Post by angli_fan on Jan 15, 2007 13:04:50 GMT -5
[from Episcopal Chaplain at the Bedside]
by Marshall
I’ve been reading over the past couple of days posts from Jim Naughton at Daily Episcopalian and from Lionel Deimel on his blog. The more I have seen of events discussed in these comments, and the more I've thought, the more I'm convinced of the ultimate sectioning of the Anglican Communion. "They" won't want to stay with "us;" and if we manage to avoid that in Dar es Salaam, it will only to be delaying the inevitable. In one sense, it doesn't matter who "walks apart." Someone will walk, and if even one province does so (and it hardly seems likely that the divisions will involve only one province on either side) the Anglican Communion will not be the same.
How and when will this happen? It may happen at any of a number of junctures. There will be participation in Tanzania or there will not. There will be invitations to Lambeth to all Episcopal bishops or there will not. All of those invited to Lambeth will come or some will not. A Covenant will be acceptable to all, or, more likely, will not. At one of those points - probably at several of those points – statements of “we cannot sit at table with” or “we cannot receive communion with” will be affirmed and/or reaffirmed, and folks will simply stop coming to the meetings. If, as Archbishop Tutu has said, what holds the Communion together is that “we meet,” when folks stop coming to meetings the Communion will change.
We have, I believe, already had a foretaste of that in the meetings that have happened to which folks have been disinvited. The meeting of Global South Primates is of this sort. I was even more convinced when the Province of Brazil was disinvited to the Cairo meeting. That was a point where a gathering of provinces to address like needs was changed to a gathering of provinces to reflect like minds. Of itself this was not a critical break. After all, there is good reason for folks with like needs to meet and share, and we who do not have the same needs have good reason to support such meetings. But the change of a meeting for like needs to a meeting of like minds seems to me a foretaste of what will happen to the Anglican Communion.
episcopalhospitalchaplain.blogspot.com/2007/01/patience-through-pain-of-waiting.html
by Marshall
I’ve been reading over the past couple of days posts from Jim Naughton at Daily Episcopalian and from Lionel Deimel on his blog. The more I have seen of events discussed in these comments, and the more I've thought, the more I'm convinced of the ultimate sectioning of the Anglican Communion. "They" won't want to stay with "us;" and if we manage to avoid that in Dar es Salaam, it will only to be delaying the inevitable. In one sense, it doesn't matter who "walks apart." Someone will walk, and if even one province does so (and it hardly seems likely that the divisions will involve only one province on either side) the Anglican Communion will not be the same.
How and when will this happen? It may happen at any of a number of junctures. There will be participation in Tanzania or there will not. There will be invitations to Lambeth to all Episcopal bishops or there will not. All of those invited to Lambeth will come or some will not. A Covenant will be acceptable to all, or, more likely, will not. At one of those points - probably at several of those points – statements of “we cannot sit at table with” or “we cannot receive communion with” will be affirmed and/or reaffirmed, and folks will simply stop coming to the meetings. If, as Archbishop Tutu has said, what holds the Communion together is that “we meet,” when folks stop coming to meetings the Communion will change.
We have, I believe, already had a foretaste of that in the meetings that have happened to which folks have been disinvited. The meeting of Global South Primates is of this sort. I was even more convinced when the Province of Brazil was disinvited to the Cairo meeting. That was a point where a gathering of provinces to address like needs was changed to a gathering of provinces to reflect like minds. Of itself this was not a critical break. After all, there is good reason for folks with like needs to meet and share, and we who do not have the same needs have good reason to support such meetings. But the change of a meeting for like needs to a meeting of like minds seems to me a foretaste of what will happen to the Anglican Communion.
episcopalhospitalchaplain.blogspot.com/2007/01/patience-through-pain-of-waiting.html