Musings after Repose

Well, I’m back from Convocation, none the worse for the restful time, but facing all of the usual residua to which that meeting gives rise: photos, videos, minutes, reports, updates, usw.

Meanwhile, over at the Old HoBD Corral, I’ve been having a discussion on the Prevailing Issue, and why it (discussion) is so difficult. I’ve observed that many among the “Reasserter” side of things seem content to reassert what they believe to be the True Answer to the problem; and rarely seem willing to discuss the issue in anything approaching a rational argument, moving from agreed upon premises to conclusions in logical steps. As the name implies, they usually articulate a reassertion of the premise/conclusion in circular form. And that is a logical fallacy. (It may be true, but it is illogical).

If this leaves us at an impasse, it is because the reasserters are unwilling to “do the theology,” as they often accuse the progressive / reappraiser side of doing. In fact, what I’m suggesting is we all need to do some reappraising together. When folks simply forbid reappraisal, we end up with a situation such as that in the Roman Catholic Church, which in regard to the ordination of women has confessed that the theological rationale of previous years was insufficient, and recognized that the more recent theological arguments were tending towards dodgy ground; and so finally ruled, “End of discussion.”)

In our situation, I think it is more helpful to engage the issue, as indeed I have gone to pains to do in Reasonable and Holy: to look at the various tele* or goods of marriage, as variously defined in the tradition, to see if a same-sex couple is capable of achieving those ends or enjoying those goods. It is, it appears to me after my study, possible to answer that question in the affirmative.

It is also helpful to look at the larger question, “What is the telos of the human being?” — about which there is considerable consensus in the Christian tradition, from both sides of the Catholic/Protestant divide: to know, love, serve and glorify God and to enjoy him for ever. And we have been taught that we achieve or thwart that end in connection to how we treat other human beings, likewise made in the image of God. This is why the theology of the imago Dei, and the recent distortions in that theology (in an unwise attempt to frame a theological defense of traditional marriage) are so important.

Now, this is not to place all of the blame on one side. Much of the argument on both sides has consisted in people talking past each other, mouthing their conclusions and waving their catch-phrases as if they were self-evident truths. This is why I try to engage people in going back to the first principles upon which we actually agree and then working forward in stepwise fashion, to see where we might end up. This necessitates a willingness to adopt up front the Anglican doctrine of humility: that we have no doubt erred, and may well err again.

For some on both sides, as well, the topic is ended, the book closed, there is no further reason for discussion. In the face of that reality, there can be any amount of dust shaken from plenty of heels, a parting of the ways — or a willingness to agree to disagree. Many in the Anglican Communion seem willing to adopt that kind of “watchful waiting” approach; it seems to be the hope of the Archbishop of Canterbury (more on this later) and the sense of “moratoria” (instead of “prohibitions”). Still, even in holding out this possibility for change Canterbury and the communion moderates are offending both those who want to see the church adopt an amended view on The Subject, and those who see such an adoption, or even its entertainment, as departure from the faith once given.

One of my interlocutors at HoBD suggested I was unwilling to adopt “first principles” myself, but I suggested that what he was offering as premises looked like conclusions to me. I rejoined that to find common ground we must get behind those conclusions to find something more basic. He offered one such principle, upon which I can agree as a basis for discussion, a classical concept well in keeping with the style of first principles: “The scriptures are ‘God’s word written’ and therefore normative for matters of salvation and Christian life.”

Although this statement itself requires a good bit of unpacking (and I look to Richard Hooker for the classical version of that task) it is something I can and do fully accept and affirm. In similar language it forms part of the Lambeth unpacking of Chicago’s Quadrilateral.

Where he and I part company is not on this fundamental premise, but on the conclusions we draw from it. So examining the arguments by which we reach these conclusions, the logical steps and inferences (and the related and sometimes unstated premises upon which they rely), would be a helpful form of engagement. Of primary importance is getting those other unstated premises out on the table. Sometimes these unstated premises are seen to be self-evident, but my experience is that they form another part of the obstacle to clear thinking.

One of the things we clearly disagree about is not whether the Scripture is a “normative” (I prefer the old language of “sufficient”) guide to salvation and moral living, but whether Scripture actually addresses The Issue upon which we disagree: is same-sex marriage possible, and if so, is it moral?

These are not easy questions, and any argument from Scripture or Reason or Tradition is going to be complex, as there is no explicit prohibition (or approbation) of same-sex marriage in Scripture; Reason alone is unlikely to provide a clear answer acceptable to those who think Scripture is clear; and Tradition, while generally tending one way, is also mixed. This is why a glib conclusion, either way, while tempting, will not settle the argument.

I am content to continue the discussion. As a starter, I want to comment briefly on one of the unspoken corollary premises of the reasserter position: that Genesis offers us a “one size fits all” divine pattern for all human sexual relations.

I address this assertion at some length in R&H, as well as the discontinuities of this premise with significant aspects of the tradition, but I want to raise an additional question here, concerning taking Genesis as a template at all, that is, questioning the very premise. Why is Genesis seen as a template for all sexual relations but not for any or all other human activities? Why, for example, do we allow other forms of industry than agriculture? (Given that was Cain’s metier and industry was the invention of the offspring of Lamech’s polygamous unions.) Why do we allow women to use anaesthesia in childbirth? (Roundly opposed on biblical grounds in the Victorian era, until Victoria herself made use of it.) Why aren’t we all vegetarians? (Yes, I know God changed the rules in Genesis 9, but if we were so keen on living in accord with God’s original intent, vegetarianism is the most biblical answer.) More importantly, Why, if the subjection of women to their husbands is a result of the fall, has it taken the church so long to recognize women as restored to their antelapsarian state as equal collaborators?

These seem to be to be questions worthy of reflection in opposition to the view that the patterns laid out in Genesis are necessarily the only options available to the children of Adam and Eve, the children of God and siblings of Christ.

However, if there is no willingness to engage these questions, if we are simply at a standoff — none of us able to convince the other of the truth of our position, or even to discuss the matter with some degree of mutual care and willingness to perhaps change our minds — then our challenge is to see if we are able to live together in harmonious disagreement, and wait for time itself slowly to winnow truth. I am certainly willing to do so, as I think there are far more important matters facing us, about which we do have significant agreement, and our efforts and resources would be well spent in their pursuit. Such as the mission of the church to restore people to unity with each other and God in Christ.

Tobias Stanislas Haller BSG

---

* A helpful correction from Bill Carroll

Huntington’s Way

Today is the centenary of William Reed Huntington. The Anglican Communion might well take a leaf from his book — or any of his books — in order to address its present squabbles. Huntington was as interested in consensus as any of us today, but he realized that we are very unlikely to achieve consensus on everything. Instead he set apart four basic points of reference for unity: the four points that go to make up the well-known Chicago-Lambeth Quadrilateral.

The chief dilemma facing the Anglican Communion today is our lack of common mind on certain questions of sexuality. In spite of the assertions that Lambeth 1.10 represented a consensus or a common mind, both the intensity of the debate and the politics surrounding its adoption, as well as the significantly divided vote, indicate at most a majority view not a consensus; and had the resolution been divided and voted on clause by clause, I am convinced that the vote on certain of them would have been even closer. Had it not been for the countervailing weight provided by the promise of "listening," I have no doubt that some who ended up voting for the resolution would have opposed it. We are now 10 years on and I do not believe the same resolution would have been adopted by as wide a margin.

So our present divisions come from moving beyond the issues upon which we do have consensus by raising particular items of pastoral theology to the level of dogmatic theology. And, for those who have raised the issue, it isn't about Scripture (one of Huntington's four points) or even primarily the authority of Scripture, but the interpretation of Scripture, and the weight the church chooses to give to those interpretations (which is really what authority means as a fact on the ground.)

Ultimately it comes down to the principles around which consensus will be centered. It is always "consensus on or about what?" Approximately half of the Anglican Communion does not see the sexuality issue as Communion-dividing, even among some who do not agree on a progressive trend on that topic. The other half do see this as worth dividing over --- some more permanently than others.

So there is no consensus even on whether this is a matter over which we must divide.

Can we maintain some form of Communion in spite of that lack of consensus on these particular issues? Do we even have a consensus that an Anglican Communion (as it has long been understood — a fellowship of autonomous provinces or churches in communion with the see of Canterbury) ought to continue? Those who think we can't or shouldn't, won't. Those who are willing to accommodate each other will.

The question — as with marriage — isn't, how do you hold together when you agree? It is, how do you remain together when you don't agree? Those who think, misunderstanding Amos, that you cannot remain together unless you agree (KJV; Hebr: make an appointment), appear to be making their choice to walk apart. They do not want to remain together "for better, for worse" but only when all agree with them on all on which they alone deem agreement to be vital.

The Communion and the church cannot long survive such self-fulfilling prophets. Only those committed to each other with a depth of toleration and charity — in spite of disagreements — will form the basis of the future Anglican Communion.

Tobias Stanislas Haller BSG

Comprehending that Wonderful and Sacred Mystery

I commend to your attention a statement on the nature of the church, with guideposts to its stability, growth, and mission, found at a new blog aptly named Comprehensiveness for the Sake of Truth. It provides a stable foundation for further building.

As I have reflected in the past, the only way to be sure we have comprehended truth is to lay hold of the One who is Truth. That comprehension is as much if not more so a matter of love than of knowledge. However wide the reach of our embrace, our ultimate hope is to fall into the outstretched arms of a loving God.

I invite you to read the document, which serves as an expansion of the Lambeth Quadrilateral with the addition of two more points of reference (our common liturgy and mission).

Tobias Stanislas Haller BSG

ps. at the end of the statement is a link to send an email to subscribe your name, parish and diocese.

Thought for 04.28.09

(inspired by a comment in the previous thread — thanks, Fred!)

The Insufficient Quad

The Lambeth Quadrilateral, though originally conceived as a tool to broaden the reach of ecumenical relations between Anglicans and other Christians, eventually came to be seen as a helpful tool in ordering our own Anglican household. It has not proven to be sufficient for some in this regard.

• They not only want (rightly) to give pride of place to the Scriptures, but the their specific understanding of the Scriptures.
• They also want to add to the credenda items in the past uniformly held to be questions of pastoral theology, not dogmatic or systematic theology.
• They want to place extra emphasis on two of the sacramental rites (marriage and ordination) rather than focusing on the two Dominical sacraments.
• And finally, they do not want to respect one specific local adaptation in the office of bishop to meet the needs of particular communities.

Tobias Stanislas Haller BSG

William Reed Huntington

Today is the transferred feast of William Reed Huntington, the 99th anniversary of his death. He was renowned for a number of his writings and his patience as a pastor and teacher. Perhaps best known as the creator of the Chicago-Lambeth Quadrilateral, he was an optimist about the possibilities of the church holding varying views together in dynamic tension. I don't know what he would say about our present state of affairs, other than to deplore the divisions and to appeal for unity in spite of differences of opinion. Here is a brief passage from his 1891 book, Popular Misconceptions of the Episcopal Church, from the chapter, "That it is a house divided against itself..."

The great need of American Christianity is unification. The civil system of the country has been so knit together that we are able proudly to declare it "an indestructible Union of the indestructible States." Our commercial system also has become so completely welded, part with part, as to defy breakage. It is in the ecclesiastical system alone that we note the mortifying lines of fracture. One people as respects the administration of law, one people as respects the transaction of business, we are still many peoples as respects the endeavor to win supremacy for the faith of Christ. In religion, disintegration is our curse.

The new consciousness beginning to dawn in the heart and mind of the Episcopal Church is the consciousness of a special call to play an intercessory and mediatorial part in the needed work of a general reconciliation. What makes it possible for an Episcopalian to take this line of remark, without subjecting himself to any just charge of arrogance, is the fact that he bases his peace-making effort wholly upon historical, and not at all upon personal grounds. He does not say, "Trust us as reconcilers because our ecclesiastics are so much more astute, our theologians so much more profound, and our communicant members so much more devout, than yours." He simply says: "Look at the history of Anglican religion, as a history, and judge for yourselves whether it do not give evidence of a greater power of inclusiveness, a more promising facility at comprehending a large variety of types, both of character and of action, than any rival system..."
. . . . .
The unity of which American Christians are in search is a "live and let live" unity. They perceive that the shutting-out policy is what has brought us to our present broken estate. What they are reaching after is the Church that shall be intolerant of these two things, and of only these two things — first, wickedness; secondly, the denial of what is confessedly central to the faith. Purity of character, as estimated by the ethical standards of the New Testament; purity of belief, as tested by the primitive Creeds — these are the only points upon which a united American Church would find it needful to insist.

But the overtures ventured by the Episcopal Church in the matter of unity are met with merciless ridicule, on the ground that the theological divergences and party differences within its own borders are so marked as to have become notorious. "Physician, heal thyself!" Is the not unnatural rejoinder of those to whom Churchmen address their affectionate invitations to reunion.

I propose to meet this rejoinder by taking the ground that it is the existence of these very divergences alleged, and the continuance of their existence within the Anglican Communion, that gives to that communion its best right to make a plea it does....

I hope at some point to post the entire essay. For now, especially in light of the Lambeth Conference now in session, this should provide us enough food for thought.

Tobias Haller BSG

Thought for 06.30.08

Just as we Anglicans regard the Scripture as "sufficient for salvation"¹ so too we regard the Nicene Creed as "the sufficient statement of the Christian Faith."² Neither tells us everything about the world or the church, nor about God; but they tell us enough. Isn't it interesting that God, through and with the church, appears only to provide us enough daily bread to keep us hungry for the eventual enjoyment of the heavenly banquet?

---

1. Articles of Religion, VI
2. Chicago-Lambeth Quadrilateral

---

Tobias Haller BSG

On the Saint Andrews Draft

The Saint Andrews Draft Covenant represents a marked improvement over the earlier effort. Many of the concerns raised in response to the earlier draft have been addressed, and a number of the troublesome details have been eliminated. In particular, the first two sections of the draft place the theology of covenant on a stronger foundation. Section One’s appeal to the articles of the Chicago-Lambeth Quadrilateral — long accepted as the basis for intercommunion with traditions outside Anglicanism, and so all the more meaningful as a basis for communion within it — establishes recognizable and already agreeable boundaries. There will, of course, continue to be disagreements concerning exactly what constitutes an acceptable “pattern of Christian theological and moral reasoning and discipline that is rooted in and answerable to the teaching of Holy Scripture and the catholic tradition.” (1.2.2) But the same section’s emphasis on remaining in Eucharistic communion (1.2.3) and common pilgrimage (1.2.6) in spite of such disagreements shows a grasp of the irrevocable nature of communion.

The enduring nature of communion is eloquently laid out in Section Two: it is a gift of God (2.1.1) ordered towards and nourished by mission (2.1.2,3) in a program of action deriving from the Anglican Consultative Council’s mission strategy, itself clearly influenced by the Baptismal Covenant of the American Book of Common Prayer. (2.2)

Section Three begins well, charting out, in an essentially non-controversial manner, the collaborative and consultative structures that have evolved, and are currently in place, in the Anglican Communion. It is only with paragraph 3.2.5 that we begin to hear about threats to the unity so well established throughout the rest of the document. If unity derives from Christ, how is Christ divided? If unity is found in our mission, how is unity challenged if the mission continues to be carried out?

Section Three defines our present difficulties rather than actually solving them: What are we to do when a minority of provinces in the communion disagrees with the majority? The ultimate answer offered by this draft, soft-pedal it as much as one likes, is excision — the very thing one would have thought impossible if the communion truly were based in Christ, who is not, and cannot be, divided. This draft continues in the mode of a pre-nuptial agreement rather than a covenant of irrevocable commitment.

Thus the primary difficulty with this covenant lies in providing for the dissolution of the very communion it seeks to preserve. It is therefore our recommendation that the appendix and section 3.2.5 (and its subsections) be deleted. What remains would then be worthy of the name “Covenant” — a promise to remain together, united in Spirit and in Mission come what may.

— a statement from the General Convention Deputation of the Episcopal Diocese of New York

---

Communion and Church

It became apparent in comments on two of my previous posts that one of our difficulties in carrying on reasonable discussion lies in the different meanings given to words we are wont to use quite a bit. These are church and communion. In both cases the words are used in an ideal and a real sense — and this creates some of the difficulties I outlined in an earlier essay on that subject.

Thus people can speak of the church as the Body of Christ, of which all the baptized are members; but we can also speak of the various churches and even the “national or particular churches” — to say nothing of our parish churches! I can speak of the communion-in-Christ that belongs, indelibly, to every Christian; while at the same time acknowledging that theological or doctrinal divisions can lead to ruptures in the day-to-day communion of one Christian body with another.

I was being quite consciously (and perhaps uncharacteristically) idealistic when, in that previous post, I noted that communion in Christ (based on baptism) is inviolable. That does not mean that I do not recognize the existence of the breaches between believers. What it does mean is that I hold it as an article of faith that our divisions are secondary to our unity. Our ecclesiastical unity is recoverable precisely because our divisions, however deeply felt, are superficial wounds: no part of the body is completely cut off, however tenuous the connection with the whole. It is not just that one part of the body ought not say to any other, “I have no need of you,” but that one part of the body really can not make that judgment. (1 Cor 12:21) However disagreeable we may become, we are stuck with each other. Divorce is not allowed.

Just as the lapsed or even the apostate are not rebaptized upon their return to the life of faith, so to, I firmly believe, our divisions can be healed without recourse to a fundamental re-invention. What we are called upon to do, in the spirit of the Lambeth Quadrilateral, is to focus upon the elements of our identity that we recognize in each other, and celebrate them as a basis for unity even if we continue to disagree about secondary concerns.

Obviously there are doctrinal differences among Anglicans of different traditions, and even greater differences between Anglicans in general and Roman Catholics or Presbyterians or Methodists in general. These differences are real, and I by no means wish to minimize them more than is necessary. What I do want to do is put them in their proper perspective and focus upon the articles of faith that we share and affirm — among which is the principal of the dignity of baptism as incorporation in the mystical body of Christ, the Church.

I would like to suggest a term for this Church of shreds and patches, which, like it or not is the Church of which we all are members. In the spirit of the Church Militant, the Church Expectant, and the Church Triumphant, I would like to suggest we recognize that we are the Church Dissonant. And, through God’s grace, may we work to decrease the dissonance and promote harmony.

Tobias Haller BSG

---

The Voice of Reason... er, England

I was just reading through the Church of England’s response to the Draft Anglican Covenant, and was pleased to see that in a number of respects they raised some of the same red flags that I had. Among these is a sensitivity to the extent that the Primates or other Instruments have authority to intervene in the internal affairs of individual provinces. (The Church of England report on one hand seems to think this might be appropriate in extraordinary circumstances, but notes on the other that it simply wouldn’t do were England itself to become the object of such tender mercies. It depends upon whose unicorn and lion are being gored, I take it.)

However, there are a few truly odd sections in this response. The one that most surprised me was the objection to the language of section 2 paragraph 3

that it [the member Church] holds and duly administers the two sacraments ordained by Christ himself — Baptism and the Supper of the Lord — ministered with the unfailing use of Christ’s words of institution, and of the elements ordained by him

in raising the specter of the old battles over the number of the sacraments. But this clause is straight out of the Lambeth Quadrilateral; and hardly likely to create a fuss now if it hasn’t for 120 years!

Of greater concern is the pernicious doctrine alluded to in the first comment on the Preamble:

Are the churches of the Anglican communion, properly so called, the thirty eight national bodies that belong to the Communion or are they the dioceses of the Communion gathered round their diocesan bishops? This is not just a theoretical ecclesiological question, but also a practical one since it raises the question of whether the bodies that should subscribe to the Covenant are the national bodies or the dioceses. This issue does not require a revision of the text, but it is something that needs to be addressed.

You bet it does. This notion that the individual dioceses of a national church somehow relate directly to the Primate of All England is also suggested by His Nibs Himself in his letter to Bishop Howe. This novelty (apart from the invitations to Lambeth, which are of course the domain of the Archbishop) appears to have arisen as kind of Alexandrine Gordian Knot solution to the problem of “Windsor” bishops within “non-Windsor” churches — allowing them to remain somehow part of the Transcendental Anglican Communion even while the church of which they are a part is excluded or demoted.

This is indeed not just a theoretical question, but a very practical one, and it utterly undermines the concept of provincial identity (to say nothing of autonomy!). Let me say this just once more: while the sacramental fullness of the church subsists in the community of the faithful gathered around its bishop, the basic unit of the church is not the diocese, but the Province. The former is a matter of sacramental theology; the latter concerns church polity. And ignoring this distinction between the two is creating a great deal of confusion. If dioceses are free to affiliate without regard to their participation in a Province, why should not the diocese of London, for example, bypass its participation in the Province of Canterbury and affiliate with the Province of Jerusalem and the Middle East? Shall we end up with an Anglican Communion that is a patchwork of embassies on foreign ground?

This uneven performance even by the Church of England strengthens my misapprehensions about the Covenant Process as a solution to our presenting problem. While I am committed to seeing it through, I urge further caution and postponement of any final action on this matter at the upcoming Lambeth Conference. Let us work through this without rushing to Law as a solution when Charity seems weak. As I noted in a comment to the Diocese of NY response to the Covenant last spring:

How does a Covenant solve the problem? If folks are unwilling to abide by informal agreements, can they be expected to abide by a contract? The old idea that Philip Turner once advanced (vows empower people to keep them) is on the basis of prima facie evidence quite false. And speaking as a pastor, it would be unconscionable to advise an engaged couple who were having difficulties in their relationship to “go ahead and get married” — as if that would solve, rather than multiply, their problems.

Tobias Haller BSG

---

Plus ça change

There is an old saying about going away for a week and returning to find a changed world. Having been away for a week I find, upon my return, not so much a change as a continuation. Still, a few incidents have spiked above the background and I’d like to comment on them here.

The Church as Social Network

The Anglican Communion Network held a meeting at which it adopted a number of statements, most of them in the “continuation” mode as opposed to that of “change.” Part of that continuation is the gradual dis-entanglement of the Network from what its Moderator seems to be coming to regard as rather a lost cause. And that is what until now has been known as the Anglican Communion — the one with the Archbishop of Canterbury as first among equals. Protestations notwithstanding, the Network seems to be heading, along with the “Global South” towards the creation of a new and alternative Communion, no longer centered on Canterbury.

This has led one long time member of the Network, Dr. Ephraim Radner, to sever his relationship with it. I am not at all surprised, other than by how long it took Dr. Radner to see which way this particular convoy was heading. Dr. Radner, with whom I disagree on much but with whom I have had a number of helpful conversations over the years, represents what the hard-liners in the Network call the “Communion conservative” point of view. I suppose that I should call myself a “Communion progressive.” That is to say, both he and I see the Anglican Communion — in its historical form centered on Canterbury — as a gift to the church that is well worth preserving, imperfect and errant though it be. The Network seems instead to have adopted the Pure Society model for the church, in which unity is preserved only through allegiance to an agreed-upon and determinable truth.

A number of things strike me about this distinction. Classical Anglicanism, in the Elizabethan Settlement, represented comprehension rather than compromise: a capacity for sometimes strongly divergent views to be accommodated within a single household. Sometimes, as in the case of Eucharistic doctrine, this was managed by including opposing theories in equal measure. Sometimes, as with the doctrine of the Atonement, it was achieved by not singling out any one explanation for special recognition. Ultimately, as in the Lambeth Quadrilateral, a sense of commonality was achieved through a summary rather than a point by point exhaustive confessional list. (We have our Lord’s own example for the wisdom of this course, in the Summary of the Law as opposed to its detailed enumeration.) Rather like the clouds of quantum physics, the truth we proclaim is not yet collapsed into particular form, but is held to exist somewhere within the bounds the church has marked out as most probable. Our knowledge is incomplete, but sufficient.

The crucible of pluralism

It also strikes me that we are seeing, in the development of the Network, the final collapse of a geographical rootedness to the church. We are entering the world of the virtual church, the Church of the Five Faves, the church not of geographical and terrestrial space, but of affinity: Ecclesiastical MySpace.

It should not come as a surprise that this is happening in America. Although the Netherlands should be recognized as the antecedent for Christian pluralism, it was in America that disestablishment and separation of church and state were not only held to be foundational in principle, but gave to the adherents of the various sects all of the elbow room that Manifest Destiny could provide. As the preface to the first American Book of Common Prayer noted:

But when in the course of Divine Providence, these American States became independent with respect to civil Government, their ecclesiastical independence was necessarily included; and the different religious denominations of Christians in these States were left at full and equal liberty to model and organize their respective Churches, and forms of worship, and discipline, in such a manner as they might judge most convenient for their future prosperity...

Many of us, in the midst of this swirl of possibilities, have chosen to seek to hold to that earlier vision of Anglican comprehensiveness as opposed to sectarian divisiveness. We have seen the Anglican Communion as a way to remain united in essentials while allowing a tolerable variety on matters about which a complete consensus has either ceased to exist or has not yet emerged.

I believe that this Anglican Communion — the fellowship of autonomous churches in communion with the See of Canterbury — will continue to exist.

It will continue, but it will be changed.

Some who have been part of this Anglican Communion until now have already made it clear they see a different future for themselves. As they are not forsaking Christ, but only this fellowship, I can wish them Godspeed. They are not lost; merely detached. Time will tell if these branches will be grafted onto other stocks, gathered into a bundle, or planted separately, where they may thrive — or not. They may eventually be grafted back to the stock that gave them life. Whatever the future, let us not cease to be open to the possibility of restoration, and a vision of unity in variety that is truly Anglican.

Tobias Haller BSG

---

See the follow-up post for further discussion in addtion to the comments below.

Sufficient for the day

A thought on the feast of Justin Martyr...

Just as we accept the "sufficiency of the Holy Scriptures for salvation" so too we regard the Nicene Creed, as the Lambeth Quadrilateral puts it, to be "the sufficient statement of the Christian Faith." What the Nicene Creed leaves out, then, is not essential to the faith. The Creed doesn't tell us everything about God, or much about the church, and hardly anything about discipline or morals; but it tells us enough about the faith in order for us to be faithful.

Isn't it interesting that God appears only to give us enough to keep us hungry for the eventual enjoyment of the banquet — just our daily bread until we reach the heavenly celebration? Can the church not rejoice in its doctrinal rations, and not impose beyond their bare sufficiency? It is in those extra-creedal matters that we begin to divide, and dividing, fail.

Let us fast from the excess that leads to division, and feed one another on the adequate fare God provides.

Tobias Haller BSG

New York GC Deputation on the Draft Covenant

from the Deputies to the General Convention from the Episcopal Diocese of New York

the following was unanimously adopted by the deputation

General Response to the Report

1. Do you think an Anglican Covenant is necessary and/or will help to strengthen the interdependent life of the Anglican Communion? Why or why not?

It would be helpful at this point in time for the Anglican Communion to make up its mind whether the needs of the world and the mission of the church in response to those needs will be better served by a more strictly and centrally regulated structure, or by a more open model deployed for ministry. We favor the latter as more in keeping with Christ’s commission to the church, which is focused not on itself and its structures but on the proclamation of the saving message to a wounded world. It appears that the more we attempt to secure our inner agreements the more we focus on the things that divide us. The Anglican Communion has been known until recently as a body governed not by statute but by bonds of affection, and a Covenant, if needed, should, unlike the present proposal, focus on the affection rather than the bondage. Such a Covenant would be tolerant of diversity and encourage bilateral cooperation in meeting local and global needs through partnerships rather than promoting more complex and rigid structures, as the present proposal seems to advise.

The Introduction to the Draft

2. How closely does this view of communion accord with our understanding of the development and vocation of the Anglican Communion?

The introduction to the Draft Covenant accurately reflects the nature of our concerns as a communion, and flags some important truths; most particularly that communion is based in the person of Christ, and the work of the church in the mission of Christ.

However, the introduction (and the Draft itself) avoid or ignore these truths, and focus on the institutional or political aspect of the Communion as a global body, as if the mere existence of a unified ecclesiastical body were sufficient to recognize the reality of communion and to effect its goals. The Draft gives unity in Christ through Baptism lip-service, while emphasizing institutional unity. It pays little attention to the fact that institutional structures that bind the work of the church too closely can limit its effectiveness in meeting local needs; and it is good to remember that all ministry is, ultimately, local; this reflects the reality of the Incarnation which has global effect precisely because of the scandal of particularity by which God chose to act in a specific time and place. The global witness of a global church is only salvific when its work and witness advance God’s kingdom in particular places, meeting particular needs. There are many global movements in the world, and not all of them advance God’s kingdom; and there are many evangelical efforts that are very effective with no global involvement at all. There is, in short, no particular virtue in being part of a global community unless that global community is ordered towards making Christ known in every particular time and place, and actually effective in doing so.

It may well be the special gift of the Anglican Communion to remain as it has been in carrying out God’s mission: a fellowship of autonomous churches, rather than a “global church.” There are other “global churches” (such as the Roman Catholic Church) which function as an institutionally unified body, and the unspoken questions suggested in the approach taken by the Draft must be, “Why abandon one of the distinctive marks of Anglicanism in order to be more like other global churches?” Are we, in doing this, seeking to mimic a structure that has its own manifest flaws and faults, rather than accepting and working with and through the difficulties inherent in our own?

The Preamble

3. Is this a sufficient rationale for entering into a Covenant? Why or why not?

The Preamble would present a sufficient rationale for a Covenant if there were any evidence that the proposal actually could achieve the goal of helping the particular and national churches “to proclaim more effectively in our different contexts the Grace of God revealed in the Gospel.” This is by no means evident, and the recent disagreements and tensions experienced in the Communion appear to indicate the contrary. Teachings on some issues supported by a majority of the Communion may, at any given time, work contrary to the advance of the Gospel in particular parts of the world. An examination of the history of Lambeth statements on such matters as polygamy and birth control are exemplary of this unfortunate tendency for global decisions to impede rather than further local evangelism.

The church must be able to proclaim the eternal and unchanging Gospel in different social and cultural contexts, and in doing so recognize that the Gospel itself emerges from and was originally presented to particular cultures and societies. The testimony of the early church shows that while the core beliefs concerning Christ and his saving acts were not subject to cultural accommodation, there were other beliefs and customs on which a range of accepted positions was tolerable, and that it is dangerous to confuse the two.

The present tensions concern matters that are not core teachings of the Gospel and Creeds; and such differences of opinion on moral discipline have long been acknowledged in the larger Christian community. A monolithic position on a social or moral issue, without the capacity to adapt it or depart from it in order to meet local needs, will not serve the mission of the church. It may well lead to a church with a heart of stone, sure of its own rightness and perhaps deaf to the Spirit speaking through the people of God.

The church must also be prepared to recognize its own errors and missteps (Articles XIX and XXI), and be aware that a rigid or authoritarian structure may impede openness to the critique offered not only by the members of the body, but from those not yet part of it. The need for the church to repent from its past sins against indigenous peoples, from the easy equivalence the church made between native cultures and native religions, leading to the cultural equivalent of genocide, lies before us. To confuse the culture of first-century Palestine with the Gospel is as bad as confusing the culture of 16th- or 19th-century Europe with the Gospel. The church must be aware that while there is a danger of deformation by culture, there are times when the church is blind to its own accommodations to past or regional cultures, and more importantly that there are times when the culture can be a corrective to the church.

An example of this is how the church gradually realized its error in supporting slavery, which had been a cultural reality accepted as the norm in the first century world — indeed, to a large extent the single most important institution in first-century global society — and which to our shame remained acceptable into the modern era. The movement to end slavery came as much from the secular Enlightenment as from the leadership of the church; and the Christian influences against slavery were often more vocal in the nonconformist groups than in those with more “global” institutional or established structure.

The Life we Share

4. Do these six affirmations adequately describe The Episcopal Church’s understanding of “common catholicity, apostolicity, and confession of faith? Why or why not?

The affirmations are to a large extent unobjectionable, as they are for the most part slight expansions of the Chicago-Lambeth Quadrilateral. However, as with any such general statements, it is in the particular application that problems will arise, as they have in recent times.

5. The Thirty-Nine Articles of Religion and the 1662 Book of Common Prayer (of the Church of England) are not currently authoritative documents for The Episcopal Church. Do you think they should be? Why or why not?

The greatest difficulty with the Draft Covenant’s citation of the Articles of Religion lies in the extent to which the Draft Covenant itself is in conflict with them. One of the characteristic marks of Anglicanism is the autonomy of national or particular churches, with a clear and absolute rejection of any and all episcopal authority from outside. (Article XXXVII, and ordination Oath of the 1662 BCP.) This is a formative element in the creation of the Church of England, and The Episcopal Church, whose ecclesiastical independence from its Mother Church was seen as “necessary” at the time of the American Revolution, as stated in the Preface to the First American Book of Common Prayer.

That first American prayerbook is markedly different from the 1662 version in many and important aspects. The Eucharistic liturgy derives not from the 1662 version, but from the older Edwardian forms preserved and expanded in the Scottish tradition. Many liturgical scholars would say that the Eucharistic rite of 1662 is seriously deficient on many grounds. To offer another example relevant to our present discussion, the marriage rite of the American book is almost completely rewritten from the English version, and significantly amends the theological rationale for marriage embodied in the English rite.

In short, this section of the Draft Covenant would be relatively unobjectionable if the reference to the 1662 Book of Common Prayer were excised, and the remainder of the Covenant brought into line with the Articles. However, there then might well be little of the Draft remaining, as so much of it, with its focus on authority, tends away from national autonomy and Scriptural sufficiency.

Our Commitment to Confession of Faith

6. Is each of these commitments clear and understandable with respect to what is being asked of the member churches and are they consistent with statements and actions made by The Episcopal Church in the General Convention? Why or why not?

A number of the commitments appear to be vague platitudes capable of a very wide degree of interpretation. For example, what are “biblically derived moral values”? As noted above, one can easily derive a biblical moral value for slavery, so long as slave-holders treat their slaves well. And what is the “vision of humanity received by and developed in the communion of member churches”? Human anthropology and its theological significance are highly variable from culture to culture, the variety perhaps nowhere so clearly evident as in the role of women in various parts of the world, and consequently the Communion. It is not abundantly clear that a common vision of humanity exists among the various members.

Point three also contains the seeds of cultural pride referred to above, that the Scripture, as interpreted and applied by the church (especially in its teaching office, which according to the Ordinal resides in the presbyterate, not the episcopate) be a source of illumination, challenge, and transformation to human cultures and systems. While this may be true, the church has often shown itself to be blind to the good inherent in human cultures, and the capacity of culture and its structures to illuminate our understanding of Scripture.

The Life we Share with Others

7. Is the mission vision offered here helpful in advancing a common life of the Anglican Communion and does this need to be a part of the Draft Covenant? Why or why not?

The mission vision laid out in the Draft is the most valuable part of the Covenant. It recognizes the call to transform unjust structures of society, and not all structures simply. This section, by focusing on what the church is for rather than on how it is structured might well constitute the whole of a Covenant. This section should be the touchstone by which the Communion functions; that is, if a given action or structure is not demonstrably enhancing the mission as described here, it had best not be undertaken or established. On that ground, it is not self-evident that the Draft Covenant as a whole will be of any benefit whatever in fulfilling the intent of this section; and will almost certainly lead to paralysis and loss of capacity to witness, as voices for creative dissent are stifled by the need to conform.

Our Unity and Common Life

8. Does this section adequately describe your understanding of the history and respective roles of the “Four Instruments of Communion”? Why or why not?

This section contains many inconsistencies and omissions. The undue focus on the episcopate is evident from the beginning, and not only overlooks the crucial role of the laity, but also of the other orders of ministry. While the ordinal confers the task of preserving unity on the bishop, the teaching office resides with the presbyter; in addition, the task of mission is primarily diaconal, and the whole people of God give their consent and their support. The Covenant ignores this balance.

Equally problematical is the affirmation that the four Instruments of Communion serve “to discern our common mind.” If there truly is a common mind, rather than merely a majority opinion, surely it need not be discerned, since it will be obvious. And while this passage verbally eschews the creation of a juridical central legislative or executive authority, the Covenant itself later goes on to recommend that the Primates Meeting essentially exercise that function. The Holy Spirit is not limited to or discerned by the Instruments of Communion, but is free to move where it wills.

Most importantly, the reduction of the Anglican Consultative Council — the only one of the four Instruments to have a clear constitutional basis and a representation from all orders of ministry — to a merely co-ordinating role (albeit in the most important aspect of our common life: mission) reveals the backwards-telescope reductionism that underlies the whole Covenant.

Finally, in discerning effectiveness, one is challenged to look to the fruits of the Spirit. These fruits are not at all evident in the past or recent work of Lambeth or the Primates, and the Archbishop of Canterbury has been tasked almost beyond his capacity in what appears to be a monastery full of novices with a reluctant abbot. One might observe that without Lambeth 1998 we might not be in the position in which we find ourselves, and reflect that had Lambeth never met at all the world would scarcely have been changed for the worse. Only the Anglican Consultative Council appears to be able to show a record of actual accomplishment for the good of the church and the world in the exercise of mission. It might be that the best course to take at present would be to rely on the already existing constitution of the ACC as the basis for any Covenant (if one is desired) rather than creating one as flawed as this present novel offering.

Unity of the Communion

9. Do you think there needs to be an executive or judicial body for resolving disagreements or disputes in the Anglican Communion? If so, do you think it should be the Primates Meeting as recommended by the Draft Covenant? Explain.

Disagreements can be settled by any number of means. The simplest remedy is to give those who are disagreeable no forum in which to air or enforce their disagreement, and merely to continue to disagree with each other until another generation arises, for whom the former dispute may be irrelevant. Seeking an authoritative solution, however, forces the issue to judgment, and judgment implies winners and losers. The Anglican Communion, from the foundation of Lambeth on, does not have a spectacular track record at settling disputes; yet most of them are forgotten over time.

Settling the authority for resolving disputes with the Primates is the worst possible solution to the dilemma faced by the Communion. Our unity is not based upon our agreement, but upon our Baptism into Christ. He is the head of the body, and the substitution of an oligarchy, whether constituted of Primates or bishops alone, or even of a more representative entity, is a form of submission to an authority which Christ forbade to his apostles, when he said, “The kings of the gentiles exercise authority over them... But with you it shall not be so; rather let the greatest among you become like the youngest.” (Luke 22:25-26) The image that comes to mind with the Draft’s proposal to commit judicial or executive authority (with the capacity to exercise discipline) to the Primates, is that of the servant who was rewarded with a position he then abused, by mistreating and lording his power over the other servants. (Luke 12:45-46) The punishment exacted upon this servant is precisely and literally division. Judgment (even — perhaps especially — when cloaked as “discernment”) will always divide; it will always create a unity of some over against others, at its worst giving in to the utilitarian notion that the peace of the many is to be achieved at the expense of the few.

Rather, if there is to be a Covenant, it should reflect the openness and freedom granted to the children of the God through the Gospel, which is not a spirit of bondage, but of charity and generosity towards those with whom one disagrees, recognizing them as members of the one Body not by virtue of their proclamation but through the blood of the Cross and the waters of Baptism. If Christ is the head, let not the members contend one with another. Christ will speak through his whole body in time, as matters of dissension cease to be divisive, in a natural and organic process. In the meantime, a comprehension of diversity within a willingly unified structure that will not allow itself to be divided, should be the goal of any covenant worthy of the name.

Moreover, this political solution with its focus on the Primates embodies a polity foreign to that of The Episcopal Church. In our church, at each level from parish to the highest synodical body, the laity are involved in leadership and custodianship of the work of the church, in concert with ordained leaders. We realize that this polity seems difficult to those who come from churches in which the episcopate is the font of all leadership. However, we note that the Anglican Consultative Council does replicate this structure at an international level, and commend this body as the primary working group for the communion.

10. What does the phrase “a common mind about matter of essential concern...” mean to you?

The use of essential brings up another conflict with the Articles of Religion, at least if essential is held to be synonymous with necessary. Article XX states that nothing can be deemed necessary for salvation if it cannot clearly be proved from Scripture. This does not mean that the church may not institute or even practice things not proved from Scripture, though it cannot require them, and it dare not require something that is not commendable to Scripture: examples from the Articles themselves are infant baptism (XXVII) and vernacular liturgy (XXIV). Anglicanism has generally held that all that is essential concerning the faith is addressed in the Creeds, and that the church is at liberty in matters of rites and ceremonies. The church’s authority in moral questions is balanced by its own tendencies to err or to fail to distinguish between that which is in Scripture from that which is truly of Scripture.

In our present divisions we are dealing with questions of pastoral theology. Decisions have been made in parts of the Communion that those parts believe to be in accord with Scripture. Those provinces that have made such decisions have done so locally, and with no suggestion that they must be required of all.

The church as a whole has taken advantage of a great deal of leeway concerning pastoral teaching. One of the most troubling phrases in this Covenant, noted above, is “biblically derived moral values” in section 3.1. The church has “derived” many and various moral values from Scripture throughout its long course, some of which few would defend as “moral” — perhaps the most egregious examples are slavery and its later cousin apartheid, which were defended by leaders of the church on biblical grounds. The “common mind” of the church can be in grave error concerning faith and morals, as the Articles attest. Ultimately, we are not saved by our morals or our works; however important they may be, they are not essential; we are saved by faith — and even this is not our fallible and imperfect faith in Christ, but the eternal and unshakeable faith of Christ: his blood, his sacrifice, his work — not ours — in which we participate vicariously, and imperfectly, as “unworthy servants.”

Our Declaration

11. Can you affirm the “fundamental shape” of the Draft Covenant? Why or why not?

The fundamental shape of the Draft does not represent the ideal of comprehension for the sake of truth, and not even compromise for the sake of peace, but rather a less than forthright institution of a substantially judicial procedure explicitly directed, not towards the discernment of agreement or the toleration of diversity, but to the exclusion of dissent based on the considerations of a conciliar entity. This “covenant” is in the form of a weak contract; not a marriage of commitment, but a pre-nuptial agreement containing the seeds of its own dissolution.

12. What do you think are the consequences of signing such a Covenant as proposed in this Draft?

The Covenant could be a benign tool for good or a means to the collapse of the Communion depending on how it is applied. On the whole, it seems to be framed to meet a need some appear to have for a degree of intolerance and rigidity. It represents such a departure from our traditions in polity, and is at such odds even in itself, that it would seem little good could come of it.

Concluding Questions

13. Having read the Draft Covenant as a whole do you agree with the CDG’s assertion that “nothing which is commended in the draft text of the Covenant can be said to be ‘new’”? Why or why not?

Contrary to the CDG’s assertion, this Covenant represents a significant departure in polity and governance for the Anglican Communion. Although language from the Anglican tradition is scattered throughout, the significance given to this language, and the emphasis on its employment has shifted from autonomous provincial government with joint cooperation and consultation, to a global body with central authority for leadership (and with an implied power of exclusion), placed in the hands of a body that had no formal existence as such prior to 1978, and has thus existed for a single generation. The elevation of “biblical morality” (as discerned by that authority) to the level of “essential,” is also a novel development.

The Draft Covenant thus seems to be a new patch put on the shabby and worn but still serviceable old cloak of the Anglican Communion; and the implied threat of schism (or exile) will create a worse tear than might happen if we were to exercise patience and charity instead of judgment.

14. In general, what is your response to the Draft Covenant taken as a whole? What is helpful in the draft? What is not-helpful? What is missing? Additional comments?

Our general response to the Draft Covenant is that it is unnecessary. The Anglican Consultative Council already has a workable Constitution for the governance of the international affairs of the Communion, and individual provinces have the right to restrict their interaction with other member provinces when and as they see fit, without undoing the whole structure. It is better to allow such temporary bilateral divisions on an ad hoc basis than to legislate division at a larger scale.

The section on Mission is a clear articulation of the purpose and direction of the church. That this is a product of the Anglican Consultative Council argues for the wisdom of emphasizing the scope of this body rather than the Primates or Lambeth.

The general tone of the Draft is unhelpful in that it appears to be less than honest in naming the real problems we face, and by seeking a solution based on bondage rather than freedom. It also fails to take adequate consideration of the importance of our baptismal unity, in spite of giving it lip-service. By focusing on implicit disunity at its conclusion, the Draft contains a poison pill.

The Draft fails to give adequate recognition to the ministries of laity, deacons and priests as distinctive participants in the governance of the church. The Draft appears willing to sacrifice those who dissent from a majority view on the altar of unity, thereby taking a view more akin to that of Caiaphas than Gamaliel; a view more punitive than paschal, willing to sacrifice others instead of exercising patience in the humble realization that the church’s process of reception demonstrably takes many generations. This document has grown out of impatience, haste, and a rush to judgment; from those ready to speak, but slow to listen.

The closing paragraph of section 7 refers to “the substance of the covenant” but places the interpretation of what that substance is in the hands of the Instruments of Communion. From our perspective, the substance appears to consist of an agreement never to disagree, but to excise the disagreeable. It is evident that this represents an essentially protestant approach, in which the church seeks to purify itself of minority views, and hence divides again and again. This is not how the church catholic has functioned at its best, when change has taken place locally, and these changes have been received (or not) throughout the larger church. Surely we have noticed that at least two major issues of division from the time of the Reformation have now been adopted by the very church that refused to allow them: the vernacular liturgy and the common cup. Change may take time, and patience is a virtue.

We referred to novices above, and the nature of the novitiate is that it requires practice and action in order properly to discern if a proposed way is right or not. It is no use simply studying patterns and taking measurements. Ultimately one must put on the clothing and see if it fits. These matters cannot be settled academically, but only by trial, and trial on a local level is the most effective (and safest) way to determine utility, rather than imposing change on the whole all at once. In this, experience is not a mere addition to the so-called Anglican way; it is an unavoidable teacher in that way. To a very real extent this Covenant stifles the possibilities for novelty through its own novel proposal for a central authority. It will quench the Spirit in order to serve the institution.

Members of the Deputation

The Rev. Gerald Keucher
Diane B. Pollard, Deputation Chair
The Rev Theodora Brooks
Michael J. McPherson
The Rev.Tobias Haller BSG
Nell B. Gibson
The Rev. James Burns
James A. Forde

---

Rearranging the Chairs

In an otherwise well-thought out essay, the always well-worth-reading Ephraim Radner makes, in my opinion, an unhelpful dichotomy. He refers to two models for the church as “localist” and “confessionalist.” At issue are the political structures of and between the various churches; this is all about politics, about who relates to whom, and how they do so, and how decisions are made and enforced. In short, our present turmoil is about ecclesiastical polity, the form of church (or inter-church) government.

The main problem with this current essay is that Dr. Radner’s categories aren’t based on the real division, and I find he creates a distinction without a difference. Read his confessionalist definition and I would say it applies equally to the localist — that is, the church is entire wherever the forms and structures are intact, the sacraments administered, and the gospel preached. That’s the traditional Anglican definition, and it works for me as it has worked for Anglicanism up until very recently — it is the holographic model by which the church subsists entire in each particular provincial instance, much as Christ is truly present in every fragment of the loaf. The fact that Dr. Radner avoids the classical language in his first definition (and uses it in his second, thereby tipping his hand a bit) only makes it seem that the definitions are different.

But, of course, this isn’t the issue. Both of Dr. Radner’s “sides” would agree on that. The problem is “How do these various parts remain united under (or within) a form of governance?” The difference of opinion plaguing us at present is not about the nature of the church (local or universal), but about the day-to-day realities of recognition of orders, cooperation in mission, common worship, and so on. It is not about what the church is but what it does and how it does it.

The real difference is between federalists and unionists: those who want a dispersed authority based on autonomy of and cooperation by the interdependent members of the communion (what we’ve had in Anglicanism since the mid-19th century), and those who want a centralized authority based on a consensus of leadership with the authority to excise from membership those who buck the consensus (the impetus towards a superior synodicality). Dr. Radner has been on the latter side for some time now, and he has good company.

But as I note, the federalist model is the one we’ve had up until now, so Dr. Radner’s case for change needs to be more persuasive. He is pressing for a more centralized form of government as a way of easing the tensions. This comes, in part, because some are unwilling to live with the ambiguity inherent in the looser model: the tensions themselves are the problem. It is not evident to me that the movement towards greater importance to the Instruments of Communion has in fact enhanced or been instrumental to our communion; that is, towards soothing the tensions. On the contrary, they seem to have led to more and more disagreement. So those who wish to push in that direction, seem to me to have a difficult case to make. If they do this to the green wood, how will the dry fare?

Let me hasten to add that I am not utterly opposed to a clear statement being made about how the communion can or should continue to function. But I remain convinced that agreement on a minimal set of principles (such as the Lambeth Quadrilateral) coupled with a laissez-faire willingness to tolerate dissent or disagreement on any matter that “cannot be proved from Scripture” — and I mean proved as in “objectively proved even to those who disagree” — would be preferable to the present Draft Covenant, which holds the authority to exclude from communion as it were like the hatchet in the glass case in the hallway, with a neat label, “In case of X break communion.” If your only tool is a hatchet, remember, everything will look like something to hew.

The real problem

What I would suggest is that we do not in fact have a systemic problem, but a particular disagreement about a fairly narrow range of issues, most of them impinging on sexuality. The heated denials that it’s really about Scriptural authority can no longer be taken seriously: after folks saying the Windsor Process wasn’t really about sex and the Primates meetings weren’t about sex, ultimately the only concrete matters that get laid on the table at the end are about sex — oh, and boundary crossings (but as the boundary crossers will assure us, it’s really about sex.)

Seeking a systemic solution for a particular problem is like the old, “The whole class will sit here until the one who stole the pencil comes forward.” I suppose it works, but it’s not very productive; especially when it turns out no one took the pencil — it just rolled under teacher’s desk.

At the same time it is no use pretending we aren’t in a difficult situation in the Anglican Communion. The seams are bursting, and there seems to be a kind of hastiness and ire in the air. So I’d like to offer for reflection something I wrote some decades ago about the renewal of religious communities. I mean, communities are communities — and renewal is renewal. What I’d like to suggest is that by an appeal to systemic change (rather than renewal) the Anglican Communion is in breakdown mode. Here’s what I wrote back in the 80s — I think it has some relevance to the present situation.

The cycles of doubt

There are four breakdown stages in a community, each characterized by a form of doubt: Mechanical, Conceptual, Moral, and Total.

Mechanical doubt: Are we doing things the right way?

Mechanical doubt is often the first response: members see the order not as a vision-inspired community, but as a mechanism that needs adjustment. Changes are superficial: a new habit design, new liturgies. Of course, there is nothing wrong with either of these things, if they grow out of a living spirit—and if they are responses to the real problems. But if they are efforts to pump life into a comatose body, it is too late for such therapies to be effective. In an organization which does not constantly seek renewal, superficial changes will do little good. Indeed, the adoption of a “therapeutic” model can be a self-fulfilling prophecy: we must be sick because we are seeking a cure!

Conceptual doubt: Are we doing the right things?

At this stage it isn’t the manner of working that comes under doubt, but the work itself. Should we stop teaching? Do we really need to say the Divine Office? These are more fundamental questions that touch at the ethos of the community. If approached with a lack of insight, actions at this stage can lead to disaster. A rebound effect can occur at this point, and some members — or the community as a whole — may develop a siege mentality. Any change becomes a fundamental threat not just to the ethos of the community, but to some even larger principle: the Faith, the Nation, the Cause. Such polarization can render productive renewal nearly impossible.

Moral doubt: Am I doing the right thing?

At this level of doubt individual members begin to internalize the misgivings and apprehensions that have troubled the organization. Those who no longer accept the driving myth of the organization, or who have reached a point of cynicism, begin to make accommodations. They begin to wonder whether they personally need to observe the rule with rigor or vigor, and laxism prevails. More conservative members come to see change and renewal as threats to their personal well-being and identity, with a concomitant decline in self-worth.

Total doubt: Why am I / are we doing this at all?

At this stage personal and communal cynicism, despondency and despair emerge full force, and the doubt shifts almost to an existential level. Organizations which have descended this far into doubt are unlikely to survive; though even here it is possible to rediscover the core ideal which drove the community.

So that’s what I said back then. Does it make sense for us now? The way out, as I counseled the religious communities, is not necessarily systemic change, but renewal in accordance with the founding charism of the community. (I didn’t make that up, by the way; Pope Paul VI did.) I have reflected before on the things I think are distinctive and worthy in Anglicanism. This is our way forward — by a return to our roots, which provide a way to deal with the pressing issues before and behind us.

I agree with Dr. Radner that the Anglican Communion could — if it gets its act together — be a “school for communion” for the wider church. But let us not get too grand: The Anglican Communion is provisional just as every other church is provisional until the Master returns. We are challenged to tread the difficult path between a totally centralized authority and a totally dispersed congregationalism. I think that is the best way to structure the church. Some might call that triumphalist; but as I don’t insist on it for those who don’t agree — which would be a contradiction to the model itself — I don’t think I’m triumphalist in the ordinary sense of the word.

As for the present situation, however, to update an old analogy, I think it is a matter of rearranging the deck chairs on the QE II. The problem isn’t with the ship, but with those who don’t like the arrangement of the chairs — or perhaps, they don’t like some of the passengers themselves, or how they behave themselves. That is where the “theological difficulty” lies. The rest is all politics.

— Tobias Haller BSG

---

Feeling a Draft (Covenant)

I’ve been reviewing the Draft Covenant for the Anglican Communion over the last weeks, and continue to find it a strange document. Much of it is inoffensive and reads like a slightly expanded Chicago-Lambeth Quadrilateral. But those very expansions, slight as they may be, void the soundness of the document, even were it not unacceptable due to the more serious implied threats folded into its latter sections. (As Petruchio observed, its sting is in its tail.)

The problems begin much earlier, with citation of the Articles of Religion and the Book of Common Prayer 1662, complete with its Ordinal, as foundational “historic formularies” to which “loyalty” is due. This is a particularly strange expansion, as the Draft Covenant itself is in direct conflict with these foundations in a number of particulars.

Most importantly, a characteristic mark of Anglicanism is the autonomy of national or particular churches, with a clear and absolute rejection of any and all episcopal authority from outside. This is clearly embodied in Article XXXVII of the Articles of Religion, which any interested reader can find at leisure in most versions of the BCP.

This clear preference for autonomy is also a crucial part of the 1662 Ordinal (which is much harder to find, as more recent editions of the so-called 1662 Book of Common Prayer were extensively amended over the years). But the original 1662 book contained, as a necessary step to ordination the swearing of an Oath which said in part:

...I do declare that no foreign Prince, Person, Prelate, State, or Potentate hath, or ought to have any jurisdiction, power, superiority, pre-eminence, or authority, Ecclesiastical or Spiritual, within this Realm. So help me God.

This ecclesiastical independence is a formative element in the creation of the Church of England, and of The Episcopal Church, whose ecclesiastical independence from its Mother Church was seen as natural and necessary at the time of the American Revolution, as stated in the Preface to the First American Book of Common Prayer. The Draft Covenant is out of step with this principle, a principle at the heart of the very authorities in which its authors place so much stock.

I am troubled when authorities are so assembled without apparent engagement with what they actually say. I leave to one side, though I cannot resist citing it, the requirement of the Preface to the Ordinal of 1662 (amended only in 1964) that requires of candidates for ordination a facility “in the Latin Tongue” even before mentioning knowledge of the Scripture. One wonders how well-observed is this portion of the 1662 book among those eager to establish it as a touchstone or foundation? It makes me wonder how serious the authors of this Draft Covenant are in their appeals to these authorities; or if rather we are not witnessing the kind of debate in which slogans are waved like banners, and authoritative books are tossed about in virtue of their weight rather than their contents.

— Tobias Haller BSG

---

The Anglican Triad

Anglicans are familiar with the Chicago-Lambeth Quadrilateral: the statement of four doctrinal and ecclesiological principles that chart out the boundaries for dialogue between churches wishing to join in closer common purpose and mission. The Quadrilateral thus describes the essentials, from an Anglican perspective, for church union or reunion.

I would like to suggest that alongside the familiar Quadrilateral we consider another structure that for want of a better term I will call the Anglican Triad (with apologies to those who use this term for what is often known, incorrectly, as “Hooker’s Three-Legged Stool.”) This Triad consists of three elements which are particularly characteristic of Anglicanism — not necessarily unique to to it, but together constituting a unity which I fear is at present very much under assault.

For shorthand I will call these three elements Humility, Provinciality, and Variety. They stand in the via media between Humiliation, Provincialism, and Chaos at one extreme, and Pride, Centralism and Uniformity at the other. All three are well attested in foundational documents of Anglicanism (The Articles of Religion, the Prefaces to the English and American Books of Common Prayer) and in the work of those who first focused the Anglican vision, such as Richard Hooker. I’ll limit my citations here to the Articles themselves, by number.

1. Humility: “The church... hath erred.” (19,21)

The admission that the church makes mistakes is profoundly revealing of the nature of the church as we understand it. It reflects the Pauline judgment that “our knowledge is partial”; and it asserts an attitude of faith and hope — and one hopes, love — rather than of certainty and judgment. This admission of uncertainty renders all but the most fundamental dogmatic matters to some extent provisional. It has been called by the rather high-falutin’ title “epistemic humility,” but I think that plain old humility says it just as well. Understood in this way, Humility is not a weakness, but a strength. It stands between abject humiliation and overweening pride.

This acknowledgment that the church makes mistakes is followed by a corollary: mistakes can (and should) be corrected. The church is not trapped within an immutable legal structure such as that attributed to the Medes and Persians. This is why Anglicanism can embrace and advance the development of doctrine and moral theology. This does not mean that every development will necessarily be correct — as the principle notes, the church makes mistakes. But the ability to admit to mistakes is the first step in correcting them. (Those familiar with 12-Step programs will at this point I hope recognize a resonance with the Serenity Prayer. It is very easy for the church to become addicted to the need to control, especially to control others through the claim of unassailable infallibility of judgment — to which Humility is a counterpoise and corrective.)

Humility stands as a meek (which does not mean “weak”) witness against domination by so-called consensus. As the Articles testify, since individual human beings may err, there is no guarantee that an assembly of such errant beings will not also err. (21) Humility points out that even an overwhelming consensus can be quite profoundly mistaken — Galileo can testify to that! So consensus by itself cannot form a term in an argument when a given proposition is being reexamined: this is simply a form of begging the question. Consensus, after all, means a “common mind with little or no opposition” — so the moment opposition appears, consensus ceases to exist, and the new proposal must be examined on its merits against the possible errancy of the formerly unchallenged position. (This is, by the way, why Hooker rejected tradition as an authority in and of itself.)

Anglicanism thus humbly rejects concepts of inerrancy and infallibility; even the Scripture itself is “sufficient” for the end for which it was intended: salvation (6). Human understanding, even of the Scripture, is fallible, and subject to a constant review as the church bears its responsibility as the “keeper of Holy Writ.” (19)

Humility also stands as a warning against the tendency to adopt unanimous statements for the purpose of apparent unity, in spite of serious disagreement with one or more parts of the adopted document. This sort of curate’s-eggery produces the appearance of agreement that cloaks underlying division. Better humbly to acknowledge the division, as the collect for the feast of Richard Hooker puts it, seeking comprehension for the sake of truth instead of compromise for the sake of peace. For as solutions such as Lambeth 1998.1.10 and the Primates’ Communiqué from Dromantine show us, such peace will be no peace.

2. Provinciality: “The Bishop of Rome hath no jurisdiction in this Realm of England.” (37)

Few things could be clearer than that the Church of England reasserted its ecclesiastical independence from Rome at the Reformation. It thought itself competent to do this, and believed it was returning to an ancient principle that had been more successfully preserved among the Eastern churches than it had in the West: the basic unit of the church is the national church or province. (It is sometimes suggested that the diocese is the basic unit of the church; however, a diocese cannot be self-sustaining in terms of the episcopate, and requires the participation of the bishops from other dioceses in order to maintain its existence. The diocese is an organ in the body of the province, and cannot subsist on its own.)

In Anglicanism Provinciality is expressed through provincial autonomy. Now, autonomy has gotten a bad name in some circles recently. It does not mean being able to do anything one likes. True autonomy should be understood in terms of the rights, powers and responsibilities exercised within and for a national church in terms of its ability to govern itself. It relates to the concept of subsidiarity: things should be done at the lowest level at which they can be accomplished. Thus priests are ordained by the diocese for the parishes; bishops by the province for the dioceses.

Provinciality is tempered by Humility, in that while each province asserts that it is fully the church, yet it does not assert itself as the only church. Rather than a “Branch” theory, this represents a more holographic understanding of the nature of the church’s fullness: it is complete within each province, as Christ is fully present in every eucharistic celebration, and in each fragment of the broken Bread. The external divisions between Christian churches constitute a scandal in that they impede the mission and work of Christ, and a failure to recognize that we do indeed share one Lord, one Faith, one Baptism; but it is not necessary that a single world-church institutional structure take the place of a fellowship of independent and self-governing provinces. Instead of a human-instituted system of authoritative government, the provinces are called to a work of service and mission, in the recognition that the church is already “One” through its faithful response to the dominical command to baptize all nations. It is to be hoped that all Christians may one day recognize this baptismal unity, and remove the various obstacles they have set in place that prevent our sharing in the one Bread at one Table. This unity in the two dominical Sacraments forms an essential element of the Quadrilateral.

Humility and Provinciality taken together reveal the process by which development is both possible and limited within the Anglican Communion. Newman believed that development of doctrine could only take place under the watchful eye of the Bishop of Rome — and this in spite of Rome’s demonstrable errors! Anglicanism broadens the scope for the source of correctives to the whole communion, the various national churches and provinces themselves being the determiners of what and how things are to change or remain the same: each determining for itself those matters that concern it. If I can offer an analogy: the Roman Catholic Magisterium is like a boarding house where you eat what is set before you or go hungry; the Anglican approach is more like a restaurant with a finite but various menu from which to choose; and the fact that I like mushrooms and you like asparagus should not keep us from eating at the same table.

Provinciality means that changes and developments may be made within a province that have no direct effect upon the governance of any other province. One example of this was the decision of the Episcopal Church to move forward with the ordination of women to the episcopate. No other province was forced to recognize or approve this decision, and it had no impact upon the governance, rights, privileges, or responsibilities of any other province. As time passed, other provinces chose to adopt — or not adopt — this innovation: this is the process of reception, and it is not complete even now: there is at present no Anglican consensus on the rightness (or wrongness) of the ordination of women to the episcopate. In the meantime any difficulties that arise — such as the inability to license a visiting woman bishop to function as such in a province that does not ordain women to the episcopate, or to license or transfer clergy ordained by a woman bishop — are readily dealt with by the canonical provisions already in place within all of the provinces; it is a matter of record keeping that need engender no ill will or severance of communion, and the evocation of Gamaliel’s advice to the Council can avoid excessive friction.

The principle, What touches all shall be decided by all, upon which I’ve reflected elsewhere, comes to play under the rubric of Provinciality. “Touches” does not mean, “having an opinion about” or “creating a situation which might lead to difficulties with a third party.” The legal principle, as Althusius pointed out, is about rights, privileges and authorities of each province that can only be restricted by each province’s individual consent. Thus, Lambeth 1998.1.10.e would be seen as overstepping its bounds if it were worded as more than the advisory that it is, since it would place a restriction on the right of provinces to ordain and bless whom they choose — and these are rights pertaining to each province that must be explicitly foregone by each, and which cannot be takenaway even by all of the other provinces combined. All, save even one, is not all.

Provinciality thus provides a balance and a means to implement development in conjunction with Humility: it allows innovations to be tested locally before anyone considers implementing them globally. This is, of course, how the church has generally functioned through the ages. One could note, for example, that the adoption of vernacular liturgy by various national churches at the Reformation finally after several centuries had impact upon the very Roman Catholic Church that so bitterly opposed the development. Going further back in history, the emergence of the Gentile church began in isolated communities, and it took some while — even after the conference of the Apostles in Jerusalem — for the church more widely to accept this innovation. After the collapse of an old consensus due to the action of the church in one place or a few places, a significant period of reception will be necessary before a new consensus is established. Ultimately, this movement from particular to universal is reflective of the Incarnation itself.

3. Variety: “Every particular or national Church hath authority to ordain, change, and abolish Ceremonies or Rites of the Church ordained only by man’s authority.” (36)

It must be admitted that Anglicanism has always experienced tension between uniformity and variety; however as another example of the importance of Provinciality, this citation from the Articles demonstrates (and a reading of the Preface to the 1549 Book of Common Prayer will support) that the concern is for uniformity within a national church, and permitted variety among them.

The matters currently causing distress in the communion concern rites and ceremonies: in particular ordination and marriage, neither of which “have any visible sign or ceremony ordained of God” (25), and so appear to fall within the rubric of permitted change. It will quickly be pointed out, however, that the limit on Variety in this regard is established by “God’s Word written” (20,36)— and some contend that the present innovations have crossed that boundary.

The question is, Who is to make that determination if not the national church? If the rites and ceremonies in question concern only a given province and its governance — for any other province is free to reject or refuse these rites and ceremonies, in principle or in the persons of those who take part in them — then as with all such matters the error is limited to the province which has erred. Are rites and ceremonies — even if errant — matters over which to break communion — as a number of provinces have done, not just with the individuals immediately representing the innovations, but with any who even approve of them? Are these matters over which to shun Christ’s table, as some have done? I believe not; and hope that there is yet time for them to reconsider their breach of communion.

Tobias S Haller BSG

---

An Immodest Proposal

After listening last week to the interview with the Nobel-prize-winning economist and game theorist, and his reflection on how game theory provides a way to maximize positive outcomes for all concerned in competetive situations, it occurs to me that a little game for the Anglican Communion might not be out of place. So instead of the "compromises" offered by most of the Conservative/Reasserter folks out there (i.e., "If you stop doing what we don't like we won't [a] throw you out or [b] leave...") let me offer this vision for an Anglican Covenant:

• Each province shall govern itself in all matters pertaining only to itself. This includes the interpretation of the historic faith and order as expressed in the Book of Common Prayer of each province, by the superior synod of each province (in our case the General Convention; in Nigeria's case, their synod.) This way, some provinces might have same-sex unions, women priests, or gay bishops, but another province doesn't have to allow or accept them either in principle or as individuals. This draws upon the already existing Anglican notion of provincial diversity in matters of rites and ceremonies, and the provision for the local adapation of the historic episcopate as described in the Lambeth Quadrilateral.

• No decision affecting all of the provinces shall be acceptable unless and until all provinces have approved such an action, through their particular superior synods. This would essentially give each province an absolute veto over any action that would force it to take a position with which it disagreed. (This is, more or less, how the Orthodox do things: recognition of Anglican orders was held up because of the veto by two of the autocephalous Orthodox churches, if I recall correctly.) Such actions and decisions would be, I take it, very few and far between, and on matters of such import the church would move very slowly; and more importantly, together.

• Lambeth and the ACC would function as conferences and consultative bodies rather than as legislatures, meeting only to address such questions as mission and program. This might actually accomplish something and allow them to serve more as instruments of unity than as forums for division.

This would, IMHO, solve a lot of problems, except those of the people within the Episcopal Church who simply cannot abide the fact that they are in a minority, and are unwilling to abide by the decisions of our General Convention, or work to change them through proper legislative means.

---

Shadows of Unity

When I was in seminary I wrote a paper for R. William Franklin's church history course, in which I compared the lives and views of Dr. William Reed Huntington and Fr. Paul Wattson, founder of the Society of the Atonement at Graymoor. The essay was later published by the Society of the Atonement, with two responses, addressing my sometimes pointed critique of Fr. Paul's concepts and direction.
It occurs to me that we are engaged in a similar discussion at present as to which model for unity or communion is best, and so I'm providing a link to this essay for anyone who might be interested in a historical perspective.
Here is the precis of the paper:

In this paper I will examine two men and the models for church unity they proposed. This is a study in contrasts and shadows. The men themselves are shadows of each other: each perceived in the other a distortion of an ideal; each reacted to the divisions within the Episcopal Church in a different way, one by seeking common ground, the other by escape to higher ground. The models for church unity they proposed reflect their different backgrounds and outlooks, and respectively present an ethos centered in community and an ethos built upon authority. As such they reflect the ongoing tension between koinonía and episkopé that has marked the church from the days of Paul and Peter. The models have changed and been adapted over time by those who have adopted them, but the end of unity for which they were to serve as means seems still as shadowy as ever.
The first part of this paper compares and contrasts the lives and philosophies of the two men: one viewing the strength of the church welling up from the parish, the other looking to the See of Peter as the fons vitae for the health of the body. The second part summarizes the origins and development of the Chicago-Lambeth Quadrilateral and the Church Unity Octave. A brief concluding section comments on the current state of ecumenical affairs, and describes one glimmer of hope among the shadows of unity.

Read the rest at Shadows of Unity