The recently concluded Lambeth Conference has given me hope.

As a refugee from Rome some 30-plus years ago, I came to learn the sometimes subtle, sometimes not so subtle differences between the Roman and the Anglican Communions. One of the features I missed on leaving Rome was the force of her teaching magisterium as vested in her bishops.

One of the key roles assigned to (and expected of) the bishop, especially to ordinaries, is the bishop's teaching duty. Here, Rome and Canterbury are on the same page. Anglican bishops must swear at their episcopal ordination to uphold and teach the true faith, to do the "straight teaching" implied by the very meaning of the term "orthodox." So far so good.

But the polity of the two communions is markedly different, as to how the bishop's teaching role may be carried out. A sitting Anglican or Episcopal diocesan bishop has a great degree of latitude as to what she or he considers "orthodox teaching," and how or whether the bishop teaches that in her or his diocese, or whether the bishop decides to publish theological teachings outside diocesan boundaries for a wider clientele. An Episcopal or Anglican diocesan bishop's underlying dogmatic/doctrinal assumptions would logically affect such practical matters as how sacraments are administered in that bishop's diocese, including, but not limited to, the sacrament of holy orders.

Our decennial Lambeth Conference has at least two apparent downsides, as contrasted with the approximate Roman equivalent of an "Ecumenical Council," attended by Roman Catholic bishops from all over the world, i.e. Communion-wide, who attend, participate and comprise the Roman church's teaching magisterium.

The first apparent downside is that Anglican bishops meet Communion-wide only every 10 years, come hell or high water, so to speak. While we can at least count on a regular reality check to monitor our consensus fidelium every 10th year, nonetheless much hell and not insignificant high water levels can accumulate in far less than 10 years!

Yet Rome, for all her superb organization, has no such mechanism in place for an every-10th-year ecumenical council. Instead, it has another monitoring mechanism. Every ordinary or diocesan bishop is required to make a quinquennial trek to Rome and make his ad limina visit to the pope, reporting in detail on his diocese. He checks in with the boss, so to speak, rather than checking up with his brother bishops assembled as we do in Lambeth. While five years sounds better than 10, I would rather check in with my colleagues than with the Archbishop of Canterbury, who wouldn't be my boss anyway. Anglican bishops, I have heard tell, don't check in with the vicar of Christ, but with Christ himself- although sometimes I have my doubts.

But why was I so delighted when I read news releases from Lambeth on the internet? Because we have just had our 10-year reality check. That's what our Anglican teaching magisterium is all about. The church, the body of Christ on earth, is a growing organism. Our part of that body, the worldwide Anglican Communion, has grown differently during the various 10-year periods between Lambeth Conferences. How it has grown in these last 10 years is attested to by unprecedented growth through vigorous evangelization in our African and other Third World dioceses. Why is pretty obvious to me. A suffering church, a persecuted church, is a church that hungers and thirsts for the righteousness that only Jesus Christ, who is the way, the truth and the life, can deliver. A smug, self-satisfied and well-fed church, a church of "the comfortable pew," isn't in quite such dire need or desperate straits.

Why am I so ecstatic in the wake of Lambeth '98? Actually not so much in the results of the voting per se, not so much fixated on whether "conservative" or "liberal" standpoint prevailed. I would have greeted either result with a similar joy. My joy consists in hearing after 30 years as an Anglican, the faint echo of a phrase I learned in theology. Granted, the phrase comes out somewhat modified, yet the bottom line is the same. That phrase went like this: "Roma locuta est; causa finita est" (Rome has spoken; case closed).

For Anglican Lambeth-watchers who noted the stunning vote dealing with matters of human sexuality, and the sacraments of holy matrimony and holy orders, I should like to rephrase the old expression as follows: "Lambeth locuta est; causa (non) finita est" (Lambeth has spoken; but the matter is still open and under study). An additional mechanism has now been built in for more frequent mutual monitoring among the primates of our 37 autonomous Anglican bodies all over the world, of which the Episcopal Church is but one. Presiding Bishop and Primate Frank T. Griswold will be in touch with his counterparts all over the world at least every two years. The assembled primates (College of Cardinals?) will seek to hear God together and be an interim magisterium of Lambeth. The case, thank God, isn't quite closed. We have an initial, resounding read on the mind of our church on these matters frozen in time like a snapshot, if you will. But now comes the difficult yet exciting task for us all, as we, the laos, the rest of the holy people of God, join our bishops in a very Anglican enterprise: to "read, mark, learn and inwardly digest" what the Holy Spirit has placed before us.

The Anglican Communion is beautiful to me. I love it more with each passing year. It does have a teaching magisterium, thank God. We are not all relativists driven by every wind of doctrine. We do have an ultimate college of bishops. And we also have a heart. We don't slam doors ("case closed!") in anyone's face. Definitive teaching is not necessarily closed-minded teaching. The bishops have spoken. Lambeth has spoken. Now the real work begins of processing it all, of reading, marking, learning and inwardly digesting - and I am excited about doing that with my episcopal sisters and brothers in Christ. o

The Rev. John E. Crean, Jr., is rector of St. Paul's Church, Grand Rapids, Mich.