ACC-7 Report Published
Episcopal News Service. [87187]
LONDON (DPS, Sept. 10) -- The report of the Seventh Meeting of the Anglican Consultative Council entitled Many Gifts, One Spirit, is available in the U.S. through Forward Movement Publications. The Council met from April 26 to May 9, 1987 at the Regional English Language Centre in Singapore.
The Report's title is taken from 1 Corinthians 12, which was read in the opening service and used by Archbishop of Canterbury Robert A. K. Runcie in his opening sermon. In that sermon, Runcie said that the church should always be ready to recognise all God's gifts in all God's people. He reminded the Conference that Anglicans did not claim to be more than part of the one Holy Catholic Church and that its vocation would "always be defined in ecumenical terms." The preface to the report records how this ecumenical aspect of Anglicanism had a high profile at ACC-7. It also highlights the need for Anglicans to set the gospel in appropriate patterns for a multi-cultural, multi-faith world.
The report contains transcripts of Runcie's sermon and the introductory addresses given by Runcie as president, and the chairman and secretary general of the Council. It also contains the four section reports and the 42 Resolutions passed by the Council. The themes of the agenda at ACC-7 were those of the Lambeth Conference 1988, namely Mission and Ministry, Dogmatic and Pastoral Affairs, Ecumenical Relations and Christianity and the Social Order. The report will therefore provide a useful resource to those preparing for the Lambeth Conference next year.
Within this broad agenda, the Council considered questions such as AIDS, racism, theological dialogues, inter-faith relations, renewal of the church in mission and the ordination of women to the priesthood and the episcopate. The Report also contains a discussion paper which was prepared at the Council Meeting on the subject of Authority in the Anglican Communion.