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A Visit From the Archbishop
Written by The Anglican Communion Institute
25 April 2007
It is becoming obvious that the leadership of TEC means to move resolutely ahead with its mission of civil rights and inclusion, insisting that these are imperatives of the Gospel of Jesus Christ and a kind of brand name for American Episcopalianism. (We leave to the side whether inclusion or civil rights are being honored or thwarted by this idea.)
In the light of the failure to respond positively to the communique of the Primates Meeting, the course being charted is becoming increasingly clear. Apparently the Archbishop of Canterbury is prepared to hear out the leadership of TEC on an alternative plan that will deal with the problems it has created for life in Communion. But the disconnect that will result could be palpable, not least because TEC leadership does not acknowledge that it has created a problem that requires any remedy of the kind an Instrument of Unity has recently urged, with urgency. It views the problem as 'conservatives' out of step with the enlightened views it holds. The recent reports of Presiding Bishop Schori's comments make this very clear indeed. She is to be commended for her candor.
The Archbishop of Canterbury will not be accused of failing to go the extra mile in this terrible mess. It might be suspected that his chief intention is to be sure he has a grasp of the facts at close hand. Proximity will in this case surely be a bracing thing.
Conservatives for their part continue, in some quarters, to admonish the Archbishop for failing to do something he is said to have the power to do: to refuse to give 'protection'; to prescind from excommunicating; to fail to acknowledge a new province or group within TEC.
Yet this is manifestly wrong. Archbishop Rowan has made it clear he will not act as a Pope. He has neither the legal nor the moral right to do so, given the history of Anglican polity and the kind of polity he is himself trying to encourage at this moment in time. Moreover, it is hard to imagine what more could have been done than was done at Dar es Salaam. Creating a new province, or enabling one, is something that individual Primates may have designs about, but the effect would only be to fracture and divide the Primates as a body.
And it is not necessary. What is necessary is for the Dar es Salaam communique to be followed up on. It is not enough to point to the success of this or that ad hoc method of oversight, granted by this or that kindly Bishop and undertaken by this or that generous Episcopal neighbor. This is at most 'finger in the dike' stuff, and it fails to reckon with all that is now required. Who will go to Lambeth? Who will represent TEC at the next Primates Meeting? Who will care for the parish in the diocese which is not overseen by kind or generous Bishop X? The Dar es Salaam communique is a unique gift. It accepts a serious problem and deals with it. It has done so with astonishing agreement of mind. How that agreement has turned into confusion and dissembling is only further testimony to the resolve of TEC to have things always on their own terms.
It is becoming clear as well that a gift is only of any value if it is given and received both. Archbishop Rowan would be forgiven for being puzzled at the failure of conservative Bishops in TEC both to applaud and embrace the communique of Dar es Salaam and receive warmly what has been given. Not to gaze on it from afar or speak of its virtues only, but to unwrap and open and take good care of what has been given.
Efforts to delay or to seek another form of 'peace' can only be seen as yet another example of American unilateralism. There is nothing wrong, uncanonical, imperial, or otherwise with the communique's requests. The requests address with clarity and charity a problem that unilateralists in the Communion have created. There is no evidence that the Primates are seeking fresh alternatives to the communique they crafted, and Archbishop Rowan is going the extra mile to take the pulse up close. Sadly, the patient is not only quite ill, but in denial as well.
---Christopher Seitz, Philip Turner and Ephraim Radner for The Anglican Communion Institute, Inc.
