Kendall Comment #10: ACI STATEMENT

56. Kendall Harmon wrote:

ACI Statement on the Repudiation of B033

We deeply regret yesterday’s decision by the House of Bishops to repudiate the Anglican Communion’s moratorium on the consecration of bishops living in homosexual relationships. As recently as May of this year, the Anglican Consultative Council officially affirmed the “implementation” in the Communion of the moratoria called for by the Windsor Report, including the moratorium rejected yesterday by the House of Bishops. With the adoption of these moratoria by the Anglican Consultative Council all of the Communion’s Instruments have now recognized their implementation as crucial to our common life in the Anglican Communion.

It is noteworthy that Section 3.1.4 of the final text of the Anglican Communion Covenant, which was contained in the section approved overwhelmingly by the Anglican Consultative Council and no longer subject to revision, gives each of the Communion Instruments the authority to “initiate and commend a process of discernment and a direction for the Communion and its Churches.” Speaking at the close of the Council’s meeting, the Archbishop of Canterbury anticipated yesterday’s action and spoke directly to The Episcopal Church on its place in the Anglican Covenant when he said “Action to negate that resolution [the moratorium] would instantly suggest to many people in the communion that The Episcopal Church would prefer not to go down the route of closer structural bonds and that particular kind of mutual responsibility.”

The Episcopal Church is already out of communion with the majority of the world’s Anglicans. It is our expectation that many dioceses will not follow The Episcopal Church out of the Anglican Communion and the mainstream of apostolic Christianity. Instead, they will take immediate action to assure the Communion and the Archbishop of Canterbury of their continued commitment both to observe the Communion’s moratoria and to preserve and restore their structural bonds to the Communion.

To this end, we will continue to work closely with these dioceses and the Communion processes to finalize and strengthen one section of the Anglican Covenant not fully approved in Jamaica. The continued flouting of Communion Instruments by The Episcopal Church demonstrates the compelling need for Section 4 of the Covenant and indeed for the strengthening of that section. Communion Partner Bishops and Rectors, and their concerned allies, wish to remain in the Communion and abide by its requests.