CONSERVATIVE NETWORK STARTS TAKING SHAPE & GAINING PLACE IN REALIGNING COMMUNION

Senior Bishops Also Ready To Cross Diocesan Lines, Plano-East Meeting Told

Report/Analysis By Auburn Faber Traycik

The Christian Challenge (Washington, DC)

January 13, 2004

IF THE OVER 3,000-STRONG Plano-East meeting January 9-10 just south of  Washington, D.C., is an example, the network of faithful Episcopalians emerging   within the Episcopal Church (ECUSA), but outside its official structure, is  becoming - as one speaker put it - a force to be reckoned with. The new Network of Anglican Communion Dioceses and Parishes reportedly  has--among other things--the encouragement of the Archbishop of Canterbury, Dr.  Rowan Williams.

But, while it seems highly unlikely that he would presently support the  designation of it as a replacement for ECUSAââ‚

-an unprecedented step--he may face  a hard choice on that score.

That is because the Network--even before its formal launching next week--is  already starting to be treated as the legitimate U.S. branch of the Communion  by several Anglican provinces and even other Christian bodies, said Pittsburgh  Bishop Robert Duncan and other principals at Plano-East in Woodbridge,  Virginia, sponsored by the D.C. and Virginia chapters of the American Anglican  Council (AAC).

The shift in ecclesial relationships is flanked by earlier announcements that  some 20 Anglican provinces considered their communion with ECUSA liberal  leadership broken or impaired, in the wake of the American Church consecration  of an actively gay bishop, V. Gene Robinson, and support for  optional  same-sex blessings. The actions--seen by most Anglicans worldwide as defying  scriptural authority, established policy, and widespread appeals--have quickened a process of realignment across the Communion.

The most remarkable recent illustration of the change taking place came in a  stinging letter to ECUSA Presiding Bishop Frank Griswold, in which the Ugandan  Anglican Church--which earlier broke ties with ECUSA--turned back the U.S.  Church plans to send a delegation to the installation of Uganda new  presiding bishop. It also saw ECUSA offer of aid as an attempt to buy Uganda  silence and cooperation for its unbiblical policies.

The Gospel of Jesus Christ is not for sale, even among the poorest of us who  have no money, the letter declared. Eternal life, obedience to Jesus  Christ, and conforming to His Word are more important, said the Ugandans--who  invited Network representatives to attend their archbishop installation instead.

That is radical stuff, the Rev. Martyn Minns, rector of Virginia Truro  Church, Fairfax, told Plano-East participants, who outnumbered the some 2,700  faithful Episcopalians who attended October landmark meeting in Dallas  (Plano). Minns said the Ugandan event would be attended by Bishop Duncan, the  Network Moderator, and Dallas Bishop James Stanton, and others.

The formal inauguration of the Network--a move the AAC says is strongly  supported by many Anglican primates--is set to take place January 19-20 at Christ  Church, Plano, and to include among its participants representatives of at  least a dozen dioceses: Albany, Pittsburgh, San Joaquin (CA), South Carolina,  Florida, Central Florida, Dallas, Fort Worth, Quincy and Springfield (both in  Illinois), Western Kansas, and Rio Grande.

THE NEW NETWORK also got a boost from a group of senior bishops which Minns  announced is now prepared to exercise episcopal ministry to marginalized or  embattled parishes across diocesan lines--with or without the permission of  the local ECUSA bishop.

Though there was speculation that this may involve foreign  bishops--canonically untouchable by ECUSA--Minns did not name names, and neither would other AAC  spokesmen TCC queried.

But the provision of adequate episcopal oversight for conservative parishes  in hostile circumstances has the backing of Anglican primates (provincial  leaders), who inferred at their October meeting in London that they will monitor  such provisions via the Archbishop of Canterbury role as consultant in the  matter.

Still, it appears virtually certain that there will be a need for bishops  willing to cross lines without permission. Already, ECUSA and AAC officials are  stalemated over a draft bishops plan that provides no override of the local  bishop if he fails to permit adequate alternate care (adequate being judged  by the recipients). And the stakes are growing higher by the day: some 100  parishes are said to have applied through the AAC for alternate episcopal care.

-Navigating Uncharted Waters-

Minns sparked amusement with his understatement that providing unauthorized  episcopal ministry--though pastoral in intent--may cause some controversy.

And of course, no one could expect that, for beleaguered faithful  Episcopalians,  it will be all smooth or swift sailing through uncharted Anglican waters.  Nor is the new Network likely to offer a panacea for all believing  Episcopalians, since it will not adopt the catholic position on women ordination.

Some confusion and questions were generated recently in the wake of Bishop  Duncan comments to the effect that the Network is not seeking to be a province  separate from ECUSA.

Indeed, it remains intertwined with a body that--despite its rebellious  pro-gay actions and the serious damage they have caused to Anglican unity and  ecumenical efforts--has yet to be de-recognized by the Archbishop of Canterbury  and/or the primates jointly. In remarks to reporters at Woodbridge, as well,  Duncan still held out hope that sufficient pressure could be brought to bear on  ECUSA to step back from its anti-scriptural position on homosexuality.

That was not exactly the message that some heard earlier--if not from Duncan, from other leading spokesmen--at the Dallas meeting and elsewhere.

One online commentator asked what happened to some conservative leaders  assertions that there would be a new province, that the irreformable ECUSA  would be `excommunicated, that no one was working on establishing a `church  within a church--a phrase lately used to describe the Network by both Duncan and  AAC President David Anderson, but a scheme that has been tried and failed.  (Based on its experience, the traditionalist Forward in Faith, North America, has  been urging some Communion-recognized means of separate existence for orthodox U.S. Anglicans since at least 1997, and had promoted similar concepts since  1976.)  As well, there have been largely fruitless prior pledges and pursuits  of alternate episcopal oversight, and, some have asked, could that be more  than an interim solution?

In sum--especially after a Pittsburgh diocesan move putting church property  into the hands of congregations was recalled in a bid to halt a lawsuit over  the motion--some have wondered whether the stay in network meant that a desire  to retain church property and remain in the club would again trump  theology, and genuine unity and communion.  

But it is not that AAC spokesmen do not see the importance of clarifying  relationships and statuses--including that of the Network--along theological lines  within the Communion; it is that it is not up to U.S. faithful to  adjudicate that, the Rev. Canon Kendall Harmon of South Carolina told TCC in  Woodbridge.

Harmon and other AAC spokesmen see the realignment as requiring a patient  process in which their main task is to identify and gather their constituency  within ECUSA and fully establish the Network, so as to distinguish the faithful  for foreign bishops seeking to maintain fellowship, and to be ready (as Fr.  Minns put it) for other possibilities.

And they are encouraged by the international situation as they see it  developing. Though many U.S. faithful would have welcomed stronger, swifter action,  the conservative majority of primates--which only began to awaken to the state  of ECUSA about eight years ago--have already significantly changed the  Anglican landscape in that time. What was first solidly manifest at the 1998 Lambeth  Conference, is now evident in unprecedented declarations of broken communion  (by about 25 percent of provinces so far).

Some provinces have apparently responded to Archbishop Williams appeal for  forbearance, and are waiting for next September results from a new  commission. That panel, led by Irish Primate Robin Eames, is to sort out the legal and  relational implications of ECUSA unilateral actions within the  Communion--though it should be noted that there is a wide range of expectations about what  this commission will do, not all of them likely to be met.

And as the first Eames Commission promoted a doctrine of reception (testing  process) on women ordination at the expense of a hallmark of communion--the  interchangeability of ministries--one might well ask whether Eames II cannot  be expected to find ways of allowing and managing two sexuality doctrines in  one Communion as well.

As Harmon sees it, the tale will be told by how the Eames Commission  performs, how it interfaces with the global South, the response of global South  leaders, and where Williams places himself in regard to that. But he thinks the  odds favor the conservatives.

Unlike the women issue, about which he contended that scripture speaks  bifocally, Harmon told TCC that it wont work...to glorify the doctrine of  reception on the gay issue. You cant `receive something which has no  scriptural grounds, and which he said has been rejected by all four advisory  instruments of Anglican unity--the Archbishop of Canterbury, the Lambeth  Conference, the Primates Meetings and the Anglican Consultative Council.

Global South leaders, in particular, will not tolerate dual theologies on the  issue, he believes--something which also might suggest that they will not  long allow an unrepentant ECUSA to retain full membership status in a Communion  of which they are also a part.

As well, Harmon sees an edge in the fact that Eames II and Archbishop  Williams will have to take the existence of the Network into consideration in  formulating their positions--a Network he also said is already receiving growing  recognition within the Communion and ecumenically.  

Moreover, he believes that liberal arguments about ECUSA pro-homosexual  innovations--that it no big deal, that it can be handled like women  ordination, that it not a Communion-dividing issue--are fast losing ground. It is a  process he thinks has been quickened by the performance of ECUSA presiding  bishop. Griswold supported the October statement of Anglican primates--which  grimly warned of a serious breakdown in commmunion if Robinson was  consecrated--and then proceeded to act as the gay bishop chief consecrator. While U.S.  conservative activists expected this result, some global South leaders were  shocked by it, Harmon said.

The bottom line, he told TCC, is that, international support for the U.S.  faithful is steadily increasing.

AND SOME LEADERS of the emerging Network have scored an approach too focused  on clinging to church property, the club, and/or the general status quo.

Last fall, Bishop Duncan told brethren in Canada that: We need to give up  our idolatries, our comfortable lives that include buildings, properties and  offices. We need to submit to godly leaders...

At Plano-East, AAC Chancellor A. Hugo Blankingship described the  unencouraging legal outlook on church property rights. But, while he noted that church  property is consecrated to the Lord and should be protected, he drew applause  when he added his belief that our orthodox clergy are our chief assets, and far  more important to us than the property. He also joined other speakers in  pointing to the conservatives own role in creating ECUSA dire situation, a  matter addressed with repentance and prayer during the meeting. This is our mess,  and we must deal with it, Blankingship said.

And in his final remarks at Plano-East, Minns asked: Which future do you  want? A safe and comfortable club for people who appreciate the finer things of  life, or are you willing to take the risk and become a missionary community  where all sorts and conditions of men and women are welcome?...Are you willing to  welcome the down and out as well as the up and out?...Not everyone who comes  will be properly dressed and know how to behave or when to sit or stand, but  saving lives is at the heart of God vision. The question is whether we are  willing to pay the price to make it our future. God vision for His Church is  not one of tidy little clubs that sing pretty little songs. God vision for  His Church is one of radical inclusion but it is also one of profound  transformation...

That vision was certainly encouraged and enlarged by moving talks given  during the meeting from representatives of some truly inspiring orthodox  ministries--Anglican Frontier Missions, which seeks to reach world  still-unevangelized; Five Talents, which aids the development of small businesses in developing  countries; Regeneration, a ministry to those seeking to overcome homosexual  attraction; SOMA (Sharing of Ministries Abroad); Alpha; and several others.

-Getting Connected-

And if anything sounded like a rejection of compromise, it was the engaging  talk by Diane Knippers, president of the Institute on Religion and Democracy  and a member of ECUSA Standing Commission on Ecumenical Relations.

The big lie is that one must choose between truth and unity, she said.  Rather, she declared: Genuine truth defines our unity. Genuine unity protects the  truth.

Noting the terrible blow that the General Convention decisions dealt to  Christian unity, she said it is preposterous that we are called schismatic or  separatist. We `dissenters are the ones committed to Christian unity.

Fr. Minns agreed. Will the Network divide [ECUSA]? he asked. No, that  division has already occurred.

Minns sees the Network as being a move of the Holy Spirit by which people  are getting connected over lines that used to separate us.

We are connected by a common vision for the Gospel and a passion for  mission; by a desire to see the Word of God proclaimed with sensitivity and power,  and apply its truth to our lives.

For members of dioceses that are part of its initial formation, the Network  will give an opportunity to bring orthodox leadership to our church at a time  when [its] very future...is at risk. It will allow new partnerships  and...relationships within North America and beyond, Minns told the Plano-East  gathering.

Reportedly, the Network will be open as well to conservative Anglicans in  Mexico and Canada, where New Westminster Bishop Michael Ingham and his diocese  have made some major waves over the issue of same-sex blessings.

For parishes that are not part of the founding dioceses it will give a place  to stand and a community with which to connect, Minns went on. Some parishes  may remain canonically within their existing dioceses, but seek spiritual  oversight through the Network, while some of the more isolated and embattled  parishes may become extra-territorial parts of the founding dioceses, or the basis  of new missionary districts, he said.

Individuals in parishes that have supported the General Convention decisions  have a few options, such as trying to build a network within their parish or  local community. Minns said the Network would also encourage the planting of  new churches.

What it will do is give hope and a place to belong for Anglican Christians  in North America who are committed to a biblical worldview and a biblical way  of life, Minns said.

Around the Communion and ecumenically, he said, the Network gives us a way  to connect with those sisters and brothers around the world...who will no  longer recognize the current leadership of [ECUSA], he added.

Could it be a replacement for ECUSA? Only God knows, but well be ready.

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