Kearon claimed that the communion's ecumenical dialogues "are at the point of collapse" and said that the last meeting of the Standing Committee of the Anglican Communion, of which Jefferts Schori is an elected member, "was probably the worst meeting I have experienced."
"The viability of our meetings are at stake," he added.
Is it the fault of the Episcopal Church? Will the meetings spring back to life if Bishop Katharine removes herself from the Standing Committee, which I fervantly pray she will not, if she has been requested to do so?
At the beginning of the session with Kearon, Jefferts Schori asked the council to vote on his request that the session be closed to all but council members. His request was decisively rejected by a show of hands.
Excellent. A victory for transparency.
He [Kearon] then began by saying that the "problem of increased and growing diversity in the Anglican Communion has been an issue for many years" and added that by the 1990s leaders in the communion began to name "the diversity of opinions in the communion and diversity in general as a problem and sought some mechanisms to address it."
To embrace the "growing diversity" would be unthinkable, then?
Kearon said during his statement that Archbishop of Canterbury Rowan Williams has limited authority beyond the ability to call meetings of certain communion bodies, make some appointments and "occasionally articulate the mind of the communion."
"Everywhere I go, everyone wants him to act as a sort of an Anglican pope as long as he does what [they] want him to do," Kearon added.
I imagine that the ABC as Anglican pope is the last thing many of us in TEC want to see, although there are exceptions.
During his remarks, Kearon also said that he has asked whether it "constitutes an intervention and is therefore a breach of the third moratoria" if a communion province has among its bishops one who is exercising ministry in another province without that province's permission.
"That question has not been addressed by any of the instruments of communion so I and the archbishop don't have guidance on that particular question," he said.
Later in the discussion, Hollingsworth said that he was puzzled about how the communion could declare a moratorium on interventions and then say it cannot determine what constitutes an intervention.
"I can pretty easily define what an intervention is," said Hollingsworth, in terms of a Southern Cone bishop who has established congregations in the Diocese of Ohio and exercise his episcopal ministry without Hollingsworth's permission. (My emphasis)
If a bishop from the Southern Cone or any other province set up shop in a diocese of the Church of England without permission of the local bishop, would the Archbishop of Canterbury recognize the action as an intervention and a breach of the third moratorium?
Backing up a bit:
The secretary general's visit was initiated by member Bruce Garner of Atlanta, Georgia, who suggested to Presiding Bishop Katharine Jefferts Schori that she invite Kearon, who was vacationing in North America, to the meeting.
Garner told ENS afterwards that he had "never witnessed so much obfuscation in such a short period of time" in his entire life.
"We were polite," he said, "but we asked him questions he could not or would not provide answers to."
The description brings to mind Tony Hayward, the CEO of BP, in his recent testimony during a Congressional hearing.
Nicholas Knisely at The Lead posted the entire report from the Executive Council meeting.
The moment I read "never witnessed so much obfuscation in such a short period of time" in his entire life", I was going to post "reminds me of Tony Hayward's Congressional testimony", but you beat me to the punch. Those "looking straight down the nose at you" English accents don't exactly help, do they? I call it the "Stewie Factor", after my favorite Family Guy character.
ReplyDeleteTo blame the atmosphere at the last meeting of the Standing Committee of the Anglican Communion on KJS, ("probably the worst meeting I have experienced") which it sounds rather as though, by implication, he may have done, seems unconscionable. There again, by no means unlikely that Rowan's letter to KJS was written in expectation of her saying "No", but placing him where he can say to the FOCAs, "But I tried".
Until now Kearon has been pretty-well universally despised as a cat's-paw of TEC by the radical right. Suspect he & Williams barely have a clue what they're doing, beyond treading water, so who are we to guess?
[LB - needing to log back to his usual avatar, but too lazy to do so]
Roger, is Kearon now Rowan's boy? If so, he will have friends on neither side.
ReplyDeleteDid you hear that Tony Hayward has stepped down from day-to-day oversight of the oil gusher? The press continue to use the oil-spill descriptive, which is flat-out wrong for what's happening in the Gulf.
Mom said I'm not to say anything if I can't say something nice so I won't say anything about Kearon or the ABC. I'm commenting simply because I like the wv which is "unsurof". I'm not unsure of the situation. I posted my opinion on my blog.
ReplyDeleteI honestly can't think that they know what to do at this point. I also v strongly suspect that they blundered into "Mitregate" for fear of p-ssing-off the FiF-UKers at a critical point in the C of E female bishops negotiations. Don't think that the implications of their slighting KJS occurred to them - or maybe that it even occurred to them that they were slighting her. Glad, from a political standpoint, that they did - the ecclesiastical equivalent of Joe Barton's apology yesterday to BP.
ReplyDeleteBut Piskie, you didn't know what your WV would be! Your mama taught you right.
ReplyDeleteLapin, we'll see what the next bumbling move out of Lambeth will be.
Rowan was never what he appeared to be - I believe that, now.
ReplyDeleteBut, you're right, Lapinbizarre, they don't know what to do. TEC hasn't bowed down, as expected, and hasn't got the entire AC crying for their blood. Both Scotland and churches within the CofE have asked our PB to come and speak. Rowan was probably having to change his undies 3 times a day during her visit.
They're running scared and getting sloppy.
Kearon said during his statement that Archbishop of Canterbury Rowan Williams has limited authority beyond the ability to call meetings of certain communion bodies, make some appointments and "occasionally articulate the mind of the communion."
ReplyDeleteInteresting: An admission that the ABC does not in fact have the power to do many of the things he has recently purported to do. Now all he has left to do is to come to the realization that the AC has no "mind" that even he can "articulate" and we may have a basis for further discussion as to the possible future of Anglicanism. And for that he needs to pay attention to its history.
wv = iminguo
(I'm channeling a horsy-looking person)
Grandmère Mimi, Seems to me Rowan Who is doing just as the Radical Right wants. Destroy the Anglican Communion so it can be replaced by Gafcon, And leave the C of E weakened so Tony Blair and the Panzer Pope can take England. I wonder if they're expecting Queen Elizabeth to convert?
ReplyDeleteI wish the Presiding Bishop had told him what to do with his miter. I expect not, but then it's probably best that she's the PB at this time. If anybody can salvage the mess Rowan Who has made it's her.
Do you suppose Prime Minister Cameron will be apologizing for the ABC soon?
An American Anglican Council news release, which out of respect for you I will not link, tho', there being other interesting stuff there, I will print the URL below, reports that at a press conference yesterday the following question and answer exchange occurred between David Virtue & KJS:
ReplyDeleteDavid Virtue, Virtue Online: "My question is for the Presiding Bishop. In light of events recently concerning the Archbishop's Pentecost letter and the TEC being asked to withdraw several ecumenical leaders from the ACC, will the Presiding Bishop and Executive Council consider cutting the 40% budget of the ACC? Has that been discussed?"
Jefferts Schori: "Your first observation is not accurate. Members of Ecumenical dialogues were removed by the Archbishop of Canterbury and the Secretary General of the Anglican Communion. We were not asked to withdraw. We were not asked to withdraw from the Anglican Consultative Council. There has been no discussion here of reducing our offering to the Anglican Communion Office."
http://www.americananglican.org/jefferts-schori-we-were-not-asked-to-withdraw
Good post G.M. Thanks.
ReplyDeleteLapin, Thinking Anglicans covers the subject and much more from the Church Times.
ReplyDeleteThanks, DP.
...the AC has no "mind" that even he can "articulate" and we may have a basis for further discussion as to the possible future of Anglicanism. And for that he needs to pay attention to its history.
ReplyDeletePaul (A.), I'm puzzled that the ABC continues to speak of the "mind" of the Communion. There is no "mind" now, there never was, and there never will be. The Elizabethan Settlement settlement stopped a good deal of bloodshed, but even then, just in the Church of England, there was no one "mind".
Wade, it's probably best that ++Katharine is PB and not you.
ReplyDeleteI expect that David Cameron has larger concerns than the churchy kerfluffle.
Quirked eyebrow here at this:
ReplyDelete"He [Kearon] then began by saying that the "problem of increased and growing diversity in the Anglican Communion has been an issue for many years" and added that by the 1990s leaders in the communion began to name "the diversity of opinions in the communion and diversity in general as a problem and sought some mechanisms to address it."
If anything we have become even more diverse in the last 20 years.
And as to this:
"Kearon claimed that the communion's ecumenical dialogues "are at the point of collapse" and said that the last meeting of the Standing Committee of the Anglican Communion, of which Jefferts Schori is an elected member, "was probably the worst meeting I have experienced."
IF this is the meeting I am recalling, that at the time a "gentleman" claimed that he could not "speak his mind with her in the room." Based on the assumption that he would be intelligent, articulate, well educated and versed in diplomacy, I wondered what it was that he could not address with a woman in the room. So, while Canon Kearon links our PB's name here, I don't believe she was the problem. And, I believe that if she was the problem he would have stated that more directly. I admire her grace but I think they are intentionally scapegoating her.
Hi Bonnie. Welcome. Again, why is diversity a problem to be solved?
ReplyDeleteIf the "gentleman" could not "speak his mind with her in the room", perhaps he was wasting his time in the room. It seems that for certain fastidious types, simply being in the same room with the PB would taint them. Since the PB has no problem being in the room with such a "gentleman", why should SHE be asked to leave?
I admire her grace but I think they are intentionally scapegoating her.
I think you could be right, Bonnie.
Well, yes of course they are scapegoating her. The way to fight that is to be as transparent as possible, and vigorously state the facts and tell the truth.
ReplyDeleteKearon also said,
"There is a logic which says if you do not share the faith and order of the wider communion then you shouldn't represent that communion to the wider church,"
So when did homoseuxality become and issue of faith and order.
I would like to know when it was elevated to apparent "core doctrine". Because that's all this is about.
The Brits always hate it when the Americans won't play their games. This whole thing is recalling to me a number of frustrating experiences in common rooms in the UK, where the Yanks just wanted to get stuff out in the open and the Brits played endless secret chess.
One people divided indeed.
Grandmere Mimi--I so admire our Presiding Bishop Katharine and since she has always conducted herself with grace and intelligence I would never believe that she would behave otherwise and was very disappointed that Canon Kearon should imply that she had. Sigh. I think they make up their play book as they go along.
ReplyDeleteI tried to find the source of my comment without any luck but I'll do more research.
And, I have left a little story about modifying the behavior of teens with a decidely biblical twist on the other thread for with we cannot blame Doug but one of my dear Southern lady friends.
Oh-oh! IT is having flashbacks about frustrating experiences with English academics. I'm soooo glad that I'm not a character in one of her flashbacks.
ReplyDeleteSo when did homoseuxality become and issue of faith and order.
IT, homosexuality is not now a matter of core doctrine; it never was; and it is so now only in the fevered imaginations of certain Anglican folk, who wish it to be so and believe that by saying that it is so, their imaginings will come true.
Bonnie, Bp. Katharine conducts herself with admirable grace and dignity - much more worthy of commendation, when we consider the many dauntingly difficult situations that she faces.
ReplyDeleteActually the meeting at which the gentleman felt he could not speak his mind was the March House of Bishops meeting with Mary Glasspool present. The man in question was Bishop Suffragan of Dallas, Paul Lambert.
ReplyDeleteWell, not much point in Bp. Lambert staying in the room, either, although I do wonder what he wanted to say that he couldn't say with Mary Glasspool present.
ReplyDeleteGrandmère Mimi, I believe you are 100% correct and I'll stick to Engineering. But being an Irishman, I do have to say that, as an apologist, Cameron is far more graceful than this Kearon fellow, who claims to be Irish.
ReplyDeleteCaminante--I think the incident I am trying to find happened before that. I have been looking around in the TA archives but I haven't found what I am looking for. I keep finding interesting bits to read so the going is slow. I wasn't following anything that was going on last year and I did think this was interesting although probably not news to others here:
ReplyDeleteThe Living Church has a report, ACC Meeting Starts with Credentials Flap
The Anglican Consultative Council (ACC) meeting in Jamaica began May 2 under protest when the credentials of the Rev. Philip Ashey, the clergy representative designated by the Church of Uganda, were rejected by the Joint Standing Committee (JSC) of the primates and the ACC.
“The Joint Standing Committee has discussed this at length,” wrote the Rev. Canon Kenneth Kearon, secretary general of the ACC in a letter dated April 30 and sent to the Most Rev. Henry Orombi, Archbishop of Uganda. “We understand that the Rev. Philip Ashey’s relationship with the Church of the Province of Uganda is as a result of a cross-provincial intervention, and note that such interventions are contrary to the Windsor Report and other reports accepted by successive meetings of the Instruments of Communion, including Primates’ Meetings you have attended.” Canon Kearon was to offer a statement on the credentials situation at the conclusion of a May 4 press briefing." I also found a long diatribe article about this same subject by Chris Sudgen.
So Kearon knew back then that Uganda was violating the Windsor Prohibitions but now he has to ask polite questions instead?
ReplyDeleteThe folks at Lambeth must give thanks to God daily that the researchers of The Daily Show never focused on them to bring back videos of their past hypocrisies.
Paul (A.), I wonder that there isn't a comedy "news" show "over there" that would take this up. Better coming from their home ground, don't you think?
ReplyDeleteSomeone explain to me how the directives out of Lambeth are not demonstrative of a double standard?
Hello Grandmere Mimi and Paul (A.)--
ReplyDeleteThat is a brilliant and lovely idea and it made me laugh. No one can do comedy like the British.
I am giving up on finding my source about the "gentleman" who could not speak with our PB in the room. I've checked TA and Ruth Gledhill without any luck. Lots of good stuff in the TA archives. One day when I am not looking for it, I will find the source of that information.
Bonnie, you've piqued my curiosity, so if you ever find the source with more details of the story, please let me know.
ReplyDelete