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Tolerable Diversity and Ecclesial Identity
Does Anglicanism Have A Future?
Philip Turner
A talk given at the Anglican Communion Conference in Charleston, SC, of 8-10 January 2004
I
Introduction
Let me begin with a sheepish confession. The question in the sub-title of this talk, “Does Anglicanism Have A Future?” is purely rhetorical. Of course Anglicanism has a future. The real question is the form that future will take. Will we somehow get through the present crisis and maintain our identity as a communion of self-governing, self-supporting, and self-propagating churches? Or, will we come out of this time of testing looking more like a federation of churches than a communion? Or will what is now the Anglican Communion in fact divide into two bodies—one composed in large measure of people from the United Kingdom, North American, Australia and New Zealand and another composed in large measure of people from the global South?
These are the likely possibilities that lie before us, and I for one am unwilling at this point to make predictions about which seems the more probable. In these remarks, it is not my purpose to foretell the future. It is rather to sketch what it will take to make the first possibility actual. It is my belief that only the first possibility (that Anglicanism remains a communion) constitutes a godly outcome, and that only the first possibility is worth the struggle.
What, however, will it take to maintain our identity as a communion; and why might it be important to continue into the future as the Anglican Communion rather than the Anglican World Federation or Anglicanism North and Anglicanism South? Of course, the immediate answer is that unless the Archbishops of Canterbury and the Primates are willing to impose some discipline on the Diocese of New Westminster and ECUSA, there is virtually no hope of maintaining Anglicanism as a communion. If we are to have any hope to continue as a communion, discipline is necessary; but discipline does not solve ecclesial issues. It only provides a space and time within which unity and truth can be restored.
The question, therefore, is if discipline is exercised and a space in time provided for repentance and reconciliation, what will it take for Anglicanism to continue as a communion? Briefly, my contention is that Anglicanism will remain a communion of churches only if it can find a way in the midst of the present crisis (and all future ones) to maintain in faithful balance the relation between ecclesial integrity on the one hand and tolerable diversity on the other. It is also my contention that it is important for Anglicanism to survive as a communion because, in the distinctive way it has at its disposal to maintain this balance, it has something of fundamental importance to contribute to the ongoing life of the one, holy, catholic, and apostolic church.
Admittedly, I have set a formidable task—one that will require far more effort than is possible here. I can, however, make the nature of the task clear by presenting a series of propositions, five negative and five positive, that track the means Anglicans (should and should not) have at their disposal to maintain a healthy balance between integrity and diversity. The negative propositions, the ones that track how the balance ought not to be maintained, are these:
ecclesial integrity and tolerable diversity cannot be maintained simply by citing scriptural “proofs;”
ecclesial integrity and tolerable diversity cannot be maintained simply by citing formularies, creeds, or confessional statements;
ecclesial integrity and tolerable diversity cannot be maintained simply by reference to political or legal authority, Episcopal, canonical, or otherwise;
ecclesial integrity and tolerable diversity cannot be maintained simply by referring to historical or social developments;
ecclesial integrity and tolerable diversity cannot be maintained simply by reference to any or all of the above in combination.
Positively, I hope to establish that ecclesial integrity and tolerable diversity can be maintained only if the presence of the Holy Spirit keeps the following five factors in a dynamic and mutually correcting relationship one to another. Under the guidance of the Holy Spirit:
disputes affecting ecclesial integrity and tolerable diversity take place in the midst of a scripturally formed people who hear the whole of the Bible in particular historical circumstances and in the midst of an ordered fellowship of worship and prayer;
disputes affecting ecclesial integrity and tolerable diversity are addressed within a community whose life is rooted in a shared will to unity and shaped by of Christ’s cross;
disputes affecting ecclesial integrity and tolerable diversity are carried out by means of a protracted, free, and open theological debate in which mutual correction is both expected and welcomed;
disputes affecting ecclesial integrity and tolerable diversity are addressed by political authorities in a cohesive manner that inhibits changes in practice until wide agreement about “novelties” has been reached;
disputes affecting ecclesial integrity and tolerable diversity are carried out within a wider “conciliar economy” that places limits upon the “autonomy” of any given parish, diocese, or province within the Anglican Communion.
II
Anglican Identity, Diversity and Integrity
The task, of course, remains to defend this normative proposal. In this enterprise, it is perhaps best to begin by noting that, for Anglicans, there is a formal way in which to address the issues of identity, integrity and diversity. This way recognizes only that diversity that corresponds to the witness of Holy Scripture as apprehended in the common life and worship of the church. Such apprehension is aided by the creeds, the Book of Common Prayer, the “Ordinal,” and, in a looser sense, the Thirty-nine Articles, the first four ecumenical councils, and (in an even looser sense) the writings of early fathers of the church.[1]
There is a substantial tradition among Anglicans that, within these parameters, substantial diversity is tolerable. There is substantial agreement as well that ecclesial integrity is to be found within the circumference marked by these boundary stones. Thus, generally speaking, Anglicans agree that if the need arises to establish or defend doctrine and practice one must first show that the doctrine or practice in question accords with Holy Scripture and its established lines of interpretation. We all know, however, that reference to Holy Scripture and its subsequent interpretations cannot always bridge the gap between original witness and present circumstance.
The next question is then how the gap is to be bridged in a satisfactory manner. Most Christians agree that the presence of the Holy Spirit in the heart of the believer and the common life of the church is utterly necessary if diversity and ecclesial integrity are to be satisfactorily combined.[2] Nevertheless, more needs to be said for the simple reason that both the Holy Spirit and the Gospel message itself are mediated to both individuals and to the church in certain ways. Nevertheless, in times of conflict, these means of reception themselves become matters of dispute.
Contrary to much recent Anglican thought, my contention is that the most adequate way to bridge this gap is, in the first instance, neither by incantation of the mantra “scripture, tradition, and reason,” nor by the exercise of ecclesial authority, nor by the rationalization of canon law, nor by reference to creeds, confessions and/or formularies, nor by the invocation of rather vague notions like “core doctrine.”[3] To be sure, save for the notion of “core doctrine” (whose equivalents, “fundamentals” and “essentials,” have proven themselves again and again impossibly vague and unstable)[4], these options all play a necessary role in forming the mind of the church. None of them, however, function properly if they are not rooted in the foundational practice I am about to describe.
This way is one in which acceptable diversity and ecclesial integrity are maintained, in the first instance and most basically, by common participation in an ordered fellowship of prayer and worship. In this ordered fellowship, the public and reiterative reading of the Holy Scriptures provides the foundation of all else; namely, common prayer, eucharistic celebration, communal instruction, common practice, ecclesial identity, integrity, and tolerable diversity[BN3].[5]
For a number of reasons, a grasp of and commitment to the central place in Christian formation of what Ephraim Radner has called “Scriptural immersion [BN4]by a people” (as opposed to prior constraint by “a defined system of ‘authority’ or ‘doctrine’,”[6] or the sovereignty of unconstrained individual conscience) has, in parts of the Anglican Communion, been steadily eroding for some time now.[7] Erosion of commitment to this communal practice has, not surprisingly, been accompanied precisely by a loss of ecclesial integrity and a proliferation of intolerable diversity.[8] Central to my argument is the conviction that apart from a renewal of this practice no satisfactory solution can be found to the presenting problem of this essay.
The best way I know to present this contention in all its force is simply to rehearse briefly the central place this complex of practices has played in forming what we now term “The Anglican Communion.”[9] (And, incidentally, in carrying out this task, I will show as well that it is to Cranmer rather than Hooker that we ought to look in our ever-present search for “Anglican Identity”). At the beginning of the “Preface” to the Book of Common Prayer adopted in 1549 Cranmer notes that his arrangement for having the greatest part of the Bible read through once a year by both clergy and people has its origins in the ancient fathers of the church. In his essay “Of Ceremonies: Why Some Be Abolished and Some Retained,”[10] Cranmer once more grounds his revision of the prayers of the church in Holy Scripture and the practice of the early fathers rather than in ecclesial authority, doctrinal propositions, or canon law.
Unlike his fellow reformers on the continent, Cranmer’s insistence on the centrality of communal appropriation of the Holy Scriptures in the context of ancient forms of prayer did not focus primarily upon using Holy Scripture to establish right doctrine. As he makes clear in “Of Ceremonies[BN5],” for him the central issue was the “unitie and concorde” produced by ancient forms.[11] These forms provide what he terms “decent ordre” or “quyete dyscyplyne” in the midst of which faithful lives can be formed and lived through reading, marking, learning and inwardly digesting the Holy Scriptures.[12] Cranmer makes this point explicitly in the “Preface” he wrote in defense of the 1540 vernacular translation of the Bible. Here he notes that the Bible is for “all people” and it ought to serve as their trustworthy guide for ‘edification’ for salvation. Indeed, he goes on to make the strong claim that “all manner of persons…may in this book learn all things, what they ought to believe, what they ought to do, and what they should not do, as well concerning almighty God, as also concerning themselves and all other.”[13]
We may summarize Cranmer’s position by saying that, in his reform of the ceremonies of the Church of England, he sought an ordered, communal, and prayerful process in which the people, [BN6]joined together in worship, heard the entirety of the Bible in an ordered manner. The purpose of this reiterative reading and prayer was the formation and strengthening of a common mind and form of life. This common scriptural formation was for him of more fundamental importance and of greater effect in maintaining the health of the Church than confessional statements or forms of ecclesial governance (Episcopacy included). Further, within Cranmer’s formational scheme of communal conformity to ordered forms of worship and prayer, individual conscience is given enormous latitude. Tolerable (sometimes even intolerable) diversity is simply assumed because it is contained within the ordered reading of the Bible and common forms of prayer. Within the boundaries of common prayer and ordered communal hearing of the whole scripture, one can trust that the Holy Spirit will lead God’s people in the way of truth; and in so doing both preserve the integrity of the church and allow for tolerable diversity within its ranks. In short, the gap between Holy Scripture and present circumstance will be closed by protracted communal practice rather than by judicial decision, political action or the citation of doctrinal formularies.
III
Cranmer’s Ethos and the Birth of A Communion
One can, I believe, see the formative power of this ethos rather clearly if one surveys the origin and growth of what we now call the Anglican Communion. At the inception of the Episcopal Church (and so perhaps the conception of the Anglican Communion), William White, who became bishop in Philadelphia, wrote, in The case of the Episcopal Churches in the United States Considered, that the Episcopal Church is defined by “ancient habits” and “stated ordinance” that render a church closest to the “form of the religion of the Scriptures.”[14] The first General Convention of the Episcopal Church, in its various acts and resolutions, went on to bind itself to the “Doctrine and Discipline” of the Church of England, to a cohesive episcopate, and a set form of common prayer. Its foundational documents permitted diversity only in respect to “inessential” matters, and these were defined as ones that contradicted neither the “Word of God” nor the demands of local “civil constitutions.”[15]
In this self-definition, one sees the same reticence in respect to doctrinal definition, ecclesial governance, and canon law that we noted in Cranmer’s earlier efforts at religious settlement The “religion of the scriptures” or the “Word of God” continue to form the bases of the constitution of the church. Nevertheless, this American formulation added a new emphasis[BN7]. R.R. Reno, C. Seitz, P. Turner and P. Zahl have termed this new element a “Conciliar Economy[BN8].”[16] As was the case of the Church of England, the foundation of this new church lay in “ancient habits” and “stated ordinances” that its authors believed rested upon and placed it “closest to” the Holy Scriptures and the early Church. The Holy Scriptures, however, were not to be appropriated in ways that ran contrary to the “Doctrine and Discipline” of the Church of England. Thus, the Episcopal Church, like the Church of England, centred its life in the ordered reading of scripture in the context of ancient forms of worship that were to be overseen by a unified episcopate. However, this scripturally formed and prayerfully ordered life was to cohere with the common practice and beliefs of another church whose common life was rooted in the same sort of scriptural formation.[17]
Here at the inception of what was to become the Anglican Communion one sees a conciliar principle imbedded. From this small beginning grew the conciliar economy that came to characterize what became the Anglican Communion. As the Anglican Communion grew, conformity to the Doctrine and Discipline of the Church of England was transformed into “uniformity with the ‘Primitive Church” of the first four centuries as explicated in the Book of Common Prayer shared throughout the globe.”[18] With a proliferation of versions of the Book of Common Prayer, came yet another shift; this time to a fellowship of churches bound by communion with the Archbishop of Canterbury. The conciliar constraint once located in the Doctrine and Discipline of the Church of England has become a constraint located in a communion of self-governing churches whose fellowship is represented and furthered by the Archbishop of Canterbury and by the Lambeth Conference of Bishops that he has authority to “gather[BN9].”
Despite variations in the Book of Common Prayer, this communion of churches manifests the same basis in the primacy of Holy Scripture appropriated in common worship and informed by ancient forms of prayer. The polity of this communion can be said to be conciliar in two ways. (1) Each church, in its appropriation of the Holy Scriptures, is bound to and constrained by others in a wider communion. (2) Each church and the communion as a whole is ordered by a number of different and interlocking councils, each with its own structure, canonical status and range of competence.[19] One function, indeed the primary function, of these councils is “to uphold the Christian faith of the Apostles of Jesus as given in Scripture.”[20] As such, it is their responsibility “to discern where that teaching is being compromised by the actions and decisions of a few.”[21]
To bring this particular part of my argument to a close, it can be said that, for Anglicans, identity, integrity, and tolerable diversity are kept in faithful balance by maintenance of a particular sort of ethos that is defined by a distinguishing set of practices [BN10]rather than by reference to a teaching authority, or the promulgations of an ecumenical council, or by a confession. That ethos is grounded in the reiterative reading of Holy Scripture within the context of a common form of worship. To be sure, faithful reception of Holy Scripture necessarily involves reference to the Book of Common Prayer, creeds, theological formularies, codes of law, and ecclesial office; but none of these “authorities” provide a point of reference that precedes or supplants Holy Scripture.[22] Further, none of them can function properly apart from the witness of Holy Scripture upon which they depend for their legitimacy. Finally, I note the important fact that, within the conciliar economy described above, the way in which Holy Scripture is received in each church is constrained by its reception in others.
IV
Doctrine Imbedded in Practice
The central importance for Anglicanism of communal hearing of Holy Scripture is a position well established by Stephen Sykes, Sometime Regius Professor of Theology at Cambridge University and former Bishop of Ely.[23] He has made the point in a forceful manner by insisting that, in addressing these issues, Anglicans, despite assertions to the contrary, in fact do have specific doctrines that are properly used to aid and guide the interpretation of Holy Scripture. As Bishop Sykes has pointed out, these doctrines are contained within the pages of the Book of Common Prayer, the Ordinal, and in canon law. Within this complex, their most fulsome presence is to be found in the liturgical forms located in the various Books of Common Prayer.[24]
To be sure, the doctrinal content of the Book of Common Prayer (in its various guises) does not appear in the form of a confession like that of Augsburg or Westminster. Neither does it appear in a conciliar document like that of Trent or Vatican Two. Rather, the doctrinal content Anglicans share is imbedded primarily in liturgical practices the purpose of which is to form the character of a communion of believers. Its liturgical and formational setting means that the doctrinal content of Anglicanism is, as it were, scattered through a complex of practices rather than focused in a specifically theological document. Scattered though doctrinal content may be, however, it is simply impossible to say, after reading through any of the Books of Common Prayer with which I am familiar, that Anglicans do not hold, among others, the doctrines of the Trinity, the two natures of Christ, Christ’s atoning sacrifice, the resurrection of the dead, the life everlasting, the presence of the Holy Spirit in the Church, the inspiration and primary authority of Holy Scripture, the effective character of the dominical sacraments, and the second Advent of Christ.
Anglicans throughout the world owe Bishop Sykes a considerable debt for exposing the bogus claim championed by Bishop McAdoo that Anglicanism is a form of Christianity that has a distinctive theological method (the interplay of scripture, tradition, and reason) but no specific doctrinal content.[25] To avoid this finally incoherent position, it is of vital importance to note, as has Bishop Sykes, that it is not incoherent to assert that Anglicanism has embedded [BN11]in its practices and in its canon law identifiable doctrinal content, and yet that free and open theological debate in respect to both belief and practice is both permissible and desirable.[26]
The combination of free and open theological debate and identifiable theological content, however, raises at least two very thorny questions in respect to the issues of ecclesial identity, integrity, and tolerable diversity. The first is what to do when clergy (who by solemn vow are committed to upholding the doctrine, discipline and worship of the church of which they are a part) begin to use the pulpit to proclaim doctrinal novelties that represent personal opinion rather than the easily recognizable doctrinal content of the Book of Common Prayer; or when they make alterations, based on personal preference, in the forms of worship they are pledged by vow to use. The way in which Anglicans have chosen to address this problem is easy to state despite the fact that it [BN12]is beginning to prove difficult to carry out. Anglicans hold that one of the primary reasons for having bishops is to provide the churches of the communion with an “ordinary” (or keeper of order) whose responsibility is to see that those charged by vow to uphold the doctrine, discipline, and worship of a given church within the Anglican Communion in fact comply with the vows they have taken. Bishops should be allowed considerable latitude in the way in which they fulfil this responsibility. However, if Bishops on a fairly wide scale ignore this responsibility or fail to exercise it in an effective manner, then the common context within the worship of the church in which the Holy Scriptures are read, marked, learned, and inwardly digested, simply fragments.
The second (and far more difficult) issue arises when a province or diocese within the communion either adds practices or changes the doctrinal content of its practices in ways that do not cohere with those of the other provinces. When such an event occurs the question arises as to whether or not the novelty in question is an example of tolerable diversity or whether or not it compromises the integrity of Anglicanism as a communion of churches. At present, pre-eminent among these added or changed practices are the ordination of women, the ordination of non-abstaining homosexual persons, and the blessing of “gay unions.”
V
Episcopal Authority, Free Debate, and Constancy of Practice within an Ecclesial Economy
How are eventualities like these to be addressed? Let it be said first of all that disputes of this nature about the practices of the provinces within the communion are of importance to its health. Apart from such disputes, the churches would fail to address the faith of the Apostles to their particular time and place. The issue is not whether these disputes should be allowed. The issue is how they are to be carried out in a way that preserves ecclesial integrity while allowing at the same time for tolerable diversity. I have already established what I believe to be a fact, namely, that no solution is possible apart from a biblically immersed people joined together in common forms for prayer and worship. Nevertheless, a properly functioning polity vastly aids the necessary and proper communal process of sifting, receiving, or rejecting novelty. For Anglicans this polity is rooted in the sort of conciliar economy described above. The point I wish to make now, however, is that, within this economy, a cohesive episcopate and constancy of practice play as an essential a role as does free and open debate.
In the midst of conflict, time can be viewed as a space for the presence of grace. Even from a purely secular point of view, space and time are necessary if thorny issues are to be satisfactorily addressed. Crucial to the provision of an ordered and peaceful space in time is a cohesive political authority that acts with slow deliberation and shows itself reluctant to change practice prior to fairly widespread communal agreement.
It is precisely this economy that is now being challenged by the Diocese of New Westminster, and the recent actions of the General Convention of ECUSA. Both the action of the Diocese of New Westminster and the actions of the General Convention of ECUSA run contrary to resolution I.10 of the 1998 Lambeth Conference of Bishops that states such action to be contrary to Holy Scripture. By saying that the practice of blessing “gay unions” is contrary to Holy Scripture, the Bishops assembled at Lambeth by implication have expressed the view also that actions of this sort lie outside the circumference of tolerable diversity; and that they compromise ecclesial integrity. In taking this stand, they further have, by implication, distinguished the blessing of “gay unions” from the ordination of women. In this latter case, despite the very dubious way in which the first of these ordinations occurred within ECUSA,[27] no statement has been made to the effect that this practice runs contrary to Holy Scripture. Rather the Bishops have recognized a serious disagreement and, because they have found no clear scriptural warrant to the contrary, have allowed for diversity of practice while at the same time urging that a process of reception be allowed to continue without hindrance throughout the communion.[28] The process of reception they recommend is meant to provide a space in time in which to test a practice that is indeed a novelty, but which reference to Scripture does not seem clearly to forbid. Indeed many, the present author included, hold that reference to scripture provides positive warrant for the change.
Thus, in one case they have judged that Holy Scripture speaks against diversity of practice and have sought to prevent it. In another, they have judged (despite the fact that innovation has produced “impaired communion”) that a period of testing should be allowed to determine if the diversity is indeed reconcilable with ecclesial integrity. In both cases, however, they have expressed how serious it is when bishops do not act in concert. In both cases they have also shown a cautions response to changes in practice.
Here are two examples of a cohesive episcopacy seeking to preserve a conciliar economy. However, the recent actions of the Diocese of New Westminster and the General Convention of ECUSA clearly serve to undermine both a conciliar economy and a cohesive episcopate. Claims to autonomy such as these in part lie behind recent actions by the Lambeth Conference to give an “enhanced responsibility” to the Primates of the Communion. It is through this “enhanced responsibility” that the Bishops of the communion hope to preserve their collegiality and so inhibit the introduction of changes in practice that threaten to divide the communion. Prior to their action, however, at least one province (the Anglican Church of Korea) had perceived the issue circumstances have now forced upon the Bishops of the communion as a whole. In consequence, it wrote into the “Fundamental Declaration” upon which its constitution and canon law are based the condition that any proposed amendment to this declaration must be sent “to all the Metropolitans of the Anglican Communion and an assurance received from them that the proposed amendment is not contrary to the terms of the Communion between the Anglican Church of Korea and the Churches of which they are Metropolitans.”[29]
The “Fundamental Declaration” of the Anglican Church of Korea gives constitutional expression to a crucial aspect of the ethos in which I believe Anglicans on the whole have sought to reconcile integrity and diversity. That is, Episcopal order and synodical governance, while allowing for free and open debate in respect to disputed issues, are to be slow to change the practices of the various provinces of the communion. Change is to be undertaken only when there is extensive agreement that any diversity caused by a change in practice does not compromise the integrity of the communion into which that diversity seeks entrance. It is within such an ethos that a scripturally formed people can find a space in time for the peaceful resolution of difference in respect to what must be held in common and the recognition of those things about which there may be tolerable diversity.
VI
Identity, Integrity, Diversity, and Virtue
This last remark prompts yet another question. How can a space in time indeed be one that leads to the peaceful resolution of differences? In respect to this question, I have mentioned already the importance of a cohesive episcopacy and constancy of practice. For episcopacy to remain cohesive and practice constant, however, a certain quality of life within the communion they order is required. In his “Preface” to the Book of Common Prayer, and in Of [BN13]Ceremonies, Cranmer insists that the communal reading of Holy Scripture entire within the context of ordered worship leads to “edification” or “Godliness.” Both “Godliness” and “edification” are terms that refer to a good deal more than right doctrine. They refer to an entire form of life in which belief and virtue are brought into correspondence[BN14].
[BN15]It is to the virtues associated with Godliness that one must turn to grasp the full nature of the ethos in which it is possible to preserve ecclesial integrity and foster tolerable diversity. We may take the fourth chapter of Ephesians as a classical statement of the content of Godliness. In describing the virtues and practices that serve the unity of the church, the author speaks of “striving earnestly to maintain the unity of the Spirit in the bond of peace” (Eph. 4:3). He then goes on to list a series of virtues and practices that imitate the sacrificial life of Christ and so comprise Godliness. These include humility, gentleness, patient endurance, kindness, compassion, forbearance, forgiveness and love (Eph 4:2,32). His point is that these virtues and practices both preserve and make up the sort of ecclesial unity Christ’s death was intended to procure.
That this statement is true can be seen easily by asking a simple question.
When Christians find themselves in serious disagreement about the content of the Gospel message or the form of life that bears witness to it, how are they to reach an agreement? The previously mentioned virtues and practices are precisely those that allow for the truth spoken in love to be distinguished from false or inadequate representations of Christian faith and practice. All depends upon a prior attitude, namely “an earnest desire to maintain unity of Spirit in the bond of peace.” This desire for unity and peace is manifest and made effective in the first instance through the sort of humility that makes room for mutual correction. Gentleness with one’s opponents creates an atmosphere of trust. Patient endurance of the foibles of those with whom one disagrees allows for relations (even troubled ones) to continue over time. Kindness and compassion make it possible for one to see one’s opponent in the best light. Forgiveness sustains relationships through the harms inevitably done. These virtues and practices make love recognizable, and it is charity in its many guises that creates the space in time that allows for both ecclesial integrity and tolerable diversity.
VII
Conclusion
Though not the only strand of Anglicanism, this one offers enormous promise as a way of balancing integrity and diversity. I speak of that strand of Anglican thought and practice that holds the view that that ecclesial integrity and tolerable diversity are best held in balance by communal reading of Holy Scripture in the context of worship and the ancient prayers of the church, and by the ordering authority of bishops who insure constancy of practice in the midst of a communion of people whose lives manifest the virtues present in Christ’s own life. Clearly the recent actions of New Westminster and ECUSA constitute a direct attack upon this tradition, and in so doing threaten to subvert what I believe to be the basic identity of the Anglican Communion.
It is this fact that serves to display both the ecumenical significance of our present crisis and the reason it is important for Anglicanism to maintain its identity as a communion rather than a federation of churches. The way in which Anglicans have sought to balance integrity and diversity provides as well a powerful response to what I believe is the most important of all ecclesiological issues. It provides an answer to the vital question of how fidelity to the original witness of the Apostles is to be maintained as the church makes that witness amidst the changes and chances of history. There are a number of proposals on the ecumenical table about how this feat is best accomplished, but none it seems to me are as adequate as the one Anglicans have more or less stumbled upon in the course of their troubled history.
The Roman Catholic answer combines a notion of the development of doctrine with that of Papal teaching authority that guarantees a correct distinction between faithful and unfaithful development. The confessional answer that Lutherans and Presbyterians favour seeks to bridge the gap between the original witness of the Apostles and present circumstances by means of a doctrinal summary of scripture’s witness. The evangelical answer is a reading of scripture controlled by a fixed interpretive grid.
This last paragraph might clearly serve as the introduction of an entirely new paper. Fear not! It is not my purpose to keep you here for another hour. I cannot show why I believe these answers are less adequate than the one I have sought to describe as characteristically Anglican. Let me say only that I believe the Anglican response to the tension betweens original witness and present circumstance allows space and time for the voice of the Apostles to be heard in a different time and place in a way the other options do not. It is, I believe, the tradition I have described that gives the Anglican Communion a particular importance within the chequered history of the divided church; and it is, I believe, the preservation of that tradition that God cares more about that the preservation of the Dioceses of New Westminster or the Episcopal Church U.S.A. In God’s economy, these two may well be a hindrance rather than a help, but not I think the Anglican Communion.
Philip Turner
[1] For a helpful and interesting discussion of the authority of these sources for Anglican theology see Henry Chadwick, “Tradition, Fathers and Councils” in Stephen Sykes and John Booty, The Study of Anglicanism, (Philadelphia: Fortress Press, 1988), pp. 91-105. See also Norman Doe, Canon Law in the Anglican Communion, (Oxford: Clarendon Press, 1998), pp. 197-200, 378.
[2] Only rarely do Anglicans go on to draw an important implication from this belief; namely, if agreement cannot be reached about what constitutes ecclesial integrity and tolerable diversity, the absence of the Holy Spirit ought to be assumed. For a well argued defense of this conclusion see Ephraim Radner, The End of the Church: A Pneumatology of Christian Division in the West, (Grand Rapids, Michigan: Will B. Eerdmans Publishing Company, 1998).
[3] An example of the first of these inadequate strategies is the recent suggestion of the Lambeth Conference of Bishops to give more authority in settling contested issues to the Primates of the Anglican Communion. (See E.g., The Truth Shall Make Your Free (the report of the Lambeth Conference of Bishops, 1998), Resolutions III.6a-c). An example of the second option is a paper by Prof. Norman Doe presented to the March 2001 meeting of the Primates suggesting that rationalization of cannon law through out the communion is the way to deal with diversity. (See also Norman Doe, Cannon Law in the Anglican Communion, pp. 274-282). The third strategy is illustrated by a chapter in To Mend the Net entitled “The Formularies @Limits of Diversity.” Here a case is made for the authority of formularies such as the Ordinal and the Articles of Religion in settling contested matters. (To Mend the Net: Anglican Faith and Order for Renewed Mission, (eds.) Drexel Gomez and Maurice Sinclair, [Carrollton, TX: The Ekklesia Society, 2001], pp. 93-105). The decision of the Ecclesiastical Court in the trial of Bishop Walter Righter for heresy provides an example of the final strategy. The court found against the plaintiffs because it judged that the defendant, in ordaining non-abstaining homosexual, had not violated “core doctrine.” (See R. R. Reno, “An Analysis of the Righter Decision,” Pro Ecclesia 5, no. 4 [Fall, 1997]: 392-396).
[4] The notion of core doctrine may be taken as analogous to others like “fundamentals” or “essentials.” Bishop Stephen Sykes has shown with remarkable clarity how difficult these ideas are to employ in any controlled and helpful manner. He points out that there is no agreement about what the fundamentals are, that the basis of their authority in an undivided church is difficult to sustain, and that they have proven themselves again and again ineffective as a means of overcoming ecclesial division. See Stephen Sykes, “The Fundamentals of Christianity” in Stephen Sykes and John Booty (eds.), The Study of Anglicanism, (London: SPCK, 1988), p. 242. See also Stephen Sykes, The Integrity of Anglicanism, (London: Mowbray, 1978), pp. 11-14.
[5] I wish to acknowledge my indebtedness for the primary form and content of the argument that follows to an unpublished article by The Rev. Dr. Ephraim Radner entitled, “Authority in Anglicanism: A paper for the Methodist Episcopal Dialogue, February 2003.”
[6] Ibid. p. 7.
[7] For a description of this erosion and a suggestion as to how it might be reversed see Philip Turner, The Anglican Digest (Advent 2002).
[8] See i.e. R. R. Reno, In the Ruins of the Church: Sustaining Faith in an Age of Diminished Christianity, (Grand Rapids, Michigan: Brazos Press, 2002), pp. 83-96, 149-164.
[9] I owe this brief history in large measure to Dr. Ephraim Radner’s paper, “Authority in Anglicanism.”
[10] See The First and Second Prayer Books of Edward VI, (London: J.M. Dent & Sons Ltd, 1957), pp. 286-288.
[11] Ibid. p. 287
[12] Ibid.
[13] Thomas Cranmer, “Preface to the Great Bible,” http://wwwbible-researcher.com/cranmer.html, p. 4.
[14] Ibid. p. 14.
[15] Ibid. For the original actions, resolutions and correspondence see Journals of the first conventions (William Stevens Perry (ed.), (Claremont, NH, 1874).
[16] See “An Open Opinion on the Authority of General Convention.” This statement can be viewed on the Website of The Living Church and on that of SEAD International.
[17] It is well to note, however, that that the American arrangement of a convention of the whole was different from the separate but interacting institutions of the Church of England. The English institutions served to make decisions based on consensus; but, because of their greater degree of separation, they necessarily went through a more gradual process than their American counterpart to reach their goal. The American arrangement brought about more immediate results, but at a cost. The cost is decisions reached in haste by a body that is dominated by its own internal dynamics, and that has no on-going accountability to a constituency.
[18] Ibid. p. 3
[19] For a recent description of the interlocking councils that define Anglican polity and canon law see Norman Doe, Canon Law in the Anglican Communion. See esp. pp. 43-126, 339-382.
[20] “An Open Opinion on the Authority of General Convention”: 8
[21] Ibid.
[22] Bishop Gore thought he could stave off the effects of biblical criticism by elevating the status of the creeds. Thus, a reference more primary than scripture itself was elevated to a position of supreme importance. Bishop Gore failed to notice that the creeds can be subject to the same critical analysis as can be the books of the Bible. He thus failed secure a place for the defense of Christian belief that stood, as it were, above Holy Scripture as a means of protecting its essential content.
[23] See Stephen Sykes, “Anglicanism and the Doctrine of the Church,” in Unashamed Anglicanism, (Nashville: Abingdon Press, 1995), pp. 116-118. In the same volume see also “Authority in the Church of England,” p. 168 where he writes: “Giving the whole people of God access to the Scriptures through the interpretative medium of the liturgy was the fundamental catechetical act of empowering the people, taken in the sixteenth century.”
[24] See Stephen Sykes, The Integrity of Anglicanism, pp. 44-52.
[25] Ibid. pp. 61-75.
[26] Stephen Sykes, The Integrity of Anglicanism, p. 44.
[27] For a discussion of the disorderly way in which the ordination of women became a practice of ECUSA see Philip Turner, “Communion, Order and the Ordination of Women,” Pro Ecclesia, (Summer 1993) Vol. II, No. 3: 275-284; “Episcopal Authority in a Divided Church,” Pro Ecclesia, (Winter 1999) Vol. VIII, No. 1: 23-50.
[28] The Truth Shall Make Your Free, Res. III.4.
[29] Cited by Norman Doe in Canon Law in the Anglican Communion, p. 26. For the statement of fundamentals see The Constitution and Canons of the Anglican Church of Korea (1992).
