The ACNA Disciplinary Canons: A Time Bomb Waiting to Explode

How the Anglican Church in North America Is Creating Obstacles to Its Own Growth - Part 6

By Robin G. Jordan

Among the charges or accusations on which an archbishop or bishop may be presented under the disciplinary canons of the Anglican Church in North America is “violation of any provision of the Constitution of this Church” and “Disobedience, or willful contravention of the Canons of this Church or of the constitution or canons of the Diocese in which he holds office” (Canon IV.2.8-9). On a number of occasions former Archbishop Robert Duncan and the College of Bishops have flagrantly violated the provisions of the constitution of the ACNA and disobeyed or willfully contravened its canons and no one has protested, much less initiated disciplinary proceedings against them.

This is attributable to a number of factors. Three are prominent:

(1) Members of the ACNA have become so accustomed to their Archbishop and bishops flouting the provisions of the constitution and canons with impunity that they think nothing of it.

(2) They have somehow bought into the idea that the ACNA’s episcopal bench is not bound by the denomination’s governing documents.

(3) The disciplinary canons are so written to make it difficult to initiate disciplinary proceedings against the Archbishop and other members of the College of Bishops.

The first of these factors is a serious attitudinal problem and does not bode well for the ACNA. Clergy and laity have become desensitized to episcopal abuse of authority and value constitutionalism and the rule of law too lightly.

The second of these factors points to an extremely distorted view of bishops and episcopacy. This view is traceable to the nineteenth century Catholic Revival and its influence.

In the nineteenth century a number of Church of England and Episcopal bishops who were unreformed Catholic in their beliefs took the position that they were above the law. Their conformity to the canons of their respective churches at the provincial and diocesan levels was purely voluntary on their part.

The same bishops insisted that the authority of the standing committee or bishop’s council, the diocesan convention or synod, and other diocesan organs was derived from them. As the source of these bodies’ authority they could ignore the decisions of such bodies.

They took a similar attitude toward General Convention or Convocation and in the case of the Church of England toward the Privy Council and Parliament. They had a highly-inflated view of their own authority: one bishop went as far as excommunicating the entire Church of England.

In England a series of important legal decisions established that bishops like other clergy were subject to the law. In the United States, however, these bishops were left unchecked and their view of bishops and episcopacy was incorporated into the canons of their dioceses.

Among the reasons that conservative Episcopalians experienced serious theological disputes with their bishops in the Episcopal Church was that a number of the liberal bishops in that province held this view of bishops and episcopacy. They saw disagreement with their theological views as an infringement upon their authority as a bishop.

When outsiders see ACNA bishops openly disregarding the provisions of its governing documents at will and without any ill-consequences, they are left with an unfavorable impression of the denomination. While ACNA members may accept the bishops’ rationalization of their misconduct, outsiders see these rationalizations for what they are—attempts to justify bad behavior.

It is difficult to see how the Anglican Church in North America can take the moral high ground in its disputes with the Episcopal Church when the denomination tolerates this kind of behavior in its bishops. The perceptive outsider notices this inconsistency.

The ACNA has nothing in its canons that resembles a provision in the canons of the Scottish Episcopal Church. `Canon 12 states: “No person shall be ordained, licensed, instituted, or collated…without first promising…to render due obedience to the Code of Canons and to what is lawfully ordered thereunder.”

ACNA bishops at their investiture are not required to sign a legal instrument in which they agree to abide by the constitution and canons of the denomination. Neither is the Archbishop.

The third of these factors draws attention to the over-all poor quality of the disciplinary canons. The Common Cause Governance Task Force in drafting the disciplinary canons did not adequately think through their provisions, omitting necessary safeguards and leaving out important details.

The poor quality of the disciplinary canons is attributable to former Archbishop Robert Duncan’s insistence upon a stream-lined constitution and set of canons. The Common Cause Governance Task Force appeared to have been strongly influenced by Duncan’s views on what should go into these governing documents and what should not.

Duncan’s views were largely an over-reaction to the emphasis upon the authority of the constitution and canons in the Episcopal Church and the use of these governing documents against conservative Episcopalians. His views were shared by other leaders in the Common Cause Partnership.

The disciplinary canons were in need of a major overhaul even before they were adopted and ratified. The ACNA Governance Task Force has to date shown no inclination to thoroughly examine the disciplinary canons and to propose much needed changes.

If they take a close look at the disciplinary canons, clergy and seminarians considering a ministry career in the ACNA will note a number of problem areas. Any or all of these problem areas may prove a major sticking point for them.

Among the charges or accusations listed in Canon IV.2 is “apostasy from the Christian faith” and “heresy, false doctrine, or schism.” The disciplinary canons do not define these terms.

Indeed the disciplinary canons do not define the nature of any of the charges or accusations listed in Canon IV.2. They leave this determination to those making the charges or accusations and to the bishop reviewing the charges or accusations in the case of a presbyter or deacon or to the board of inquiry in case of the Archbishop or another bishop.

Under the provisions of Canon IV.2 clergy who do not agree with their doctrine may be prosecuted for not using the ACNA Catechism and the ACNA Prayer Book. Bishops who do not agree with their doctrine are also liable to prosecution for not enforcing their use.

If the Provincial Council does not adopt a canon authorizing the use of the Catechism and the Prayer Book, the trial will finally draw much needed attention to the constitutionality and canonicity of the College of Bishops’ authorization of their use. One or more rulings of the Provincial Tribunal may be required to resolve the matter.

In the case of charges or accusations made against a presbyter or deacon, the bishop may dismiss the charges or accusations if he considers them to be frivolous. Those making the charges or accusations have no recourse if they disagree with the bishop’s decision.

The disciplinary canons contain no special provisions for the handling of allegations of child sexual abuse, a major defect of the disciplinary canons. Such provisions would mandate the investigation of all allegations of child sexual abuse and the immediate referral of the allegations to the state and county child protection services for investigation.

The disciplinary canons leave to the discretion of the bishop whether the allegations of child sexual abuse should be investigated. They put the bishop in the same position that the Roman Catholic Church’s lax policies on child sexual abuse placed its bishops.

The disciplinary canons’ lack of special provisions for the handling of allegations of child sexual abuse are a major scandal in the making, opening the denomination, its judicatories, and its congregations to costly litigation. No denomination, no judicatory, and no congregation is immune to child sexual abuse.

A major child sexual abuse scandal would cause serious damage to the public image of the ACNA. It would have the same impact on the ACNA as similar scandals have had on the Roman Catholic Church and a number of Anglican provinces and dioceses.

In all of these cases the denomination or the judicatory failed to adequately protect the children in its churches and other institutions. With so many church-related child sexual abuse cases receiving public attention, it is both incomprehensible and inexcusable that the ACNA has done nothing to address this major defect in its disciplinary canons.

Child safety is an important concern to parents. They are not going to attend the churches of a denomination that shows little or no concern for the safety of children nor are they going to send their children to church schools, preschools, and daycare centers of that denomination.

Canon IV.3.2 contains this cryptic statement: “If it is determined by the diocesan authority that a trial should occur, then a presentment shall be prepared and procedures followed according to the norms of ecclesiastical law. “ It does not identify to what diocesan authority it is referring—the bishop, the standing committee, or some other official or body.

The same canon also does not identify to what ecclesiastical law it is referring. These two examples are just two of a number of omissions of necessary details in the provisions of the disciplinary canons.

The disciplinary canons make no provision for the investigation of charges or accusations against clergy and the presentment and trial of clergy during a vacancy in a see.

The disciplinary canons make the presentment of a bishop far more difficult than the presentment of other clergy. At the same time they make fairly easy the process by which a bishop may demand the investigation of rumors, reports, or allegations affecting his personal or official character, which he suspects may be circulating.

Charges or accusations against a bishop and rumors, reports, and allegations circulating about a bishop are investigated by a Board of Inquiry appointed by the Archbishop. The disciplinary canons provide no alternative procedure for the appointment of a Board of Inquiry when the Archbishop is the bishop against whom the charges or accusations have been made or about whom rumors, reports, and allegations are suspected of being circulated.

Under the provisions of the disciplinary canons the Archbishop appoints the legal advisor to the Court for the Trial of a Bishop and the prosecutor for that court. The disciplinary canons provide no alternative procedure for the appointment of the legal advisor and the prosecutor when the Archbishop s the bishop who is appearing before the court. They do not require the Archbishop’s appointees to excuse themselves from the case due to actual or perceived conflict of interest or lack of impartiality.

Under the provisions of the disciplinary canons the Archbishop appoints the members of the Court of Extraordinary Jurisdiction as well as the legal advisor to that court and the prosecutor for the court. This court tries the cases of clergy who are under the oversight of an ACNA bishop but canonically attached to anther Anglican province or diocese or whose diocese lacks a trial court of its own.

The disciplinary canons do not prohibit the Archbishop from appointing legal advisors to these two courts and prosecutors for the same courts on a case by case basis. These appointments may be used to influence how a case proceeds and to determine its outcome.

Under the provisions of Canon IV.8.4 a bishop cannot revoke or reduce the suspension of a presbyter or deacon without “the advice and consent of the Archbishop,” acting “in consultation with the Executive Committee.” The College of Bishops cannot revoke or reduce the suspension of a bishop except with the Archbishop’s consent.

Both are unprecedented in Anglican canon law. It is a principle of longstanding in Anglican ecclesiastical jurisprudence that the sentencing authority, the bishop in the case of presbyters and deacons, and the College of Bishops in the case of bishops, has the right to revoke or reduce a sentence.

The only disciplinary canons in which I have found similar provisions are those of the Anglican Church of Rwanda adopted in 2008. They are the work of a former Roman Catholic AMiA priest and are based upon the Roman Catholic Church’s Code of Canon Law and Roman Catholic ecclesiastical jurisprudence.

The provisions in the ACNA disciplinary canons are based upon the provisions in the Rwandan disciplinary canons. At the time the ACNA disciplinary canons were drafted, the AMiA had representatives on the Common Cause Governance Task Force.

Under the provisions of Canon IV.9.1 the Archbishop may overrule a bishop’s inhibition of a presbyter or deacon. This is also unprecedented in Anglican canon law.

Anglican bishops have historically enjoyed the right to inhibit clergy who are accused or suspected of wrongdoing or who do not heed their godly admonitions. The canons of a province may limit the power of its bishops to inhibit to certain categories of offenses, set time limits on the inhibition, and prescribe other safeguards.

Even in Anglican provinces in which the Archbishop is recognized to be the metropolitan of the province in its constitution (in the case of the Church of England, its canons) and likewise recognized to have metropolitical authority over the other bishops, the ordinary of a diocese is free from the interference of such an ecclesiastical superior in his exercise of his power to inhibit. The Archbishop of the ACNA is not recognized to be the metropolitan of the ACNA in its constitution nor is the Archbishop recognized to have metropolitical authority over the other ACNA bishops in the constitution. Yet the ACNA canons and model diocese governing documents grant powers to the Archbishop that go well beyond those of a typical Anglican metropolitan.

My examination of the problem areas in the disciplinary canons’ provisions is not exhaustive. It does show how these provisions threaten the growth of the Anglican Church in North America.

The disciplinary canons discourage the flow of fresh talent into the ACNA from outside of the denomination, fresh talent that would enabled the denomination to expand its population base and maintain healthy, long-term growth.

The disciplinary canons offer no reassurance to parents that ACNA churches are a safe environment for their children. Rather they suggest that the ACNA does not take the safety of their children with the seriousness that it deserves.

The disciplinary canons raise questions about the competency and motives of those in positions of leadership in the ACNA involved in their drafting, their promotion, and their approval. They play into the unchurched population’s stereotypes of church leaders.

The disciplinary canons are bound to cause dissension in the ACNA at some point and cost the denomination members. I would go as far as saying that ACNA leaders may be sitting on a time bomb.

See also

An ACNA Church in Your Area? Maybe? Maybe Not!
Episcopacy Out of Control in the Anglican Church in North America

Introducing the ACNA's High Church Party

“But Are They Bible Christians?”

How the Anglican Church in North Americ Is Creating Obstaclesto Its Own Growth – Part 1