The Anglicans: What Happened in Tanzania

By Jordan Hylden First Things

Thursday, February 22, 2007, 10:47 AM

³We came very close to separation,² said Archbishop Gregory Venables of this weekend¹s meeting of global Anglican leaders, ³but Biblical doctrine and behavior have been affirmed as the norms in the Anglican Church.²

It could have gone the other way, and for a time it looked as if it would. But, in the end, Anglican conservatives everywhere breathed a collective sigh of relief on reading the strongly worded statement issued unanimously by the Church¹s thirty-eight primates, which bluntly called on the Episcopal Church

Those who follow the story know that the current crisis stems from the Episcopal Church¹s decision in 2003 to consecrate a non-celibate homosexual as bishop of New Hampshire and to allow priests in several dioceses to bless same-sex unions formally. Global reaction was swift and sharp, with multiple Anglican provinces (notably Nigeria and Rwanda) immediately declaring a state of ³broken² or ³impaired² communion with the Episcopal Church. Tensions were high even within the Episcopal Church itself, as numerous conservative parishes began leaving or threatening to leave

Although on its surface it all seemed to be an argument merely about sex, on a deeper level it was a crisis of unity and authority. Five years prior to Gene Robinson¹s consecration as bishop, the 1998 Lambeth Conference (a gathering of all Anglican bishops, which meets every ten years) had upheld the traditional Christian understanding of marriage and sexual ethics. Anglicans, who lack a central executive authority, have long depended on its thirty-eight member churches to abide by the decisions made together in council. The consecration of Gene Robinson called that expectation into question

Since the earliest times of the Christian Church, bishops have acted to represent the unity and authority of the global Church to the local diocese, and the local diocese to the global church. So if Gene Robinson did not believe what the Church believes, then how could he represent the Anglican Church in New Hampshire? The same problem presented itself on a church-wide level: If the Episcopal Church did not believe what the Anglican Church believes, then in what sense does it remain an Anglican church? And what good is the Lambeth Conference if no one actually has to follow it?

Anglican unity, it seemed, did not extend to matters of church doctrine, and Anglican authority consisted in everyone doing as they saw fit. Indeed, the Episcopal Church defended its actions in these terms, arguing that ³Anglican comprehensiveness² means making room for all sincerely held beliefs, while ³local autonomy² means allowing each Anglican national province to do as it pleases.

For most Anglicans, and indeed for most Christians, this understanding of church doctrine was difficult to accept. Each week, Christians confess in the Nicene Creed their belief in the ³one, holy, catholic, and apostolic church,² which among other things means that the Church ought to be united in professing the teachings of Christ and the apostles. But the Episcopal Church by its actions had called this into question. Unity in truth, it in effect held, no longer mattered. The situation was described quite accurately by Bishop N.T. Wright, a leading Anglican intellectual, as ³doctrinal indifferentism.² The likes of it have rarely been seen in the history of the Christian Church, and to most Anglicans worldwide it was absolutely unacceptable. A solution had to be found.

The way forward was charted in outline in 2004 by the Windsor Report, a document commissioned by the archbishop of Canterbury and drafted by an international Anglican committee. In it, the actions of the Episcopal Church were clearly judged to be an unacceptable breach. Anglican unity and authority would be impossible, the report warned, if Anglicans continue to disregard the authority of ecclesial councils. Part of the problem, however, was judged to be the somewhat ad hoc nature of those councils, and indeed of the Anglican Communion itself.

Much like the British Empire, the Anglican Church grew haphazardly along with the fortunes of the British Crown. So long as authority rested firmly in the British sovereign and the Thirty-Nine Articles, doctrinal crises were generally kept under control. But with the empire gone, the Church was left without much to hold it together beyond informal pledges to keep to traditional Anglican teaching. So long as everyone did, Anglicans managed to muddle through, but, as the challenges of modernity increasingly became manifest, new global structures became necessary.

The once-per-decade Lambeth Conference and the biennial Primates¹ Meeting gradually grew to fill the gap and, generally speaking, worked by means of gentlemen¹s agreement. Until, that is, the Episcopal Church¹s actions of 2003. No mechanism existed to deal with this sort of disagreement, the Windsor Report explained, and so again something new had to be done if unity and authority were to be maintained.

The Windsor Report proposed an Anglican Covenant, which essentially included a brief summary of traditional Anglican beliefs as well as a commitment by each Anglican national church to abide by the decisions made together in council. The flip side of the covenant, of course, would be that churches that decided not to abide by the decisions made together in council wouldn¹t get invited back for any more meetings. In effect, they would be choosing to walk apart from the Anglican Communion, and the rest of the Anglican churches would continue on without them.

The archbishop of Canterbury, Rowan Williams, became an enthusiastic proponent of the Windsor plan, along with most of the Church of England. In 2005, the rest of the Anglican primates followed suit in their biennial meeting in Northern Ireland, adopting the Windsor Report with only slight modifications as the way forward for the whole Church. It was admittedly something new for Anglicanism, but then again the entire Church had in a sense been a series of ad hoc developments. This was another, and it was overwhelmingly decided to be the best way to preserve Anglican unity and authority.

Which is what made the 2006 General Convention of the Episcopal Church so frustrating. Rather than unequivocally signing on to the Windsor plan, the Episcopal Church gave a sort of half-response. The primates had asked the Episcopal Church to do three things: (1) apologize for its actions in 2003, (2) promise not to consecrate any more actively homosexual bishops, and (3) and promise to stop blessing same-sex unions. The Episcopalians sort of complied with the first two requests and hardly addressed the third.

Things were complicated further by the election, as the new presiding bishop, of Katherine Jefferts Schori, an unapologetic proponent of everything the Episcopal Church had been asked to stop doing. A significant number of Episcopalian bishops and parishes began distancing themselves from their own church, expressing their desire somehow to comply with the Windsor Report, even though General Convention hadn¹t. Some parishes left altogether. Tensions rose, and the patience of several conservative Anglican provinces (especially the Church of Nigeria) wore thin. Schism began to look like a real possibility.

Which brings us to the threshold of last weekend¹s meeting in Tanzania. Many conservative Anglican leaders, such as Archbishop Peter Akinola of Nigeria, seriously doubted that the Episcopal Church would be disciplined for its actions, thus making the idea of Anglican unity and authority something of a joke and turning the Lambeth Conference (as Akinola famously said) into an ³expensive jamboree.²

Akinola had good reason to be doubtful. Many of the more liberal Anglican provinces, such as Canada and Brazil, did not seem eager to discipline the American church. The problem was compounded by a certain level of conservative mistrust of the English church, whose archbishop, Rowan Williams, had earlier in his career been an advocate of same-sex unions. African conservatives made a number of moves to distance themselves from Canterbury, signaling their willingness to cut ties if need be.

Above all, it was Williams¹ goal to maintain the catholic substance of Anglicanism while avoiding schism. On the one hand, Williams had to convince Anglican evangelicals to remain in a church that lacks the confessional clarity and simplicity of mainstream evangelicalism

He was in a tight spot, and he spoke, quite understandably, of nightmare scenarios in which Anglican unity and authority would explode, leaving a piece here, a piece there

None of that happened. Instead, everyone at Tanzania miraculously held together, committing the Anglican Communion to a meaningful disciplinary course against the Episcopal Church and promising strict consequences if the Episcopalians do not mend their ways. The primates at Tanzania asked the bishops of the Episcopal Church to do two specific things: first, unequivocally promise not to authorize Rites of Blessing for same-sex unions; second, unequivocally promise not to consecrate any more actively homosexual bishops. It has been described as an ultimatum, and it comes with a deadline (September 30) and consequences: If not followed, the Episcopal Church will not be invited to next year¹s Lambeth Conference and so in effect will be judged to have walked apart from the Anglican Communion.

Furthermore, the primates¹ statement provides for the creation of an American ³church-within-a-church,² fulfilling a long-standing request of conservative Episcopalians. All Episcopalian bishops will be given the opportunity to come under the direct authority of a separate five-member Pastoral Council (two members of which will be chosen by the current presiding bishop and the remainder by the archbishop of Canterbury and the primates). Conservative Episcopalian bishops will be allowed to nominate one of their own number as a ³Primatial Vicar,² who will act in effect as presiding bishop for the church-within-a-church under the supervision of the primates¹ Pastoral Council.

This new council could act as a significant check on the Episcopal Church¹s internal authority, and it has been given great leeway to negotiate its own terms. In an especially telling line, it is given authorization under paragraph 157 of the Windsor Report to consider whether the Episcopal Church¹s future actions merit further steps toward the withdrawal of the Episcopal Church from membership in the Anglican Communion. In essence, the new church-within-a-church stands ready to become a new American Anglican province in its own right if the Episcopal Church should decide finally to revoke its own current status in the communion.

In addition, the primates have encouraged but not required those who have already left the Episcopal Church to return under the new pastoral scheme, and they have left the door open for their inclusion in more-or-less their present form. The primates have also requested that all legal action currently pending against breakaway parishes come to an end, a significant repudiation of the Episcopal Church¹s well-publicized strategy of filing as many lawsuits as possible. It remains to be seen whether the national church office will comply, but one certainly hopes that it will.

The next move belongs to the Episcopal Church, and Anglicans can only wait to see how it will respond to the primates¹ requests. For many liberals within the Episcopal Church, for whom the gay-rights agenda is a nonnegotiable justice issue, complying with the primates¹ requests would be seen as acquiescing to bigotry. The liberal argument in favor of delaying full homosexual inclusion has long been to wait ³for a season² so as to ³continue the conversation,² thus tactically awaiting the best opportunity to win the greatest gain. But this argument lost much of its luster at Tanzania, since the logic of subscription to an Anglican Covenant (a new and excellent version of which was also unveiled in Tanzania) means that the Episcopal Church would need to bind itself to the decisions of a largely conservative global Anglican body. The civil-rights-era argument that ³justice delayed is justice denied² will thus appeal strongly to many liberals, some of whom are already tiring of an endless conversation that seems every time to end with conservatives having the last word. Still, there remains an outside chance that Episcopalians will join together to accept the primates¹ requests, thus preserving the church¹s Anglican status.

It has been a long road, and much uncertainty lies ahead. But what uncertainty remains is principally related to the decisions now facing the Episcopal Church. As for the Anglican Communion, its choice has been made. Years from now, it may well be that we will look upon this week as a crucial turning-point in Anglican history, crucial as anything since the English Reformation. For the Anglican Communion has finally decided to live up to its name: a global communion of churches, diverse yet united by a common faith and mutual hope, seeking together the mind of Christ, living humbly and prayerfully under the authority of Scripture. So may it remain.

Jordan Hylden is a junior fellow at First Things.