Clarifying the Role of the AAC in the New Province

http://www.standfirminfaith.com/index.php/site/article/18390/

[Stand Firm] 6 Dec 2008--With the formation of Anglican Church in North America (ACNA), which is a coming together of Anglican judicatories under an Archbishop, it leaves two of its sponsoring organizations in a here and there situation. Both the Forward In Faith-North America (FIFNA) and the American Anglican Council (AAC) are advocacy and affinity organizations that overlay actual ecclesial judicatories, and although both are presently headed by bishops, the bishops and the members are all embedded in separate actual church structures.

The AAC since its inception in 1996 has worked for reform and renewal in the church. At first it was limited to reform and renewal in the Episcopal Church once referred to as ECUSA, and now more recently as TEC, but since the theological troubles of the last five or so years the AAC has broadened its scope to the entire Anglican Communion, since these are finally Anglican Communion issues.

Presently a fair number of our AAC Board of Trustees, parish affiliates and general membership of individual lay and clergy are in still in TEC and will most likely remain in TEC for the foreseeable future. The ministry and work of the AAC is built to encompass their needs as well as those who are not a part of TEC. Recently the AAC created a specific "Episcopal Church Desk" to handle the issues that were specific to TEC, provide a direct channel for questions and issue to be raised, and to assist with planning for the AAChaving once again a presence at the Episcopal Church General Convention in Anaheim this summer. Additionally the Vice-President of the AAC, the Rt. Rev. Peter Beckwith, Diocesan Bishop of Springfield, will be the Bishop-liaison having chaplaincy to the "Episcopal Desk."