|
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 communiqué 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 communiqué 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
communiqué 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
communiqué 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 communiqué 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
Ephraim Radner
The Anglican Communion Institute
|