It is difficult to overestimate the importance of bishop NT Wright’s">NT Wright’s and the archbishop of York’s most recent communications. Both have sent shock waves through the convention .
Some console themselves with the comforting illusion that ++York, a man in whom many ECUSAns had previously placed great hope, was not “speaking for the archbishop of Canterbury.”
Ruth Gledhill, in fact, confirms that this is true:
But here is what I can say. John Sentamu is definitely not at GenCon06 as a representative of the Archbishop of Canterbury.
And yet she also seems to suggest something perhaps a little more informal:
Even though he read out a message from Dr Williams at the convention, and was introduced by Griswold as representing ABC, there is absolutely no question but he is there in a personal capacity only. And why is this? It is so he has more freedom to act. “Watch John Sentamu,” a source told me. “He is key.”
I have no idea how exactly to understand this cryptic message from Ms. Gledhill’s source but it is interesting.
I don’t believe in coincidences.
I’ve argued for a very long time now that the ABC is absolutely committed to preserving the Communion and upholding the mind of the Communion as articulated in the Windsor Report, specifically as it was received and amended at Dromantine.
This point of view was, to my mind, was greatly substantiated by +Langrish’s visit and speech to the HOB.
And now, as we near the precipice of our winding “Windsor Journey,” first +Durham (the fourth highest see in England), and then ++York (the second) communicate the very same message: the resolutions of the Special Commission do not sufficiently answer the Windsor Requests in the course of 24 hours.
Now, I’m not an Anglican mover and shaker. I have no inside information. I’m a lowly parish priest and part-time blogger. But I’m not stupid. Were I to stand on the center left of things (let’s say as an institutionalist who agrees with Integrity in principle but remains committed to Canterbury), I would be very afraid. I would put two and two together and realize that the resolutions need to change and change dramatically to reflect, precisely, the language of Windsor.
But here’s the problem. As I pointed out this morning, the institutional center-left is engaged in a rear defensive action against the radical left. They are doing all in their strength to simply keep the SCECAC resolutions from being pulled further away than it already is from the Windsor language.
As evidence of this struggle, look no further than the SCECAC discussions we’ve published on Stand Firm from the start of General Convention.
Moreover, take note of today’s floor debate over the most innocuous of the SCECAC resolutions, resolution A159. Today’s was not primarily a debate between revisionists and orthodox, but between the more radical revisionists who sought to inject the language of “autonomy and “independence” and “historic separation” into a resolution designed to express the Episcopal Church’s desire to remain within the Anglican Communion, and the institutional revisionists who fought just to keep the language as it is.
If this is any indication of the way things will go with the more specific responses to the Windsor Report coming out of the SCECAC (if they ever come out), then it will be an epic struggle just to get the resolutions passed through both houses with the same language (as required) to say nothing of an attempt to strengthen them.
So the institutionalists are stuck between the clear call of Canterbury (again, I don’t believe in coincidences) on their right (for lack of a better expression) and the pull of Integrity on their left.
The situation is nearing the untenable stage.
As Canon Anderson said this afternoon at the AAC briefing (and I paraphrase) “The sovereign hand of the Almighty God, the God who split the Red Sea, can do all things”
But short of his merciful intervention, the Episcopal Church we love could be nearing her end.
26 Comments •
Rev. Joseph
Thank you Matt+ for all your work. I’m glued to my computer. Your analysis is helpful but not hopeful, it saddens me that we are so near the precipice.