FiF International News
How Far Can This Centre Reach?
Aug 1, 2008

How Far Can This Centre Reach?

Reflections by Fr Warren Tanghe in response to the
Archbishop of Canterbury's Second Presidential Address to the Lambeth Conference

Last autumn I visited a friend in Boston.  Her son's family recently moved there, and each Thursday she delights to look after her grandson.  On the Thursday I was there, we spent time at the playground in a public park near her home.  The playground was fenced, in part so that if a minder's attention wandered, the child being minded would not be able to get too far away.

Such fences as may have once bounded the Anglican "playground" seem to have fallen in disrepair, and the "children" seem to be running off.  And it remains to be seen whether will be possible for the "minder" to catch them and bring them back.

The Communion's chief "minder", Archbp. Rowan Williams, in his address to the Lambeth Conference on July 29th, spoke from the center.  One sees him standing there in the form of the Crucified, arms outstretched, reaching to both sides of the present conflict within the Communion.  But the question is, have the "children" already run too far for those arms to touch and gather them?

Both traditionalists and innovators (to use the Archbishop's tags) seem to agree that Archbp. Williams has fairly represented the positions they wish to affirm.  But in a sense the Archbishop may have failed to look far enough beyond the presenting issues.

Presentations like that of Prof. West yesterday suggest that the two sides are both seeking to live under Scripture, but have come to understand what it says - and in its details, not just in a general way - differently.  The Archbishop's remarks suggest that he holds a similar view; that is perhaps the basis on which he believes the two sides can be drawn together.

That may be true of innovators and traditionalists in the Communion as a whole.  It seems to be what innovators from the American Church are saying about themselves here.  But is that really what is going on?

One American traditionalist, Bp. Peter Beckwith of Springfield, IL, has recently characterized his dealings with The Episcopal Church (TEC) as "inter-faith relations".  This sound-byte conveys the deep sense among American traditionalists that, in the American Church at least, the notion that the innovators share with them the common ground of standing under Scripture is illusory.

While innovators may speak of broad themes which are indeed Scriptural, such as "justice", for instance, they do not seem to traditionalists to take such words to mean what they mean in Scripture and the Tradition.  And indeed TEC innovators are actively involved in initiatives which in traditionalists' eyes seem to amount to reducing "religion" to what all religions hold in common.  In consequence, that which is specifically Christian appears to be treated as simply part of the way in which "religion" has worked itself out in our particular culture; and it likewise seems that anything contrary to "religion", anything, for instance, which might seem to divide or engender conflict, must be dropped.

Traditionalists in North America, too, seem to have gone farther than the Archbishop seems to recognize.  Over the years they have perceived the innovators as saying one thing, but either not acting on it or going back on it.  As the innovators' perceived control of church structures and attacks upon their number have increased, traditionalists have developed alternative structures in conjunction with traditionalist leaders and provinces in the wider Communion.  Not only individuals, but congregations and dioceses have decamped, or seem poised to do so.  Their alienation, not only from TEC, but from a Communion which has proved unable to protect them and its historic faith, is profound.

Traditionalists feel that they have been betrayed.  And this is not true only in North America.  At the beginning of July, the Church of England's General Synod voted to proceed with the consecration of women as bishops in a way which not only denied traditionalists of the structural protections they consider necessary to the integrity of their position, but will strip them of some of the protections they presently have, such as the ministry of the Provincial Episcopal Visitors - protections they were promised would be permanent.

Words may be spoken of the "honored place" of traditionalists in the Communion and its churches: but actions have belied those words, destroying whatever trust was left.  And while, as a member of the press, one has been very much on the fringes of this Conference, one must question whether the process of encounter and listening which has been at its heart could suffice to restore that trust.

English traditionalists are fighting for a structural solution which will give them a place within the C of E.  Over the last thirty years, American traditionalists have worked to find a place for traditionalists within the structures of TEC, only to be rebuffed at every turn.  Now, they seek a place outside those structures, but within the Anglican family.

It would seem a small step for a Communion considering the provision of a "holding bin" for those who have already separated themselves from its North American provinces, to making that "safe place" available to all who may wish to do so.  Such a separate structure, after all, is what traditionalists have been asking for with increasing unanimity, and are now creating for themselves in conjunction with overseas provinces.  Only in such an ecclesial body will they be able to live out their faith and pursue their mission with integrity.  And it seems to this observer that if there is any prospect of reconciliation between traditionalists and the TEC, it lies in giving their own structure to what is now a minority within its structures so that they speak to each other on a level playing field.

That seems, as I say, a short step from what has already been placed before the Communion by the Windsor Continuation Group.  But it seems unlikely that the Communion will take that step.

If there is truth in these perceptions, one must question whether the center which the Archbishop has described and which he occupies can indeed provide common ground for both traditionalists and innovators.  One fears that things have gone too far - that there are too many facts on the ground - for the parties to trust each other to live out the three (misnamed) moratoria outlined by the Windsor Continuation Group, even if they were to agree on them.

This cradle Anglican would like to see the Communion as Archbp. Williams sees it, and have the hope for it which he has.  But in North America in particular, the "children" seem to him to have run much too far apart for even the Archbishop's generous arms to reach and collect them, and bring them back.