Thinking Anglicans

Covenant – the only way forward

Bishop Graham Kings has written at Cif belief The Anglican covenant is the only way forward. (Another copy here.)

Its detractors say it will stifle diversity, but unless the church votes for the covenant, deeper divisions will be unavoidable.

“Things fall apart; the centre cannot hold” is a celebrated line in WB Yeats’s 1920 poem The Second Coming. How that relates to the Church of England and the tensions in the wider Anglican communion, 90 years later, we shall witness next week. On Wednesday 24 November, General Synod will be debating the Anglican covenant.

This covenant of unity seeks to hold the Anglican communion together organically in the face of increasing fragmentation. The choice in this debate is to opt into intensifying our world-wide relationships in affection and commitment or to allow splits to develop further and irrevocably. Do we consider each other and decide we belong together, or do we do our own thing and hang apart?

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Michael Harnois
Michael Harnois
13 years ago

What the conservatives in the Communion do not seem to grasp is that the commitment of the American and Canadian churches to our GLBT sisters and brothers is absolute and irrevocable and based on our understanding of Scripture, not a disregard for Scripture. We are not going to turn back or turn away from that commitment. Period. The Communion is important to us, but it is not and cannot be more important than following Jesus. The Covenant, then, will ensure the fracture of the Communion. Only a decision by the “offended” member Churches to respect the integrity of the North… Read more »

Martin Reynolds
Martin Reynolds
13 years ago

Can anyone make any sense of this?

Marshall Scott
13 years ago

I have some difficulty with both Bishop Kings’ and Canon Barnett-Cowan’s interpretations. I took the good Canon’s admonition and looked again at that Covenant as proposed. When I did, I realized that there is no automatic relationship between being a church of the Anglican Communion and a signatory church of the Covenant. It’s not really two tiers, but two bodies, one new and one old, with some (perhaps a lot of) overlap. (http://episcopalhospitalchaplain.blogspot.com/2010/11/new-game-of-proposed-anglican-covenant.html) One way or another, it’s more confused than Bishop Kings or Canon Barnett-Cowan suggest. That confusion should make it harder for any church, including the Episcopal Church… Read more »

Richard Ashby
Richard Ashby
13 years ago

The parallel with the formula to replace the subscribing to the 39 articles is false. The declaration of assent permits a wide variety of interpretation in the spirit of scripture, tradition and reason. The covenant doesn’t. It’s as simple as that. The relevant sections of the Covenant, as shown by many correspondents both here and on other blogs, have provision to disciplne provinces if others don’t like what they are doing. It’s quite obvious to this observer at least, (if not to those who have a professional interest in the Covenant, either because they devised it or it fits their… Read more »

Tobias Haller
13 years ago

Things do fall apart, however much we try to maintain them. “Tower and temple fall to dust.”

The Covenant, far from preventing division, by its own language (read carefully as the Canon of UFO suggests) outlines a process for consequences to the relationships we have enjoyed, in all their messy complexity and variability, for years. The Covenant will provide a way, not to avoid divisions, but to formalise them. Some shall hang together, and others be hanged separately.

The Covenant is a way forward in the wrong direction.

Cynthia Gilliatt
Cynthia Gilliatt
13 years ago

Re the two recent apologiae [is that the right plural?] for the Covenant – lipstick on a pig.

Leon Clarke
Leon Clarke
13 years ago

As far as the Nigerians are concerned, either the covenant drives TEC out or they leave the Anglican communion. Thus fundamentally, the choice that needs to be made is between TEC and Nigeria. We have to make that choice because Nigeria forces us to. Since no-one seems clear whether the covenant does force TEC out, proponents of the covenant seem to be answering the question with an answer that they themselves don’t understand. This seems a strange approach.

JCF
JCF
13 years ago

“Covenant – the only way forward”

Maybe so—to “Bishop Kings’ Communion”. Just not for the *Anglican* one.

Iain McLean
Iain McLean
13 years ago

Although apparently more moderate than recent statements by Bishop Cameron and others, Bishop Kings accuses opponents of the Covenant of “false witness”. This is surely libellous, isn’t it – to say nothing of the Crucifixion-narrative echo.

Father Ron Smith
Father Ron Smith
13 years ago

“Bishop Graham Kings has written at Cif belief *The Anglican covenant is the only way forward*. Its detractors say it will stifle diversity, but unless the church votes for the covenant, deeper divisions will be unavoidable.” The only way forward? For Whom? Certainly not TEC and the Anglican Church of Canada – nor indeed any other Province of the Communion that wants to bring justice to women and the LGBT Community – or to any other marginalised part of society that is presently outside of the enlightened and vital *Blessing* of the Church. And as for the statement that ‘unless… Read more »

Charlotte
Charlotte
13 years ago

Having received no answer to my question on the previous post, I’ll take the liberty of asking it again on this post. Bishop Kings in some ways might be the ideal person to answer it: —— Here is a thought-experiment: I’d be glad to get a response. Suppose that, following the adoption of the Anglican Covenant, the question is put before the various bodies as to whether faithfully partnered gay or lesbian persons could be ordained priest. Suppose that (using Canon Barnett-Cowan’s language) “the consultative processes of the Anglican Communion” were to result in “the discernment that this was an… Read more »

JPM
JPM
13 years ago

Here’s a passage from “The Second Coming” far more descriptive of recent scheming and conniving over the so-called Covenant:

The best lack all conviction, while the worst / Are full of passionate intensity.

Leonardo Ricardo
13 years ago

Archbishop Drexel Gomez, Chair on the Design Group for the Anglican Communion Covenant said:

THE PUNITIVE ANGLICAN COVENANT: Various Provinces will be forced out of the Anglican Family because ¨what you are doing is an offense to the integrity of the family¨ +Drexel Gomez

I think we can trust him at his word on this one:
HERE

Spirit of Vatican II
Spirit of Vatican II
13 years ago

“Things fall apart” — perhaps it is Christendom that is falling apart, despite the desperate effort of the Covenant to put it together again — and from these convulsions perhaps it is a new and open Christianity that is struggling to be born?

Jeremy
Jeremy
13 years ago

“The Covenant is a way forward in the wrong direction.” — Tobias Haller

No. It’s not even that.

It’s a way backward. Plain and simple.

MarkBrunson
13 years ago

To paraphrase –

“We must move forward – TO THE MIDDLE AGES!”

Anybody else notice how often those vigorously – and viciously – promoting this attempted centralization have “Canon” or “Bishop” attached to their names?

What a desperate, transparent and sad attempt at wool-pulling from a mind like Graham Kings – who should know better.

Susannah Clark
13 years ago

“Things fall apart; the centre cannot hold” The centre always holds. The centre is God. We are one in Christ. Just because some provincial leaders huff and puff and threaten to walk out when other legitimate leaders come to meetings etc… does not mean the centre is not holding. It simply means that some christians are saying to other christians “You must do it my way”. That is the problem. That is what threatens human distances. Whereas TEC, trying in good faith to lead lives in Christ, are not saying “You must do it our way” to other provinces. They… Read more »

Malcolm+
Malcolm+
13 years ago

Leonardo, could you give us a link to that Gomez quote?

Fr John
Fr John
13 years ago

The sound and fury of those who dearly desire the covenant to exclude the work of the Holy Spirit, and drive those from the Co0mmunion who understand the inclusive nature of Jesus and his gospel.

Shame on them, confound their politics, frustrate their knavish tricks.

Fr John

Chris Smith
Chris Smith
13 years ago

We are in a dark period of Christian history for certain but there are also great rays of light and hope for a new foundation for the Church. By “Church” I mean all Christians be they Protestant, Anglican, Roman Catholic or Orthodox. Perhaps Vatican II provided the first ray of new light but it also opened windows for all Christians and it is entirely possible that the Holy Spirit is moving us toward building a new foundation which reflects the teachings of Jesus rather than imperial monarchs. Many bishops are indeed shepherds and not monarchs but old imperial models must… Read more »

Father Ron Smith
Father Ron Smith
13 years ago

“One bishop from Canada used the analogy of the family. Once you belong to the family, you belong [forever],” Gomez* recalled. “But in many families, you remain in the family but you can’t stay in the house because your presence in the home is a bad example to other young people, and so you are forced to move out because what you are doing is an offense to the integrity of the family.” – Abp. Gomez discussing the Covenant – If ever there was proof positive that Archbishop Gopmez, Architect of the Covenant, intended it for exclusion of TEC and… Read more »

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