Rev. Dr. Ephraim Radner

The Wisdom of the Cross: Some reflections on ACC-14 and the Anglican Covenant

A number of persons from around the Communion have asked me for my perspective on the recent ACC meeting's treatment of the proposed Anglican Covenant. There are at least two reasons, I suppose, why my opinion might be solicited. First, I have been a member of the Covenant Design Group that, over the past two and half years has worked at the drafting of this document. Obviously, I have a particular stake in what happens to the work we have spent over 30 full days in prayer, study, and labor producing.

The Eastern Congo and the Failure of Christian Witness

Briefly Newsworthy When Laurent Nkunda was captured leaving the eastern Congo on January 22, 2009, a tentative sense of relief was felt by many in and around the area. Nkunda has been the leader of a "rebel" army that has, since 2004 at least, roamed the north-eastern areas of Congo, killing, raping, and pillaging the populace in the name of defending Tutsi Congolese from the attacks of Hutu extremists who had infiltrated the area after their expulsion from Rwanda in the mid-1990's. Most recently, his army staged an offensive that seemed bent on overcoming areas protected by t

An Open letter to the Covenant Design Group

January 11th, 2009 The Baptism of Our Lord To the Members of the Covenant Design Group and the Windsor Continuation Group: I write to you as a concerned member of the Covenant Design Group, as a committed member of the Episcopal Church (USA), and as one whose professional and spiritual life has been and continues to be devoted to the strengthening of our common witness as Anglican Christians. This is a simple plea for us to do our work better in the midst of continuing ecclesial disintegration. What motivates this plea at this time? On the one hand, no more than the general evidence of on

The ACNA Constitution: In Line with the Covenant?

Work in formulating and adopting an Anglican Covenant is proceeding, and with renewed focus. I judge this to be the case despite some vocal claims that the project is both pointless and perverse. Most of these limited and negative claims have come from Western Anglicans intent on maintaining their local autonomy in terms of non-accountability to other Anglican churches and the Communion at large; and among these voices, not surprisingly, is a preponderance of Americans. But there have also been conservative voices, associated with the primarily non-Western group known as GAFCON (Global Ang

What I Have Learned These Past Five Years: Reflections in Advent, 2008

The last few years of struggle within the Episcopal Church (TEC) and within the Anglican Communion have taken their toll on many persons and congregations, and on our common life in a larger way. Every day brings some new report on the impending or already achieved "break-up" of Anglicanism and on the spectacle of "global schism", even while Anglican leaders insist that this hasn't happened yet. Many congregations in the United States, and some in Canada, have left their denominations for other forms of Anglican relationship.

A New "Province" in North America: Neither the Only Nor the Right Answer for the Communion

A new "province" for North American Anglicans is now promised to be "up and running" in the next month or so. It will comprise the 3-4 dioceses that have voted to leave TEC; the associations of various congregations that have left TEC (e.g. CANA) and those started outside of TEC from departing groups; it will also include congregations and denominations within the Anglican tradition that have formed over the past decades in North America. All of these groups now form part of an association called Common Cause. The formation of this new "province" appears to be a fait accompli.

Truthful Language and Orderly Separation

The Anglican Communion is currently pursuing a number of activities in response to the acrimonious struggle over sexual teaching and discipline within our churches. These activities have been encouraged by the Communion's leadership, including at the recent Lambeth Conference. I have, to various degrees, been a supporter of these activities, not least because I have trusted those who have promoted these means towards ecclesial healing.

True Christian Unity? Reflections on the Lambeth Conference

Anyone who has observed the Anglican Communion over the past few months knows that the outcome to the recent Lambeth Conference is not simply going to be smooth sailing for our churches. The press itself has veered wildly in its evaluation of the Communion throughout the Conference: first, there were declarations of Anglicanism's imminent demise, then claims of dire victory for liberal or conservative forces respectively, then the crowning of Rowan Williams as the Great Peacemaker, and now, most recently, the stoking of new acrimony with stale "revelations" of the Archbishop's long-known

An Open Letter to the Bishops Gathering at Lambeth

Open Letter to the Lambeth Bishops
To the Bishops gathering for the Lambeth Conference:

I write to you personally and openly. I hope that at least some of you will take my words to heart, not because they are mine (which, on their own, would not count for much), but because they represent the mind, I believe, of many in the Communion who are not as vocal in the councils and organs of communication within our church as some.