Thinking Anglicans

Fort Worth makes another announcement

The Diocese of Fort Worth issued this announcement “From the Bishop”: The Realignment Moves Forward. It includes this:

…As you know, in March the House of Bishops voted down a very workable proposal for alternative primatial oversight that the Primates’ Meeting had offered to provide for our expressed needs, and no other alternative plan has been suggested. This resulted in the declaration that the Standing Committee and I made on May 16th that we would now have to pursue our original appeal for APO – an appeal that was supported by an overwhelming majority vote at our Diocesan Convention last year – independent of the structures of The Episcopal Church. We have had some very encouraging meetings and conversations over the summer months with a number of Bishops and dioceses and Primates and Provinces that share our concerns and our commitment to Christian orthodoxy. The Archbishop of Canterbury has been kept informed of these developments. More about this will be forthcoming in the weeks ahead.

One of the most encouraging signs of the realignment that is under way is the first-ever Council of Bishops of the Common Cause Partners which is to meet in Pittsburgh during the last week of September. This is a gathering of all bishops exercising active ministry within the member bodies of Common Cause.* The purpose of the meeting is to explore ways in which we can work together for a biblical, missionary and united Anglicanism in North America. I will be among some 60 bishops in attendance, as will be the newly consecrated bishops serving those congregations here in the States that are under the Provinces of Uganda and Kenya.

By the end of this month, the House of Bishops will have decided the future direction of TEC, and as a result we too will have to declare our future as a diocese. I do not expect that TEC will comply with the requests of the Primates in their Dar es Salaam Communiqué. In that case, we will see further fraction and division in the Communion during the months ahead. We will then have to choose in favor of the Anglican Communion majority at the expense of our historic relationship with the General Convention Church…

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Who can expel?

The Episcopal Majority has published a paper by the Revd Canon Robert J Brooks which is titled Who Can Expel the Episcopal Church from the Anglican Communion?

Lisa Fox writes in the Preamble there:

Much virtual and real ink has been spilled about what the Episcopal Church’s constitution does or does not allow. Canon Brooks shifts the focus to the Anglican Consultative Council [ACC], which has a written constitution, unanimously adopted by the provinces of the Anglican Communion. Given that the proposed new structures have Communion-wide ramifications, it makes sense to consider what the constitution of the ACC does and does not allow.

Canon Brooks concludes that only the ACC can expel the Episcopal Church, and it would require a constitutional amendment ratified by the General Synods of two-thirds of the provinces. In other words, 26 of the synods in Anglican Communion provinces would have to vote to expel the Episcopal Church.

This article has been linked to elsewhere and comments about it from a conservative perspective can be read here and from a liberal perspective here.

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wikipedia and the Presiding Bishop

The Church Times followed up on the 18 August report in the Independent Wikipedia and the art of censorship by publishing a short item last week, now on the web, authored by me, Jefferts Schori in the dark on Wikipedia edit.

Episcopal News Service picked this up and published Presiding Bishop unaware of Wikipedia edit; allegations discredited.

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Virginia: two more news reports

From the Richmond Times-Dispatch
Ruling reversed in church dispute
Update and another version of this on Saturday, Judge reverses ruling to dismiss church lawsuits.

From the Falls Church News-Press
1st Court Ruling After Defections Favors Continuing Episcopalians

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Virginia: ADVA reacts to Friday's court hearing

The Anglican District of Virginia has at the time of posting not yet issued this press release. However the text of it does appear here instead.

Update A text has now appeared and it is not the same text. Here is the ADVA press release:Anglican District of Virginia Responds to Judge Bellows’ Decision to Dismiss Volunteers from Lawsuit

The earlier text is reproduced below the fold.

(more…)

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Virginia: reports of court hearing

Updated Sunday morning

Episcopal News Service reports that Court will use Church’s Constitution and Canons in deciding property disputes.

Virginia’s Fairfax Circuit Court ruled August 10 in favor of the Episcopal Church and the Diocese of Virginia in denying the claims of 11 separated congregations that the court should not consider the Church’s Constitution and Canons in deciding property disputes.

The congregations, in which a majority of members have voted to leave the Episcopal Church but continue to occupy its property, asked the court to dismiss the complaints of the Church and the diocese.

After hearing arguments by all parties, the judge overruled all but one part of the motions. The court dismissed the claims of the diocese for a judgment that the congregations had committed a trespass by holding onto the property. Such claims, the court ruled, should be pleaded separately…

And this:

Also on August 10, after hearing arguments on a motion to dismiss all the individual defendant vestry members, clergy, and trustees from the litigation, all of the parties agreed that they — together with the separated congregations — will be bound by whatever ruling the trial court makes regarding ownership of the real and personal property. Their agreement extends to any ruling on appeal.

According to the agreement, if the court rules in favor of the Episcopal Church and the diocese, an orderly transition with respect to all property would ensue. The Church and the diocese reserve the right, however, to seek an accounting of all monies spent by the departed congregations and bring the individual vestry members and clergy back into the litigation for that purpose.

There is another account of yesterday’s court session here: A Very Good Day.

A recent letter from the diocese (mentioned in the ENS report) can be found here.

Update Sunday morning:

There is still nothing yet posted on CANA or on ADVA websites about this.

The Diocese of Virginia now has this: Judge Overrules Motion to Dismiss Lawsuits:

Today in Fairfax Circuit Court, Judge Randy I. Bellows overruled a motion to dismiss lawsuits filed by The Diocese of Virginia and The Episcopal Church against 11 congregations that voted last year to leave The Episcopal Church and attempt to take Episcopal Church property.

The decision to overrule the motion to dismiss came at the end of a four-hour hearing in Courtroom 4-C. In addition, two-hours into the hearing, The Diocese of Virginia and The Episcopal Church agreed to allow individuals named in the lawsuits to be taken out of the suits on assurance that those individuals and their successors will be bound by the rulings of the court on diocesan and Church claims concerning property.

“Our only aim in including these individuals was to make sure the proper parties were before the court so that the relief and remedies we seek could be properly sought and obtained,” said Patrick Getlein, secretary of the Diocese. “The assurance to be bound by the rulings of the court achieves that objective.”

Those individuals whose names were removed today include the vestry and rector of each congregation. Trustees remain named in the suits only in their capacity as holders of title.

“We are pleased with today’s rulings and the agreement on removing the names of individuals from the suits. But by no means is the work here done,” said Mr. Getlein. “There are still individuals and congregations who have been dispossessed and literally locked out of their churches. Their exile continues.”

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Nigerian chaplaincy revisited

Thinking Anglicans first wrote about this topic back on 16 August 2006. Since then, I have written further to various CANA officials but I have never had any response from anyone.
The “About CANA” page has moved since last year, and is now to be found here. The second link to “Archbishop Peter Akinola himself says this elsewhere on the site” has now moved here.

Mark Harris returned to the subject yesterday in CANA and inventive storytelling. He writes:

I was surprised to read the following on the Convocation of Anglicans in North America website, on the page titled, “What is CANA”:

“ECUSA proved over and over again that it was unwilling to respect the faith of Anglican Nigerians by its divisive actions. One of these actions was that ECUSA unilaterally sacked the former Nigerian chaplain appointed to care for Anglican Nigerians in this country, the Rev. Canon Gordon Okunsanya. So, we can really say that ECUSA itself made the creation of CANA necessary. Necessity is truly the mother of invention.”

Necessity is actually the mother of inventive storytelling. I had thought that Thinking Anglican’s [sic] rather complete review of the matter might have caused CANA to change this bit of the story of their beginnings, particularly since CANA went to some trouble to revamp their web presence, but I guess not. Nothing has been done.

The idea that ECUSA made the creation of CANA necessary, on any basis having to do with the appointment of Canon Okunsanya, is rot.

Mark Harris also draws attention to the misinformation contained on the Frequently Asked Questions page of the CANA website:

Now CANA asks and then answers, in the Frequently Asked Questions section of its web site, “Is such an international connection unusual? (The connection is between CANA and Nigeria and their work in the US)

Not really. For more than 160 years (1607–1776), the first Anglicans in this country existed as a missionary outpost under the Bishop of London, England. After the American Revolution, the Church of Scotland [sic] consecrated Samuel Seabury in 1789 as the first bishop of the fledgling Episcopal Church. Most of the Anglican provinces in existence today started as the result of a similar missionary initiative. More recent provinces have had similar international sponsorship.”

Once again CANA needs to clean up its act: Minor points are overlooked… the Anglicans were not “a missionary outpost,” perhaps the clergy sent here by the missionary societies were missionaries. And, let’s see…oh yes, the Episcopal Church of Scotland [sic] did consecrate Samuel Seabury, but he was sent off to England and then went to Scotland having been elected by at least somebody in the US to some particular venue (Connecticut) where there was NO bishop in place. He was not a missionary from Scotland.

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Colorado Springs: church court verdict

Updated again Monday

From the Colorado Springs Gazette Church court: Armstrong guilty:

An ecclesiastical court on Wednesday convicted the Rev. Donald Armstrong of stealing nearly $400,000 from his Colorado Springs parish, though it cannot legally punish the breakaway pastor.

The court of the Episcopal Diocese of Colorado will decide in about a month, however, whether to recommend that Bishop Robert O’Neill defrock Armstrong, a largely symbolic action that would end all ties between the church and him.

From Episcopal News Service Former rector Don Armstrong found guilty of financial misconduct:

The Rev. Don Armstrong, former rector of Grace and St. Stephen’s Episcopal Church in Colorado Springs, has been found guilty on all counts of financial misconduct presented to an Ecclesiastical Court of the Diocese of Colorado that has been reviewing the evidence since July 31.

The preliminary judgment was made public August 8 by the five members of the Ecclesiastical Court who unanimously found Armstrong guilty of diverting $392,409 from the parish’s operating fund and committing tax fraud by not reporting $548,000 in non-salary income and benefits to state and federal tax authorities.

On other counts of misconduct, Armstrong has been found guilty of receiving illegal loans totaling $122,479.16 in violation of Diocesan Canons; unauthorized encumbrance and alienation of Grace Church’s real property; violation of the temporary inhibition placed on Armstrong; the improper use of clergy discretionary funds; and failure to maintain proper books of account.

Press release from the Diocese of Colorado here (PDF).

Updates

Associated Press Episcopal Court Issues Tentative Verdict

Rocky Mountain News Episcopal court finds pastor guilty of theft

Living Church Guilty Verdict in Colorado Misconduct Case

Friday
Colorado Springs Gazette Springs police looking into possible embezzlement at Grace Church and, later, Police look into Grace funds.

Monday update
Denver Post Cops investigate theft report (Saturday article)

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Arora rebukes Anderson

The Archbishop of York’s Adviser on Communications, Arun Arora has responded to an article in the Church of England Newspaper, written by The Rev. Canon David C. Anderson, who is President, American Anglican Council and Secretary of the Anglican Communion Network.

Arun Arora’s response can be found on the archbishop’s website: Why Canon Anderson Got it Wrong.

Anglican Mainstream has linked to this response with the headline: York Diocesan website posts swingeing rebuttal of Anderson, Phillips.

Here are the links to the articles by David Phillips which are also mentioned:
Telegraph reports Sentamu saying sexual ethics are not core issues
Archbishop Sentamu on Unity

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Mark Lawrence re-elected

Episcopal News Service reports that South Carolina re-elects Mark Lawrence as bishop.

The Very Rev. Mark Lawrence was re-elected as bishop of the Episcopal Diocese of South Carolina August 4 at a special electing convention held at St. James Church on St. James Island, South Carolina. Lawrence was the only candidate in the election since no petitions to add other names to the slate were received by the July 11 deadline…

The diocesan website announcement is here:

The Diocese re-elected the Very Rev. Mark J. Lawrence as the 14th Bishop of the Diocese of South Carolina, August 4, at a special called election at St. James Church, James Island. Mark, had been previously elected by the diocese in September of 2006, but that election was declared null and void by the Presiding Bishop in March of 2007.

Prior to the election, a service of Holy Eucharist, Rite I, was celebrated. The Rev. Steve Wood, Rector of St. Andrew’s Mt. Pleasant, challenged those present to engage the culture with the gospel, and not stand apart from it.

Fifty eight congregations were represented with 201 lay delegates and 82 priests. In a vote by orders, 78 clergy voted for Mark Lawrence, with two abstentions. Missions cast seven yes votes, with one half deputation divided. Among congregations, forty-three yes votes were received, with three congregations voting no and one abstention.

Once the vote, re-electing Lawrence was announced the congregation voiced their pleasure with applause.

And here is an eyewitness account of the event from the Living Church, No Surprises, Much Rejoicing.

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Virginia: bishop removes 21 clergy

Updated again Saturday

The Bishop of Virginia has removed 21 priests from the ordained ministry of The Episcopal Church.

See the full details here: Inhibited Clergy Released from Obligations of Priesthood:

Yesterday, in an official act observed by two presbyters of The Diocese of Virginia and with the advice and consent of the diocesan Standing Committee, the Rt. Rev. Peter James Lee took the required canonical action to remove from the priesthood clergy inhibited by him on January 22, 2007. Those clergy were inhibited following a determination by the diocesan Standing Committee January 18 that they had abandoned the Communion of The Episcopal Church. The possibility of such a determination was explained by the Bishop in a December 1, 2006 letter to the clergy and leadership of the now-former Episcopal congregations. By this action, the former Episcopal clergy are “released from the obligations of Priest or Deacon and … deprived of the right to exercise the gifts and spiritual authority conferred in Ordination.”

In addition to losing their capacity to officiate in Episcopal churches or in any manner as Episcopal priests, the former Episcopal clergy lose their capacity to contribute to pension plans begun during their time as Episcopal priests and any other benefits of service as Episcopal priests or employees of Episcopal churches or institutions. Pension benefits accrued to this point will remain payable…

The names listed do not include Martyn Minns who was earlier consecrated a bishop in the Church of Nigeria (Anglican Communion). In a letter dated October 2, Bishop Lee wrote:

…On August 20, 2006, the Rt. Rev. Martyn Minns was consecrated a bishop in the Church of Nigeria. That act established his canonical residence in Nigeria and ended his canonical residence in the Diocese of Virginia. Consequently, as a Bishop from another province of the Anglican Communion, Martyn’s ability to function in any jurisdiction other than Nigeria, where he is canonically resident, requires that he be licensed by the Bishop with oversight.

…I have licensed Martyn to serve as priest-in-charge of Truro church through January 1, 2007. The details of the license also establish that Martyn will perform no episcopal acts in the Diocese of Virginia through January 1, 2007 and that Martyn will exercise his ministry in compliance with the Constitution and Canons of The Episcopal Church and The Diocese of Virginia.

The Anglican District of Virginia, an “association of Anglican congregations in Virginia”, has responded. See ADV Responds to the Bishop of Virginia’s Announcement to Depose Former Clergy.

ADV describes itself thus:

ADV is currently comprised of 19 member congregations, 15 of which are under the ecclesiastical authority of the Bishop of CANA, The Right Reverend Martyn Minns, and four of which are ecclesiastical members under direct authority of other Anglican Archbishops, strongly supported by ADV members.

The Anglican Communion Network has responded. See Bishops will continue in ministry with Virginia priests:

…The Rt. Rev. Keith Ackerman of the Episcopal Diocese of Quincy, the Rt. Rev. Peter Beckwith of the Episcopal Diocese of Springfield, the Rt. Rev. Robert Duncan of the Episcopal Diocese of Pittsburgh, the. Rt. Rev. Jack Iker of the Episcopal Diocese of Fort Worth and the Rt. Rev. John David Schofield of the Episcopal Diocese of San Joaquin have issued the following statement:

“In conscience we must remain in relationship and ministry with these priests, and the many others who have had this canon used against them because of their determination to stand with mainstream Anglicanism. As bishops, we ordain priests for the whole church. Surely we overstep our bounds when we attempt to decide for the whole church that a priest’s ministry is ended because he is no longer under our authority.

“Because these Virginia priests are priests in good standing in the Provinces of Uganda and Nigeria, respectively, the deposition is, in fact, of no effect. Each is recognized as a priest in good standing of the Anglican Communion. Therefore we welcome them to exercise their sacerdotal ministries in our Dioceses. Though we continue to work and pray for a charitable disengagement, actions such as this only make our relationships with each other more difficult and divided.”

Julia Duin has this report in the Washington Times Episcopal bishop ejects clergy.

Updated Saturday morning
Associated Press Priests reject Virginia Episcopal bishop’s sanctions
Living Church Network Bishops Pledge Solidarity With Virginia Clergy

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Colorado Springs: more reports

The Living Church has Brief Testimony in Presentment Trial of Colorado Priest.

Episcopal News Service has COLORADO: Evidence presented against former Colorado Springs rector.

Update Thursday afternoon
Colorado Springs Independent Armstrong a no-show at his own church trial.

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Colorado Springs: church court hearing

Updated Wednesday evening

The Diocese of Colorado has been holding an ecclesiastical court hearing to consider what action should be taken in the case of The Revd Donald Armstrong.

Jean Torkelson in the Rocky Mountain News has Episcopal priest’s case goes to church court and Episcopal lawyer slams Armstrong at hearing.

Colleen Slevin of Associated Press has Panel To Decide Case Against Armstrong.

Ed Sealover in the Colorado Springs Gazette has Episcopals may revoke Armstrong’s ordination.

All this is separate from the property dispute which is what the Denver Post is focused on in Theology battle rocks Springs church, world by Electa Draper.

The two congregations involved have websites:
The Episcopal Church congregation is here.
The CANA congregation is here.

Update
Another two reports:

Jean Torkelson Rocky Mountain News Spotlight hotter for ex-rector:

…The whistle-blower who entangled the Rev. Don Armstrong in allegations of misusing hundreds of thousands of dollars in church money was the parish bookkeeper, an attorney said Tuesday…

Electa Draper Denver Post Rebel priest spurns hearing

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Network council meeting decisions

Updated Wednesday afternoon

Doug LeBlanc reports further in the Living Church :Revised Network Charter Retains Clause Acceding to TEC Constitution.

Delegates to the annual council meeting of the Anglican Communion Network declined removing the organization from under the authority of the constitution of the General Convention of The Episcopal Church during a plenary session July 31.

The proposal would have deleted language from the group’s organizational charter that the Network “shall operate in good faith within the Constitution of the Episcopal Church.”

Instead, the council adopted a bylaws resolution that says Network affiliates outside The Episcopal Church are not required to submit to the constitution of The Episcopal Church.

The decision followed a plea by the Rt. Rev. James Stanton, Bishop of Dallas, that the council not act prematurely. Bishop Stanton pointed out that the General Conventions of 1964 and 1967 defined The Episcopal Church as a constituent member of the Anglican Communion.

Press releases issued include:
Network States Willingness to “Engage in Mediation” with National Church
Bishop Duncan Re-elected Network Moderator
Council Ratifies Common Cause Structural Document
Network Approves Common Cause Theological Statement

One reaction to all this can be found in Ephraim Radner: A Brief Statement of Resignation from the Anglican Communion Network.

George Conger has a picture of all the bishops.

Update
Doug LeBlanc has a further Living Church report, Archbishop Venables Challenges ‘Curia’ Characterization:

During a press conference after the Anglican Communion Network’s two-day council meeting, the Most Rev. Gregory Venables of the Province of the Southern Cone challenged the notion among some Episcopalians that the primates are claiming curial powers for themselves.

Because Anglicans worldwide are led by locally elected bishops, he said, “Common sense and biblical concepts would say that the primates are at that highest level of authority, along with the Archbishop of Canterbury.”

The Rt. Rev. Jack L. Iker, Bishop of Fort Worth, said the primates’ increased authority is in direct response to Resolution III.6 of the 1998 Lambeth Conference. That resolution said, in part, that the primates’ meeting should “include among its responsibilities positive encouragement to mission, intervention in cases of exceptional emergency which are incapable of internal resolution within provinces, and giving of guidelines on the limits of Anglican diversity in submission to the sovereign authority of Holy Scripture and in loyalty to our Anglican tradition and formularies.”

“The progressives dismiss everything that Lambeth says,” the Rt. Rev. Robert Duncan, Bishop of Pittsburgh, said…

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Pittsburgh diocese plans for change

As Steve Levin of the Pittsburgh Post-Gazette reports today, the Diocese of Pittsburgh has launched a Web site to provide resources for parishes and individuals “in deciding how to go forward.”

Read the newspaper report here: Episcopal diocese launches Web site to chart options.

The new website is Parish Toolbox and here is the press release about it on the official diocesan website.

Meanwhile, the Bishop of Pittsburgh’s speech at the Anglican Communion Network annual council meeting in Ft Worth, Texas is reported by Doug LeBlanc writing in the Living Church this way:

“The American province is lost and something will have to replace it,” said Bishop Duncan, who has served as the Network’s elected moderator for three and a half years…

Bishop Duncan expressed his disappointment that the Archbishop of Canterbury has not supported Network members in ways that he and other Network leaders had hoped.

“Never, ever has he spoken publicly in defense of the orthodox in the United States,” Bishop Duncan said of the Most Rev. Rowan Williams, adding that “the cost is his office.

“To lose that historic office is a cost of such magnitude that God must be doing a new thing,” he said.

A reporter for The Living Church asked Bishop Duncan to expand on his remarks about the cost of the archbishop’s office. “I was actually expanding on a remark that the Archbishop of Sydney made during a breakfast I had with him two weeks ago,” Bishop Duncan said, explaining that both the See of Canterbury and the Lambeth Conference have been lost as instruments of communion.

“The fact is that the Archbishop of Canterbury has not led in a way that might have saved his office and might have saved Lambeth,” Bishop Duncan said.

He cited the willingness of presidents Abraham Lincoln and Franklin Roosevelt to go further than the law allowed during times of national crisis.

“In this crisis, we’ve had no leader to lead,” he said. Asked if he thought that being in communion with the Archbishop of Canterbury was essential to being Anglican, Bishop Duncan said that being obedient to scripture is of greater importance than being recognized by Canterbury.

For the full text of what Bishop Duncan said, see here.

See also an earlier Living Church report by Steve Waring: Bishop Duncan: Fall HOB Meeting is Windsor Bishops’ ‘Last Stand’

And also, see an earlier report, with a lot more background information, by Fr Jake Pittsburgh Continues Plans to Split.

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Rewriting History

Ekklesia has published Re-writing History: the Episcopal Church struggle.

In the global intra-Anglican ‘wars’ about sexuality, biblical interpretation, authority and church polity, The Episcopal Church (TEC) in the USA has been singled out from other Anglican provinces and subjected to harsh criticism and threats of expulsion. Why is this? What are the underlying issues about the use of Scripture and other questions which explain why TEC is such a bone of contention? Can Christians learn to handle differences in more creative ways which honour the life-giving Gospel message they are supposed to exemplify?

To read this new report and analysis from Ekklesia associate Savitri Hensman in PDF format go here.

For a nine point summary of the report go here.

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The Common Cause of a Common Light

The Reverend Dr. Ephraim Radner, a member of the Covenant Design Group, and currently Rector of the Church of the Ascension, Pueblo, Colorado, USA but soon to become professor of historical theology at Wycliffe College, Toronto, Canada has written a paper, published at the ACI website, entitled The Common Cause of a Common Light. Here’s how it starts:

The movement towards a separated North American Anglican church, aligned perhaps with one part of the Anglican Communion and not another, appears to be gaining steam. The focus of the Anglican Communion Network’s official leadership has shifted perceptibly towards this goal, overtly transferring its energies from its work as a coalition of American traditionalist bishops working representatively with the larger Communion, to the strategy of a “Common Cause” formation of a new ecclesial structure that would function either as a new Anglican Communion province, or as a province in a new alternative Anglican Communion. Regular consultation among Network bishops has diminished in frequency, while the work on Common Cause has demanded new and steadier communication.

Is this shift of energies positive? As a founding member of the Network, I would urge more open discussion about this. Indeed, it is a discussion that has not taken place in any organized, illuminated, and Communion-wide basis, and it needs to, quickly and honestly and without rancor. Obviously, the topic has long been a staple of blog debate. But however informative such debate can be, it is not a substitute for common prayer, discussion, and discernment as a Body in the Lord. Indeed, most bloggers are anonymous or pseudonymous, their representative roles blurred or hidden, and their actual numbers limited by the psychological demands of the genre. Yet, from Lambeth to North America to Africa, much that we know about the hopes and strategies of the coming months comes only on internet discussions culled from partially leaked memos, recorded off-hand comments, indirect interviews, secret informants, and pure speculation. And on this basis people declare their allegiances! The Anglican Church is longing for an open council, un-manipulated by guile and passion; yet what we are getting instead are the sparks of competing political strategies that have the effect of inculcating ecclesial passivity drunk on anxiety.

It’s worth reading right through, despite a problem with its formatting which one hopes will be fixed soon.

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Network annual meeting and statistics

The American body named Network of Anglican Communion Dioceses and Parishes also known as the Anglican Communion Network will hold its Annual Council Meeting on 30-31 July at St Matthew’s Cathedral in Bedford Texas, which is near Fort Worth. Here is the official announcement:

Over 80 representatives of the Anglican Communion Network will gather at St. Vincent’s Cathedral in Bedford, Texas for two full days July 30–31 for the Network’s Annual Council Meeting. This will be the third meeting of its kind since the birth of the Network in March 2004. The Bible teacher for the meeting will be the Most Rev. Greg Venables, Archbishop of the Southern Cone.

The press is welcome to attend plenary sessions of the council meeting. Press credentials can be obtained by registering online at www.regonline.com/annualcouncil2007. Suzanne Gill, Director of Communications for the Network Diocese of Fort Worth, will be coordinating press on site and can be reached at (817) 244–2885. The meeting is otherwise closed to the public.

And here is this morning’s report in the Fort Worth Star-Telegram:

Episcopalians’ struggle comes home

Area residents will get a close-up look this month at the decades-long rift that is continuing to tear apart the 2.3 million-member Episcopal Church.

About 80 representatives of the Anglican Communion Network, of which Fort Worth Bishop Jack Iker is a leading member, will meet July 30-31 in Bedford at St. Vincent’s Cathedral.

The network — formed three years ago by Episcopal members appalled by church actions such as the 2003 consecration of openly gay Bishop Gene Robinson of New Hampshire — likely will be a sounding board for more attacks on leadership of the U.S. church.

Strengthening dissent

The Rev. Ryan Reed, dean of the Bedford cathedral, said network representatives will discuss how to work more closely with other conservative Anglican groups. Archbishop Greg Venables, a conservative who leads the Anglican province that includes Venezuela and Bolivia, is the main speaker. Some sessions are not open to the public, but general gatherings are open.

The Anglican Communion Network and similar conservative groups contend that the American church no longer represents those abiding by the historic faith.

The network, based in Pittsburgh, represents 200,000 laity and 2,200 clergy in the U.S., said the Rev. Daryl Fenton, chief executive. It has 10 member dioceses, including Dallas and Fort Worth, and also has alliances with some 40 smaller U.S. Anglican groups that have left the Episcopal Church in opposition of what they say are departures from biblical Christianity by Episcopal leadership…

Back in December 2006, TA published this article: What size is NACDAP really? which included this:

The American Network of Anglican Communion Dioceses and Parishes or Anglican Communion Network has published this map, showing at the time of writing a total of 737 parishes that are said to be affiliated with them in some way.

Curiously though, the same website also says:

We are currently ten dioceses and six convocations stretching from coast to coast, border to border. As of January 2005, ACN dioceses and parishes count 200,000 Episcopal Christians in more than 800 congregations, and the number of affiliated parishes grows weekly.

The map on the ACN website now lists a total of 845 “parishes” though from an English perspective “congregations” would be a more accurate term to describe them. Nevertheless the claims made by Daryl Fenton above are identical to the now updated page of the ACN website quoted previously which currently says:

We are currently ten dioceses, six convocations and the international conference stretching from coast to coast, border to border. As of January 2007, ACN dioceses and parishes count 200,000 laity and 2,200 clergy in more than 900 congregations, and the number of affiliated parishes grows weekly. We have received support throughout the Anglican Communion, including encouragement from the Archbishop of Canterbury. Fourteen leaders of the international Anglican Communion, representing 75 percent of the world’s 60 million Anglicans, have offered their recognition and pledged the full weight of their ministries to the Anglican Communion Network.

There are clearly a number of inconsistencies in these claims. An earlier attempt to get to the bottom of the numbers claimed by the Network was done in February this year: A Modest Analysis of NACDAP’s “Anglicans in the United States” by Lionel Deimel, Joan Gundersen, and Christopher Wilkins. You can read that here. The data provided to the primates in Dar es Salaam by Bishop Robert Duncan can be read in this PDF file here.

See also Let’s do the numbers and also NPR has fun with numbers at epiScope.

And much more recently, on 29 June, epiScope had this comment on the slightly different issue of counting “breakaway” churches:

…there may be 250 congregations within the continental United States that claim to answer to various Anglican bishops in Africa and Latin America—but that’s not the same thing as “up to 250 of the 7,000 congregations in the U.S. church.”

The numbers, as we’ve said before, are hard to pin down, because—as we all know—”congregations don’t leave, people do.” The vast majority of the congregations listed under foreign bishops appear to be fledgling “new church plants” meeting in homes and hotels, not established, full-bore, paid-up TEC parishes.

In fact, so far your editor has found less than a dozen TEC congregations that were officially listed by their dioceses as “closed” when a significant group chose to depart and re-form as an “Anglican” congregation. (More later; watch this space!) The rest remain open as TEC congregations, in many cases greatly renewing their mission and ministry in the absence of the controversy du jour.

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Anglican Covenant: American response process

Those who felt uncomfortable about the process which the General Synod approved last Sunday for the Church of England to respond to the ACO about the Draft Anglican Covenant may be interested in this.

Nine members of the Episcopal Church’s Executive Council (which is somewhat similar in function to the CofE’s Archbishops’ Council) have been appointed to draft the Church’s response to the first version of an Anglican covenant. None of them are bishops.

Presiding Bishop Katharine Jefferts Schori and House of Deputies President Bonnie Anderson made the appointments. The nine members of the Covenant Response Drafting Group are:

  • Rosalie Simmonds Ballentine (Diocese of the Virgin Islands) Chair
  • Kim Byham (Newark),
  • The Rev. Dr. Lee Alison Crawford (Vermont),
  • The Rev. Dr. Ian T. Douglas (Massachusetts)
  • Canon Victoria L. Garvey (Chicago)
  • The Rev. Canon Mark Harris (Delaware)
  • The Rev. Winnie S. Varghese (New York)
  • Ted M. Yumoto (San Joaquin)
  • Belton T. Zeigler (Upper South Carolina)

The group is charged with writing a proposed response of the Executive Council to the draft Anglican covenant for the council, to be considered at its October 2007 meeting in Dearborn, Michigan. Anderson said that the drafting group will also “design a process for continuing to gather input from the entire Episcopal Church to aid the Executive Council in its response to subsequent covenant drafts.”

More detail here.

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South Carolina election: no extra candidates

From the Diocese of South Carolina website:

No Petition Candidates Submitted for Bishop’s Election

The deadline for the submission of petition candidates for the Bishop’s Election of the Diocese of South Carolina has come and gone. No petitions were submitted.

The special Bishop’s Election, as previously called by the Standing Committee on June 9, will be begin at 10:00 am on August 4, 2007 at St. James Church, James Island. Registration of clergy and lay delegates will begin at 8:00 am. Immediately following the celebration of Holy Communion the convention will convene to elect the XIV Bishop of South Carolina. We request that each mission and parish submit the names of their specially elected lay delegates to the Diocesan office as soon as possible.

The Rev. J. Haden McCormick
President, Standing Committee

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