Via VirtueOnline

A Hint from Hiltz

By Charles Raven
http://www.anglicanspread.org/
November 4, 2010

As is now well known, leading orthodox Primates such as Henry Orombi and Ian Ernest have made it clear that they and other Global South colleagues will not attend the Primates' Meeting called by the Archbishop of Canterbury for January 2011 unless invitations to TEC's Katharine Jefferts Schori and the Anglican Church of Canada's Fred Hiltz are rescinded, but according to the Anglican Journal, the Anglican Church of Canada's newspaper, Hiltz has a solution to the impasse.

It reports that at a recent joint meeting of the Anglican House of Bishops and the Lutheran Conference of Bishops in Montreal 'Archbishop Hiltz said the Archbishop of Canterbury Rowan Williams may try to deal with this problem by arranging prior meetings of smaller groups of like-minded primates'.

Hiltz tends to be overshadowed by his more colourful fellow primate south of the 49th parallel and perhaps for this explains why this potentially very significant comment has been largely overlooked. Whether he is simply thinking out loud or whether he is trailing a thought out strategy it is not possible to tell, but there is no denying that it will have a certain appeal to Lambeth strategists.

Just days before Hiltz' comments, Dr Williams was interviewed by The Hindu during his Indian tour and in answer to a question about the deep divisions in the Anglican Communion he observed 'I don't at all like, or want to encourage, the idea of a multi-tier organization. But that would, in my mind, be preferable to complete chaos and fragmentation.'

So to break down the Primates' Meeting into manageable groups of the 'like-minded' would be entirely in accord with being a multi-tier Communion, another form of the original damage limitation strategy of a 'two track' Communion proposed by Dr Williams after TEC's 2009 General Convention which decisively rejected two of the three Windsor moratoria, namely those relating to public rites of blessing for same sex unions and the consecration to the episcopate of those living in partnered gay relationships.

Although it may be a second best, a segmented Communion is really now the only option left for the Lambeth leadership. Since the Fourth Global South to South Encounter in Singapore last April it has been clear that those leaders have no enthusiasm for the Windsor Anglican Covenant and without their involvement it becomes pointless. Paradoxically, the futility of the Covenant is underlined by the vitriolic opposition being expressed to it in England by the liberal pressure groups 'Inclusive Church ' and 'Modern Church' as the Church of England's General Synod prepares to debate it next month.

Andrew Goddard in his recent article 'Framing the Anglican Covenant: Trick or Treat?' has helpfully exposed the sheer irrationality of liberal fury, expressed in outlandish claims such as it will 'make the Church of England subject to an outside power for the first time since Henry VIII', but the puzzle remains as to why there should be such strong feelings about a programme which the majority of the orthodox in the Anglican Communion are no longer interested in.

A clue lies in the fact that as recently as August last year, the Revd Giles Goddard, a leading figure in 'Inclusive Church', was arguing that even TEC should sign up to the Covenant. He wrote 'The Episcopal Church in Anaheim passed various resolutions which reaffirmed its inclusive polity and brought greater clarity about the way forward TEC may take. In that context, and having passed those resolutions, what is to stop TEC signing the Covenant? We are awaiting a further draft, but unless it contains radical strengthening of any judicial measures, it seems to me that TEC would be able to sign it, as a sign of its mutual commitment and in the context of its present policy of ensuring that it is open to LGBT people both single and in relationships.'

So why the 'U' turn? The 'judicial measures' remained hopelessly weak in the final draft and it is difficult to see any other explanation than that after the South to South Encounter in Singapore it finally became absolutely clear that the Covenant could not be used as a long term process to broker in acceptance, or at least toleration, of same sex unions beyond the already liberal dominated Provinces of the Communion. Accordingly, Presiding Bishop Jefferts Schori last July dismissed the Covenant as 'cheap grace'. So all that is left for revisionists in England is the fear that the Covenant, weak and ambiguous as it is, could become the basis for something stronger at home while doing nothing to inhibit the Global South.

From Dr Williams' point of view the Covenant must be a double disappointment - it has not only failed to desensitise the Global South, but has actually ended up inflaming liberal sentiment in his own backyard. So a multi-tier Communion becomes the fall back position and its attraction for him - and danger to the orthodox - is that while Global South Primates are no longer being encouraged to violate their consciences by sharing fellowship with those with whom they are unable to recognise as faithful leaders, the Archbishop of Canterbury retains his central role as mediator.

Politically the parallel could be understood as being with situations such as the Middle East where direct talks break down and shuttle diplomacy becomes necessary, even if the shuttle is from one wing of a retreat centre to the other. But Communion governance which had descended to this level would make quite manifest the ecclesiological absurdity of multi-tiered communion, however much Dr Williams might dress it up in the language of discernment and dialectic. Communion by its nature requires commonality and if that is grounded in nothing more substantial than a desire to keep an institution going, rather than the recognition of a common confession and common moral discipleship, it is no longer a Christian communion.

But perhaps pragmatism has become so ingrained in the Lambeth leadership that another political parallel is uppermost in which the resolution of difference no longer matters as long as control is maintained - for instance, British rule in the vast Indian subcontinent was only ever possible through collaboration with competing regional elites sustained by a more or less skilful policy of divide and rule. Global South leaders have recognised that the Windsor process has become a game and Archbishop Orombi declared in Capetown last month that the game was over ; Archbishop Hiltz may just have let slip the new game Lambeth is about to attempt.

END