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Windsor Report: Two Observations on Its Ecumenical Content, The
Anglican Theological Review, Fall 2005 by Wright, J Robert
Surely neither church need any longer accuse the other of being seriously flawed because of some deficiency that is already in process of correction. Surely the Roman Catholic Church would claim that the place of Scripture in the ritual of Vatican Council II or in the funeral of Pope John Paul II was every bit as important as the Anglican affirmation "scripture takes first place" (as the Windsor Report reads the Chicago-Lambeth Quadrilateral, para. 53) and that for the Anglican tradition bishops especially are the "teachers of scripture" (para. 58). Surely both churches can agree that Scripture is held as a "universal authority" by both of them, but that a personal living focus of leadership is also desirable in both for the sake of "energising the Church for its mission and sustaining it in its unity." To contrast the supreme authority of Scripture with the supreme pontiff in Rome is to mix two very different factors, when in fact each church is trying to accord some kind of authority to each phenomenon on its own terms. Thus, there could well be some clarification or elucidation in the Windsor Report, lest paragraphs 42 and 70 be read as retreating from the Anglican position affirmed in the ARCIC Final Report and in The Gift of Authority or from the process toward full communion that was conceived by the 1966 Joint Declaration of Pope Paul VI and Archbishop Michael Ramsey It is all the more incongruous to find the Windsor Report arguing for an enhanced dependence upon the see of Canterbury (para. 110), while the Anglican primates are concerned lest this might detract from their own "proper provincial autonomy."
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I also note, finally, the statement in the Windsor Report that Scripture is the "central fact of unity within the Anglican Communion" (para. 63). One wonders whether this too was intended as a contrast to the Roman Catholic Church. Or is there some uniquely superior way in which this is thought to be more true for Anglicans than for other churches? Is this the beginning of a process to declare Scripture, by itself, another "Instrument of Unity"? Or is this assertion made for the sake of those parts of the globe where there is a more exclusive allegiance to scriptural primacy than in England or the USA?
The Orthodox
If it be the case that the Windsor Report drives an unnecessary split between papacy and Scripture in not doing justice to the agreed results of the international Anglican-Roman Catholic dialogue, so also the Report, which itself purports to be about ecclesiology could further benefit from attention to the "communia ecclesiology" that has been fruitfully considered in the international Anglican-Orthodox dialogue. This can be seen especially in the agreed Dublin Statement (1984).3 Collectively, the Orthodox churches at present are composed of various groupings, in which the special place of honor is accorded to the four ancient autocephalous or self-governing patriarchates (Constantinople, Alexandria, Antioch, and Jerusalem), followed by eleven other autocephalous churches, and then another group of churches described as autonomous but not autocephalous. Timothy Ware described all these churches and their organization as a family of self-governing churches, "held together, not by a centralized organization, not by a single prelate wielding absolute power over the whole body, but by the double bond of unity in the faith and communion in the sacraments."4 "Each church," he went on to assert, "while independent, is in full agreement with the rest on all matters of doctrine, and between them all there is full sacramental communion." The Ecumenical Patriarch (of Constantinople) holds a position of special honor but does not have the right to interfere in the internal affairs of other churches.
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