The Archbishop of Canterbury's long-awaited Advent Letter is, in many ways, a sequel to his reflection of June 2006 - 'The Challenge and Hope of Being An Anglican Today'. It is, in fact, a longer document (at over 4,300 words compared to the earlier reflection's 3,350 words) and one which repays careful and repeated study rather than instant reactions. The present comments are not meant to pre-empt this need for patient reflection, through a simple summary; rather, we hope to contribute to it through attentive and extended reading of its meaning.
The letter falls into six distinct parts, which we shall examine in sequence.
I. The opening introduction sets the letter in context and draws attention to his earlier summary of responses from Primates to the Joint Standing Committee's (JSC) analysis of the American bishops' statement from New Orleans (NOLA). The soundbite summary of those responses is 'we have no consensus about the New Orleans statement'. Some of the negative responses are seen as reaction to 'reported remarks of individual bishops in The Episcopal Church' which either repudiated the statement or 'argued that it did not imply any change in current policies'. This makes clear that, although some Primates 'reflected a deep desire to put the question decisively behind us as a Communion', this will prove impossible as long as there is no commonly recognized change in TEC's policies and no common self-discipline among TEC bishops themselves to work together with the larger Communion.
The Archbishop of Canterbury's long-awaited Advent Letter is, in many ways, a sequel to his reflection of June 2006 – The Challenge and Hope of Being An Anglican Today II. The lengthy second section addresses the crucial question – 'Where does this leave us as a Communion?' . The Archbishop believes that the answer 'is not a simple one' as 'we have no single central executive authority'. However, in fulfilment of the Archbishop of Canterbury's historic role, he seeks to 'try and state what common ground there is' and to do so 'out of profound conviction that the existence of our Communion is truly a gift of God to the wholeness of Christ's Church'. That means there is both a need to prevent further fractures but also to set forth clearly some of the boundaries of Anglican identity. Although he does not explain it here, this notion of the Communion's charism as directed towards the larger Church's "wholeness" picks up themes he has stated elsewhere: the successful and faithful resolution of Anglican conflicts in the present could represent a gracious model for all Christians in our search for common ministry and service of God within the world. It is this common witness for which many people thirst and long, and Anglicans must be willing to advance it within their own house if there is ever to be a hope of drawing together the wider Church.
The Communion is 'a voluntary association of provinces and dioceses' whose unity depends on mutual recognition and an acknowledgment of 'the same "constitutive elements" in one another'. A full relationship of communion is then defined in relation to three areas of 'common acknowledgment', with comments on each:
1. The common acknowledgment that we stand under the authority of Scripture as 'the rule and ultimate standard of faith', in the words of the Chicago-Lambeth Quadrilateral; as the gift shaped by the Holy Spirit which decisively interprets God to the community of believers and the community of believers to itself and opens our hearts to the living and eternal Word that is Christ.
2. The common acknowledgement of an authentic ministry of Word and Sacrament.
3. The common acknowledgement that the first and great priority of each local Christian community is to communicate the Good News.
The first of these acknowledgements includes the crucial statement that 'We recognise each other in one fellowship when we see one another "standing under" the word of Scripture' and the warning that our reading – and particularly any new reading of the Bible – is an ecclesial task: 'Understanding the Bible is not a private process or something to be undertaken in isolation by one part of the family. Radical change in the way we read cannot be determined by one group or tradition alone'. The second 'common acknowledgement' of the Communion's Christian life roots the principle of non-intervention in each others' churches in the 'trust that the Lord who has called us by his Word also calls men and women in other contexts and raises up for them as for us a ministry which can be recognised as performing the same tasks'. Given the development of 'missions' from one province into the sphere of another, it is important that the Archbishop affirms that it is 'when we are able to recognise biblical faithfulness and authentic ministry in one another' that communion leads us 'to support each other's efforts to win people for Christ and to serve the world in his Name'. Thus, the third constitutive element of the Anglican Communion – the mission of evangelism – is bound up with the first two elements of common Scriptural learning and accountability and mutually recognized ministries, and requires their robust functioning. There is no effective mission apart from hearing the Scriptures together and accepting a common order of our ministries.
In this context the 'present crisis' is named as 'in significant part a crisis about whether we can fully, honestly and gratefully recognise these gifts in each other', with the sexuality debates simply standing as symptoms of confusion over this mutual recognition. Only in this light does the Archbishop then reaffirm as he has consistently – including in 'Challenge and Hope' – what the debate is and is not about in relation to sexuality. Although the Communion has clearly committed itself to 'defending the human rights and civil liberties of homosexual people' and 'offering' them 'pastoral care' such commitment does not coincide with an affirmation of homosexual activity as 'an acceptable Christian lifestyle'.
The problem here lies with the Communion's common sense of Scripture's demands and the 'moral tradition of the wider church'. In fact, as the Archbishop argues, 'insofar as there is currently any consensus in the Communion…it is not in favour of change in our discipline or our interpretation of the Bible'. This is then tied to the issue of mutual recognition though a description of an individual church's actions which might inevitably raise 'the question of whether a local church is still fully recognisable within the one family of practice and reflection'. In this, the Archbishop is clearly referring to events in TEC through which a sexually partnered homosexual bishop is ordained and same-sex liturgies are officially permitted. These, he goes on to say, mark 'a decisive move that plainly implies a new understanding of Scripture that has not been received and agreed by the wider Church'. That, in a nutshell, is his diagnosis of the problem between the Communion and TEC.
But significantly, the Archbishop goes to say that in such a situation a two-fold reaction is right and proper. First, 'it becomes important to clarify that the Communion as a whole is not committed to receiving the new interpretation'. Furthermore, 'there must be ways in which others can appropriately distance themselves from decisions and policies which they have not agreed'. Here, he openly accepts the need for the Communion today both to have a way formally to reject TEC's actions, and also to provide a recognized place of differentiation from TEC on the part of her members that maintain their commitment to the Communion's teaching and discipline.
The Archbishop then concludes by setting boundaries as to what amounts to an appropriate distancing. He accepts that some (both within and outside America) believe that 'the first condition of recognisability (a common reading and understanding of Scripture) is not [being] met' with respect to TEC. They have at the same time, he realizes, also concluded that the other two constitutive elements of the Communion ('the whole structure of mission and ministry') are also lacking in their relationship with TEC. They have thus sought ways to provide 'supplementary ministerial care' to TEC members who can no longer accept their church's leadership. As requested by the JSC, however, the Archbishop reminds the Primates that 'successive Lambeth Conferences and Primates' Meetings have cautioned very strongly against such provision'. He then lists the following problems with the way 'supplementary ministerial care' has been provided by non-Americans creating new episcopal structures within America:
1. 'It creates a seriously anomalous position' vis a vis jurisdiction, orders, and relationships
2. 'It does not appeal to a clear or universal principle by which it may be decided that a local church's ministry is completely defective'
3. 'On the ground, it creates rivalry and confusion'
4. 'It opens the door to complex and unedifying legal wrangles in civil courts'
5. 'It creates a situation in which pastoral care and oversight have to be exercised at a great distance'
These represent significant drawbacks to the current extra-jurisdictional provisions, in the Archbishop's mind. While not ruling out such actions, he notes that all the Instruments have in recent years stated that 'interventions are not to be sanctioned' and that it is 'reasonable' that this principle 'should only be overridden when the Communion together ha[s] in some way concluded, not only that a province [is] behaving anomalously, but that this [is] so serious as to compromise the entire ministry and mission the province was undertaking'. It appears that, although the Communion has reached the first conclusion – TEC's actions are outside the bounds of common discipline and teaching -- it has not reached the latter conlusion – common agreement on extra-jurisdictional care for those in TEC still in line with the Communion. The section therefore concludes with a sixth problem that relates back to the call to be faithful to Scripture:
6. Without such a condition [ie conciliar consensus of TEC's failure to receive acknowledgement her Scriptural and ministerial recognizability], the risk is magnified of smaller and smaller groups taking to themselves the authority to decide on the adequacy of a neighbour's ministerial life or spiritual authenticity. The gospels and the epistles of Paul alike warn us against a hasty final judgment on the spiritual state of our neighbours.
This whole second section is, therefore, an almost programmatic call for a conciliar discernment of mutual recognition and a setting of boundaries both in relation to unilateral implementation of innovative readings of Scripture and unilateral judgments about the total failure of a church to be recognisably Anglican and so to intervene in its sphere of ministry or mission.
III. The third section of the letter turns more explicitly and, as it were, historically to the situation of TEC in relation to the Communion. Again in line with his statements since the day his appointment as Archbishop of Canterbury was announced, he states that, despite debates over the force of Lambeth resolutions, 'the 1998 Resolution is the only point of reference clearly agreed by the overwhelming majority of the Communion. This is the point where our common reading of Scripture stands…'. What was said implicitly in section two is now made explicit: 'it is not surprising if some have concluded that the official organs of The Episcopal Church….have put in question the degree to which it can be recognised as belonging to the same family by deciding to act against the strong, reiterated and consistent advice of the Instruments of Communion'. That is the justification for 'the repeated requests for clarification' and it is noted that 'several within The Episcopal Church, including a significant number of bishops and some diocesan conventions, have clearly distanced themselves from the prevailing view in their province'. There is, here, little support for the idea long promoted by some leaders of TEC that those who disagree with TEC's affirmation of homosexual life represent only a small, insignificant dissenting minority. There is also here a hint – elaborated in what follows - as to the significance of the diocese in terms of the ultimate unit of mutual recognition within the Anglican family (recalling the Communion was defined as a 'voluntary association of provinces and dioceses').
There follows an important description of those within TEC whom the Archbishop considers to have 'distanced' themselves from TEC's official policies in favour of the Communion's teaching and discipline : it includes (but this implies the list is not exhaustive) the Camp Allen Windsor bishops but also 'others who have looked for more radical solutions'. Even the radicals, therefore – presumably dioceses and bishops ending their ties with TEC - are not excluded from what he goes on to say. While recognising the potentially incendiary nature of what he says ('without elaborating on the practical implications of this or the complicated and diverse politics of the situation') the Arcbhsishop states that 'it is obvious that such dioceses and bishops cannot be regarded as deficient in recognisable faithfulness to the common deposit and the common language and practice of the Communion'. In other words, while there is unclarity about the status of 'the official organs' of TEC - in terms of their recognisability as part of the Anglican family using the principles outlined earlier – there is no lack of clarity about the Communion status of those who have distanced themselves from TEC in one way or another. Lest there be any doubt, the Archbishop says that 'If their faith and practice are recognised by other churches in the Communion as representing the common mind of the Anglican Church, they are clearly in fellowship with the Communion'. If the Archbishop, therefore, has concerns over those who have left TEC and formed new structures under non-American and TEC jurisdictions – and he has real concerns – they do not lie at the level of "faith and practice", but rather at the level of ecclesial prudence and constructiveness. The difference is an extremely important one to note.
Given this analysis of the fractured nature of TEC, the 'practical challenge' and goal is 'to find ways of working out a fruitful, sustainable and honest relation for' the group of committed faithful Communion Anglicans in TEC and America in relation to both their own province and the wider Communion. Unilateral solutions ('a series of ad hoc arrangements with individual provinces elsewhere') are again ones that the Archbishop cannot accept, and he appeals to the Dar es Salaam Primates' Communiqué and the anger about 'uncontrolled interventions' to underline their negative character. But he is adamant that something does need to be done – 'local solutions that will have some theological and canonical solidity'.
Turning to the wider issue of TEC's provincial relation with the Communion as a whole, the Archbishop calls for recognition as a Communion of two key points. First, that 'most if not all' bishops at NOLA were eager to meet the primates' requests and be loyal to the Communion and therefore that the Communion has a responsibility 'to and for that large body' (again with special mention of those committed to Windsor and Lambeth I.10). In summary, the Communion must not 'give way to the temptation to view the Episcopal Church as a monochrome body'. Second, the Communion must acknowledge that the quest for clarification from TEC as to her commitments to Communion teaching and discipline on matters of sexuality must now cease – she has explained as much as she is able to do.
But this raises the question of what clarity has in fact been offered. Here again the Archbishop acknowledges that the interpretation of NOLA is 'disputable'. He accepts that the TEC House of Bishops has indeed adopted the requested moratorium on ordaining sexually active homosexuals in relation to the episcopate; but he also accepts that there has been no change by TEC's House of Bishops in relation to same-sex blessings ('the declaration on same-sex blessings is in effect a reiteration of the position taken in previous statements'). This latter fact leaves 'many' in the Communion dissatisfied and 'there is obviously a significant and serious gap between what TEC understands and what others assume as to what constitutes a liturgical provision in the name of the Church at large'.
The internal conflict in TEC is then addressed with recognition of the Presiding Bishop's proposed scheme but also an acknowledgment that it is unclear how other provinces will be consulted or involved (a clear sign that this is considered important). Significantly, he also asserts that 'what has been proposed does not so far seem to have commanded the full confidence of those most affected'. There is also a reminder of Dar's concerns over legal disputes: although this question was not addressed by NOLA, TEC is clearly actively pursuing litigation against its 'distancing' members, and drawing them into legal battles, despite the Primates' recommendations.
Finally, in this section, a further concern is noted regarding – to use the earlier categories of discernment – 'common acknowledgment about an authentic ministry of Word and Sacrament'. The House of Bishops at NOLA apparently decided to subordinate themselves to General Convention, for they claimed that they could not make decisions that somehow pre-empted the entire General Convention's choices. The Archbishop describes this as 'a decision of some significance' which 'raises a major ecclesiological issue' relating to 'the distinctive charism of bishops as an order and their responsibility for sustaining doctrinal standards'. In terms of mutual recognition this – a new issue as far as any of the Communion's Instruments has noted it – is described as pointing to 'a gap between what some in the Episcopal Church understand about the ministry of bishops and what is held elsewhere in the Communion'. The Archbishop explicitly states, 'this needs to be addressed'.
The section closes by reiterating that the Communion needs to move on from seeking clarification from TEC in a way that honours 'the intentions and hard work done by the bishops of TEC' but also finds a way forward.
IV. The fourth section begins to chart that way forward with a focus on the Lambeth Conference. A two-fold rationale for invitations (and non-invitations) to the Conference is offered. First, reflecting the earlier emphasis on the importance of common counsel for Communion life, the Archbishop explains that some have not been invited because 'their Episcopal ordination was carried through against the counsel of the Instruments of Communion'. He thus corrects any misunderstanding in TEC about his desire to invite Gene Robinson (he has no such intention). At the same time, although accepting 'the good faith of those who have felt called to provide additional Episcopal oversight in the USA' through accepting ordination as bishops from extra-jurisdictional sources, he cannot invite these new bishops either because their ordinations also 'have not been encouraged or legitimised by the Communion overall'. Recognising the problems non-invitation causes, the Archbishop strongly urges 'those whose strong commitments create such problems' (presumably the backers of Gene Robinson and the provinces who have consecrated missionary bishops for America) what they are prepared to offer for the Conference he seeks – one 'that will have some general credibility in and for the Communion overall'. There is a marked tone here of exhortation to a mature acknowledgment of a difficult situation that requires constructive engagement rather than symbolic gestures of disaffiliation and antagonism.
Second (and emphasised by reference to underlining in his letter of invitation and printing here in italics), acceptance of an invitation to the Lambeth Conference 'must be taken as implying willingness to work with those aspects of the Conference's agenda that relate to implementing the recommendations of Windsor, including the development of a Covenant'. While allowing for diversity and discussion Windsor and a covenant are clearly seen as means of avoiding repetition of recent tensions. The Archbishop then demonstrates the seriousness of this intention by signalling that 'I intend to be in direct contact with those who have expressed unease about this, so as to try and clarify how deep their difficulties go with accepting or adopting the Conference's agenda'. The 'recommendations of Windsor' and the Covenant's development are not optional matters for Lambeth bishops, according to the Archbishop, and he here makes clear that the agenda of Lambeth will in part reflect these matters.
Further clarification is then given as to the nature and purpose of the Conference. It is neither 'a canonical tribunal' nor 'merely a general consultation'. It is – and these descriptions are telling:
· A meeting of the chief pastors and teachers of the Communion, seeking an authoritative common voice
· A meeting designed to strengthen and deepen the sense of what the Episcopal vocation is.
The use of the phrase 'authoritative common voice', as related to the teaching vocation of the episcopacy, is a striking sign that the Archbishop is pressing Lambeth to adopt a more synodical character, in the traditional sense of this word. And in this, he appears to have moved beyond earlier remarks he has made about the Conference. This being so, we can better understand the essential ecclesial importance he attaches to a kind of disciplined attendance by the bishops of the Communion.
The Archbishop accepts that difficult and divisive issues will be addressed at the Conference, but insists this is best done in the proposed context of prayer and mutual spiritual enrichment. That will assist in discernment as to 'whether or how far we can recognise the same gospel and ministry in diverse places and policies'. An invitation 'does not constitute a certification of orthodoxy' in the first place. But it does provide 'a challenge to pray seriously together and to seek a resolution that will be as widely owned as may be'. In a challenge to those threatening a boycott, he warns that 'the refusal to meet can be a refusal of the cross – and so of the resurrection', as if to say that the situation facing the Communion can only be resolved in terms of evangelical "life" if the Communion's bishops are willing to make the sacrifice necessary for gathering together to meet prayerfully the challenges to faith and practice that we are now experiencing. Lambeth, he notes, is in part about 'our handling of conflict and potential division as part of our maturing both as pastors and as disciples'. This means that any meeting will prove painful. But Gospel life cannot emerge by avoiding this pain. The stakes are clearly very high.
A paragraph then addresses preparation with a call for conversations across divisions and preparatory reading before noting that 'we are bound to seek for fruitful ways of carrying forward liaison with provinces whose policies cause scandal or difficulty to others'. There are also, however, other forms of relational communion that will continue outside the formal Instruments.
The status of TEC is clearly still in the balance – 'we simply cannot pretend that there is now a ready-made consensus on the future of relationships between TEC and other provinces' – with work to be done about not just sexuality but 'fidelity to Scripture and identity in ministry and mission'. The challenging question is again starkly put: we must face 'both honestly and charitably, the deeply painful question of who we can and cannot recognise as sharing the same calling and task'.
V. In the light of these challenges, the fifth section offers two recommendations. These are without doubt important in their concrete scope.
First, picking up the request of JSC, is the need to address the fractures in TEC. The goal of his recommendation is to achieve a 'better level of mutual understanding" between "the leadership of the Episcopal Church and those with whom they are most in dispute, internally and externally". To this end, he proposed a 'facilitated' meeting of the parties involved. Such a meeting would seek to 'ease tensions' and 'clarify options' as well as provide clear 'ideas about the future pattern of liaison between TEC and other parts of the Communion'. This proposal has raised concerns by some already that it will prove 'more of the sam'" with respect to fruitless 'dialogue' between an intransigent TEC leadership and an increasingly desperate and persecuted American Anglican minority. Earlier attempts at discussions, with Kenneth Kearon present, went nowhere. What is to prevent the same pointless outcome of past discussions? However, the fact that the Archbishop has taken the lead in this – "I wish to pursue" these conversations – as well as his statement that he has already 'identified' persons who will assist in this, suggests that this is no longer a matter of encouraged dialogue but of hosted and directed engagement with the goal of a Communion-accepted solution. Certainly, the entire framework of the letter points in this direction, and therefore would mark a significant difference with previous attempts at 'conversation'. If this is not the case, the Archbishop does not in fact take the lead in this quickly, the proposal is surely open to dismissal.
Second, with echoes of the Windsor Report's proposal for an Archbishop's Council of Advice and a recognition of the limits of current structures, he will convene 'a small group of primates and others' who will work with the primates, JSC, Covenant Design Group and Lambeth Conference Design Group. Their task is to address 'the unanswered questions arising from the inconclusive evaluation of the primates' to NOLA and 'to take certain issues forward to Lambeth' where it will feed into discussions of Anglican identity and the Covenant process. Its agenda is stark, explicitly including:
· "Whether in the present circumstances it is possible for provinces or individual bishops at odds with the expressed mind of the Communion to participate fully in representative Communion agencies, including ecumenical bodies".
· "To weigh current developments in the light of the clear recommendations of Windsor of the subsequent statements from the ACC and the Primates' Meeting"
· "It will be bound to consider the exact status of bishops ordained by one province for ministry in another"
About what situations is the Archbishop here concerned? The context of the proposal – 'unanswered questions' with respect to NOLA – indicates that the main issue is TEC's (and perhaps other churches') relationship with the Communion: how far does her claim as 'Anglican' go when in fact her teaching and practice have clearly departed from the Communion's? However, the mention of Windsor's recommendations and extra-jurisdictionally ordained bishops, also indicates that the Archbishop is aware that various responses to TEC's clear departure from Communion teaching and practice has also obscured the character of Anglican identity more broadly and of common authority. These issues must also be addressed, rather than allowed to further dissipate a common mind. The Archbishop recognises 'much unclarity' over 'who speaks for the Communion?' and says this needs resolution 'urgently': 'the people of the Communion need to be sure that they are not placed in unsustainable and damaging positions by any vagueness as to what the Communion as a whole believes and endorses, and so the issue of who represents the Communion cannot be evaded…Not everyone carrying the name of Anglican can claim to speak authentically for the identity we share as a global fellowship'.
This last concern, which is surely a weighty one, faces into the current dissolution of the Communion's 'common voice' through a host of unilateral decisions that clearly affect teaching and discipline both. Not only are churches like TEC and certain bishops and dioceses in Canada knowingly moving ahead with innovations that run counter to everything that Anglicans have together articulated and decided, but in doing so they are wittingly undercutting the very notion of common identity, character, authority, mission, and concern. Those responding to these actions have, in their turn, if with a certain reactionary rationale, ended up moving forward in ways that do not represent common decision-making within the Communion and that may, in fact, further the dismantling of Anglican identity. To pursue such destructive innovations unilaterally, and still call oneself 'Anglican' has put into question the very notion of Anglicanism itself as a divinely called church within the One, Holy, Catholic, and Apostolic Church into which we are called to grow with other Christians.
The group that the Archbishop proposes offer recommendations about this challenge, as it affects several churches and the Communion as a whole (including how Lambeth Conference may operate) cannot be some judicial tribunal. Nor, however, can it be a repeat of the Panel of Reference that, despite careful work, has been unable to direct any major conflicts it has examined towards fruitful resolution. It appears that the Archbishops himself, given his own role as the articulator of the Communion's mind, and gatherer of her chief pastors, has accepted his role as moral leader for the Communion especially in this time of crisis. He will, again, seek to bring concrete recommendations before the council of Anglicanism's bishops for the sake of the Communion's common ordering. This is yet another indication that the Archbishop has decided that the Lambeth Conference must be a truly conciliar decision-making body for the Communion.
VI. The short concluding sixth section offers a strongly worded exhortation to faith in the promises of God's grace, understood in the context of Advent. He straightforwardly rejects a set of assumptions he believes are presupposed in much discussion within the Communion:
· 'that any change from our current deadlock is impossible'
· 'that division is unavoidable'
· 'that any such division represents so radical a difference in fundamental faith that no recognition and future co-operation can be imagined'.
It is assumptions like this, the Archbishop implies, which seem to forget that 'human planning and ingenuity' do not save us; nor can 'human resistance and sin' 'frustrate' God's good purpose. The Lord's salvation is a 'gift'; and to such a gift ought our common hopes and actions to be oriented. So the Archbishop concludes with a call to prayer, obedience and openness to God's recreating work.
The Christian integrity of this letter lies in the way its concerns and proposals are molded by this overarching orientation of expectancy, willingness, and receipt in faith. With Archbishop Williams and the whole Church, we too cry out, 'Come… Amen. Come Lord Jesus. The grace of the Lord Jesus be with God's people. Amen' (Rev. 22:17, 20-21).
