The official report of this afternoon’s session can be found here.
The afternoon started with some appointments which Synod was asked to approve. Allan Bridgewater’s appointment as Chair of the Church of England Pensions Board was extended until 31 December 2008. Andrew Britton was appointed to the Archbishops’ Council for a five-year term from 1 October 2007, where he will replace Michael Chamberlain, and Katherine McPherson and Anne Sloman’s membership of the Council was extended to 31 December 2009.
Synod then moved onto the clergy pension scheme and gave final agreement to the modifications to the scheme provisionally agreed in February. These will reduce the benefits for future service a little but will keep costs within manageable limits.
The debate on the Private Member’s Motion about Possible Military Action Against Iran that should have been debated during the afternoon was terminated early.
The original motion was:
That this Synod, in the light of growing international concern about possible US military action against Iran, believe that in present circumstances unilateral pre-emptive military action by the US or any other government against Iran cannot be justified.
There was also a long amendment proposed by Dr Philip Giddings which replaced the above with a series of more detailed recommendations, including one urging the government of Iran to comply with UN Security Council resolutions and Treaty obligations.
Immediately after the proposer, The Revd Canon Simon Bessant, had made his opening speech, Dr Chris Sugden put a procedural motion to move to next business. His stated reason for this was to avoid prejudicing the position of the new and soon-to-be-installed Anglican bishop in Iran.
This motion was eventually passed, but only after a formal division of the synod. The voting was 113 to 96. The motion therefore lapsed and the topic cannot be taken up again in the lifetime of this synod, without express approval of the business committee.
This opened up a half-hour space in the agenda so Synod started to consider amendments to its standing orders.
Finally, there was a short presentation on plans to provide hospitality to visiting bishops in the days leading up to next year’s Lambeth conference.
Church Times Report of Saturday
11 CommentsThere was an unusually large number of Questions directed to the Ministry Division about the supervision and inspection of theological colleges. Most of these did not mention Wycliffe Hall by name. One however did:
The Revd Jonathan Alderton-Ford (St Edmundsbury & Ipswich) to ask the Chairman of the Ministry Division:
Q. Given the reports in the media that staff relationships have broken down at Wycliffe Hall theological college, what steps is the Ministry Division taking to resolve the matter?
The Bishop of Derby to reply as Vice Chairman of the Theological Education and Training Committee
A. The Bishop of Norwich, the Chair of Ministry Division has been in regular contact with the Bishop of Liverpool, the Chair of the Wycliffe Council. Further, the Bishops’ Committee for Ministry has set in place a process to inform itself regarding the situation at Wycliffe. A small team of independent advisors, drawn from current Senior Inspectors, will report to the Bishops’ Committee for Ministry, which can then take any further action, if required.
0 CommentsThe official report of the morning’s business is here. Full audio recordings are available there.
The revision stage of the Marriage Measure was completed with no substantive changes to the draft published at GS 1616B.
The BBC has a report on this: Church relaxes rules on marriage.
The Parochial Fees Order was approved with one substantial amendment: the fee payable to the PCC in respect of a service for the burial of cremated remains in a churchyard was increased: from £55 to £74.
The item to consider the report of the Standing Orders Committee was not reached before the lunch break and will probably be taken up on Monday afternoon.
Further report of the afternoon’s business to follow.
0 CommentsThe official reports, including audio of the entire proceedings, can be found here.
TA will publish some further details of Answers to Questions later today. Meanwhile, Church Society has some notes here.
The Church Times has a brief report here.
Jonathan Petre has a report of the presentation by the Children’s Commissioner, Prof Sir Albert Aynsley Green: Church told to defend youth ‘failed by Britain’.
Alastair Cutting also has a report of this, see Children have more fun – (b) 6July2007.
GS 1650A has been issued, in which it says:
…The Synod agenda already provides for substantial consideration of appointments issues on Monday afternoon. The report Talent and Calling (GS 1650) did not, however, consider the appointment arrangements for diocesan bishops and its recommendations in respect of Crown appointments to cathedral posts were made before this week’s announcement from the Government. The Presidents have decided, therefore, that some change is needed to Monday’s business so that there can be a debate that takes account of the Green Paper.
The Presidents have directed that after item 26 (address from Sir Joseph Pilling) there should be a debate on a motion moved by the Bishop of Leicester [copy below]. This will be place of items 27 and 28 in the agenda.
The new motion will give Synod the opportunity to consider how it wishes to respond both to the Government’s proposals and the recommendations in Talent and Calling.
The new motion is:
That this Synod, noting that proposals in the Government’s Green Paper of 3 July (attached to GS 1650A) will necessitate further discussion with the Church:
(a) welcome the prospect of the Church achieving the ‘decisive voice in the appointment of bishops’ for which Synod voted in 1974;
(b) affirm its willingness for the Church to have the decisive voice in the selection of cathedral deans and canons appointed by the Crown, given the Prime Minister’s wish no longer to play an active role in the selection of individual candidates;
(c) invite the Archbishops, in consultation with the Archbishops’ Council and the House of Bishops, to oversee the necessary consequential discussions with the Government and to report to the February group of sessions, including on the implications for those matters covered by chapter 8 of GS 1650); and
(d) endorse the recommendations in chapter 10 of GS 1650, with the exception of recommendations 20-30, invite those responsible to give effect to them and invite the Archbishops’ Council to report to Synod during 2008 on progress with implementation.
In the light of this direction, the Bishops of Sheffield and Leicester give notice that they do not intend to move items 27 and 28.
0 CommentsPat Ashworth in the Church Times reports: Synod members to urge caution over Anglican Covenant.
and also PM to withdraw from choosing diocesan bishops.
Jonathan Petre in the Daily Telegraph has Church of England coalition to tackle liberals.
Earlier in the week, he had Biggest change since Henry VIII and Pope.
9 CommentsIt appears that Church Society doesn’t think so. Read Is an Anglican Covenant a good idea? and then also read General Synod The Anglican Covenant.
23 Commentspress release from InclusiveChurch
Covenant proposals and extra-Provincial Bishops
5th July 2007
The growing number of bishops created by African provinces for “pastoral oversight” in North America (and potentially in other provinces), the attempts to create a Covenant that defines Anglican doctrine and ethics, and the apparent intention to organise an alternative to the Lambeth Conference in London next year all point towards one thing. The strategy to destabilise the Anglican Communion is moving into another phase.
The creation by the provinces of Uganda, Kenya and Nigeria of extra-provincial Bishops is against the expressed wish of the Windsor Report and the post Lambeth ’98 process of listening and reconciliation. It is more evidence that the Primates of those provinces and their supporters in the US and Britain profoundly misunderstand the nature of the Communion. We very much regret that the Chair of the Covenant Design Group, the Archbishop of the West Indies, has welcomed these appointments.
Inclusive Church’s aim is to support and celebrate the traditional breadth and generosity of the Gospel of Jesus Christ as it has been received and passed on through Anglican history and lived out in the Communion. This creates challenges when there are fundamental disagreements. But the way to respond to disagreements is not to walk apart, nor to create separate structures, nor to seek to impose one particular point of view on the Communion. It is to engage, to communicate, to speak, to listen and to learn.
Clearly there are outstanding issues over how the Communion should respond to the reality that many Provinces include lesbian and gay Christians who live with partners in loving, faithful relationships. But the extraordinary way in which this issue has been allowed to dominate the life of the Communion over the past ten years is not coincidence.
There can be little doubt that the issue is being used by some, mainly conservative, Christians as a lever to try to change the Communion into something it is not; from a conciliar church into a confessional one. From a praxis-based Communion where the bonds between us are the bonds of fellowship and love to a codified Communion where exclusions are legally determined and legally enforced, and where the Communion defines itself not by who it includes but by who it excludes.
The Covenant process has been moved, by this group, away from its original intention which was to affirm the bonds of fellowship which exist. The way in which the draft was received by some at the Primates meeting in Tanzania is indication that, whatever the intention, it will be used to enforce a particular interpretation of the Scriptures to the detriment of the life of the Communion. We do not need a Curia, and the process of drafting a Covenant is already giving more power to the Primates than is justified by our history, by our life and by some of their actions to date.
Hard cases make bad laws. We wish to see, urgently, greater understanding between provinces, and we can see the value of a Covenant which enables this to happen . But the proposed draft before us is likely to be an instrument of further division, not unification. Some of our structures may need reform – but it is already clear that this Covenant process is unlikely to help.
The suggestion of an alternative “not the Lambeth Conference” is, simply, sad. Those who suggest it are walking away from the possibility of dialogue. The suggestion has little to do with dealing with our post-imperial past, and little to do with ensuring that particular voices are heard. It has a great deal to do with power; and with the location of power in the Communion.
We call on those supporting these actions to recognise that there is more than one answer to the questions which face us. Resolution will be achieved only through mutual respect and communication, and an acknowledgement that different views are sincerely held by faithful and loyal members of the Communion.
Inclusive Church is deeply committed to continuing the debate over these questions. The Anglican Communon has faced problems before and moved through them. With God’s help, we will again.
Giles Goddard
Chair, IC
Here is what the Green Paper from the Ministry of Justice says about church matters:
The Government’s role in ecclesiastical, judicial and public appointments
Appointments in the Church of England
57. The Church of England is by law established as the Church in England and the Monarch is its Supreme Governor. The Government remains committed to this position.
58. Because The Queen acts on the advice of Ministers, the Prime Minister as her First Minister has a role in advising The Queen on certain appointments within the Church. Diocesan and Suffragan Bishops, as well as 28 Cathedral Deans, a small number of Cathedral Canons, some 200 parish priests and a number of other post-holders in the Church of England are appointed by The Queen on the advice of the Prime Minister.
59. In the case of Archbishops and Diocesan Bishops, reflecting the agreement reached between the Church and the State in 1976, the Crown Nominations Commission (formerly the Crown Appointments Commission) passes two names to the Prime Minister, usually in order of preference, who may recommend either of them to The Queen, or reject both and ask for further nominations. The Crown Nominations Commission is a Church based body, with the Archbishop of Canterbury as Chair and the Archbishop of York as Vice-Chair. However, the Prime Minister’s Secretary for Appointments is an ex-officio and non-voting member. The chair of the Crown Nominations Commission is taken by the Archbishop in whose province the vacancy has arisen.
60. For the appointment of Suffragan Bishops the relevant Diocesan Bishop is required by law to submit two names to the Crown. These are passed to the Prime Minister by the Archbishop of the Province concerned with a supportive letter. It has been the convention for more than a century that the Prime Minister advises the Monarch to nominate the person named first in the petition.
61. In the case of Deans appointed by the Crown, it is the practice for the Prime Minister to commend a name to the Queen, chosen from a shortlist provided by the Prime Minister’s Secretary for Appointments and agreed with the Diocesan Bishop, and following consultations with the Cathedral, Bishop, Archbishop of the province concerned and others as appropriate. (The aim is to reach agreement with the Bishop on the preferred order of the list.) In the case of the Crown canonries and parishes, following consultations led by the Downing Street Appointments Secretariat, the Prime Minister recommends the appointment to The Queen.
62. In considering the role which the Prime Minister and the Government should play in Church appointments, the Government is guided by four principles:
63. To reflect the principle that, where possible, the Prime Minister should not have an active role in the selection of individual candidates, for diocesan bishoprics the Prime Minister proposes that from now on he should ask the Crown Nominations Commission to put only one name to him, a recommendation he would then convey to The Queen. The Government will discuss with the Church any necessary consequential changes to procedures. The current convention for appointing Suffragan Bishops will continue.
64. The Government respects and understands the different arrangements for Cathedral, parish and other Crown appointments in the Church. Developing any new arrangements for such appointments will require a process of constructive engagement between the Government and the Church, and the Government is committed to ensuring a productive dialogue. The Government is aware that a Church review of certain senior appointments, including Cathedral appointments, is to be debated by General Synod later this month; it hopes that this will be a good starting point for that dialogue. Until new arrangements are agreed, the Secretary for Appointments will continue to assist as appropriate.
65. These changes would also have implications for the Lord Chancellor’s patronage of some 450 parishes and a small number of canonries. It would be sensible for any changes agreed to the procedures for Crown patronage to be also agreed for the Lord Chancellor’s patronage.
66. No changes are proposed to Crown appointments to the Royal Peculiars such as Westminster Abbey and St. George’s Chapel,Windsor, reflecting the personal nature of the relationship of these institutions with the Monarch. Current conventions will continue.
25 CommentsThe Affirming Catholicism press release published below mentions that an amendment has been tabled by Jonathan Clark.
The amendment reads as follows:
to delete all the words after “the Archbishops’ Council,” and replacing them with:
“to bring back to the next group of sessions of Synod for approval a considered response to the draft from the Covenant Design Group for submission to the Anglican Communion Office.”
The original motion would then read this way:
That this Synod:
32 Commentsa) affirm its willingness to engage positively with the unanimous recommendation of the Primates in February 2007 for a process designed to produce a covenant for the Anglican Communion;
b) note that such a process will only be concluded when any definitive text has been duly considered through the synodical processes of the provinces of the Communion; and
c) invite the Presidents, having consulted the House of Bishops and the Archbishops’ Council,
to agree the terms of a considered response to the draft from the Covenant Design Group for submission to the Anglican Communion Office by the end of the year.to bring back to the next group of sessions of Synod for approval a considered response to the draft from the Covenant Design Group for submission to the Anglican Communion Office.
Affirming Catholicism press release:
Alarm raised over draft Covenant
In the week before the General Synod of the Church of England will be asked to endorse the process to create an Anglican Covenant, Affirming Catholicism has sounded alarm over the current proposed draft. In a commentary on the Covenant design group’s proposal to give the final say on Anglican doctrine to the meeting of the leaders of national churches, the Primates, The Rev’d Dr Mark Chapman, editor of a forthcoming Affirming Catholicism publication on the Anglican Covenant, and Vice-Principal of the Ripon College, Cuddesdon, said:
The emphasis given in the current proposals to the Primates’ Meeting (composed of 38 men and one woman) downplays the importance of synods. There is something disingenuous about giving power to determine membership of the Communion and to decide what constitutes the ‘common mind’ of the Churches to a group who at the moment refuse even to share Eucharistic communion with each other.
Affirming Catholicism has previously welcomed the idea of an Anglican Covenant as one possible way of healing divisions over Church discipline regarding homosexuality which have fractured the global communion, and Dr Chapman’s paper reiterates the movement’s hope that an instrument which creates dialogue and affirms the progressive elements within Anglicanism might provide a way forward.
The Chair of Trustees, Canon Nerissa Jones, MBE, said:
We support any attempt by the Archbishop of Canterbury to hold us all together. Affirming Catholics are progressive and inclusive Anglicans who value our place in a diverse and global Communion. And that is why we argue that only a covenant which values the role of local Synods, and recognises that episcopal power must be shared with lay people, can win the support of ordinary Anglicans. We hope that Synod will vote to support the ongoing process provided that it also insists that these features are vital to the future of Anglicanism as we know it.
This weekend’s Synod motion, if passed, would give authority to top officials in the Church of England to comment on the draft ahead of next year’s gathering of Anglican Bishops at the Lambeth Conference. Fr Jonathan Clark, a member of the group Affirming Catholics in Synod and rector of the Anglican Society of Catholic Priests, has tabled an amendment to the motion to ensure that the Synod itself – the only elected body in the Church – endorses the Church’s official response to the current draft covenant. Fr Clark has also jointly published an article with the Rev’d Canon Dr Graham Kings, theological secretary of the evangelical organisation, Fulcrum, in which the two affirm the need for a covenant which can build mutual respect and increased tolerance amongst Anglican Christians.
3/ 07/ 07
5 CommentsUpdated
Andrew Goddard has written another briefing document, now available at Fulcrum The Anglican Covenant: Background and Resources. It now includes many links, including to a few articles that Thinking Anglicans has not mentioned previously. Reading this document is strongly recommended.
28 CommentsGraham Kings, vicar of St Mary Islington and associated with Fulcrum and Jonathan Clark, rector of St Mary Stoke Newington and associated with Affirming Catholicism have jointly written an article which you can read here: Stretching and the Spirit: The Anglican Covenant.
42 CommentsAs Archbishop Drexel Gomez has been invited to address the synod, it seems appropriate to draw attention to some earlier remarks of his about the covenant. George Conger originally wrote this up for the Central Florida Episcopalian, although it has since appeared elsewhere. Read Gomez brings ‘Global South’ perspective to Diocese of Central Florida.
Also, the Standing Committee of the Diocese of Virginia has published a response to the Draft Anglican Covenant which can be found here as a PDF, but is quite short so is reproduced here below the fold.
Last week in a letter to the Church Times Canon Gregory Cameron wrote a defence of the Covenant principle in response to an earlier letter from John Plant. This week there are three further responses, including one from the Bishop of Lincoln.
12 CommentsChris Sugden of Oxford has written about this. It is hidden at the back of a Word document linked from here at Anglican Mainstream which starts out with another copy of the Fulcrum article by Andrew Goddard.
An html copy of this article is now here.
36 CommentsFulcrum has published an article by Andrew Goddard The Anglican Covenant – A Briefing Paper for the Evangelical Group on General Synod.
9 CommentsFollowing Monday’s press briefing for next month’s Church of England General Synod the Church Times has these articles:
Big debates on pensions, top jobs, and Communion
Marriage rules, simplified, to be debated again
The official Church of England press release is Key debates on Senior Church Appointments, Anglican Communion Covenant, Marriage Law and Iran at the York Synod
Christine Seib writes in The Times on pensions, one of the items on the agenda: God’s work is an expensive enterprise
Our list of links to synod papers is here.
0 CommentsFive General Synod members have sent the following note on the Draft Anglican Covenant to their fellow synod members.
TA will be glad to publish any other communications to synod members on the Covenant that we receive.
The Draft Anglican Covenant
1. The case for a Covenant has not been made out – the so-called crisis in the Anglican Communion has been greatly exaggerated by the media and by some within the Communion who have a vested interest in generating the crisis phenomenon. We need to reclaim the agenda for ourselves. The Communion has always been a federation of allied Churches which has lived with differences of views on a wide range of matters. Trust has been strained across the Communion in the sense that some accuse others of breaking faith on certain issues in relation to human sexuality. But vigorous disagreements are nothing new or startling for us. The four instruments of the Communion are perfectly capable of dealing with difference. It is also possible to argue that trust is not under strain; trust has been strengthened because we are now more open about our different expressions of faith within the body of Christ.
2. The Covenant is an attempt to impose agreement where this did not exist before – a founding principle of Anglican ecclesiology is immortalised in the words of HM Queen Elizabeth I who did not wish “to make windows into men’s souls”. When questioned about the Eucharist, she said “Christ was the word that spake it. He took the bread and brake it; And what his words did make it that I believe and take it.” There has never been a single version of “authentic Anglicanism” and a Covenant cannot begin to grapple with the existing diversity within our Church and the Communion. A true family cannot exist without disagreements and neither can the Anglican Communion. It is because we are in Communion with one another that we need to struggle with one another.
3. The Covenant is a route to disunity – in drawing a sharp distinction between covenanters and non-covenanters, this process would create and constitute division rather than fostering continued Communion-wide dialogue. Province A may have already declared itself out of Communion with province B, even though province B may still regard itself in Communion with province A. People already refuse to share the Eucharist together. But the current structures allow for people and provinces easily to re establish links re assert communion with one another. The Covenant will institutionalise this process and make it harder.
4. If the Communion needs a Covenant, we all need to agree about it; if we can all agree about it, we do not need a Covenant – the Covenant is process focused rather than outcome focused. It ignores the “elephant in the room”: we need to learn to live with difference in witness to the world of Christ’s body broken for us. The Covenant is displacement activity.
5. The mechanisms in section 6 of the Covenant are woefully inadequate to establish what would be, in effect, a new order within the Anglican Communion and the Church of England – the four instruments of the Communion are satisfactory for a federation of allied churches but are not suitable institutions for a new order. No indication is given as to where the balance of power would lie under the Covenant as between the four instruments or how they would operate together in order to enforce the covenant. If a new order were to be established, it would require fundamental institutional reform. It is not possible to superimpose a new order on the existing structure.
6. The gift of Anglican ecclesiology is that it is both a Church catholic and reformed and this is undermined by the Covenant – the Church of England emerged from the Reformation with an essential balance between bishops and the people. This is currently expressed in the jurisdiction of a bishop in Synod. The Covenant fundamentally shifts the balance of power towards bishops in an unprecedented way. Three of the instruments of the Communion are exclusively made up of bishops which subordinates the role of clergy and laity. The Covenant fails to acknowledge that Anglican tradition has never accepted something akin to papal or curial authority, whilst also not being congregationalist. It is critical that the Anglican tradition is maintained, clergy and lay participation synodically expressed with authority, and undue weight is not handed over to episcopally dominated structures.
7. Covenants with other Churches do not have the same legal significance as the draft Anglican Covenant – an expression of common will or mutual respect is very different to, in effect, subordinating the Church of England to the institutions of the Anglican Communion.
8. The Covenant raises such fundamental issues that a period of careful reflection and reception is required – the Anglican tradition of living with difference is one of our core charisms. It is not acceptable for General Synod to be bounced into endorsing the current approach to the Covenant without full reflection and debate. Although the Primates may wish to debate the Covenant at the next Lambeth Conference and we may wish to pray for these deliberations, they should not be seen as having synodical endorsement when we have no idea what representations may be made on our behalf or what the shape of the final draft Covenant will be.
The Very Revd Colin Slee (Deans 55); the Revd Brian Lewis (Chelmsford 90); the Revd Paul Collier (Southwark 217); John Ward (London 359); the Revd Canon Prof Marilyn McCord Adams (Universities 446)
5 CommentsAnnex 4 of GS 1661, the paper by the MCU, is now available here.
Note that it is not the most recent paper from MCU on this topic. That one can be found here.
10 CommentsAnnex 3 of GS 1661, the paper by Dr Martin Davie, is now available here.
4 CommentsThe meetings of General Synod are always accompanied by a wide variety of “fringe meetings”.
At York, one of these will be organised by Changing Attitude as reported here: Davis Mac-Iyalla, Director of Changing Attitude Nigeria to visit UK:
In York he will talk at a meeting of the CA York group on Saturday 7 July and a fringe meeting at General Synod on 8 July. He will meet bishops and members of Synod. He also hopes to meet Bishop Benjamin Kwashi of the diocese of Jos, Nigeria, who is at Synod for a meeting organised by Anglican Mainstream.
Want your fringe meeting publicised here? Write to us in the Comments.
Update
Anglican Mainstream has announced its meeting here:
2 CommentsBishop Benjamin Kwashi, Bishop of Jos, Northern Nigeria will speak at the Anglican Mainstream “fringe meeting” at General Synod on Monday July 9th 2007 at 1 .15 p.m. on The Anglican Communion – an African Perspective.
Bishop Kwashi has been Bishop of Jos since 1992. He has seen a number of his church buildings burnt to the ground and his wife was physically assaulted by terrorists in their home last year.
He is Co-ordinating bishop for the Convocation of Anglicans in North America and Chairman of the board of Sharing of Ministries Abroad (SOMA) International.David Mac-Iyalla of Changing Attitude Nigeria and Bishop Robinson Cavalcanti of Recife Brazil will be joining 70 members of General Synod to hear Bishop Kwashi. .