Meeting with the Moderator

Bishop Bob Duncan, who currently serves as the moderator of the Network of Anglican Communion Dioceses and Parishes in the US, took time to meet with the clergy of Fort Worth at Camp Crucis back on the Feast of the Visitation. It was a very positive talk, despite the gravity of concerns about the church in our day. I think we all appreciated the opportunity to listen to Bishop Duncan and his interesting in hearing from us. Here are a few of the major points I brought back with me from His Grace's talk and the discussion that followed.

* "Moderation doesn't work anymore." This was the biggest indicator that things in the Anglican scene have changed. We are accustomed to moving toward a compromise on any given problem. That probably won't work in this situation. We have now tossed out the baby and savored the bathwater. Our tradition was shaped as a via media ("middle way") between Roman and Genevan Christianity. That via media produced a Christian synthesis. However, in the current situation, we are pursuing a via media between the Gospel and secularism. That leaves you with a worldly synthesis, not a Christian one. Thus, moderation doesn't work anymore. I have noticed that those on the revisionist side have come more and more vocally to the same conclusion as well, except that for them it is the desire to no longer attempt a compromise with traditional faith and practice.

* "The decisive moment has already passed." There have been several critical moments in the story of the Episcopal Church's decline, and Duncan acknowledged that others might come to a different conclusion about which event was most critical. But because of the nature of the international response (i.e., that "communion has been torn at its deepest level," according to the Windsor Report), he sees the consecration of Vickie Gene Robinson as that decisive moment. The importance of that understanding is that we should not be watching and waiting for some "big thing" to happen at the next general convention or at some other moment. The "big thing" has already happened. The question now is whether it will end up being a turning point in the Anglican journey.

* There is a need more than ever for clergy to be wholesome examples to the flock. A large part of the decline involves a crisis in leadership. The executive model has taken over the episcopate and many rectorates. Clergy held themselves less and less accountable on matters of faith and practice. The change in the marriage canon allowing the possibility for divorce and remarriage for the first time has led to a compromised leadership. Now we even have bishops who have been married three or four times. The meaning of marriage has always been love. Ducan pointed out the problem in Anglican thought in the 1920s that began to replace the purpose of marriage with pleasure rather than procreation. Today's problems are a natural progression of that line of thought. Conservatives also need to voice regret and repentance for our complicity in these problems. The primary charge of the clergy is the care of their flock--it is a sacred responsibility. They are to be wholesome examples to the flock. They are to practice and teach the doctrines and disciplines of the gospel, and to banish all erroneous and harmful teaching. And they are to protect and nurture the flock at all cost.

* The prayer book tradition had taken the role of a universal magisterium in the Anglican Communion, but because of the breakdown in that common prayer tradition, it can no longer fulfill that role. This point was made in the introduction to Aidan Nichols' The Panther and the Hind. Although most provinces developed their own edition of the Book of Common Prayer, they were substantially the same--both in thought and language. The period of liturgical revisionism in the past few decades has left each province with multiple rites and options within their liturgies, often more than one official liturgical book. The liturgies themselves no longer characterize the theology that was standard in the common prayer tradition. Where once each faction and tradition appealed to the same Prayer Book to keep them together, there is no longer that common authority to serve as a unifying factor. The unfortunate side of liturgical revision is that it has institutionalized our fractures and undermined our theology. There is a need for a new common authority. In response to this, I suggested that it may be time to be vocal about calling for the end of schism which has plagued our tradition for 500 years. It may take another 500 years to realize that, but it would give direction to the moment for restructuring and realignment within the Anglican Communion that has been in process for the past century.

Duncan was clear about the call to be faithful in a time of crisis. He encouraged us all to nurture and guard the flock entrusted to us. It is time to reverse a pattern of unfaithfulness and division. So many problems became overwhelming because we thought we could solve them ourselves. It is time to trust in the Lord.

Also, you can read Suzanne Gill's report on the gathering in the Living Church.