Anglican/Roman Catholic Report Looks Forward
Episcopal News Service. March 25, 1982 [82075]
NEW YORK (DPS, March 25) -- An official commission of Anglican and Roman Catholic theologians has completed a statement on authority which it hopes will be a "call for the establishing of a new relationship between our churches as a next stage in the journey toward Christian unity."
The Anglican/Roman Catholic International Commission, composed of nine members of each of the two Churches, has been at work in fulfillment of a joint decision by Pope Paul VI and Archbishop Michael Ramsey of Canterbury, reached during their meeting in Rome in March 1966. Co-chairmen of the Commission are Anglican Archbishop Henry McAdoo of Dublin and Roman Catholic Bishop Alan Clark of East Anglia.
The Commission's new paper on authority is published in a 122-page paperback book called The Final Report. In addition to the authority statement, the book contains the texts of previously released agreed documents on Eucharistic Doctrine (1971), Ministry and Ordination (1973), and Authority in the Church I (1976), as well as "elucidations" of the various statements.
The 1976 statement on authority ended with a list of four difficulties about authority that the Commission was not ready to tackle. These questions concern what the New Testament says about Peter as head of the Church, the "divine right" that gave primacy to the bishops of Rome (the popes), the matter of papal infallibility and the question of how the popes exercise jurisdiction (authority) over their fellow bishops.
It is to these questions that the Commission has turned in the second paper on authority, which was actually completed last fall at Windsor.
With regard to the place of Peter in the New Testament, the Commission says that while the Scriptures attribute a special position to Peter among the twelve, there is "no explicit record of a transmission of Peter's leadership; nor is the transmission of apostolic authority in general very clear."
However, the Commission notes that the "unique responsibility" of the bishop of Rome arose early in history and tradition and the Church gradually came to acknowledge the special leadership of that bishop.
The statement says that "it is possible to think that a primacy of the bishop of Rome is not contrary to the New Testament and is part of God's purpose regarding the Church's unity and catholicity, while admitting that the New Testament texts offer no sufficient basis for this."
The Commission concludes "that a universal primacy will be needed in a reunited Church and should appropriately be the primacy of the bishop of Rome..."
The term "divine law" or "divine right" (jus divinium) was used by Vatican Council I "to describe the primacy of the 'successor in the chair of Peter' whom the Council recognized in the bishop of Rome." The term means "that this primacy expresses God's purpose for his Church."
However, the Commission says that this doctrine of a universal primacy does not mean "that a Christian community out of communion with the see of Rome does not belong to the Church of God." The Second Vatican Council confirmed this when it "rejected the position that the Church of God is co-extensive with the Roman Catholic Church."
The Commission concludes that it believes "the primacy of the bishop of Rome can be affirmed as part of God's design for the universal koinonia in terms which are compatible" with the traditions of both the Anglican and Roman Catholic Churches.
The Commission describes jurisdiction "as the authority or power... necessary for the exercise of an office." The commissioners agree that such jurisdiction is found in both churches. In two cautions, they note that jurisdiction should not be equated with arbitrary power and that the universal primate is not the source of authority and jurisdiction of local bishops.
Acknowledging that the issue of infallibility has presented the Commission and the churches with some difficulties, the report points to a number of areas of broad agreement and suggests that "some difficulties will not be wholly resolved until a practical initiative has been taken and our two Churches have lived together more visibly in the one koinonia." The comments in the Report point to the belief that infallibility lies only with God and that its exercise, under the guidance of the Holy Spirit, should be toward the exclusion of error rather than the permanent encapsulation of truth.
The Rt. Rev. Arthur A. Vogel, Bishop of West Missouri and the only Episcopalian on the Commission, has written the preface to the American edition -- which is published by Forward Movement Publications. In that paper, he pleads that the collection of statements and elucidations not be read simply as ecumenical statements but that "it is hoped that the Statements will be agents of self-discovery to those living in each church; the Statements are not attempts to compromise the truth for an external ecumenical goal lying beyond us all."
In later remarks, Vogel commented on the Report which he called "unique in the last four hundred years of Western Church history" and where the panel hopes the work will lead.
"The mystery of the church is the mystery of the communion of God's people with him and with one another in him; thus, the concept of "communion," or "koinonia," is both a context and underlying theme of all the Statements. The Holy Eucharist is held by the Commission to signify and produce communion; ministerial oversight is meant to serve communion; and episcopal primacy in the church is meant to focus communion and serve the unity of the church in a special way.
"The Statement on Authority is somewhat different in kind from the Statements on the Eucharist and on Ministry and Ordination: the Commission contends that the latter two Statements accurately describe the presently lived faith and life of the Anglican Communion and Roman Catholic Church on those topics; the Statement on Authority does not fully describe either church in its present condition, but the Commission believes the Statement describes the norms -- based on the common history of both churches -- which each church espouses.
"The International Commission believes that the Statements show, if they are accepted by the churches, sufficient agreement in Faith to allow the mutual recognition of each other as sister churches in the Catholic communion, essentially one in belief, sacraments, and ministry, although sometimes bringing different theological vocabularies and spiritual heritages for the enrichment of the other. On the basis of the coverage found in the Statements the Commission suggests that a new relationship between the churches is called for a next stage in the journey toward organic unity."