The Future of the Anglican Communion Covenant in Light of GAFCON
Jan 29th, 2009 by David
An article by Rev. Prof. Stephen Noll. Read it all here
The call for an Anglican Communion Covenant resulted directly from the Windsor Report (sec. 113-120), and the Windsor Report itself was a crisis response document. It is therefore not possible or desirable to evaluate any document that emerges from a drafting process without asking the question: “Will it address the crisis facing the Communion?”
That said, the crisis has also raised issues of the identity and governance of the Anglican Communion that have lain dormant for many decades. From time to time, the Lambeth Conference began to address these issues, but more often than not it punted them further down the field. Now many of us feel that the conflicts and contradictions of Anglican identity and governance must be squarely faced. A covenant could be just the sort of document to do this. Or not.
It is my contention in this essay that the official Anglican Covenant process under the direction of Abp. Drexel Gomez will not be able to produce an adequate document to meet the requirements of the hour. In the two years since the formation of the Covenant Drafting Group in September 2006, a new team has taken the field, the Fellowship of Confessing Anglicans. Meeting in Jerusalem in June 2008, the Global Anglican Future Conference (GAFCON) published a statement of identity – “The Jerusalem Declaration” – and formed a Primates’ Council claiming extraordinary authority to separate from a heterodox Province or to recognize an orthodox Province. It seems likely that this Council will soon recognize a North American Province separate from The Episcopal Church and the Anglican Church of Canada.
Despite the advent of the GAFCON movement, representing nearly half the Anglicans in the world, the Lambeth Conference proceeded with business as usual, including the promotion of the existing Covenant process, which now faces the likely outcome of being rejected by both orthodox and revisionist wings of the Communion. It is now time to step back and reexamine the process and principles of the Covenant. It is my conviction that the Anglican Communion is a house divided against itself, and that no covenant can ignore this fact without becoming irrelevant and hypocritical.
In contrast to the high hopes that the Rev. Dr. Radner has for the Covenant process, Dr. Noll points out that the fix was in from the beginning.
The Covenant group is so ideologically committed to saving the Communion at all costs, that it isn’t even prepared to include submissions from major orthodox Provinces and world class orthodox Evangelicals. In the process of saving the institution, the Covenant process wounds its soul.
“All is well”. NOT
What frosts me, is the disaster that was plopped on to our plates, is found in the Windsor Report (paraphrased):
“… unless some new consensus should emerge within the Communion.”
The “leaders” of our sinking ship have been working tirelessly to advance a new consensus within theCommunion.
GAFCON, and FoCA, cannot be ignored.
These fellowships are responses to failing innovation, and manipulation to twist the Communion into something not recognizable.
Once the GS Primates officially recognize these new entities, then it is the beginning of a new ball game. It just may heat up this week.
I do not think that the current leadership can ’spin’ that reality.