Delegates to the Network's Annual Council held this week at St. Vincent's Cathedral in Bedford, a suburb of Fort Worth, Texas, voted unanimously to ratify the Federation Articles of the Common Cause Partnership (CCP) that may ultimately put it on a collision course with the House of Bishops of the Episcopal Church that meets in September in New Orleans. The Common Cause Partnership, through its Convener Bishop Robert Duncan, has called the first ever meeting of a Council of Common Cause Bishops, set to convene in Pittsburgh immediately following the TEC House of Bishops meeting in Newo Orleans in September.

Describing the federation Articles, mid-Atlantic Network Dean and Bishop-elect John Guernsey said, they are "a step forward for Common Cause that allows the constituent partners to retain their [current]identity and autonomy while forming a more coherent and accountable structure. None of the groups disappear and none of the groups stop their gospel mission... Yet we are forming a more coherent whole."

The Jurisdictions and Ministries of the ten Common Cause Partners included are: the American Anglican Council (AAC); the Anglican Communion Network (ACN); the Anglican Mission in the Americas (AMiA); the Anglican Network in Canada (ANiC); The Anglican Coalition in Canada (ACiC), the Anglican Province of America (APA); the Convocation of Anglicans in North America (CANA); the Anglican Essentials Federation (AEF); Forward in Faith, North America (FIF/NA); and the Reformed Episcopal Church (REC).

Each of the ten groups that make up Common Cause must ratify the Federation articles.

"What is needed is a completely new structure. Lambeth is failing, Canterbury is failing, the Anglican Consultative Council is prejudiced in a Western way and the primates are sadly divided north and south," said Bishop Robert Duncan, ACN moderator and convener of Common Cause.

Among other actions taken were:

* The orthodox Pittsburgh bishop was unanimously re-elected by the 80 delegates to lead the coalition for another term. Delegates also re-elected the Rev. Canon David Anderson secretary and elected Mr. Bill Roemer treasurer. All three were elected unanimously by acclamation. Bishop Duncan, Canon Anderson and Mr. Roemer will each serve a three-year term.

* The groups reiterated the Network's commitment to making space for different opinions about women in Holy Orders.

* Delegates requested suspension of litigation ..."unconditional commit to the unanimous urging of the Primates of the Anglican Communion that all existing litigation between The Episcopal Church (TEC) and those who have left TEC or are otherwise engaged in litigation involving claims of TEC, be suspended." The Network again urged TEC to meet to seek a way forward to resolve current disputes through mediation as opposed to the continuation of litigation which is now proliferating at the hand of TEC.

* Delegates of the ACN declined to remove the clause from its Charter which declares that the Network "shall operate in good faith within the Constitution of the Episcopal Church. However, by amendment to their bylaws, the ACN delegates made it clear that Network affiliates outside The Episcopal Church were not required to submit to the constitution of The Episcopal Church. The decision followed a plea by the Rt. Rev. James Stanton, Bishop of Dallas, that the council not act prematurely. Bishop Stanton pointed out that the General Conventions of 1964 and 1967 defined The Episcopal Church as a constituent member of the Anglican Communion. "If somebody is going to be faithless to that vision, I want it to be them, not us," said Bishop Stanton. With reference to the majority of liberal leadership in The Episcopal Church he said, "We are in danger of doing exactly on the right what they have done on the left. I pray we will not do that." Nothing in the charter or bylaws shall be interpreted as requiring submission to the constitution of The Episcopal Church by affiliates of this Network who are not themselves members of The Episcopal Church said the leaders.

Highlights from the CCP Articles of Federation include:

* Work toward making it possible for Common Cause partners to transfer members between the parishes of different jurisdictions and allow the clergy of Partners to "officiate transiently" in jurisdictions other than their own.

* Allow Common Cause Partners to work more closely together in communications, mission and education.

* Each jurisdiction in the CCP accepts one of the historic Books of Common Prayer as the primary standard for worship. The autonomy of the individual Jurisdictions and Ministries, and their constituent bodies, is in no way restricted or superseded by membership in the CCP.

* View eventual union when deemed appropriate as the goal of the Federation.

* Propagate the truths of the Gospel as articulated and practiced in the historic Anglican way and speak with one voice and act in concert for the welfare and witness of all its Partners.

* Pursuing a communal, charitable and organic relationship with the world-wide Anglican Communion; and support planting congregations by Partners.

[Arguing how all this might be observed by The Episcopal Church (TEC), Bishop James M. Adams (Western Kansas) was clear about how much influence the Network bishops have had: "We suffer under the delusion that we have any influence in The Episcopal Church. The action of General Convention 2006 sealed it - we have no influence whatsoever. They don't listen to a word we say."

Referencing the Episcopal Church he said: "What to do? Well, when your growth rate is static if not shrinking, one looks for ways to grow. One way is to ally with other like-minded little groups who share your obsession with "purity" and "clean hands."]

Katie Sherrod, Ft. Worth Diocese's token liberal voice cynically observed, "so now they've formed yet another 'orthodox' entity, whose purpose is to "build toward that new ecclesiastical structure" that will one day supplant The Episcopal Church [and one assumes the Anglican Church of Canada] as the official Anglican presence in North America."

"What is needed is a completely new structure. Lambeth is failing, Canterbury is failing, the Anglican Consultative Council is prejudiced in a Western way and the primates are sadly divided north and south. We'll leave and they can take the stuff with them to hell, because that is where they will take it. This is Good Friday and we have to face it," said Bishop Robert Duncan, ACN moderator and convener of Common Cause.

Clearly momentum is building. If these Network and Common Cause bishops and numerous Global South bishops and archbishops decide not to go to Lambeth and form an "alternate Lambeth" we will have a de facto if not de jure schism in the Anglican Communion.

The chasm between the Network and TEC is clearly unbridgeable. There are few "safe" dioceses any more. Even dioceses with overwhelming orthodox majorities can be subject to litigation by minority liberals. To all intents and purposes orthodoxy is finished in the post-modern Episcopal Church.

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