Browning Calls Canada To Shared Agenda
Episcopal News Service. October 29, 1987 [87220]
HALIFAX, Nova Scotia (DPS, Oct. 29) -- Efforts to include women into the fullness of ministry are essential to building a strong church through the next century, Most Rev. Edmond L. Browning told the largest gathering of Anglicans in Maritime history, here Oct. 18.
The Presiding Bishop of the Episcopal Church was here along with about 8,000 at Metro Center to celebrate the bicentennial of the Anglican episcopate in Canada. Browning addressed the Canadian House of Bishops and then traveled to England to be a guest speaker at the Church of England's House of Bishops.
"The Anglican Church of Canada and the Episcopal Church in the United States have taken bold steps within our catholic tradition to welcome women into the fullness of ministry, as deacons, priests and eventually bishops," he said.
"I believe with all my heart and all my mind we are building for the future. I believe that these bold actions are our gift to the Anglican Communion and, with all humility, to all Christendom."
And he urged the bishops, when they head for Lambeth Conference, to "share the riches" that ordination of women has brought to the church.
"The bishops of Canada and the United States must travel to Lambeth with the experience of the early Christians who learned that the faith excluded neither Jew nor Gentile and now excludes neither male nor female," he said.
"We must go to Lambeth and bring the joys and pain we have experienced, the happiness of inclusion and the grief of separation."
Browning advised the gathering, which included Canadian government officials, that mutual agendas to address common issues between Canada and the U.S. must be firmly set."
That agenda "must touch on theological, moral and ecclesial matters, and it must deal with every aspect of our life together."
"It must also include common international, political, social and economic issues. We need each other to address matters of acid rain, Native American land rights, immigration and refugee policy."
The agenda would not be complete unless contemporary challenges, bilingualism and multiculturalism are addressed," the Bishop said.