Dioceses' Endorsement of the Covenant

The Reverend Canon Professor Christopher Seitz The Reverend Dr. Philip Turner The Reverend Dr. Ephraim Radner Mark McCall, Esq. ACI welcomes the encouragement given by the Archbishop of Canterbury to the decision by the Diocesan Board and Standing Committee of the Diocese of Central Florida to affirm the first three sections of the Anglican Covenant. As we have previously stated, these sections entail substantial commitments to mutual responsibility and interdependence in the life of the Communion. While it is not ACI's prerogative to release the full text of the letter, we are grateful for the Archbishop's recognition that acceptance of the Covenant, in whatever form, is the means by which we declare our "intent to live within the agreed terms of the Communion's life." We also acknowledge that endorsement by dioceses "would not instantly and automatically have an institutional effect (and so would not automatically affect the diocese's legal relationship with the Province of TEC)." As the Archbishop notes, matters regarding the implementation of the Covenant in the Communion remain to be sorted out. No one can expect that the institutional effects will be felt "instantly or automatically." But everyone recognizes that such effects, if not instant or automatic, are nevertheless certain. By Resolution 14.11, the ACC earlier this year asked "the Secretary General to send the revised Ridley Cambridge Text, at that time [at the next meeting of the JSC], only to the member Churches of the Anglican Consultative Council for consideration and decision on acceptance or adoption by them as The Anglican Communion Covenant." Should the other Instruments of Communion continue to defer to the ACC's initial distribution of the Covenant (and that is a matter of comity among the Instruments, not necessity), we believe the Archbishop's invitation to dioceses to "endorse" the Covenant while it is being considered under the ACC's recommended procedures is welcome. We hope this invitation will be accepted by many TEC dioceses. It is important to emphasize that neither the ACC nor any of the Communion Instruments determines how the member churches consider and express their agreement to the Covenant. That is a matter committed to the "constitutional procedures" of the member churches. Given TEC's unique polity, those procedures will inevitably require consideration and agreement or rejection by TEC's dioceses. Indeed, it is the character of this 'unique polity' that is now at the center of negotiation and evaluation. The ACC is not in a position to adjudicate this matter, even as it must face the messiness that this 'unique polity' invariably entails. The Archbishop of Canterbury knows that adoption of the Covenant works best at the provincial level, but he does not prejudge whether dioceses can adopt if a province does not because that would be to prejudge the decision of provinces to commit to the accountability demanded by the Covenant as well as the character of the Covenant in its completed form. By the same token, neither TEC's unique polity nor the Covenant itself controls the constitutional procedures of the ACC. It is in everyone's interest that those procedures be given every opportunity to promote the widest possible participation in the covenanted life of the Communion. But it is also clear that there inevitably will be institutional effects on the Communion Instruments themselves, including the ACC, in the years to come. While they are not instant, neither are they to be avoided. In the meantime, we are in complete agreement with the Archbishop of Canterbury that endorsement of the Covenant by dioceses is a way to begin to preserve and restore "pastoral and sacramental relations with the rest of the Communion."