Anglicans around the world are sometimes surprisingly English. They exhibit real skill in not saying ‘no’ outright, but are good at burying or smoothing over rejection of an awkward proposal, smothering things in politeness.
There have been two excellent specimens for any sociologists interested.
Last month, a body called the Anglican Consultative Council (ACC) gathered in Belfast – to do as their name implies, consult together as Anglican bishops, clergy and lay people representing Anglican provinces – that is, national churches (mostly).
Several, but not all, Provinces in the conservative Gafcon (Global Anglican Communion) network did not turn up. Nigeria, Rwanda, and Uganda maintained their long-standing boycott.
But a similarly conservative body, the Global South Fellowship of Anglicans, did show up but stayed away from communion services. They came to engage with what were called the Nairobi-Cairo proposals, which had been put forward by another Anglican Communion body, the Inter-Anglican Standing Commission on Unity, Faith and Order, which focuses on theology.
The Nairobi-Cairo proposals would have slightly loosened the ties of the Anglican Communion, reflecting the reality that only some of the member national churches actually remain in full communion. The old description of the Communion as churches “in communion with the See of Canterbury” would be replaced with a reference to a “historic connection with the See of Canterbury”. The Role of the Archbishop of Canterbury would have been supplemented with a “collegial council of regional primates” (national church leaders) to reflect the diversity of the Anglican Communion.
But all of this was dismissed oh so politely. The ACC voted to file away the proposal simply as “resources for the continuing discernment of the Anglican Communion concerning its life together and the development of the Instruments of Communion.”
In particular, they reaffirmed “widespread agreement that communion with the See of Canterbury remains vital to any rearticulation of Anglican identity.” Widespread is an interesting term because the ACC is aware that large parts of the Anglican Communion no longer believe that Canterbury or the CofE can hold the Communion together. For4 example, Nigeria, the largest national church in the Anglican Communion, has removed relationship with Canterbury from its constitution. The final resolution is here.
There was one critical moment in the discussion. The motion that dispatched the Nairobi-Cairo proposals into the long grass included a clause that originally said the ACC “rejoices that all God’s people are ‘called to one hope’ because there is ‘one body, one Spirit…one Lord, one faith, one baptism, one God and Father of all, who is over all and through all and in all’ (Ephesians 4:4-6)”
Joaquin Philpotts, from the Anglican Church of South America, moved an amendment that added “and acknowledges that our present divisions in the Anglican Communion are partly caused by disagreements about the ‘one faith’.”
Thus the ACC put on record the doctrinal differences in the Anglican Communion. The ACC delegates may not have read it, but an essay by Bishop Glenn Davies in the US-based Living Church site before the ACC met, argued that the Nairobi-Cairo proposals to somewhat loosen the structure of the Anglican Communion could not solve the real issue of doctrine. “While the proposal to remove the Archbishop of Canterbury as the ex officio chair of the Primates’ Meeting and the ACC is timely, such a proposal is akin to rearranging the deck chairs on the Titanic, Davies wrote. “As desirable as it may be in the postcolonial era, it does nothing to address the crisis surrounding marriage and human sexuality.”
It turned out that at the ACC meeting, progressives agreed that the Cairo Nairobi proposals attempt to slightly change the structures of the Anglican Communion failed to tackle the real problem – the doctrinal split over same sex blessings and same sex marriage. But they simply supported the status quo.
An inconvenient fact
Africans were marginalised, according to another delegate, Berthier Lainirina, from the Province of the Indian Ocean in a piece published at Anglican.Ink. Lainirina is truly a voice from the margins, as he is the principal of St Patrick’s Theological College in Southern Mozambique, which features in the very bottom of the global wealth charts. (Writer’s note: He has visited my Church, St James Croydon in Inner West, and we support his college.)
He noted that the ACC meeting was heavily Westernised. “My experience at ACC-19 in Belfast, however, left me asking a different question: if cultural diversity is so important, why were African ways of communicating, participating, and making decisions given so little attention?
“This is not a complaint. It is about whether the structures of ACC-19 genuinely reflected the diversity of the Anglican Communion or whether they operated almost entirely through Western cultural assumptions.” This affected the ACC election od a standing committee, because candidates only communicated by written documents. African culture would have worked with personal meetings with the candidates in Lainirina’s thesis.
But he points to a bigger problem. “Perhaps it should not surprise us that no representative from the African churches was elected to the ACC Standing Committee, despite Africa now being home to the majority of the world’s Anglicans.
“That should concern the whole Communion. If our structures consistently favour one cultural way of participating while overlooking others, then our commitment to inclusion becomes difficult to believe.”
Lainirina might have been too polite to make this next point, but the traditional Anglican structures are a huge gerrymander. Progressive provinces are overrepresented on the ACC. The regional structure of elections is weighted against the Africans.
Meanwhile in York
For a moment it looked as if those arguing for same sex relationships were about to win in the English General Synod, meeting in York. A motion crafted to echo early motions campaigning for Women Bishops was put forward by British classical scholar Professor Helen King: “That this Synod affirm that there are no fundamental objections to being in a committed, faithful, intimate same-sex relationship, and that such a relationship can be entirely compatible with Christian discipleship”.
It was amended out of existence – or was it? A gentler assertion of the same-sex cause was substituted. That this Synod:
(a) affirm that all baptised, believing and faithful persons regardless of sexual orientation are full members of the Body of Christ;
(b) delight in the lives and ministries of LGBTQIA+ people in the Church of England;
(c) recognise a legitimate range of theological perspectives, held in good conscience, across the Church of England, on the right ordering of committed, faithful, intimate same-sex relationships, and;
(d) recognise that this includes views that affirm and views that reject the position that there are no fundamental objections to being in such a relationship and that such a relationship can be entirely compatible with Christian discipleship and ministry.
For conservatives, the problem was that this amended motion endorsed a “legitimate range of theological perspectives” that specifically included “views that affirm and views that reject the position that there are no fundamental objections to being in such a [same sex] relationship..” The General Synod voted for this milder amendment.
But then it failed to be passed when the amended motion came up for a vote. How it failed is very interesting.
Bishops | Clergy | Laity | |
| In Favour | 11 | 93 | 101 |
| Against | 14 | 79 | 83 |
| Abstain | 4 | 0 | 0 |
It was the Bishops who sent the King motion, as amended, into the long grass. Quite why the bishops who have supported the adoption of blessings for same sex civil marriage voted to defuse this debate is, unknown.
But this is the last meeting of the C of E General Synod before fresh elections for the next five-year term, known as the “quinquennium.” It may be they don’t want things stirred up before that election – and that the motion would have activated the conservatives.
Image: The C of E General Synod meets in York. Image Source: C of E