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 Anglican-Roman report Growing Together
Ruth Gledhill has reported most recent Anglican - Roman Catholic report 'Growing Together'.
According to Ruth this sidesteps the problem that official Roman and Anglican beliefs are at odds and focuses instead on steps to grow together at the local church level. This is not unreasonable and it is an approach already followed by Evangelicals of different denominations. Indeed it is already common place for Anglicans and Roman Catholics to be closely involved at the local level.
The difficulty it raises is in the basis of unity. For Evangelicals unity across denominational lines is found in a shared faith - that is in the supreme authority of Scripture and the gospel of justification by grace through faith in Christ alone. These two issues - authority and salvation - are the fundamental issues of the Christian faith (and indeed of any religion).
But Roman Catholics have a very different view of authority and of the salvation, differences become clearer in practice (the place of the Pope, intercession for the dead, notions of priesthood etc). Therefore unity at the local level requires that we say that the issues of authority and salvation are somehow secondary. Or alternatively that the Anglican view of these things, or the Roman view, is no longer acceptable.
This new document has not yet been made available publicly because it is being scrutinised by Rome. If they are satisfied that it fits with Roman dogma they will approve it, otherwise it will go back to the body which produced it (IARCUM).
Therefore, to those who believe the doctrines of the Church of England these reports always look like one-way traffic - our leaders seem willing to abandon the fundamentals of our faith - our understanding of authority and salvation - for the goal of visible unity. Rome, on the other hand, constantly ensures that agreement is compatible with their existing dogma.
From Ruth's blog:
1. Anglicans and Roman Catholics agree that God desires the visible unity of all Christian people and that such unity is itself part of our witness. Our churches share a commitment to work for that unity in truth for which Christ prayed (John 17).
2.... Through this [Arcic] dialogue over 40 years Anglicans and Roman Catholics have grown closer together and have come to see that what they hold in common is far greater than those things in which they differ.
4... Its purpose [of the Mississauga meeting] was to address the imperative for Christian reconciliation and healing in a broken and divided world at the beginning of a new millennium .. and to chart a way forward for the future.
[In the next few pars, the members go on to say that given the difficulties in the Anglican Communion over gays and women's ordination, they cannot formally sign a 'Joint Declaration of Agreement' as originally hoped. This statement is as far as they can go. Nevertheless, it still goes quite a long way.]
17... The Church's living of communion is therefore a vital part of its mission, and mission is harmed when communion is lacking.
18... We are therefore irrevocably committed to the re-establishment of full visible unity.
25... In our search for unity, the goal of the Roman Catholic Church and the Anglican Communion is to come together n a common confession of Apostolic faith and a shared sacramental life with a common ministry of oversight. The sharing of those inter-related elements will serve and strengthen the Church's witness in mission.
71...Anglicans rejected the jurisdiction of the Bishop of Rome as universal primate in the 16th century.Today, however, some Anglicans are beginning to see the potential value of a ministry of universal primacy, which would be exercised by the Bishop of Rome, as a sign and focus of unity within a re-united Church.
99... We, the bishops of Iarccum, invite Anglicans and Roman Catholics everwhere to consider the following suggestions. They are offered as practical examples of the kind of joint action in missionm that we believe our shared faith now invites us to pursue and which would deepen the communion we share.
100...Local churches may consider joint programmes for the formation of families... as well as preparing common catechetical resources for use in baptismal and confirmation preparation and in Sunday schools. We suggest that our local parishes regularly make a public profession of faith together, perhaps by renewing baptismal promises at Pentecost each year. We invite local churches to use the same baptismal certificate, and, where necessary, to review and improve those currently in use.
101... We encourage attendance at each other's Eucharists, respecting the different disciplines of our Churches... While this would take the form of non-communicating attendance in each other's churches, it would nonetheless initiate a renewed awareness of the value of spiritual communion.
102. We also encourage more frequent joint non-eucharistic worship, including celebrations of faith, pilgrimages, processions of witness (eg on Good Friday), and shared public liturgies on significant occasions.
103. We encourage Anglicans and Roman Catholics to pray for the local bishop of the other church as well as for their own bishop... We welcome the growing Anglican custom of including in the prayers of the faithful a prayer for the Pope, and we invite Roman Catholics to pray regularly in public for the Archbishop of Canterbury and the leaders of the Anglican Communion.
111... Episcopal consultation and cooperation in the formulation of protocols for handling the movement of clergy from one Communion to the other is encouraged.
114. We urge Anglicans and Roman Catholics to explore together how the ministry of the Bishop of Rome might be offered and received in order to assist our Communions to grow towards full, ecclesial communion.
David Phillips
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