By Robin G. Jordan
For the time being congregations and clergy that accept the
authority of the Bible and the Anglican formularies and joined the Anglican
Church in North America can use whatever Prayer Book they were using at the
time they joined the ACNA provided the bishop of the diocese or network
approves that Prayer Book. This will change once the ACNA’s liturgical
commission has completed its compilation of a Prayer Book for the ACNA and the
College of Bishops has authorized its use.
I am not holding my breath for the College of Bishops to
abide by the ACNA’s constitution and to refer the book to the Provincial
Council for final approval in the form of a canon authorizing its use—a
decision that would require the ratification of the Provincial Assembly. This
might lead to lengthy debate over which the bishops would have no control and
the rejection of the book in part or in entirety or its approval by a very
narrow margin. It might draw attention to the theological divisions in the ACNA
and the behind-the-scenes maneuvering of the different special interest groups
to influence the doctrine and worship of that body.
I am not expecting a major shift in the direction that the
College of Bishops is taking the Anglican Church in North America. The ACNA’s
Fundamental Declarations, its canons, its “theological lens,” its Ordinal, and Texts for Common Prayer provide clear
indications of that direction. It is certainly not back to the Bible and the
Anglican formularies.
Once a Prayer Book is authorized for use in the Anglican
Church in North America, all congregations and clergy will, under the
provisions of the ACNA’s canons, be required to use that Prayer Book. At that
point Anglicans who accept the authority of the Bible and the Anglican
formularies will be forced to come to terms with some cold, hard truths. They
are not going to be able to maintain an enclave for Anglicans like themselves
in the ACNA. They will have to abandon their beliefs; leave the ACNA for a confessional
denomination or church; or secede from the ACNA and form a Reformed Evangelical
Anglican Church in North America. They have already to a large extent
compromised their theological integrity in participating in the ACNA. They have
deceived themselves by thinking that they might be able to affect change in
that body. They have further deluded themselves by believing that the ACNA
might over time become more genuinely comprehensive. This is not going to
happen. They are well on their way to becoming marginalized in that body.
In the Nairobi Communiqué and Commitment the Global
Fellowship of Confessing Anglicans commits itself to “authorising and affirming
faithful Anglicans who have been excluded by their diocese or province.” “The
main thrust of work here,” the communiqué states, “would be devoted to
discerning the need for new provinces, dioceses and churches — and then
authenticating their ministries and orders as Anglican.”
The communiqué does not define what it means by “faithful
Anglicans.” Presumably the communiqué is referring to Anglicans who are firm in
their adherence to the teaching of the Bible and the doctrine of the Anglican
formularies. This understanding would be consistent with the Jerusalem Declaration and Being Faithful: The Shapeof Historic Anglicanism Today. If that is the case, excluding faithful
Anglicans from a province or diocese can be understood to mean not making room
for them and their beliefs and practices in the province or diocese. It also
can be understood to mean relegating faithful Anglicans to an unimportant or
powerless position in a province or diocese.
The Fundamental Declarations and the canons of the Anglican
Church in North America already exclude faithful Anglicans unwilling to
compromise their theological integrity. With the adoption of the ACNA
“theological lens,” the authorization of the ACNA Ordinal, and the approval of Texts for Common Prayer the College of
Bishops is now excluding faithful Anglicans who were members of one of the
founding entities of the ACNA and became a part of the ACNA upon its formation,
or became a part of the ACNA under the various protocols with its sponsor
provinces. In light of the direction the College of Bishops has so far taken
the ACNA, the authorization of a Prayer Book for use in the province in all
likelihood will further exclude these Anglicans.
The Global Fellowship of Confessing Anglicans has to date
taken no action to authorize and affirm the faithful Anglicans the College of
Bishops is excluding. The GFCA has done nothing to give official approval to
them, to recognize their authenticity as Anglicans, or to support them. Indeed
the inaction of the GFCA is emboldening the ACNA bishops to take the ACNA even
farther away from historic Anglicanism in the direction of unreformed
Catholicism. This is another cold, hard truth that Anglicans faithful to the
Bible and the Anglican formularies and presently a part of the ACNA must face.
The Anglican Church in North America in its own formularies—in
its Fundamental Declarations, its canons, its “theological lens,” its Ordinal,
and now Texts for Common Prayer—has
rejected the authority of the Bible and the Anglican formularies. For Anglicans
faithful to the Bible and the Anglican formularies, and with a confessional
understanding of Anglicanism, their future in the Anglican Church in North
America looks quite bleak. The Fundamental Declarations, the canons, the
“theological lens,” the Ordinal, and Texts for Common Prayer are like nails
driven into the lid of their coffin. The ACNA Prayer Book and Catechism will be
the final nails.
See
Once they require we abandon the 1928 BCP, we're out.
ReplyDeleteThe Anglican Church in North America's canons do not make any provision for the use of any other service book beside its 2019 Book of Common Prayer once the book is completed. With its completion authorization to use any other service book, including the 1928 Book of Common Prayer, the Church of Nigeria's 1996 Book of Common Prayer, the Anglican Church of Kenya's 2002, 2003 Our Modern Services, and the Reformed Episcopal Church's 2003 Book of Common Prayer, ceases in the ACNA with no exceptions. Unless the Provincial Council enacts new legislation extending the authorization for use of these books and the Provincial Assembly ratifies the legislation, they are a thing of the past. Folks in the ACNA put too much trust in their leaders at the time of the adoption and ratification of the ACNA governing documents. The same leaders did not encourage close examination of these documents and public discussion of their contents. It was less than three months between the time they were made public and the time they were adopted and ratified--insufficient time for most folks to have given them the careful scrutiny that they deserved. Any feed back the Governance Task Force received was largely ignored. Now folks in the ACNA are faced with the consequences of not insisting upon a more extended public review of their contents.
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