Anglicans Evaluating 'Two Track' Church

The Anglican Church may try a 'double your pleasure, double your fun' approach to their worldwide communion.

WASHINGTON, D.C. (Catholic Online) - Archbishop of Canterbury Rowan Williams has suggested that the Anglican Communion may need to look at two ways for national churches to relate. His comments came on the heels of actions by The Episcopal Church (TEC) at the recent General Convention, which spurned the moratorium on ordaining homosexual bishops.

Williams issued a document on July 27th entitled, "Communion, Covenant and our Anglican Future," where he cited the actions of TEC, pointing out that the resolutions indicated that the American church did not necessarily want to cut relations with the communion. At the same time, TEC did not offer any initiatives to repair the gap that now exists.

In discussing what he calls a "two-track system," Williams expressed a desire to find ways for orthodox Anglicans to remain related while giving room for an alternative model of relationship for groups that are expressing their doctrine and polity in a different way.

"The ideal is that both 'tracks' should be able to pursue what they believe God is calling them to be as Church, with greater integrity and consistency," according to the Archbishop. "It helps to be clear about these possible futures, however much we think them less than ideal, and to speak about them not in apocalyptic terms of schism and excommunication."

Noted Anglican journalist David Virtue has a different perspsective on William's view of a "two-track church." He notes that the Archbishop has all but ignored the actions of conservative Anglicans at the GAFCON Conference prior to the Lambeth Conference in his evaluations.

Regarding Williams' newest communiqué, Virtue writes, "Nonsense, it is not about 'two styles of being Anglican.' That completely insults hundreds of Episcopal rectors and a number of bishops who have lost dioceses, churches and pensions, as well as thousands of Episcopalians who have poured their life savings into building churches only to walk away from it all at the end of the day in tears over the direction and apostasy of a church whose leader repudiates personal salvation and other Episcopal leaders gleefully uphold and bless abortion without reprimand."

"It is about two theologies, two religions now coexisting uneasily together," he continues. "That was manifest in Alexandria, Egypt, where the Primates got clarity about two understandings of the Christian faith that no amount of comprehensiveness could eliminate."

He also notes, "If Williams is talking about an alternative structure, it is already in place and growing by the day... The Communion is moving on leaving Williams behind scrambling in the dust hoping and praying that the words mene, mene, tekel upharson are not the words being written on the great wooden doors of Lambeth Palace by an unseen hand."

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The Archbishop stated that he hoped the current issues with TEC would not be misunderstood. "All of this is to do with becoming the Church God wants us to be, for the better proclamation of the liberating gospel of Jesus Christ," he said, refusing to look at the recent developments with The Episcopal Church as "an unhappy sent of tensions" but "an opportunity for clarity, renewal and deeper relation with one another" and with God.

He ended the document by stating, "We must hope that, in spite of the difficulties, this may yet be the beginning of a new era of mission and spiritual growth for all who value the Anglican name and heritage."

The Catholic News Agency noted that the Archbishop of Canterbury's statements stands in stark contrast to the observations given by N.T. Wright, the noted biblical scholar and Anglican Bishop of Durham. Bishop Wright stated that the Episcopal Church's recent decision formalized a "schism" and marked a "clear break" with the Anglican Communion. He also criticized those Episcopalians who have "long embraced a theology in which chastity, as universally understood by the wider Christian tradition, has been optional."

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Randy Sly is the Associate Editor of Catholic Online. He is a former Archbishop of the Charismatic Episcopal Church who laid aside that ministry to enter into the full communion of the Catholic Church.

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