Anglican Theological Review: Windsor Report: Communion, Structure, and Covenant, The

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Windsor Report: Communion, Structure, and Covenant, The

Wondra, Ellen K

The Windsor Report challenges Anglican ecclesiology on multiple fronts. Autonomy and interdependence; worldwide structures and contextualized mission; episcopacy and the ministry of the baptized; centralized accountability and dispersed authority: these matters and more are brought to the fore by the Windsor Report and by the events and discussions that prompted it.

This issue of the Anglican Theological Review presents essays on these topics by authors taking a wide range of stands and writing from a variety of theological perspectives, mirroring in part the diversity of the Anglican Church of Canada and the Episcopal Church in the U.S.A. Though differing in their assessment of the current situation, the helpfulness of the Windsor Report, and the prospects for the Anglican Communion, all of the authors are demonstrably committed to the unity of their own churches and of the Anglican Communion worldwide.

The challenges set by the Windsor Report are not new. Nor do they seem susceptible to any permanent resolution. Paul Marshall notes "the curious vocation of the churches in Canada and the United States to forge paths for the evolution of the Anglican heritage." From North America have come the beginnings of Anglicanisms synodical structure with its strong lay voice; the missionary focus of episcopacy; the first efforts for formal establishment of full communion among Anglicans; and the first experience of church as separate from state. Such precedents cast a different light on the current Anglican crisis than does the Windsor Report. Losing sight of these contributions, as Marshall suggests the Report does, can cost the Communion dearly in times that creativity is needed-times such as these.

George Surnner finds North American modernity less admirable because of its "surrender of claims to ultimate truth." Relativism reduces truth to cultural specificity, so that it is no longer possible to adduce grounds for distinction and judgment. Sumner urges a return to catholicity grounded in "the specific claims Christians make." The Windsor Report embraces catholicity in its "act of judgment and discernment" that thinks "with the tradition." The Anglican tradition is marked by a minimum of doctrinal definition and formal magisterial structure, and so "an inherently conservative doctrinal model" is necessary. And this the Windsor Report presents, in Sumner's view.

But does the Windsor Report resort too much to structure, and too little to relationships? Ian Douglas argues that by taking an "instrumentalist" approach, the Windsor Report misses the significance of the missiological orientation it embraces early in the document. Unity for the sake of God's mission of reconciliation comes about through relationships that cross lines of theological, sociocultural, and ecclesiological difference to reach for reconciliation and restoration.

Like Douglas, Paul Zahl is critical of the Windsor Report's attempt to contain difference rather than exploring it. By refusing to engage the presenting issue of human sexuality, the Report ducks the substantive issue, setting aside core gospel issues in favor of process. This is nothing other than doublespeak that may be characteristic of "Anglicanism qua Anglicanism." Ultimately, for Zahl, the current crisis calls into question "the Anglican project as a whole." Authentic reconciliation cannot take place unless chief points of difference are brought out into the open. "Facing both ways" prevents this from happening.

Steven Charleston sees the Windsor Report as "an opportunity for genuine reconciliation" only if we are willing to stand on the "soft" but common ground of processes in which members of the church take personal responsibility for one another. From this vantage, the Windsor Report is best read in light of what serves, heals, and welcomes not "us" but "them"-those with whom we disagree and from whom we are alienated, no matter who "they" are. Gospel narratives of servanthood, forgiveness, and discernment shed a different light on the Report which, Charleston notes, has much to teach about the dangers and opportunities of Christians seeking shared understanding and communal life.

Charleston's essay lays the groundwork for considering the contrasting roles of covenant and contract in ecclesial life and thought. Contracts deal with facts, and little more. Covenants, on the other hand, also deal with extenuating circumstances, with particularities, and with matters of equity that go beyond the stated facts of a case. Katherine Grieb examines the tensions between law and equity inherent in covenant, tensions the Windsor Report attempts to maintain in a productive way. The Windsor Report follows Pauls work on unity, rightly locating authority with God, and stressing the value of "the hard work of staying in communion." But resorting to strengthened structures seems to counter this grounding biblical vision. "More structure by itself does not automatically solve the problem of lawlessness," Grieb argues. A covenantal relationship where moral authority is highly valued, and where "speaking the truth in love" is more desirable than polemics, provides fertile ground where bonds of affection can sink deep roots and endure.

In a similar vein, Harold Lewis notes the importance of covenant in framing our lives sacramentally and relationally. Until recently, covenant has held Anglicanism together, despite the many challenges facing it (not the least being the provincialism of many North Americans). However, a shift to law and contract has taken place (and with it the "centralized curialization" of Anglicanism), giving evidence of distrust and unwillingness to tolerate difference and disagreement. But, Lewis reminds us, appealing only to contract or law may well indicate that the battle for workable relationships has already been lost, and with it the capaciousness found in Anglicanism since Hooker.

Ephraim Radner likewise addresses the tensions inherent in covenant relationships, with particular attention to the Windsor Reports proposed Anglican Covenant. The Episcopal Church's commitments to unhindered autonomy and exercise of conscience (similar to those advocated by John Milton in Areopagitica) distorts its "prelatical" heritage, with its emphasis on the freedom-in-community of the early church. The proposed Anglican Covenant holds together autonomy and community and maintains Anglicanism's commitment to episcopal focus within the context of consultation. Finally, Radner says, the covenant points to "the divine character of freedom exercised in mutual subjection for the sake of unity, in the character of 'the mind of Christ.'"

The Windsor Report argues that unity-in-diversity requires structures of authority and accountability that keep the local churches (dioceses) in communion with each other and with whatever global Instruments of Unity may exist. William Carroll argues that the Report s proposals reflect colonial Anglicanism s impulse to regulate and control from the center. In that framework, the notion of subsidiarity is used not to strengthen the work of local communities, but to centralize authority. Then, it is tempting to preserve unity at the cost of justice. True communion grounded in "the 'dangerous memory' of Jesus" does not diminish freedom, but enhances it. What is needed, Carroll maintains, is a "genuinely polycentric and postcolonial Anglicanism" that relies not on its own structures but on "God's mercy, the Spirit's guidance, and the responsible use of human freedom."

The issues addressed by the Windsor Report are not unique to the Anglican Communion; they have been the subject of long and fruitful ecumenical dialogue. J. Robert Wright finds that the Windsor Report largely ignores the international Anglican dialogues with the Roman Catholic Church and the Orthodox churches. And the report is the weaker for it. The Reports paragraphs 42 and 70 set up a false contrast between Anglicanism and Roman Catholicism in matters of the primary authority of Scripture and of the desirability of a universal primacy. Further, the Orthodox tradition, with its autocephalous churches and sufficiently full agreement in doctrine, presents an alternative to centralized authority. Wright considers the Orthodox paradigm of a "quasi-federation" more realistic for North American Anglicans than the Windsor Reports proposals for a more nearly Roman Catholic model.

Kevin Flynn also judges that the Windsor Report takes inadequate notice of the extensive work by ARCIC on koinonia ecclesiology in Church as Communion and The Gift of Authority. ARCIC's agreements make clear that the local churches and the worldwide church are necessarily interrelated and even co-constitutive, and they point to challenges associated with a collegium of bishops. And the Report's discussion of adiaphora ignores the important Roman Catholic contribution of the idea of a "hierarchy of truths." Flynn concludes that the Anglican Communion has much to learn from Anglican-Roman Catholic dialogues at every level: openhearted listening, respectful attitudes, avoidance of controversial language, and a certain detachment from one's own desires and visions for the sake of communion with the other.

General Convention 2003 and the Windsor Report have initiated what Jeffrey Steenson hopes will be "a truly fruitful period of development" for Anglican ecclesiology. The Episcopal Church's constitutional structure, modeled on secular government, tends toward making the church a "servant of the culture." The development of the role of the Archbishop of Canterbury from Lambeth 1988 through the Virginia Report and now the Windsor Report offers an alternative: Anglicans may voluntarily accept a primatial ministry at the worldwide level. Steenson goes further to identify the papacy of Benedict XVI as itself an opportunity for further Anglican reception of worldwide primacy. Perhaps the time is ripe for a deeper consideration of the possibilities offered in John Paul II's Ut unum sint and in ARCIC's The Gift of Authority.

In the final essay, William Gregg brings family systems theory to bear on the current crisis in the Anglican Communion. The work of Bowen, Friedman, and others meshes with koinonia ecclesiology in emphasizing the health of the body and the interdependent relations of all members. The Windsor Report's focus on formal structures and definitions of communion points to "too narrow and controlled an ecclesiology." Yet Gregg is hopeful for the Anglican Communion, in part because the Windsor Report invites the Communion to a process of growth and development.

After these essays were submitted, officially appointed scholars and leaders in the Episcopal Church responded to the Windsor Report's request for an explanation of "how a person living in a same gender union may be considered eligible to lead the flock of Christ" (para. 135). To Set Our Hope on Christ (New York: Office of Communication, Episcopal Church Center, 2005) reiterates the Episcopal Church's commitment to the unity of the Anglican Communion even while it confesses human fallibility and weakness. The response looks at evidence from Scripture, tradition, and reason to address the issue of holiness of life in same-sex relationships. It moves on to consider "the Episcopal Church's historical witness to unity-in-difference" (Part III), noting failures that have cost the church dearly as well as instances where the church has grown through trust in "the faithfulness of those with whom we disagree" (para. 3.22).

The final part examines discernment of "eligibility for ordination," focusing on persons' ability to give "true, faithful, and, if need be, costly witness to the power of the Lord's death and resurrection" (4.3). The response affirms the trust historically placed in local churches (dioceses) to discern the charisms needed for effective episcopal leadership in specific circumstances, while recognizing that every bishop is a bishop for and of the whole church. To Set Our Hope on Christ concludes that "salutary diversity" contributes to bringing the church "into the fullness of God's truth," particularly when that diversity includes the leadership of those who have been previously marginalized. The response underscores the importance of maintaining relationships during the sometimes-difficult processes of discernment and reception. Appended to the document is a lengthy assessment, "The Historical Development of Beliefs and Policies Regarding Sexuality in the Episcopal Church, USA."

The publication of To Set Our Hope on Christ concurrent with presentations made by the Anglican Church of Canada and ECUSA to the Anglican Consultative Council drew instant and sometimes strong response from many quarters. It is too soon to tell what effect these materials will have on the present, changing situation. As this issue of the Anglican Theological Review goes to press, the debate about the future of Anglicanism continues to be lively and widespread, as it no doubt will be at least up through the Lambeth Conference of 2008. It is our hope that this issue of the ATR will contribute more light than heat to this important moment in the life of the Anglican Communion.

ELLEN K. WONDRA*

* Ellen K. Wondra is Professor of Theology and Ethics at Seabury-Western Theological Seminary and Associate Editor of the Anglican Theological Review. She is a long-time member of the Anglican Roman Catholic Consultation in the U.S. (ARCUSA) and currently serves on the Standing Commission on Ecumenical and Inter-religious Relations.