As a Canadian, I take note of the views attributed to Canadian Canon Alyson Barnett-Cowan, director for Unity, Faith and Order at the Anglican Communion.

"She says that it was wrong to say that non-signatories would no longer count as part of the Communion. They would remain members of the Communion, but “signatories will have made a com­mit­ment to live in that communion in a particularly enhanced way, and to a process of consultation and common discernment.”

This is a bureaucratic language game. Translation: There will be first class and second class citizens in the "Communion". But I'm thinking, even second class citizens may be expected to pay taxes in order to continue to oil the machinery of the estate.

Ahhh, Orwell would be pleased by these disciples of his!

War is Peace and Peace his War. Fascists are those who oppose the covenant, but really the fascists are those who support it.

These neo-totalitarians are more than adept at twisting truth to meet their biases.

Bishop Cameron is the same fellow who put a board member of the IRD on the covenant design team. The IRD, as most Cafe readers know, is committed to undermining the mainline Protestant Churches in the United States. Imagine a member of the covenant design team who was a board member of an organization dedicated to undermining the Church of England, or Nigeria.

What a bizarre world the Covenant supporters live in: it is absolutely vital to adopt it, but it really won't make much difference! It doesn't make one a fascist to point out that paradox. Moreover, one ought remember that the symbol of fascism is a bundle of rods surrounding an axe -- the symbol of unity maintained by "force" -- precisely what the Windsor Report (paragraph 118) called for!

I wonder if Canon Alyson Barnett-Cowan is reading the same Covenant that I am. If so, how does she interpret most of Section 4, with its disciplinary language? Of COURSE the Covenant will discipline those who do not agree to (name your poison here). It clearly says it will.

Yet at the same time, especially in Section 3, it says that each province is independent and makes its own decisions.

To approve a document such as this is to tell the world that we do not know what we are doing. It's ridiculous to say one thing in one section, and then override it another. And it's just as ridiculous to say "all pigs are equal" when we know that some pigs will be more equal than others.

Could it be that Cameron is betraying his fear that the General Synod will not pass the Anglican Covenant? It's hard for me to understand his intemperate language otherwise. He's lashing out like he's been wounded.

It's obvious that the opponents of the Anglican Covenant are not small minded xenophobes. To the contrary, they seek relationships with the greater communion. They seek interdependence. They would not ask other provinces to give up their independence or to be dependent. There is no contradiction between interdependence and independence. You don't build a relationship on a prenuptial agreement.

John, I think you are right. The pro-Covenant folks in England have long since telegraphed their anxiety by proposing adoption by simple majority. A very odd move for such an "important" document!

The aspersions are out of order. However, they might be more reasonable if directed toward those who oppose any sort of manifesto rather than those who oppose this particular "Covenant", which is simply poor.

The current document is poor because:

1. It is blind to the importance of the Summary of the Law in Christian ethics.

2. It excises "reason" from "Scripture, reason, and tradition", thereby overturning a 400 year-old pillar in the Anglican way of theology.

3. It fails to preclude invasive episcopal boundary crossings.

4. Its focus is concentration of power.

I think it amusing that the progressives and liberals of Modern Church and the No Anglican Covenant Campaign are now the BNP in the bishop's view. Straw man defenses are generally the stuff of weakness.

FWIW
jimBeyer

I have asked elsewhere, but here will do too.

I had understood that Lambeth had been responsible for Radner's appointment .... do you have other information?

Are you saying Radner was appointed in full knowledge of his membership of the IRD board?

Or did they find out later?

Martin, I am trying to remember why I think it is Bishop Cameron who made the appointments. He defended the appointment to me when I asked him about it at the Lambeth Conference. I don't know what Lambeth knew at the time of the appointments, but when we called attention to the Rev. Radner's membership on the IRD board, nothing happened.