Updated again Wednesday evening
See earlier ACO reports here.
The Standing Committee Daily Bulletin – Day 2
Update 1
ENS has two reports, Standing Committee decides Episcopal Church’s ‘separation would inhibit dialogue’ and Standing Committee members celebrate commitment to transparency.
Update 2
The Standing Committee Daily Bulletin – Day 3
The Standing Committee Daily Bulletin – Day 4
25 CommentsUpdated Saturday afternoon
The Anglican Communion Office has published a Q and A document about this, titled What is the Standing Committee?
This body is, as it happens, meeting right now in London. The membership is shown here.
Here is the first report from that meeting:
The Standing Committee Daily Bulletin – Day 1
And the new Articles of Association are available as a PDF file here.
11 CommentsThe Primate of Nigeria, Archbishop Nicholas Okoh, is in Virginia, attending the annual council of CANA.
According to Episcopal Café
Asked about whether Okoh had sought permission to be in the diocese, Henry Burt, a spokesperson for the Episcopal Diocese of Virginia, said “Bishop Johnston received no request from Archbishop Okoh to exercise any ministry in the Diocese of Virginia. Unfortunately, the circumstances of this visit do not aid the process commended by the Windsor Report.”
According to Breakaway Groups Prevented Anglican Split, Nigerian Primate Suggests in the Christian Post
According to Okoh, the Church of Nigeria received the same sanctions as The Episcopal Church this year, which include removal from the Anglican Communion’s ecumenical dialogues and from a body that examines issues of doctrine and authority.
“The command of Scripture is that we should go everywhere and preach and teach. So we came here to help our brothers and sisters in the Lord. But instead of getting commendation, we are getting punishment or sanction,” said Okoh, who was elected as primate in September.
Criticizing the move, he commented, “To do so, to ban us … we believe they were not properly advised. So if you ask me whether there is justification for that, I will say no.”
Sanctions were proposed by the Archbishop of Canterbury, Dr. Rowan Williams, earlier this year for provinces that breach the three moratoria that leaders in the 77 million-member global body had agreed to since 2004. The moratoria include cross-border interventions, the ordination of partnered homosexuals and the blessing of same-sex unions.
The legal situation in Virginia is complex. Previously, in ADV motion for rehearing has no merit, and even earlier in Anglican District of Virginia files motion of appeal Episcopal Café explained the detail. In summary now:
6 CommentsIn a motion for rehearing to the Virginia Supreme Court the nine churches in dispute with the Episcopal Diocese of Virginia over church property earlier this month reversed field and instead of claiming they are a branch of the Church of Nigeria now claim that CANA is not a branch of the Church of Nigeria…
The Archbishop of Nigeria, Nicholas Okoh addressed a press conference on Wednesday. The full text of his prepared remarks can be found at ADDRESS OF PRESS CONFERENCE DELIVERED BY THE MOST REVD NICHOLAS OKOH.
Among his remarks was this:
We congratulate Pastor Ayo Oritsejafor, the new CAN President and wish him a very successful tenure. We invite him and all denominational leaders to protect Christian interests and our cherished way of life, including speaking out against the invading army of homosexuality, lesbianism and bisexual lifestyle under any guise. In this matter silence can be detrimental to public well being. The issue at stake of human sexuality is not an Anglican prerogative and it is by no means limited to the Anglican circle as it is clearly shown all over the world. Same sex marriage, paedophilia and all sexual pervasions should be roundly condemned by all who accept the authority of Scripture over human life…
And then he continued:
…Recently, our Church was classified along with Churches who have broken call for moratorium by the Anglican authorities in Canterbury, in certain areas such as ordination of Gay Bishops, conducting of same sex marriage and border crossing. Our church is said to have crossed borders in its pastoral work in the USA. We reject being put in the same category with churches conducting gay ordination and same sex marriage, and the equating of our evangelical initiative (for which we should be commended) with those who are doing things unbiblical. But for the Nigerian initiative and others like her, many of our faithful Anglican American friends who cannot tolerate the unbiblical practices of the Episcopal Church in America could have gone away to other faiths. The great commission to go in to all the world to save souls is our compelling constitution. The step taken by Canterbury in this regard therefore is ill-advised and does not make any contribution towards the healing of the ailment in the Anglican extended family.
The Church in the West had vowed to use their money to spread the homosexual lifestyle in African societies and Churches; after all Africa is poor. They are pursuing this agenda vigorously and what is more, they now have the support of the United Nations. We therefore call on parents to ensure that their children obtain their first degree in Nigeria before travelling abroad. Parents and guardians should closely watch and monitor the relationship which their children or wards keep so that deviant behaviour could be timely corrected. The sin of homosexuality, it must be reemphasised, destroyed the communities of Sodom and Gomorrah.
Hat tip Episcopal Café which reported it under the headline Primate of Nigeria speaks on homosexuality and border crossing.
37 CommentsMeanwhile, out in the real world…
There will be a synod fringe event at lunchtime on Monday about the Church in Zimbabwe. Today, Brian Castle, Bishop of Tonbridge, writes at Cif belief ‘Don’t forget us,’ say Zimbabwean Christians.
3 CommentsCriticism of what the Anglican Communion Office is doing comes from more than one direction.
On the one hand, Paul Bagshaw of the MCU has this detailed critique of Part 4 of the Anglican Covenant, Questions on the critical clause.
This is a follow-up to his earlier articles linked here.
On the other hand, the Anglican Communion Institute has this detailed criticism of the Anglican Communion Steering Committee. See ACC Standing Committee: Five Things That Should Be Done Now.
29 CommentsThe Church Times published a leader column yesterday, Have the Mexicans started a wave?
This argues the desirability of seeking a supermajority of votes in the CofE General Synod:
…The records of the recent House of Bishops meeting, released this week, show that the House agreed not to propose special majorities when it comes to the vote in the General Synod. The decision is surprising, given the impact that the Covenant might have on the Church of England. Although the text contains no mechanical means whereby one province can influence the deliberations of another, it will obviously change matters to know that a decision might result in some form of severance from the Communion mainstream. This might not be a bad thing — greater responsiveness to each other is, after all, the object of the Covenant — but it will be a different thing.
As matters now stand, the implications if a province decides not to endorse the Covenant are unknown. The Covenant Working Group concluded that, in such an eventuality, “there should be the flexibility for the Instruments of Communion to determine an appropriate response in the evolving situation.” In other words, the Anglican Consultative Council, the Primates’ Meeting, the Archbishop of Canterbury, and, if time drags on, the Lambeth Conference would have to make something up. The C of E is not any old province, however, and were it to reject the Covenant, it is hard to see the project surviving. At the very least, the Archbishop of Canterbury would find it hard to support the Covenant without the backing of his Church. As so much rests on the vote, a two-thirds majority in the Synod would provide a clearer endorsement.
Paul Bagshaw has published an article today, Why the Covenant won’t work.
The Covenant will work in all sorts of ways, of course, some intended some predictable if unintended.
What it won’t do and can’t do, is what it says on the tin. It cannot ‘prevent and manage’ disputes:
This Commission believes that the case for adoption of an Anglican Covenant is overwhelming:
* The Anglican Communion cannot again afford, in every sense, the crippling prospect of repeated worldwide inter-Anglican conflict such as that engendered by the current crisis. Given the imperfections of our communion and human nature, doubtless there will be more disagreements. It is our shared responsibility to have in place an agreed mechanism to enable and maintain life in communion, and to prevent and manage communion disputes. (Windsor Report §119)
The reason it cannot ‘prevent and manage’ disputes is simple. If the Covenant mechanisms can be applied retrospectively (which is effectively what is being attempted) then these mechanisms are applied as it were from the outside of the dispute. They step in like courts and police to adjudicate and enforce an outcome – in this case the expulsion (in whole or part) of the offending members of the Communion…
A few days ago, he also published Just what will the Covenant cost?
5 CommentsACNS reports two further resignations: Archbishops Henry Orombi and Justice Okrofi.
But the headline reads: Two new members to be welcomed onto the Standing Committee of the Anglican Communion.
The forthcoming Standing Committee meeting will welcome two new members from Asia and Africa: Bp Paul Sarker (Moderator of the Church of Bangladesh and Bishop of Dhaka) and Revd Canon Janet Trisk of South Africa (Rector of the Parish of St David, Prestbury in Pietermaritzburg, in the Diocese of Natal).
The two new additions and the existing members face a packed agenda for their July meeting that includes reports on finance, mission, the Anglican Relief and Development Alliance, evangelism and church growth, and unity, faith and order including the progress of consideration of the Anglican Communion Covenant by the Provinces.
They will also be discussing Standing Committee membership issues including electing a successor to Bp Azad Marshall, Bishop of Iran, and noting the resignations of Archbishops Justice Akrofi and Henry Orombi.
Outside of Committee business, the members’ agenda includes visits to Lambeth Palace, its library and Westminster Abbey.
The then current list of Standing Committee members as given in a recent ENS report on the resignation of Bishop Azad Marshall was:
[old list deleted]
Update
While I was writing the above, ENS published a new article, Standing Committee membership, resignations confirmed by Anglican Communion Office
The Anglican Communion Office has announced that two new members will serve on the Standing Committee beginning with the July 23-27 meeting in London: Bishop Paul Sarker, moderator of the Church of Bangladesh and bishop of Dhaka; and the Rev. Canon Janet Trisk, rector of the parish of St. David, Prestbury, in Pietermaritzburg, South Africa.
Trisk was elected at the last Standing Committee meeting to replace Nomfundo Walaza, also from South Africa, and Sarker is the elected alternate for Middle East President Bishop Mouneer Anis, who resigned his membership in February saying that his presence has “no value whatsoever” and that his voice is “like a useless cry in the wilderness.”
The July 2 release also confirmed that Archbishop Henry Orombi of Uganda and his elected alternate, Archbishop Justice Akrofi of West Africa, have resigned from the Standing Committee.
And giving an updated membership list (quoted verbatim):
Savi Hensman writes today at Cif belief about The Anglican power play.
The proposed Covenant is the culmination of a conservative and homophobic drive for power in the Anglican Communion
The Church of England’s House of Bishops is urging it to accept an Anglican Communion Covenant. This would give top leaders of overseas churches more power over the C of E and (strictly in theory) vice versa. The Archbishop of Canterbury has been a champion of greater centralism among Anglicans worldwide, supposedly to strengthen unity. But recent events have exposed the tawdry reality behind talk of “interdependence” and “bonds of affection”.
The Communion has long been a family of churches in different parts of the world, with a common heritage of faith but able to make their own decisions. The 1878 Lambeth Conference resolved that “the duly certified action of every national or particular Church, and of each ecclesiastical province (or diocese not included in a province), in the exercise of its own discipline, should be respected by all the other Churches” and “no bishop or other clergyman of any other Church should exercise his functions within that diocese without the consent of the bishop thereof” .
This was repeatedly affirmed at international gatherings, as were the value of freedom and human rights. (While the Archbishop of Canterbury, the most senior C of E cleric, was expected to convene such events, he had no authority over other provinces.)
Adrian Worsfold wrote for the Daily Episcopalian a little while ago about The slow-motion car crash.
…Once again, and to be clear: if you don’t want the consequences, don’t vote for the document. To remove the Covenant is to finish Windsor too. This applies far wider than for The Episcopal Church and The Anglican Church of Canada, the latter of which is dragging its feet somewhat in its aching movement from its desire to be agreeable in the Communion and its realisation that this document is a disaster.
The Archbishop of Canterbury believes in the bishops as people of a body, as in traditional authority, so policies are in the end sacred and personal. He is attached to this road, the only road, and in detail. I see him as a person, let’s say, in the passenger seat of a rally car with all the maps, the details and the documents, handed to him by the bureaucrats on the back seat according to tasks he set them. And then he’s the one who gives the instructions to his Secretary General, whose foot is slammed on the accelerator and whose hands are held fast on the steering wheel. They are in a rally and they are deciding the route for all the following Anglican cars. The fact that everyone sees this in slow motion should not alter the reality that there is an almighty car crash about to take place, with the lead car, and every other car following behind, generating a pile up for which ambulances are to be needed in numbers. Some rally driver, somewhere behind, needs to apply the brakes and radio the others.
And yesterday, Marshall Scott wrote in the same venue about Cowboy poker and the Anglican Communion.
4 CommentsSeveral years ago I began describing our Anglican struggles as “cowboy poker.” For those who have never heard of it, cowboy poker is a unique game. It’s a competition held in some rodeos in the United States, and perhaps elsewhere (yes, there are rodeos elsewhere). A card table and chair are set in the middle of the arena. Contestants sit around it playing poker. There is money on the table, but it isn’t won by playing cards. In fact, the cards aren’t the game. Instead, a fighting bull is released into the arena, looking for something to attack. The expectation is that the bull will charge the table, and the pot will go, winner-take-all, to the last person seated at the table.
I’ve had that thought again and again through the past few years. There have been many ways of looking at our struggles – differences over the limits of welcome and inclusion, over the interpretation of Scripture, over theological anthropology. However, it has also been a family argument over patrimony. That has included arguments over who would be the “true heirs” of the Anglican tradition; but also who would be recognized as Anglican by the Archbishop of Canterbury. The difference would fall between those who measured it by official recognition by the Church of England and the Anglican Consultative Council; and those who measured it by invitations to the Lambeth Conference, the Primates’ Meetings, and “representative bodies.” Granted, there have been, as I said, disagreements about interpretation, but those have been in the context of remarkable agreement, included even in the draft Covenant, that Scripture and the Prayer Book tradition are fundamental to the Anglican tradition. So, I think there’s something to be said for the thought that this is about being recognized – being accepted, officially if grudgingly – by Canterbury (and if possible by the current incumbent)…
Mexico has become the first Communion Province to adopt the Anglican Communion Covenant following its VI General Synod in Mexico City on 11 and 12 June.
Secretary General Kenneth Kearon said he was delighted at the decision and labelled The Anglican Church of Mexico’s decision as a “significant step” in the life of the Communion.
The Anglican Communion Covenant, a document that outlines the common life and values of the Communion, was described by Archbishop of Canterbury Dr Rowan Williams as “Something that helps us know where we stand together and also helps us to intensify our fellowship and our trust.” It includes a section that proposes how to address significant disagreements within the Anglican Communion.
The idea of a Covenant was first raised in 2004 and member churches are currently reviewing the latest and final version. “We are delighted to hear that Mexico has agreed to adopt the Covenant,” said Canon Kearon. “Provinces were asked to take their time to seriously consider this document, and we are glad to hear from recent synods that they are doing just that.”
Read the press release here: Mexico adopts the Anglican Communion Covenant.
10 CommentsFor an earlier resignation see a bishop resigns from a committee.
Now comes the Bishop in Iran, Azad Marshall.
Read George Conger’s report in the Church of England Newspaper Battle over ACC Standing Committee looms.
22 CommentsThe Bishop in Iran has quit the Anglican Communion’s ‘Standing Committee’.
Bishop Azad Marshall’s decision to stand down will come as a blow to the Archbishop of Canterbury who has sought to vest an unprecedented degree of authority in the new entity—formed by the merger of the Standing Committee of the Anglican Consultative Council and the Standing Committee of the Primates Meeting…
The Advisory Committee of Communion Partners has issued A Response to the Pentecost Pastoral Letter from the Archbishop of Canterbury.
(To discover who exactly the signatories are, scroll to the bottom.)
I failed to link earlier to the statement from the Chicago Consultation which doesn’t seem to have made it yet to the consultation’s own website. So I have copied it here below the fold.
Another statement comes from The Associated Parishes for Liturgy and Mission. That one is here: look for The Convent Station Statement on the changing ethos of the Anglican Communion Sunday, June 13, 2010
Andrew Goddard has written at Fulcrum: Reflections on the Archbishop of Canterbury’s Pentecost Letter: A pathway for Anglican spiritual renewal?
8 CommentsFrom a press release by the Anglican Church in North America:
The Anglican Church in North America has 614 congregations in 20 dioceses. More than 200 other congregations are ministry partners with the Anglican Church, including the congregations of The Anglican Mission. The Anglican Church represents more than 100,000 Christians in North America.
Previous reports here, here, and here.
This short PDF file explains where these congregations came from.
23 CommentsENS reports: Secretary general says Episcopal Church should have expected consequences for Glasspool consecration
The Rev. Canon Kenneth Kearon, secretary general of the Anglican Communion, told the Episcopal Church’s Executive Council June 18 that when Diocese of Los Angeles Bishop Suffragan Mary Glasspool was ordained as the church’s second openly gay, partnered bishop, the church ought to have known that it would face sanctions.
However, he said that in the recent removal of Episcopal Church members from some Anglican Communion ecumenical dialogues “the aim has not been to get at the Episcopal Church, but to find room for others to remain as well as enabling as full a participation as possible for the Episcopal Church within the communion.”
Kearon claimed that the communion’s ecumenical dialogues “are at the point of collapse” and said that the last meeting of the Standing Committee of the Anglican Communion, of which Jefferts Schori is an elected member, “was probably the worst meeting I have experienced.”
“The viability of our meetings are at stake,” he added…
For earlier reports of the meeting, see Executive Council quizzes Secretary General.
In a formal statement issued after the meeting, available from ENS here, the Council said this about the encounter with Kearon:
The 45-minute session on Friday with invited guest Canon Kenneth Kearon was carefully prepared for by the Standing Committee on World Mission, who wrote the thoughtful and substantive questions that made clear our commitment to being an inclusive church while also deeply committed to classic Anglicanism and deepening our relationship with our sisters and brothers across the Communion.
Canon Kearon began by describing the beginning of the current tensions as the increasing “problem of growth and diversity in the Anglican Communion.” This statement was significant to a body that has long seen diversity in the Body of Christ as an opportunity and has sought to base its actions on the baptismal promise that we will seek and serve Christ in all people and respect the dignity of every human being.
The questions sought clarification on the presenting issues, including the Archbishop of Canterbury’s removal of appointees from The Episcopal Church to ecumenical bodies and Canon Kearon’s statement that The Episcopal Church does not “share the faith and order of the vast majority of the Anglican Communion.” He also responded to concerns about incursions by other provinces of the Communion. He acknowledged that the Archbishop of Canterbury considers certain activities of the Province of the Southern Cone to constitute an incursion, but is awaiting clarification about the extent of these activities from the primate of that province. However, such ongoing breaches of the moratorium on incursions do not rise to the same level of departure from the faith and order of the Communion as does the full inclusion of lesbian, gay, bisexual and transgendered Christians.
The Council very much appreciated the chance to meet with Canon Kearon, who agreed to respond in writing to additional questions from members of the Council.
The Living Church also has a report, see Kenneth Kearon Defends Archbishop’s Decisions.
63 CommentsUpdated Friday evening
The Church Times reports on last Sunday’s service at Southwark Cathedral, in a sidebar to the story headlined Bishops criticise USPG cuts.
Doffed: the Presiding Bishop of the US Episcopal Church, Dr Katharine Jefferts Schori, was asked by Lambeth Palace not to wear her mitre when she visited Southwark Cathedral last Sunday. As a consequence, she carried it under her arm. In her sermon, she spoke of the fear of strangers: “There’s something in our ancient genetic memory that ratchets up our state of arousal when we meet a stranger — it’s a survival mechanism that has kept our species alive for millennia by being wary about strangers. But there’s also a piece of our make-up that we talk about in more theological terms — the part that leaps to judgement about that person’s sins. It’s connected to knowing our own sinfulness, and our tendency toward competition.” She urged the congregation to lose the “defensive veneer that wants to shut out other sinners”.
In a letter to The Times, a group of 15 clerics in the Southwark diocese, mostly conservative Evangelicals, criticised the invitation: “We seriously question the judgement of those who have not withdrawn their invitation to her after her recent consecration of Mary Glasspool,” a partnered lesbian. She also spoke at the Scottish Synod, where she talked of her Church’s “radical hospitality”. At the USPG annual meeting, she was upbraided by the Archbishop of Cape Town, the Most Revd Thabo Makgoba: the support for same-sex partnerships had communicated “a measure of uncaring at the consequent difficulties for us”
In a related story, the Church of England Newspaper has this report by George Conger Bishop Jefferts Schori rebuffs Dr. Williams’ call for restraint. It includes this:
The June 2 public letter follows upon private communications between Bishop Jefferts Schori and Dr. Rowan Williams about her continuing role in the councils of the Anglican Communion.
The press officer to the Secretary General of the Anglican Consultative Council has confirmed to The Church of England Newspaper that Canon Kenneth Kearon hand delivered a letter from Dr. Williams to Bishop Jefferts Schori at the April 17 consecration ceremony of Bishop Ian Douglas of Connecticut.
The chancellor to the Presiding Bishop, David Booth Beers, told bishops attending the May 24 to 28 Living Our Vows bishops’ training programme at the Lake Logan Episcopal Center in North Carolina that in this letter Dr. Williams had asked the Presiding Bishop to consider absenting herself from meetings of the Anglican Communion’s Standing Committee and the Primates Meeting in light of the Episcopal Church’s violation of the moratoria on gay bishops and blessings, those present tell CEN.
Speaking to a group of bishops during an informal after dinner session, Mr. Beers stated the Presiding Bishop had rejected the Archbishop of Canterbury’s suggestion, observing that he had no authority to remove her from the Primates Standing Committee as she had been elected by the North and South American primates. She also objected to Dr. Williams’ claim to have the authority to ban her from the councils of the church.
One of the bishops at the evening encounter told CEN that speculation on the future structures of the Communion was also shared by Mr. Beers with the bishops. The Archbishop of Canterbury’s press office did not respond to requests for clarification on Mr. Beers’ comments, while a spokesman for the Presiding Bishop declined to comment on “speculation and conjecture.”
Other reports:
Diana Butler Bass at Beliefnet Mitregate: The Anglican Crisis Over Women’s Hats
Maggi Dawn Mitregate: the latest church row
Friday evening update
According to the American Anglican Council in an article headlined Jefferts Schori: “We were not asked to withdraw” the following exchanges took place at the press conference following the Executive Council meeting in Maryland today:
Robert Lundy, American Anglican Council: Presiding Bishop, my question is in regards to the election of a new representative for The Episcopal Church to the Anglican Consultative Council. Was that new representative Bishop Ian Douglas and if so, will you and Bishop Ian Douglas be attending the next Standing Committee meeting of the ACC?
Presiding Bishop Jefferts Schori: We expect those elections to happen this afternoon and yes I expect the representatives of The Episcopal Church to be present at that meeting.
President Anderson: We’re looking forward to the election. We have two candidates in both positions that are open. . .
David Virtue, Virtue Online: My question is for the Presiding Bishop. In light of events recently concerning the Archbishop’s Pentecost letter and the TEC being asked to withdraw several ecumenical leaders from the ACC, will the Presiding Bishop and Executive Council consider cutting the 40% budget of the ACC? Has that been discussed?
Jefferts Schori: Your first observation is not accurate. Members of Ecumenical dialogues were removed by the Archbishop of Canterbury and the Secretary General of the Anglican Communion. We were not asked to withdraw. We were not asked to withdraw from the Anglican Consultative Council. There has been no discussion here of reducing our offering to the Anglican Communion Office.
Mary Francis Schjonberg, Episcopal Life: At the beginning of this presentation this morning, what was your general sense that the way he (Kenneth Kearon) sees things may not be the way The Episcopal Church sees things. At the end of the session, do you think there was any greater understanding on his part or on the Council’s part about the situation in the Communion?
Anderson: I’d like to say in response to that one of the comments that Secretary Kearon made in his opening remarks struck me particularly where he mentioned that some of the issues that they have identified in the Anglican Communion and one of them, a presenting issue, is diversity. In the first place, I don’t think that The Episcopal Church sees diversity as an issue in the same way in which Secretary Kearon presented it of being seen from his viewpoint. I did not see any change in that by the time we had finished talking. I didn’t see any concrete evidence that there was a particular newly developed line of understanding becoming perhaps both ways.
Jefferts Schori: I think we look forward to the possibility of…upon further reflection that all participants in the conversation this morning they have had their understanding increased.
And two more #mitregate articles
RNS Daniel Burke It’s hats-off to female bishop, and not in a good way
Ruth Gledhill Mitregate: The Sequel
34 CommentsUpdated again Wednesday evening
I published a couple of cross-border intervention footnotes recently to other articles, see here, and also here. That was after the Secretary General of the Anglican Communion, Kenneth Kearon wrote a letter in which he indicated some doubts in this area.
Today, Episcopal Café joins the campaign for better information on this topic.
Has the Church of Nigeria formally engaged in boundary crossing? The Archbishop of Canterbury and the Secretary General of the Anglican Consultative Council do not know.
On their respective websites the Church of Nigeria and CANA openly confess that the Church of Nigeria is formally in violation of the boundary crossing moratorium…
See It’s formal: CANA is a diocese of the Church of Nigeria.
Referring to the recent Virginia court decision involving CANA/Anglican District of Virginia:
…The Virginia Supreme Court Decision said the ADV congregations lost the case because, as ADV claimed (and as you can see, still claim), they were a branch of the Church of Nigeria.
This information is offered to assist the Archbishop of Canterbury and the Secretary General in their inquiries into whether the Province of the Church of Nigeria has engaged in and continues to engage in crossing boundaries of another province of the Communion in violation of the moratorium against such intervention.
And there is this further document dated May 2010 from the ACNA website [PDF] that lists all the cross-border interventions and notes that:
During this period of transition, bishops within ACNA will retain membership in the House of Bishops of the province in which they were members prior to the formation of ACNA.
H/T to the Café and to Albany Via Media.
Update Wednesday evening
ENS reports that Communion secretary general due to attend Executive Council meeting
31 CommentsThe Rev. Canon Kenneth Kearon, secretary general of the Anglican Communion, is to speak to the Episcopal Church’s Executive Council here on June 18.
Presiding Bishop Katharine Jefferts Schori told the council at its opening plenary session that Kearon would engage with the council in a question-and-answer session at 9 a.m. on the last day of the council’s June 16-18 meeting at the Conference Center at the Maritime Institute.
His presence at the meeting will come 11 days after he announced that he had sent letters to five Episcopal Church members of the inter-Anglican ecumenical dialogues with the Lutheran, Methodist, Old Catholic and Orthodox churches “informing them that their membership on these dialogues has been discontinued.” Kearon also said on June 7 that he had written to the Episcopal Church member of the Inter-Anglican Standing Commission on Unity Faith and Order (IASCUFO), withdrawing her membership and inviting her to serve as a consultant to that body…
From Australia comes this report that:
There is a growing backlash against women being treated as equals in churches around Australia, with some women being pressured not to become priests. Barney Zwartz reports on the battle looming.
Read Men lead, women obey? from the Melbourne Age.
14 CommentsInclusive Church has issued this open letter to the Archbishop of Canterbury.
64 CommentsSt John’s Vicarage
Secker St
London SE1 8UF10th June 2010
Dear Archbishop
We are writing to express our grave concern about the contents of your Pentecost letter and its consequences applied with such speed by the Anglican Communion Office.
Your letter opens with a reminder of the joy of Pentecost, when “we celebrate the gift God gives us of being able to communicate the Good News of Jesus Christ in the various languages of the whole human world”. But the result of your proposals – to summarily remove from those Communion bodies to which you directly appoint, those provinces which are in your view in breach of the moratoria – is a diminishing of the diversity of the Anglican Communion and a silencing of the different languages in which we are called to speak.
Our concerns are three-fold.
First, it is clear from the actions of the Secretary-General of the Anglican Communion that the application of the sanctions is one-sided and disproportionate. The Anglican Church of North America may now provide cover for the Bishops previously ordained by Nigeria, Uganda and Kenya but these provinces remain committed to them and the actions which made the emergence of ACNA possible, actions carried out in direct violation of the moratorium that you asked for. It would be farcical to suggest they are no longer breaking the moratoria just because they have been successful in generating a breakaway body to provide local cover for the result of their acts. The Secretary-General is “seeking clarification” regarding the Southern Cone and Canada. However, without consultation, he has proceeded in removing members of The Episcopal Church from Communion bodies. This kind of punitive exclusion will do nothing to promote the “path of mutual respect and thankfulness that will hold us in union and help us grow in that truth.”
Second, by proposing these actions you are not strengthening but diminishing the distinctiveness and the contribution of the Anglican voice to our ecumenical dialogue. It is clear that all the major churches are engaged in the struggle to acknowledge and include LGBT Christians. The Anglican Communion has been more open than most about its struggle, and has earned the respect of many of our partners in this. By excluding those provinces which have been able, despite deep controversy and through profound study and prayer, to include both those who welcome LGBT Christians and those who do not, you are empowering the Anglican Communion to speak with a voice which does not reflect its truth; it is, in short, inauthentic. Further, it fails to acknowledge the terrible persecution which is experienced by LGBT Christians, and those who uphold human rights as reflecting crucial Gospel values, in many of those provinces which are at the forefront of opposition to TEC and the Anglican Church of Canada. Your previous statements opposing homophobia and seeking generosity from (among others) the Church of Uganda are undermined by these actions.
Third, the actions proposed and taken appear to pre-empt the consequences of the draft Covenant. You reiterate that “the Covenant is not envisaged as an instrument of control”. And yet, by these sanctions you are prefiguring the life of the Covenant by already excluding from Anglican dialogue those who do not have majority support – creating, by default, track 2 churches. It is increasingly clear, as discussions about the Covenant continue, that whatever its original intentions it is already becoming an instrument of control, an additional “instrument of unity” which will achieve precisely the opposite.
By excluding TEC and possibly the ACoC in this way, the voices are also silenced of the thousands of members of the Church of England for whom the life of TEC and the ACoC is a source of joy and thanksgiving – for whom the full inclusion of LGBT Christians within our parishes is already a reality, even though the structures and senior hierarchy of the Church of England are unable to acknowledge this reality.
You stress the urgency of mission. The result of these actions is further to undermine the mission of the Church of England, and to cause despair amongst those who are trying to enable all to understand the love of God. Supporters of Inclusive Church have spoken with you on a number of occasions about the vital urgency of speaking generously about the breadth of Christian experience. Unless we do, we will be unable to re-engage with the communities we seek to serve in this country and who are bemused by the Church of England’s continuing rejection of LGBT Christians.
The period of engagement for which you call will not be served by putting in place further exclusionary structures. It is only the conservative extreme of the Anglican Communion which appears to support – indeed, to encourage – further division. We are profoundly supportive of the sort of frank and open conversations for which you too hope. Therefore, a question – how do you anticipate these conversations being fruitful when decisions have already been taken which further reduce the status of LGBT Christians and those who welcome them?
Yours sincerely
Canon Giles Goddard
Chair, IC
Updated Friday afternoon to add final text of resolution as carried by Synod and two further reports
The Synod debated the Anglican Covenant on Thursday afternoon. Here is the report in the Anglican Journal: A step in the right direction. Third and final draft of Covenant called ‘a very significant improvement’
The ACoC wesbite has this report: Consideration of the Covenant.
Marites N. Sison has this report at Episcopal Life: Third and final draft of Anglican Covenant called ‘a very significant improvement’.
This is the resolution as originally proposed:
A137: Anglican Communion Covenant (original text)
Be it resolved that this General Synod:
1. receive the final text of The Covenant for the Anglican Communion;
2. request that materials be prepared under the auspices of the Anglican Communion Working Group, for parishes and dioceses in order that study and consultation be undertaken on The Covenant for the Anglican Communion;
3. direct the Council of General Synod, after this period of consultation and study, to bring a recommendation regarding adoption of The Covenant for the Anglican Communion to the General Synod of 2013.
But this was amended. However the ACoC website has not yet published the amended text. We will bring you the final text as soon as we can.
This was amended by the addition of two extra paragraphs. The resolution was then carried by Synod.
A137: Anglican Communion Covenant (carried as amended)
Be it resolved that this General Synod:
1. receive the final text of The Covenant for the Anglican Communion;
2. request that materials be prepared under the auspices of the Anglican Communion Working Group, for parishes and dioceses in order that study and consultation be undertaken on The Covenant for the Anglican Communion;
3. request that conversations, both within the Anglican Church of Canada and across the Communion, reflect the values of openness, transparency, generosity of spirit, and integrity, which have been requested repeatedly in the context of the discussion of controversial matters within the Communion;
4. request that the proposed Covenant be referred to the Faith, Worship and Ministry Committee and to the Governance Working Group in order to support these conversations by providing advice on the theological, ecclesiological, legal, and constitutional implications of a decision to adopt or not to adopt the Covenant;
5. direct the Council of General Synod, after this period of consultation and study, to bring a recommendation regarding adoption of The Covenant for the Anglican Communion to the General Synod of 2013.
A second motion was ruled out of order by the chair.
C004: Decision to adopt Anglican Covenant (ruled out of order)
Be it resolved that this General Synod:
11 Comments1. Affirm the commitment of the Anglican Church of Canada to full participation in the life and mission of the Anglican Communion; and
2. Will consider a formal decision to adopt the proposed Anglican Covenant after the Church of England has formally adopted it.
Rebecca Paveley reports in the Church Times Primates of Canada and US ‘distressed’ at plans for Anglican sanctions.
An extract from Bishop Katharine’s pastoral letter appears on the Comment pages of the paper.
Bishop David Hamid notes that the sanctions being imposed by the Anglican Communion Office extend to Europe, see Archbishop of Canterbury’s Pentecost Letter: A European Consequence.
Andrew McGowan has written an excellent analysis in The Anglican Babel: A view from Australia. Read it all, but here is an excerpt:
… ++Katharine is still right here, however, and ++Rowan wrong. He is wrong in a tragic way—seeking, doubtless at great personal cost, a unity in the terms that existing Anglican Communion structures assume or require, but which in fact has now escaped us.
++Rowan is wrong in identifying the TEC ‘Communion Partners’ or others ‘who disagree strongly with recent decisions’ as those who want to be aligned with the Communion’s general commitments. I believe the vast majority of the members of TEC, including its leaders, do want to be aligned with the Communion’s general commitments and are, with specific and well-known exceptions. I have no more desire than the Archbishop of Canterbury to brush past the difficulties those exceptions present; but when did attitudes to homosexuality, rather than to the Creeds or the Sacraments, come to define the ‘Communion’s general commitments’?
This is an ecclesiological as well as a theological mistake, in that it characterizes the Communion not by its vast common depth of faith and hope, framed in specific and diverse history, but by the conversations of the thin layer that constitutes the ‘instruments of unity’, whose success has of late been desultory, and future significance increasingly uncertain.
++Rowan is also wrong in equating the positions in Inter-Anglican bodies such as IASCUFO with representation of the Communion as a whole. This is precisely the sort of context where Anglicans need to have the breadth of visions and voices that might take us forward in faith and charity, even if it is to a place of mutual disagreement and realignment. The removal of a TEC member of IASCUFO makes it a weaker body in all respects.
The position is slightly different regarding exclusion of TEC from the ecumenical dialogue groups, but the result no more inspiring; our dialogue partners may indeed now have a better chance of knowing ‘who it is they are talking to’—they will know precisely that they are talking only to some of us.
And while numerous commentators have suggested there are power grabs or constitutional problems with the dis-invitations, few have noted that membership of such bodies has never before been seen as a question of delegation, or of representing national Churches; rather their members have been chosen for expertise, and with a necessary diversity that reflects our own (than you Bruce Kaye for this point).
Not all blame, even for these specific missteps, should be laid at the feet of the Archbishop of Canterbury or of the Anglican Communion Office. It is patronising to conservatives in the ‘Global South’ and elsewhere to absolve them of responsibility. But here is where the singling out of TEC, at least as it appears in Canon Kenneth Kearon’s subsequent letter, becomes inexplicable (nb., after a week or two of no clarification, maybe change ‘inexplicable’ to ‘outrageous’). Most groups who have disregarded the other moratorium, of cross-border interventions, have not been mentioned in the prescriptions for dis-inviting participation in international bodies…
Fr Jake also has an analysis, see The Dark Side of Canterbury…Perhaps
4 Comments…What if, in a desperate move to hold the Anglican Communion together, Dr. Williams is playing a very dangerous political game?
In order to play such a game, the role of Archbishop of Canterbury would have to be seen as a postition from which one can wield power. Ecclesiastical power, in this case. But a manifestation of power just the same, even in its weakened form in today’s reality.
One way to have others recognize your power, your authority, your ability to dominate another, is to proclaim that certain people must be punished for their actions. Check.
But by what criteria would the person attempting to solidfy their power choose the victim that would set the example? Of course they would choose the one who is the most desperate to hold on to the bonds signified by the relationship with the one doling out the punishments.
So, in this case, who would be the most desperate? I would suggest that would be TEC…