Connecticut Convenes Mission Symposium
Episcopal News Service. [84178]
Anne W. Rowthorn, Ph.D.
WEST HARTFORD, Conn. (DPS, Sept. 13) -- What is the mission of Christ's Church? From Sept. 1-8, 20 Anglican church leaders and theologians gathered in the Hartford area to consider this question and other issues about what it means to be a world-wide family of churches.
The Pan-Anglican Symposium on Mission Theology was sponsored by the Standing Commission on World Mission of the Episcopal Church, the Episcopal Diocese of Connecticut and the Scottish Episcopal Church. It was hosted by the diocese as part of its bicentennial celebration of the consecration of Bishop Samuel Seabury.
The participants were 14 presenters who prepared and read papers, 6 responders who commented on the papers, and several observers who were also part of the dialogue.
The presenters were asked to address, out of the context of the particular writer's theology, region, culture and politics, the same basic question, "What is the mission of Christ's Church?" The papers were submitted and then shared among the participants in advance. They set the framework for conversation, and those talks told the range of Anglicanism and its concerns.
There was an English evangelical from a small theological college who would like the dis-establishment of the Church of England considered; there was a British philosopher-theologian who would not. The resurgence of Islam was a matter of concern to Africans, as was the relationship of Christianity to traditional religions -- the latter also an issue in Canada, New Zealand and in Asia. There were those for whom English is a second language: a Brazilian liberation theologian and a Latin American bishop. A Caribbean professor noted that this year is the 150th anniversary of the emancipation of his people from slavery, and an American bishop talked about the emancipation of the wealthy in his own country from the captivity of their riches. Issues of land and homeland were raised by a Maori bishop and problems of no land and homelessness concerned a North American bishop and a South American priest.
There were issues of ministry. A bishop coadjutor shared his thoughts on the meaning of episcopacy at a time when he is preparing to assume the role of diocesan bishop. Many presenters were concerned about pervasive clericalization of the Church evident in several provinces and were worried about a passive laity waiting to be authorized by the clergy to do their ministries in the world. An American theologian thinks the Church in most regions is in need of a re-examination of all forms and orders of ministry.
The transition from what was once understood as British-brand Christianity imported to colonies was a persistent theme, since colonies are now nations and former colonial chaplaincies and missions self-governing, independent and autonomous churches. It is a transition through which African Anglicanism is becoming more African, Asian Anglicanism more Asian, and so on throughout the world as the mission of Christ's Church in nation upon nation becomes more imbedded in local culture.
Other common themes raised by the presenters were issues of poverty and the identity of the Church with the poor and the oppressed in their struggles for justice; issues of power -- the power of class, race and politics; and themes of male sexual domination in all areas in the life of the Church.
One attendee noted that merely hearing the papers, would have made the Symposium a rich gathering. But participants also shared themselves in an authentic meeting of minds and spirits and imaginations. It was, at times, a struggle, as they listened carefully to hear and receive each other and to seek in each other that unity which is promised to us in Christ. But undoubtedly most would agree with host Bishop Arthur Walmsley when he commented during the final hours of the Symposium, "I believe personally that something like this kind of community being brought together is the only way to break down the middle walls of partition between peoples and that what the Church is called to be in the world is an icon of one-ness. I know of no other way except for people to come together in a serious effort to listen to the Spirit which is the characteristic Christian way of listening to each other. We all have been given to each other as God's gift."
The Pan-Anglican Symposium on Mission Theology is one of several international forums on mission which has been held recently. There was the Roland Allen Pacific Basin Conference in Honolulu in June, 1983; the World Mission Conference on the Church in Global Development at Sewanee, Tenn. this past June; and also an important dialogue on mission as part of the meeting of the Anglican Consultative Council in Nigeria in July.
What is the significance of these several meetings on mission? Among other things, they suggest a new way of living in this family we call the Anglican Communion. Referring to this latest forum, the Rev. Canon Samuel Van Culin, was quoted as saying, "This Symposium is a sign of who we are and what we are as a family." The Most Rev. Alistair Haggart agreed, "The Anglican Communion is precisely the Anglican Communion, and affection is absolutely vital to a living communion. For affection there must be an exchange of persons."
The presenters were: the Rt. Rev. David M. Gitari, bishop of Mount Kenya East; the Rev. Clement H. Janda, general secretary of the Sudan Council of Churches; the Rev. John S. Pobee of the University of Ghana; the Rev. Canon Alan Chan, a theologian from the Chinese University of Hong Kong; the Rev. Pritam B. Santram, general secretary of the Church of North India; the Rev. Colin Buchanan, principal of St. John's College in Nottingham; Lady Helen Oppenheimer, a theologian; the Rt. Rev. Dr. Adrian O. Caceras, bishop of Ecuador; the Rev. Dr. Kortright Davis of the Barbados, who now teaches theology in Washington, D.C.; the Rev. Dr. Jaci C. Marashin from Sao Paulo, Brazil; Dr. Marianne H. Micks, a professor at Virginia Theological Seminary; the Rt. Rev. A. Theodore Eastman, bishop coadjutor of the Diocese of Maryland; the Most Rev. Edward W. Scott, Primate of the Anglican Church of Canada; and the Most Rev. Paul A. Reeves, Primate and Archbishop of New Zealand.
Responders included the following: Dr. Timothy Sedgewick of Seabury-Western Theological Seminary; Sister Rose Marie Franklin, a Maryknoll sister of the Intercommunity Center for Justice and Peace in New York City; the Rev. Charles H. Long, director and editor of Forward Movement Publications; the Rev. Canon Samuel Van Culin, secretary general of the Anglican Consultative Council; Carman St. J. Hunter, former executive for World Mission of the Episcopal Church; and the Rev. Frank Sugeno of the Episcopal Theological Seminary of the Southwest.
The following participated as observers: the Rev. John S. Barton, director of World Mission for the Anglican Church of Canada; the Rt. Rev. A. Donald Davies, chairman of both the sponsoring standing commission and the Standing Committee on World Mission of the Executive Council; the Rt. Rev. G. Edward Haynesworth, executive for World Mission of the Episcopal Church; and D. Barry Menuez, executive for education for Mission and Ministry of the Episcopal Church.
Walmsley and Haggart who is Primus of the Episcopal Church in Scotland and vice-chairman of the Anglican Consultative Council, and the Rev. Phillip Turner, of General Theological Seminary in New York, were largely responsible for the Symposium's organization.