Communion And Episcopal Authority

A Concluding Postscript to "The organizational basis of the Anglican Communion:  a theological consideration" by Ephraim Radner I My colleague Prof. Radner traces a significant history"”one that locates the authority of Bishops as prior to that of the administrative structures into which they were later folded.  The prior authority of the Episcopal Office, in the tradition of the church, rests not in its structural position within a hierarchical order but in self-expenditure on behalf of the church on the part of those who hold office.  The self-expenditure of Bishops has through the ages assumed three forms.  First and foremost is a pattern of holy life that reflects that of Christ; second, guardianship of the truth about God revealed in Christ; and third responsibility for the peace and good order of the church.  Each of the forms of self-expenditure rests first of all in a form of personal agency rather than occupancy of a structural position. It is to the priority of personal agency over political and administrative structure that Archbishop Rowan refers in his now well known and frequently quoted letter to Bishop John Howe of Central Florida.  The Archbishop wrote, "The organic union with the wider Church is the Bishop and the Diocese rather than the Provincial structure as such."  Prof Radner's research makes it clear that the Archbishop has history on his side. It is my view that he also has truth on his side, but for the moment I am willing to let his position and that of Prof. Radner stand without defense.  My question is what the implications of the primacy of Bishop and Diocese are for the present debates and struggles within The Anglican Communion.  This question has three parts. What are the implications for the polity of The Episcopal Church?  What are the implications for the proposed Anglican Covenant?  What are the implications for The Anglican Communion both in respect to its self -understanding and its ecumenical relationships? II It is no secret that the actions of The Episcopal Church in the matter of Gene Robinson have posed issues Anglican Polity in its various forms has proved ill equipped to address. Few, however, have noticed that the polity issues presented by this action have proven most disruptive and knotted within The Episcopal Church itself.  It is indeed ironical that the nature and limits of Episcopal authority and Diocesan sovereignty have become a battle ground within the very church that takes its name from the calling and office of a bishop. To be precise, the ordination of the present Bishop of New Hampshire has led a number of Parishes and latterly several Dioceses to withdraw from The Episcopal Church, and place themselves under the jurisdiction of a Diocese or Province outside of its jurisdictional reach.  It is my belief that the Parishes that have taken this action do not have a constitutional right to do so.  I will leave open the question as to whether Dioceses have such a right.  Withdrawal from The Episcopal Church on the part of a Diocese is a complex constitutional issue that cannot be settled within the present polity of The Episcopal Church.  There is no independent judiciary that might make such a determination.  Under present circumstances the issue will most certainly be decided by the exercise of power and the civil courts I take this constitutional lacuna to pose a serious polity issue for The Episcopal Church, but it is not an issue that can be helpfully addressed here.  What can be addressed is the fact that the Constitution of the Episcopal Church gives the sort of priority to Bishop and Diocese that both Archbishop Rowan and Ephraim Radner defend.  In his recent paper, "Is the Episcopal Church Hierarchical?" (www//anglicancommunioninsitute.com) my colleague Mark McCall has shown that the Constitution of The Episcopal Church does not employ hierarchical language in describing the relation between the General Convention and the various dioceses that make up its membership.  By the terms of its constitution, The Episcopal Church is an association of Dioceses that lacks an ordered hierarchy save within the various Dioceses that comprise its membership.  It is not surprising therefore, that according to its Constitution, The Episcopal Church does not have a Metropolitan Archbishop.  Rather, it has a Presiding Bishop whose primary task is simply to  "preside" over its convention and carry on common business between conventions. The reason for this non-hierarchical form of governance is largely historical"”the newly established Protestant Episcopal Church USA had to remove itself from governance by the British Crown and Parliament.  Accordingly, its Constitution states clearly that the locus of authority within The Episcopal Church is the Bishop in his or her Diocese.  Within The Episcopal Church there is no constitutional provision for a hierarchical structure that places the authority of individual Bishops in their Dioceses within a larger structure to which they must defer. By historical accident rather than theological design, the Constitution of The Episcopal Church accords with Archbishop Rowan's statement about the priority of Bishop and Diocese and with Prof. Radner's analysis of the evolution of Episcopal authority and provincial structure.  However, in reaction to the secession from the Episcopal Church on the part of several of its Dioceses, the Office of the Presiding Bishop of The Episcopal Church has made a legal argument before a secular court that runs counter to the plain sense of its Constitution.  That argument is that The Episcopal Church is in fact a hierarchical church, the various Dioceses of which are subordinate to the Presiding Bishop, the Executive Council, and the General Convention. When challenged about the constitutional probity of this legal argument she has replied that in taking these actions she has the full support of The Executive Council.  It is important to note, I believe, that this response contains no contrary argument about the plain sense of the Constitution.  It is simply a reference to the will of a body commissioned to carry on the business of the General Convention between its regularly scheduled meetings.  The inadequacy of this sort of response to a serious constitutional argument is not my primary point, however.  My primary point is that the constitution of the church that precipitated the current crisis in fact makes provision for the central place of Bishop and Diocese within Anglican polity. I take it that this allowance will prove a point of definition in the current debate over the identity of Anglicanism and the nature of its polity.  As things now stand, when the proposed covenant reaches its final form, it will be sent in the first instance to the various Provinces for ratification.  It is generally assumed that The Episcopal Church will refuse to ratify any form of covenant that curtails its autonomy, especially in matters of doctrine, worship, and discipline that life in ecclesial communion has generally demanded.  It is at this point that the Archbishop's theological claim will be put to the test.  It is one thing to ask the Provinces for the sake of convenience to ratify the covenant.  It is quite another, however, to prevent Dioceses from ratifying a covenant when the Province with which they are associated has not done so. Because of the innovative hierarchical claims now being put forward by the Office of the Presiding Bishop, and because she wishes to void the primacy of the various Dioceses of The Episcopal Church established in its constitution, provision for ratification on the part of individual Dioceses is being opposed strenuously.   Nevertheless, the arguments for a provincial monopoly of covenantal powers now championed by those who hold the levers of power within The Episcopal Church in fact reverses the theological order of precedence so plainly visible in the evolution of the polity of the Western Church.  Further, an administrative structure is now given precedence over the agency of those in each Diocese recognized in each Diocese as persons given to expending themselves on behalf of the church"”its holiness, the truth of the Gospel it proclaims, and the good order and peace of its common life through which it witnesses to the Gospel of reconciliation. III What are the implications of the primacy of agency over administrative structure for the proposed covenant?  If Archbishop Rowan's position becomes that of the Anglican Communion, its covenant will be understood in the first instance as a compact between Bishops in their various Dioceses rather than an agreement between the administrative bodies of various national churches.  The implications of such an understanding are far reaching indeed.  Anglicanism will have defined itself not as a federation of ecclesial structures defined by the boundaries of nation states but as a communion of Bishops in their Dioceses each of which is pledged to the others in sub mission to catholic belief and practice.  To be sure, provincial structures will remain important for purposes of good order, mutual support, and common witness. They will not, however, serve as points of definition for Anglicanism as such.  If asked to define their identity as Christians, the right answer for Anglicans would not be that they are members of the Church of England, or the Church of Uganda, or The Episcopal Church.  The right answer would be that they are Christians whose Bishop is in communion with the Archbishop of Canterbury and all other Bishops in communion with the occupant of that office. An answer such as this firmly establishes the catholic character of Anglicanism and in so doing relegates self-definition by reference to denomination or national church to a position of secondary importance.  It is at this point that the theological implications of Prof. Radner's historical argument become immediately apparent.  To say, as has Archbishop Rowan, that "The organ of union with the wider Church is the Bishop and the Diocese rather than the Provincial structure as such" and that there is a need "to regard the Bishop and the Diocese as the primary locus of ecclesial identity rather than the abstract reality of the 'national church'," is to say that catholic identity is more fundamental for Christians than national identity. I need hardly say that perhaps the most negative legacy of the Reformation is precisely an over emphasis on national identity.  Ratification of a covenant rooted, as suggested by both the Virginia Report and the Windsor Report, in mutual subjection on the part of Bishops and Dioceses would firmly establish the catholic character of Anglicanism and at the same time make its claim to be a communion rather than a federation of churches credible. The primacy of personal agency over administrative structure also has implications for the most contested part of the proposed covenant.  Section Four of the Cambridge/Ridley Draft seeks to find a way to hold the Dioceses and Provinces of the Anglican Communion responsible one to another in respect both to Christian faith and practice.  The Episcopal Church has opposed any such measures on grounds that they will produce a centralized hierarchy that compromises the autonomy of the various Provinces of the Communion.  A careful read of the Cambridge/Ridley Draft hardly establishes the credibility of such a claim.  If there is a problem with present proposals it is not over centralization.  It is a lack of clarity about the locus of authority within the Communion to establish that the action of a Province or Diocese has crossed the line of acceptable diversity and in so doing has compromised the integrity of the Communion as a whole.  It is not my present purpose to sort out this thorny issue.  It is my purpose, however, to say that the primacy of personal agency over administrative structure, resting as it does upon the self-expenditure of personal agents on behalf of the church, suggests that a determination of this sort must receive its final ratification by the Lambeth Conference of Bishops.  Whether a determination of this sort is made in the first instance by the Archbishop of Canterbury, the Meeting of Primates, the Anglican Consultative Council, or the vote of the various Provinces that determination must be regarded as temporary until such time as it is ratified or refused by the conference of Bishops whose members are understood by Anglicans to be "the organ of union with the wider Church." IV Finally, what are the implications of the primacy of personal agency over administrative structure for Anglican identity and ecumenical relations? In a letter to the Secretary General of the Anglican Communion, Cardinal Kasper indirectly raises both questions.  The Cardinal worries, as have I, that in its present form the proposed covenant "is now described in terms which seem to weaken a clear sense of responsibility toward the Covenant."  By this he means that the present draft "seems to weaken the undertaking given in the St. Andrew's Draft which does provide in certain circumstances for a resolution of the Instruments of Communion that a particular Church's action has resulted in 'relinquishment' of the covenant relationship."  His view is that because of this "draw back" from the St. Andrew's Draft, the Anglican Communion may fail to ratify a covenant that demonstrates "in a clear and unequivocal way the binding nature of the bond of communion existing between the churches of the Anglican Communion." In short, the Cardinal worries that a failure to provide an adequate mechanism for determining the limits of diversity, means that Anglicanism will have lost its identity as a communion of churches.  Rome would then have to deal with the various provinces of the Communion as a congeries of independent churches each of which might have to be addressed in a different way.  A similar concern is expressed in a series of questions the Cardinal poses about which bodies might be eligible to ratify the proposed covenant.  He worries in particular (a.) that ecclesial bodies not formally in communion with the Archbishop of Canterbury might be allowed to adopt the covenant; (b.) that communion might not exist between covenanting bodies; and (c.) that the covenant might allow Dioceses to adopt the covenant apart from the Provinces to which they belong. I share the Cardinal's concern in respect to the first two items.  However, it is the third that seems to me of greatest importance for determining Anglican identity and shaping its ecumenical relationships.  If the position about the centrality of the Bishop and the Diocese stated by Archbishop Rowan and defended by Dr. Radner is taken as a central aspect of Anglican ecclesiology, Anglicans must define themselves as Christians who through their Bishop are in communion with the Archbishop of Canterbury.  They must also go on to explain how this fellowship that has its foundation in the Bishop and the Diocese indeed can function as a communion.  The Cardinal seems to believe this unlikely if there is not a clear structure of Provinces, each with a hierarchical relation to their constituent Dioceses and each subject to an agreed mechanism for assuring mutual accountability. At this point, the Cardinal apparently shares the view of the Office of the Presiding Bishop that the administrative structure of a Province ought to have priority over its constituent Dioceses but disagrees that administrative structures ought to be autonomous in relation one to another.   The argument put forward by the Presiding Bishop and her Chancellor favors autonomy on the part of national churches.  That implied by the Cardinal's questions suggests a more centralized authority to which the various Provinces are subject and to which the Dioceses are subject through the Provinces to which they belong.  If the first position were to prevail, Anglican identity would attach to national churches bound by federal links.  If that of the Cardinal were to prevail, Anglican identity would attach to a body of churches with common bonds to a central authority. The position stated by Archbishop Rowan and defended by Prof. Radner suggests an identity proposed both by the Virginia Report and the Windsor Report.  That is, Anglicans would understand themselves as Christians whose Bishop is in communion with the Archbishop of Canterbury and who are bound through their Bishop with other dioceses in a covenant that maintains the communion of these Dioceses through mutual subjection in the body of Christ. The challenge now before such a communion of churches is to find mechanisms for sustaining and furthering communion that do not establish a centralized jurisdiction on the one hand or convert a communion of churches into a federation of administrative structures on the other. To put the matter another way, the challenge before the Anglican Communion at the moment is this; as a catholic expression of Christian belief and practice, can Anglicans show their ecumenical partners on the one hand that their communion is more than a loose confederation of independent churches and on the other that they have a way of sustaining catholic identity that does not involve first the elevation of administrative structure over personal agency and second the creation of a centralized form of authority under which these structures are ordered?  The Roman Catholic Church, like other churches, would like to know as they turn to Anglicans, "Who are we dealing with?"  This is a fair question and the reasons for it go beyond simple diplomatic logistics.  The press for Christian communion that rightly motivates all of our ecclesial relations demands that we have the means of and the basis for recognizing our Christian partners outside the fold.  The Anglican Communion is now provided with a challenge to articulate this in a way that can actually further rather than impede the movement into communion.  Indeed, it is the present moment when the pastoral synodality identified as the apostolic vocation of the episcopacy can be reappropriated in a covenantal manner that may well provide an opening to such an unimpeded movement.