalities.....but both are firmly evangelical.
One of the wonderful and interesting things about GAFCON is that it was a broad group.....it was not just Reform, Sydney and Nigerians by any stretch of the imagination. There is very much more in common between "open" and "conservative" evangelicals than there is between all of us and so called "liberals".
Put it this way, if Tom Wright were ABC in the last 5 years and had dealt with TEC as suggested by The Windsor Report, I am sure GAFCON would never have happened and all those at GAFCON would have been at Lambeth and happy to be in the AC under the leadership of somebody who is not aligned with "conservative" evangelicals. It is important to realise that many of the leaders of "open" evangelicals are perfectly acceptable to "conservatives" and are respected by them as people and theologians.
Even though one has to use them, I don't believe the labels "open" and "conservative" are helpful, except to those who wish to divide evangelcals. And, there are people who wish to divide evangelicals. The labels amplify small differences when there is much more agreement in reality.
The wonderful reality of GAFCON was that there is great unity and trust between many who are from various "traditions" eg evangelical, Anglocatholic and charismatic. I think the core positions of the Fulcrum leadership on the presenting issues in the AC would have been perfectly at home in the GAFCON set up - this is what really matters, not disagreements on approach in how to deal with revisionists in positions of leadership in the AC. We are not divided on the core issues.
If the Fulcrum leadership and the ACI are "open" evangelicals, then "open" and "conservative" evangelicals share the same high view of scripture and want the same things for the AC......we are very closely related in reality.
Posted by: Graham Kings
Thursday 21 August 2008 - 12:06pm
‘Marcus’, on the Stand Firm thread on ‘Patience and Urgency’, has posted a perceptive comment, which echoes the ‘Communion Liberal’ and ‘Federal Liberal’ designation I outlined here and the ‘Institutional Revisionists’ and ‘Ideological Revisionists’ designation Sarah Hey outlined here:
The really interesting battle, of which we are only beginning to see the first whiff of shot, is going to be between those who consider themselves liberal (/inclusive/prophetic) first and Anglican second and those whose Anglican identity takes priority.
What changed at Lambeth is this - it’s not that there was a vote which the liberals lost. That they could always have ignored: they did in the past and they would have done again.
It’s that liberal bishops (mainly) from the American churches came face to face, honestly and with Christian charity with bishops from across the world and realised that they are not mindless homophobic bigots; that TEC’s actions really did cause hurt and harm to Anglicans across the globe; and that there is a significant majority within the communion who disagree with them and are prepared to bind themselves within a covenant with or without the American Church in order to make sure this doesn’t happen again.
By forcing the Americans to come face to face with what they’ve done, Rowan Williams has left them no room to hide.
One prediction about the oncoming liberal civil war: A lot of previously liberal bishops will line up on the Communion/Canterbury/covenant side; the other side will be made up of powerful lay figures who (self evidently) did not have the Lambeth Experience.
Posted by: Sergei
Thursday 21 August 2008 - 11:52am
Re. Nersen's comment that 'I would like to see a situation in which liberal English parishes were free to join "TEC Global" and non-revisionist TEC(USA) parishes were free to join the Anglican Communion', where does that leave those of us in the middle who would feel uncomfortable with either church - and who has the right to the 'Anglican' name.
A two communion scenario would shift the 'liberal' church in an ever more liberal direction, whilst the 'conservative' church would have a more conservative centre of gravity than some 'open evangelicals' would be comfortable with. It could elect Bishops Nazir-Ali or Akinola or Orombi or Jensen as its head, but then would probably become much more internally authoritarian in nature - witness the Nigerian refusal to permit bishops to make up their own minds about responding to the ABC's invitation to Lambeth. Surely we are still better off trying to keep the ship afloat, even though the TEC will almost inevitably not be able to hold to the moratium indefinitely.The alternative is two churchs that rapidly become three or four as splits within emerge, some go to Rome, some reject charismatic phenomenon, some find other non-negotiable issues etc.....
Posted by: Graham Kings
Thursday 21 August 2008 - 11:37am
As well as the comments on 'Patience and Urgency' on the TitusOneNine thread here, which I mentioned yesterday, Kendall Harmon has now created a new TitusOneNine thread here. I've posted the following comment and in part it answers some of the concerns Carl asked yesterday on this Fulcrum thread:
The question raised [on the earlier thread] was: are we in the same position post-Lambeth as we were pre-Lambeth? I believe that we are in a different position.
The Archbishop of Canterbury now has the authority of the Lambeth Conference 2008 to proceed with the urgent call for the 3 morotoria. These morotoria now have all four of the Instruments of Unity behind them, not three, which is new.
He has the authority of the Lambeth Conference to proceed with the Anglican Covenant. This is new.
His Presidential Addresses were not merely ‘unilateral’, as someone commented on the earlier thread. He was not speaking as Rowan Williams but as Archbishop of Canterbury, President of the Lambeth Conference and with the weight of the bishops’ comments from the indaba groups behind him.
Let no one doubt his resolution to proceed in the direction he delineated in his Concluding Presidential Address, which really is worth reading again. The weight of the groups behind moving ahead on this trajectory was enormous.
The question was asked about whether TEC would co-operate with the Pastoral Forum. Again, we are in a new position post-Lambeth. As well as the Primates’ Meeting at Dar es Salaam - where something similar was mentioned - there is now the added authority of the Lambeth Conference in the setting up of the Pastoral Forum. I think it would be likely that private discussions took place at the Lambeth Conference with various bishops of the TEC before such an announcement was made.
Yes, we are in a grave situation as the GAFCON Primates’ Council meets in London now and the Pittsburgh decisions loom. This calls for ‘gravitas’, and that is what was provided by the weight of the Lambeth Conference. Let us continue to pray and pray for God’s wisdom in these decisions.
Thinking Anglicans has linked into both Ephraim Radner's 'True Christian Unity' and my 'Patience and Urgency' here. It is worth following comments there too.
Posted by: nersenpaul
Thursday 21 August 2008 - 07:53am
Yes Adrian - as I suggested, we have unreconcileable views on the authority of scripture, but I suspect you have a caricature of what evangelicals think about the subject. We do think! Some of us think a lot. Here is something from Dr Packer: http://www.biblicalstudies.org.uk/article_herm_packer.html
Hello Birinus. You say, "The problem, Nersen, is that the 'Mind of the Communion' isn't the tolerant, muddled, middle-of-the-road, compromise that we know and love, but an intolerant, conservative, doctrinally-orthodox anglicanism..."
Not sure why you think Anglicanism should be muddled or compromising....I know some of it has been for a long time, and perhaps Henry VIII wanted that approach on particular issues at particular times, but just because a fraction of Anglicanism has been "liberal", it does not follow that is how it should be nor that all of Anglicanism should accept the compromise.
As for what the ABC is doing, I think you see a man dealing with realities in the knowledge that his private views have persuaded few and the last 5 years of not making hard decisions is creating more division rather than papering over the cracks.......and the reality which is behind his clarity at the end of the Lambeth conference (despite the fact that tiny TEC has a quarter of the bishops present at Lambeth!) is that the Lambeth Conference really was weakened and needed the missing GAFCON bishops (including the 3 English bishops who were not present), but GAFCON clearly really did not need or miss the small liberal wing of the AC which gathered at Lambeth. So, the ABC faces a choice: lead the AC to be a small (maybe 10m?), western, liberal denomination, or to try and keep in the AC all those who were at GAFCON (who represent about 30-40m Anglicans in the world). He has clearly chosen to try and keep the AC as a global communion and many times used the word "church" to describe it ........ this marks the end of the muddled, compromised, middle-of-the road club which you may prefer.
The good news is that you are not alone, if you are a "liberal", and it looks increasingly like there will be two "Anglican communions", with a liberal one led by TEC(USA) and having more than one Gene Robinson, as they will be free of AC moratoria. This won't be good for Gene's book sales but might be good for the AC. I think +Winchester and others who talk of an amicable split are wise. We would all be happier in honest, genuine alignments. So, I would like to see a situation in which liberal English parishes were free to join "TEC Global" and non-revisionist TEC(USA) parishes were free to join the Anglican Communion. No law suits about property and money. No more fighting about theology. No more "don't ask, don't tell" hypocrisy. All will be aligned with like-minded people locally and around the world and can go forward without all the backbiting of recent years. Pls be clear, I am not so keen to exclude you or Adrian but for there to be sustainable, honest relationships and a healthy communion....or even, a church. We could achieve this by being honest that we are never going to reconcile the views of Gene Robinson and Michael Nazir Ali, are we? If I have picked extremes, then we are never going to reconcile the views of K.J.Schori and Tom Wright, are we? Much better if we admit there are 2 clear groups (maybe 3 with those who are practically RC in their practice) and have an amicable split. The alternative is more years and decades of in-fighting as people continue to try to reconcile the unreconcileable.....and fail. Unity is only going to be possible in groups which share a genuine basis for unity - this is what the ABC needs to accept or he will be leading us into more years of in-fighting. Things can be much better for all sides - we just need to be honest about the realities of the AC and have an amicable split so revisionists are free to revise whatever they want (happily, together, without Akinola and even nice "open" evangelicals asking for moratoria etc) and the rest of us are free to get on with being less muddled, less middle-of-the road Anglicans with a high view of scripture (because that is what we are)
Posted by: carl
Thursday 21 August 2008 - 02:45am
Could I ask a question of the liberals on this thread? It might seem an ignorant question, but I assure you that it is sincere.
Why are liberals so angry about Lambeth?
From my perspective, Lambeth was the completion of a liberal route of the four Instruments of Communion. Rowan Williams has neutralized the Primates meeting, and now the Lambeth Conference. The ACO is bought and paid for by the Left. And RW has proved that he will not act against TEC and its allies despite any words he might say to the contrary. It's true RW said some harsh things to TEC at Lambeth. But this seems to me nothing more than an attempt to manage conservative feelings. He has said things before, but he has never followed through with action. Instead, he has acted to undermine his own words. It is true RW proposed some new central organs to deal with the crisis. But he has done so before, and his previous efforts have never actually done anything. It is true that he is proposing a covenant. But the covenant is being created to maintain the status quo, and in any case will be enforced by the same institutions that have so scrupulously protected TEC the last four years. In short, this Lambeth conference has established that liberals can act with impunity; that no consequences will ever attach.
What then is there for liberals to be mad about? You have largely won the institutional battle. If you didn't own all four instruments of the Communion, there wouldn't be a GAFCON. That entity is a measure of conservative weakness in the four instruments. It seems to me that if liberals just continued on doing what they have been doing, then conservatives would eventually leave. You would have to tolerate for a time the hypocrisy of RW calling you out even as he quietly protects you. But is that such a large price to pay for eventual victory? To suggest leaving the field just as you have won the day is beyond incongruous to me.
carl
Posted by: Graham Kings
Wednesday 20 August 2008 - 04:58pm
Sarah Hey has written an article today on Stand Firm, ‘Interesting Discussions Going On Over at Fulcrum & T19’ which links into her article, ‘The Post-Lambeth Anglican Communion’, my ‘Patience and Urgency’, this Fulcrum thread and this TitusOneNine thread.
Helpful linking of discussions. Virtual interdependence....?
Posted by: Deleted user 1222
Wednesday 20 August 2008 - 03:27pm
That might be so, Nersen: in that biblical texts, critically understood, are one source of theological construction. I would not argue they are supreme. In this case, they are being presented in literalist fashion: there is most certainly an argument that faithful, intended, relationships, between gay people, with sexual expression towards those relationships, is not what these biblical texts are about. They are about a relationship of casual sexual expression with idolatry. However, to be clear about my position: even when texts are to be understood one way and one way only, if they are wrong they are to be discarded. And this is the practice for so much of biblical text. So much, after all, contradicts itself, but even when it does not it is subject to a critical reception along with other sources of understanding.
Posted by: Nathan Humphrey+
Wednesday 20 August 2008 - 01:57pm
Very fine reflections, Graham! Readers of this piece may also be interested in my own reflections on the theme of "intensification," found here.
Posted by: Birinus
Wednesday 20 August 2008 - 01:57pm
The problem, Nersen, is that the 'Mind of the Communion' isn't the tolerant, muddled, middle-of-the-road, compromise that we know and love, but an intolerant, conservative, doctrinally-orthodox anglicanism, that wouldn't even recognize the likes of myself or Pluralist as valid Christians (and probably a fair few of the 'open evos' posting on Fulcrum).
So the question is, what exactly is +Rowan hoping to achieve? Is he trying to enforce orthodoxy on the entire communion, at the expense of the entire liberal wing, or is he still hoping to gain time by frustrating any attempts to actually do anything meaningful?
Posted by: nersenpaul
Wednesday 20 August 2008 - 09:28am
Adrian incorrectly labelling respected theologians like Dr Packer as "biblical literalists" does not diminish the biblical stance or arguments of Dr Packer and many others, including many who would not consider themselves "conservative" in any sense. Are all who reject the rights-based "new thing" of TEC now to be labelled "biblical literalists"? Even nice "open" evangelicals?
The reason that Rowan Williams, a respected theologian, does not push his personal views on certain issues is that even his huge brainpower and past writings did not convince many other theologians in the AC, even some of his friends, and have not changed what he calls "the mind of the Communion". Dr WIlliams shows a great humility about his personal views and also a great desire for unity...... I prefer his approach to that of some bishops who merely assert that issues are not "first order" and hope everyone might roll over and pretend we are united despite all the evidence to the contrary since the divisive actions of TEC in 2003.
I will go on about the bible, Adrian, because the main issue causing division in the AC is the authority of scripture.
Posted by: Deleted user 1222
Wednesday 20 August 2008 - 01:09am
As I understand it, there is Canon Law provided by The Episcopal Church, under which dioceses come. Thus those bishops who imagine they can take their dioceses elsewhere will find themselves replaced. It's a question of doing it effectively and at the right time.
There are proposals. There are proposals for the interventions of the Pastoral Forum, and a whole set of others, and Rowan Williams has consistently said (as shown here by Graham Kings) that he wants it more like a Church. Of course back in history there were colonialists and they were, well, Church of England, taking the culture and religion overseas. The Episcopal Church comes via Scotland of course, and we see a difference even in the British Isles between the different Anglican Churches. But what developed was a set of autonomous Churches.
Nersen Pillay can go on about the Bible, but Bishop Pierre Whalon (via Thinking Anglicans) tells us that gay inclusion is about moral theology and not first order doctrine, and thinks (while wanting to develop the communion) that the theological argument can be better made for inclusion. He takes into account a different cultural experience elsewhere. I just think he is far too optimistic, because his argument won't be accepted by the J. I. Packers of this world, who are biblical literalists and elevate words of Paul applied to another cultural situation (what Rowan Williams called heterosexuals seeking out sexual variety in that Greek culture) into first order doctrine. Many Anglicans would agree with such as Bishop Pierre Whalon on this issue, and indeed have a view consistent with Rowan Williams's private views - the difference being that these views should be enacted in a culturally sensitive Church. Anglican Churches are in their places and cannot be expected to move according to different cultural settings than their own: none should impose on the other.
Bishop Pierre Whalon may have his argument, but when the chips are down he will be looking at interventions from dreamed up institutions that have no authority over a Church like The Episcopal Church, or any other.
Posted by: Graham Kings
Wednesday 20 August 2008 - 12:15am
There are two useful resources available from the final press conference of the Lambeth Conference.
The text of the answers by the Archbishop of Canterbury is here, on the Lichfield Diocesan site - this does not include the questions.
The audio of the press conference - including the questions - is here, on the Lambeth Conference site.
To provide the context of two key answers, I have transcribed the following questions - on the Pastoral Forum and on whether the Communion is considered by the Archbishop to be 'a church', something I mentioned in 'Patience and Urgency':
Can you talk a little bit more about the Pastoral Forum? We only just heard about it about two weeks ago and now it is going to be constituted. Does it have powers subscribed to it? Do the Provinces has to say 'yes' to it?
What I said in the Presidential Address was that I am looking for some specific proposals because we haven’t got them yet. And I want those ideally within quite a short time frame. I think the attempt to shape this was something to do with the fact that nobody was very happy with some new strictly Canonical structure but that there was a sense that something in the Dar es Salaam Primates’ Communiqué about how external support might be factored into a local church like the Episcopal Church. Something is worth pursuing so it is putting a bit of flesh on that.
You say in your Presidential Address, 'The covenanted future has the potential to make us more of a church.' Is this answering the Catholic question about ecclesiology and is this suggesting the Communion itself is moving more towards being 'a church'?
I think the answer would have to be yes from where I stand. I hope that a little bit more mutual responsibility and accountability and a bit more willingness to walk in step will make us more like a church. Not, I have to say it again, not a centralised body with enforced conformity but that willing acceptance of moving together.
More of a church in the sense that that structure, as I again said in the Presidential Address, represents a bit of a challenge to the tendency for local churches to get trapped in their local contexts. I think that’s a danger. The catholic ideal, if you like, the global ideal, is one of the ways we push back against those tendencies.
Posted by: Ephraim Radner
Tuesday 19 August 2008 - 09:34pm
Pluralist is making this all sound way too macchievellian by half. Would that it were so easy to manipulate people into doing things! (Actually no – it wouldn’t be good; at the same time, it isn’t happening.) He seems to think that the grand old “Anglican” tradition is simply made up of self-sustaining “churches” that used to be reasonable and get along, but now power-hungry centralizers, either nasty evangelicals or integralist catholics, have got their hands on the wheel and are trying to take away the freedoms of the little guys, who are nice and tolerant and know how to “reach across the oceans” in love without having a gun pointed at their head or pointing it at others.
In the first place, it never really was like this golden age – most of the “communion” was governed for decades from afar in a highly centralized way and, through the manipulations resources, remains so; “independency” was limited by far more authoritarian cultural and theological expectations than today’s putative Rowanite illusions of grandeur; and the struggles for self-definition within Anglican “churches” have, in most cases, never had any time to be truly resolved before the current turmoil. Secondly, it is hardly clear that churches like TEC are really such as Pluralist believes, structurally. For instance, is TEC actually “governed” authoritatively by General Convention? The courts, of course, will thrash this one out (or not); but there are strong legal reasons to claim that dioceses remain the only real entity of authority in the U.S.. This is more a matter of “have at it” in the public arena than “democratic traditions are under attack! quick, let’s circle the wagons!”. We've been and we still are sorting things out. “Centralizing” in the manner that Pluralist abhors – well, it hasn’t happened, nor is it quite clear what it would look like anyway, since there is no formal proposal yet set out, so it’s a fantasy indeed that he is criticizing at this stage – amounts, structurally, to rearranging pieces that are, historically speaking, “still” up for grabs, since they have never really settled very well.
Pluralist’s arguments are not (as I see it) historically grounded or realistic approximations of what is actually going on; they remain assertions of a certain political predilection -- fine, as far as it goes -- thrown into an ongoing debate, whose theological and pragmatic elements remain ones that, in various arrangements, will either persuade or not. Bishops, synods, priests, laity, congregations and so on can and no doubt will choose to assert themselves differently in all this. What is not at all clear, however, is whether there is anything “traditional” at all to govern these choices. One of the virtues of Rowan Williams’ “catholic” approach is precisely that he is at least attempting to provide coherent Christian touchstones for discerning a way forward in the midst of an ecclesial movement that is dynamic – one hopes providentially – and not only reactionary, which is how I view the complaints Pluralist lays out.
Posted by: nersenpaul
Tuesday 19 August 2008 - 03:21pm
It is not at all surprising that a pluralist should not agree with the views of evangelicals .....
Rowan Williams may not be an evangelical, but he is not a pluralist....so, it is not surprising that a pluralist should not like his stance on church unity and his desire that the GAFCON bishops should return.
Opposing, contradictory views on scripture and authority in the church can never be united genuinely. We are currently living through the consequences of decades of pretending "unity" is possible when people hold unreconcileable views on primary issues like the authority of scripture......in the end, those who believe in the authority of scripture, even the nice "open" people, cannot accept any "new thing" which is incomaptible with scripture - it is good if the pluralists and atheists and social campaigners in the AC are realising this (at last).
Posted by: Deleted user 1222
Tuesday 19 August 2008 - 12:59pm
I have indeed so posted a comment, treating both separately and yet alongside if not quite together. You can see there that I have changed my mind about something, that is also the case further down, and this connects across with thoughts by Mark Harris at Preludium (who also was quite kind about my writing and drawing). It is that it is time for The Episcopal Church and the Anglican Church of Canada to get out of the Communion. In this I'd go further and cleaner than Mark Harris.
Of course I think this of the Church of England too, and many others, but the issue first is pressing on TEC and very quickly after on the ACC. Lambeth was a double-dealing conference, that on the one hand was a resolution free gathering to hear and speak in an intensive way. On the other hand, embryonic institutions and existing ones were working in effect to stitch up the Archbishop of Canterbury's centralisation project. It is almost as if what the bishops said or heard did not matter. So TEC and the ACC simply are not going to get a fair deal.
The important thing here is that in withdrawing (keep a nominal connection - but cut the physical and financial flows) neither TEC nor ACC should set up formal relationships (except perhaps with each other) and just tend to their own gardens.
Let's be clear that they can do this now because of GAFCON. The extreme evangelicals and other hangers on aren't going to come back into the Canterbury Communion without demanding centralising reforms of their own, and they won't give up key forms of control. Whether it reintegrates or not, I think it is reasonably clear that many Churches particularly of Western Anglicanism will not put up with what is on offer either from the Archbishop, other institutions and especially from GAFCON.
One thing I do agree (so far) with Graham Kings about is that Rowan Williams is no pushover Archbishop of Canterbury: he knows how to grab the steering wheel and turn the whole vehicle in his direction. If you were designing a presidential system of power you couldn't do it better than having a resolution-less conference that leaves your method of introducing institutions free. This is innovation big time, and all on his own model of Catholicism and Church. There is no accident that he calls the Anglican Communion a Church, and indeed he asserts it. So the innovation he decries, coming from one or two actual Anglican Churches, is more than matched by his own.
One thing the Presiding Bishop of TEC, Katharine Jefferts Schori, has made very clear herself on a number of occasions is that the Anglican Communion is not a Church. So they really cannot be part of this project, and nor can any Church that values its autonomy or the organic relationships between Churches within Anglicanism.
So the suggestion is to get out and let this scheming come to a collapse - other than those who want it, probably a number in the Global South - and have relations restore on a more open basis. The Pastoral Forum, Faith and Order Commission and all the rest of it have no more authority than all the rest of the dreamt up innovations. So while these games are being played, get out, and see who your friends are.
Posted by: Graham Kings
Tuesday 19 August 2008 - 10:19am
On his Pluralist Speaks site, Adrian Worsfold has posted, early this morning, a long comment on both my article 'Patience and Urgency' and the article by Ephraim Radner 'True Christian Unity?'.
Posted by: Obadiahslope
Monday 18 August 2008 - 11:44pm
Many of the goats - or actually sheep, are scattered on several hills across North America. If the pastoral forum is to work, and to be seen to work, seeking out those sheep should surely be part of its "urgent" work. Getting the Gafcon primates on board would be the only way to do this with any speed. So the composition of the Forum, as with the earlier "Panel of reference" will be significant in determining the outcomes. I don't have a crystal ball, but a list of who is on the forum panel could be almost as good.
John Sandeman
Posted by: Ephraim Radner
Monday 18 August 2008 - 08:55pm
Patience and urgency are indeed two necessary elements in our current calling. The folks in Burundi, where I once worked, have their own many versions of proverbs on patience -- buke buke bukomez' igihonyi [little by little grows the banana]; they also have their "seize the moment" ones: Ireka kugarura impene ikiri hafi ngw irenge umurambi ukabira nkayo [if you don't bring your goat back when it's still nearby, you will have to wander over the hills just like the goat]. (I hope I haven't mangled the Kirundi here.) The problem with wise proverbs is that we tend to remember and apply them when we like them, rather than when we need them. Things get even more complicated when what is needed is a kind of synthesis of two prudential requirements. The key is to listen to those wiser than ourselves. Thanks, Graham, for taking on this last role in this case! Ephraim Radner
Posted by: Graham Kings
Monday 18 August 2008 - 07:23pm
We have just published on Fulcrum my August newsletter, 'Patience and Urgency: Lambeth Conference 2008'. It will also be published in the Church of England Newspaper this Friday, 22 August 2008.
Add your comments on the Fulcrum Forum
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