The Episcopal Diocese of Tennessee



A Statement Regarding the Formation of a new Anglican Church

A Statement Regarding the Formation of a new Anglican Church

December 12, 2008

 

Many of you will have read in the newspapers of the formation of a new “Anglican Church in North America” earlier this month.  The new body is the result of agreements reached between a number of churches and organizations, gathered under the “Common Cause Partnership”, all of which have their origins in either the Episcopal Church or the Anglican Church of Canada.

 

Some have wondered about the status of this church, and about its intention to seek recognition as a province of the Anglican Communion.  A basic principle of catholic Christianity is that it is not self-authenticating; its credentials cannot be established by the mere assertion of them.  Christian faith looks to authorities, as well: the Scriptures, principally, but also Creeds and Councils that articulate them reasonably and traditionally, and all of which communicate the Gospel and act as a standard by which faith is recognized and acknowledged.  Anglicanism itself represents a distinctive witness within the Christian faith, with its own markers and measures.  A particular church (any particular church) always looks beyond itself in some way in the key points of its existence, and others will evaluate it accordingly.

 

However we view this new church in terms of these things, we must recognize that membership in the Anglican Communion is not something claimed unilaterally or seized by force.  Sharp elbows may be useful in any number of contexts, but are hardly edifying or effective in this one.  A request to be admitted as a province must be approved by the Primates’ Meeting and then acted upon by the Anglican Consultative Council, two of the Instruments of Communion that have developed within Anglicanism to help bring coherence to its life.  The constituent bodies of the Anglican Church in North America are not known for a willingness to pay much heed to any of the Instruments of Communion.  It is even doubtful that they are much interested in any authentication that looks to the existing structures of the world-wide Communion.  Their witness is predicated on a self-proclaimed unwillingness to wait for these structures to work.

 

It is doubtful as well whether such authentication would be given by the Instruments of Communion. We might ask ourselves why. The Archbishop of Canterbury has repeately reminded Anglicans of the theological difficulties that are posed by the unwelcomed intervention of one province in the life of another. "Such interventions often imply that nothing within a province, no provision made or pastoral care offered, can be recognizably and adequately Christian; and this is a claim not lightly to be made by any Christian community regarding any other without grave breach of charity" (Lambeth Conference, Third Presidential Address). The unilateral attempt to jury-rig new structures intended to replace one province with another jurisdiction creates even greater problems. "Some in our Communion would be content to see us become a loose federation, perhaps with diverse expression of Anglicanism existing side by side in more or less open competition but with little co-ordination of mission, little sense of obligation to sustain a common set of theological and practical commitments... [It] would encourage some of the least appealing kinds of religious division" (Lambeth Conference 2008, First Presidential Address). The Archbishop of Canterbury has invited us to a different vision and a deeper commitment to each other. Improvisations of the sort he speaks of, with no reference to the Instruments of Communion, threaten to further fracture, rather than to heal, the Anglican Communion. 

 

Members of the Diocese of Tennessee should be confident in our living relationship with Jesus Christ, in the fellowship of the Church.  With all good will, we are members of the world-wide Anglican Communion.  As Episcopalians we will not be supplanted or displaced as members of the Anglican Communion by the actions or assertions of any group or combination of groups in middle Tennessee.  We will continue with our mission and will uphold the order of the Church that serves this mission.  We seek coherence in our common life, connection to each other, and the grace of the Jesus Christ in our daily lives.  I encourage you to continue steadfast in your faith.

 

 - The Rt Rev’d John Bauerschmidt, Bishop of Tennessee

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