ACC Challenge: 'Join Unity Search'
Episcopal News Service. October 1, 1981 [81253]
LONDON -- Anglicans throughout the world may be taking a more active role in the search for Christian unity if a challenge from the Anglican Consultative Council finds a response in the member churches.
Christian unity was a major theme of the ten-day meeting that was held in mid-September at Newcastle-upon-Tyne. It was the fifth full meeting of the Council and brought together about 60 people from the 27 member churches of the Communion in 40 countries, including the U.S. Episcopal Church.
At the conclusion of the meeting, the delegates asked the president, Archbishop Robert Runcie of Canterbury, and the chairman, John Denton of Australia, to send a pastoral letter to all Anglican primates to be sent on to all dioceses and parishes urging them to share as fully as possible in the quest for Christian unity.
In a first concrete step toward that goal, the Council recommended that the recently-disbanded Anglican/Roman Catholic International Commission be replaced by a broader panel to explore the stages to unity. That was agreed to even though the Communion has not yet been able to evaluate the worth of the original talks and may take a lot of time doing so.
Delegates did not have the final report before them but they did discuss how the 27 autonomous churches could go about examining that work and how that response could be coordinated into a unified Anglican voice. It was decided to use the channel of general synods and this route may mean that it will be the1988 Lambeth gathering before a consensus emerges.
In other major actions, growing out of the Council sections, the delegates agreed to establish a research trust and to name Bishop John Howe, who will retire as secretary general of the Council in 1983 as its first fellow with a mandate to examine developments in Anglicanism over the last quarter-century.
Although the Council chose not to address directly the many social issues as it has done in the past, a resolution about southern Africa did express abhorrence for the "continuance of suffering in Angola and oppression in Namibia and South Africa."
In this same area, the Council identified 12 major areas of concern which were commended for discussion including questions of how the Church could allow members to grow spiritually.
More concrete areas of concern were also lifted up, including how the Church could minister in violent situations and how it could become a community in urban settings and how the gospel could be brought to bear on poverty, arms issues, racism, hunger, power usage and economic inequities.
A constitution, submitted by dioceses of the southern cone of South America, won Council approval and that new province will be inaugurated in 1982.
Reactions to the meeting were generally favorable according to Church Times correspondent Douglas Brown who interviewed a number of delegates at the end of the session. One complaint that did surface was on preparation for the meetings and creation of the agenda. Runcie called for greater preparation and wider participation in these areas and was echoed by a number of delegates who found the agenda too rigid and cumbersome.
These housekeeping items did not dispel the enthusiasm for the organization which was voiced by Archbishop Timothy Olufosoye of Nigeria who hailed the Council understanding of third world problems and the growing role of third world churches in Anglican affairs.
The Episcopal Church delegation is composed of Presiding Bishop John M. Allin; the Rev. Robert Wainwright, a member of the Executive Council from the Diocese of Rochester and Dr. Charles R. Lawrence, president of the General Convention House of Deputies. Lawrence was elected to the council standing committee at the meeting.