One wonders if there are any three English bishops out there with the guts to get together and do what the Bishop and the Bishop Coadjutor of Aberdeen and the Bishop of Ross and Caithness did for the Episcopal Church in consecrating Samuel Seabury (our first bishop) on November 14, 1784: consecrate a woman as a bishop in England.As the English already know, we are a rebellious lot here in the US, but the Church of England is no less so, having broken the yoke to the Church of Rome some hundreds of years ago.
Probably not.
It’s hard for a leopard to change its spots. (Nigel Taber-Hamilton)
At our recent General Synod, the Scottish Episcopal Church, decided by a clear majority not to adopt the Anglican Covenant. In 2011, Synod had discussed the Covenant in Indaba session. It was clear then that a decision to adopt was unlikely.As General Convention of the Episcopal Church begins, and the Anglican Covenant is on the agenda, I thought Bishop David's article was worth posting in its entirety. My hope is that we join the Scottish Episcopal Church, the dioceses in the Church of England, and the House of Bishops in the Anglican Church in the Philippines to vote a firm "no" to adoption of the Anglican Covenant.
We tried hard to keep the issue open. I believe that the Anglican Covenant is an honourable attempt to heal our brokenness. But some time ago, as I set out to address yet another meeting in my diocese, I confided to my blog that I was going to listen to the most committed Anglicans on the planet telling me why they didn’t like the Anglican Covenant. Put simply, they believed that the Covenant is un-Anglican.
The Scottish Episcopal Church holds tenaciously to its commitment to the Anglican Communion. I see three reasons for that.
First, it's our size - to a small church, it matters that we belong to something bigger. Then there is a reason which is proprietorial and slightly presumptuous - we invoke the memory of Samuel Seabury, consecrated in 1784 by the Scottish bishops as the first bishop of the church in the United States of America. We like to believe that we were in at the beginning. We want to be part of the bringing to birth of a new phase of Communion life. Finally and more subtly, our particular attitude to authority - rooted in the collegiality of a College of Bishops - finds an echo in the Anglican Communion' aspiration to dispersed rather than centralised authority.
We approached this decision with great care and with some apprehension. We too are a diverse church. We have congregations who see the Anglican Covenant as important and necessary for their security within our church. This decision has called on our reserves of internal trust. Those congregations needed to know that, whether or not we adopted the Covenant, we intend to take a measured and respectful approach to our diversity. But therein lies the first of the problems. The Covenant addresses what it sees primarily as inter-provincial disagreement. But its effect may actually be to heighten intra-provincial tensions.
Provinces will continue to consider the Covenant and come to their own decisions. The Anglican Communion will continue to seek unity in an astonishing diversity of culture and context across the world. It already has structures and processes through which we build communion life. There are the four Instruments of Communion. There are networks - family, environment and others. There is the Anglican Alliance. There is Continuing Indaba - for which I serve as Chair of the Reference Group. There are Diocesan Companionship Links.
But we need a more comprehensive understanding of the challenges. We also need to recognise that no single measure can address them all.
The genesis of the Anglican Covenant lay in the Windsor Report - which arose from the development of conflict around issues of human sexuality. In my experience, conflict is almost never 'single issue'. It is a complex of issues which sometimes don't quite match in a directly adversarial way. And the passion with which those conflicts are experienced tells us that other issues are in play. It's about more than the 'presenting question'. Let me suggest two other issues which are part of this.
The first is one to which we are tangentially linked through the Seabury story - it is the legacy of history. The sharp word is colonialism. People assert independence of thought and action more strongly - challenge authority more resolutely - when relationships are shaped and conditioned by the legacy of history. In the Anglican Communion, that history affects interactions between the New World and the old world and between the developed and the developing world. The challenge is to build an Anglican Communion which transcends its history - a post-colonial Communion.
At the Primates Meeting in Dublin last year, I learnt that another of the great diversities of Communion life is in our understanding of authority. A bishop in the Church of England does not exercise authority as we do in Scotland - different again in America and in Nigeria and in Hong Kong. That diversity enriches but it has led to misunderstanding and disappointment in one another.
I believe that a new understanding of the problems we face is needed. By challenging the legacy of history, new axes of relationship will be encouraged. We shall be better able to address the deeply adversarial divisions which gather around the human sexuality issues. Communion grows when we share together in mission, grow together as disciples and act with a self-discipline which is the foundation of unity in diversity.
Our Communion is a gift to the world - a global institution which aspires to exist largely without centralised authority and to celebrate its rich diversity. Such a Communion models things which are important for the world community. Such a Communion is attractive in mission because it has learned to transcend conflict. I believe that we now have a historic opportunity to reshape the Anglican Communion so that it may become an instrument of God's mission to the world in the next generation.
THE Scottish Episcopal Church has rejected an agreement backed by the Archbishop of Canterbury that could have seen sanctions imposed on them if they diverged from the Anglican Communion’s rulings on issues such as the ordination of gay bishops and same-sex unions.The Scotsman tells us in a few words whence sprang the odious Anglican Covenant. What can I say about Mr Bain's characterization? "Ouch!"
....
David Bain, a member of Scottish Episcopal Church General Synod, characterised the covenant as a “blancmange with shards of glass in it” that was “completely unexceptional until you come to that awful crunch”
The news warms my heart. In a sense, the Scottish Episcopal Church is our mother church, because she gave us our first bishops.Scotland says firm and clear No to Anglican Covenant. Yes to Communion. No to the Covenant.
The General Synod of the Scottish Episcopal Church today voted against the adoption of the Anglican Covenant. Following a variety of views expressed by members of General Synod, the Motion that Synod agree in principle to adopt the Anglican Covenant was put to vote - 112 votes against; 6 votes in favour; 13 abstentions. The Primus of the Scottish Episcopal Church, The Most Rev David Chillingworth, Bishop of St Andrews, Dunkeld & Dunblane then presented a resolution on the Anglican Communionin support of Motion 27, saying “The Anglican Communion matters deeply to us in the Scottish Episcopal Church. We invoke the history of Samuel Seabury, consecrated in 1784 by the Scottish bishops as the first bishop of the church in the United States of America. We want to be part of the re-founding - the bringing to birth of a new phase of Communion life.”Yes! I love the mention of Bishop Samuel Seabury.
The General Synod of the Scottish Episcopal Church today voted against the adoption of the Anglican Covenant.Primus David Chillingworth's address to Synod is here.
David Chillingworth, Primus of the Scottish Episcopal Church,
INTRODUCTION TO SESSION ON ANGLICAN COVENANT
Explain process
Indaba - Inform General Synod Representatives - no Resolution or decision
My progress around the diocese - impressions
What is the issue
Diversity - colonisation - communion - federation - asperation
Positive about covenant - negative about this covenant or this instrument
Nobody imposing this - English dioceses have been rejecting it
Hugh Magee, the No Anglican Covenant Co-ordinator in Scotland, sent this summary of the progress, or otherwise, of the Covenant in Scotland. It comes with the caveat "subject to verification".At this moment, the view to the North cannot pleasant for the two archbishops in England.
If you are at all familiar with the Scottish Episcopal Church, you will know that we have seven dioceses in this Province: Aberdeen, Argyll, Brechin, Edinburgh, Glasgow, Moray and St. Andrews. At this stage, all but the first two of these diocese have held their Synods and all have rejected the Covenant, and a prevailing view (though perhaps not the only one) is that Aberdeen and Argyll will follow suit.
The only fly in the ointment at this stage is the possibility that the Provincial Synod will be asked to make assent to the Covenant a canonical matter, in which case the normal two-year ratification process would be set in motion (assuming such a canon were initially accepted). At this stage, it seems more credible to assume that the Covenant is dead in the water in Scotland.
Bear in mind that the Scottish Episcopal Church has close historical and liturgical ties with the Episcopal Church in the U.S. and is perhaps therefore predisposed to be supportive of its American counterpart, which is seen as a presumed culprit in the present debate. After all, it could be argued that the Anglican Communion itself was born in Aberdeen in 1784, with the consecration of Samuel Seabury to be the first American bishop.
You have probably been wondering why I haven’t got around to saying anything about the Primates’ Meeting. Well it was interesting – and exhausting – even though it didn’t involve any serious travel for me. Here I am with my Celtic companions, Archbishops Barry and Alan.
First of all, I found the opportunities of building contacts and making friends quite extraordinary. It makes a difference – if one is talking about blasphemy laws in Pakistan – to be sitting beside Bishop Samuel Azariah of the Church of Pakistan. Far off places suddenly become very close. And that’s what Communion is about.
Secondly, I felt keenly the disappointment of not being with those who had decided that they could not be part of the meeting. It was my first Primates’ Meeting. I felt the poorer for not hearing what they had to say and having the chance of discussing with them.
But it was still a good and worthwhile meeting. As the statements make clear, the Meeting spent much time clarifying the role of the Primates’ Meeting as one of the Instruments of Communion. It should not be a place where decisions are made for the Communion or for Provinces. It was clear that most of us come – as I do – from Provinces where decision-making is collegial and consultative within our autonomous provincial structure.
So when our College of Bishops meets next week, my colleagues will not expect me to bring back a series of decisions for implementation. But they will want me to share with them the best account I can give of how other Provinces are dealing with the same problems as we face. That won’t just be an account of how far-off places are doing – because through the Instruments of Communion we expect to respond to the feelings and the difficulties of other Provinces. As they respond to us. That’s what it means to be a Communion. (My emphasis)
