The Lead

Yesterday I explained why I think Executive Council is violating the spirit, if not the letter, of our canons in refusing to release the report it received from the Standing Commission on Constitution and Canons regarding the Anglican Covenant. Today, I’d like to argue the matter on practical grounds.

Even if one believes that reports produced by bodies compelled by canon to meet in public can be released on a timetable established by the body to whom that report is given—which, obviously, I don’t—that doesn’t mean suppressing the contents of the report is a good idea.

If we want our decisions regarding the Anglican Covenant to be regarded as broadly credible, we need to reach them in as transparent a fashion as possible. At present it seems that the Church will not have the opportunity to see the report prepared by Constitution and Canons until next spring. If the report states that we cannot adopt the covenant without making constitutional and canonical changes, that leaves advocates for the covenant a fairly compact window in which to draft legislation and organize support. Critics of our church will claim that the process was not fair to proponents of the covenant, and I couldn’t disagree with them.

The process of getting significant legislation through General Convention begins a long time before the Blue Book is published. Constitutional and canonical changes are significant pieces of legislation. If we are being honest with ourselves, I think we have to admit that withholding the Constitution and Canons report until the spring means that we will not be able to pass constitutional and canonical changes in 2012, which means that such changes would get their first reading in 2015, and that the constitutional changes would have to be approved again in 2018—at which point we could sign the covenant.

Withholding the contents of the report in question would have an adverse effect on the legislative prospects of covenant supporters who, at the moment, have no idea what kind of heavy constitutional lifting may lie ahead of them. It also hands critics of our church a club with which to beat us.

My other concern engendered by the decision to withhold the report is that I am aware of a few other reports that came before previous Executive Council but never saw the light of day. I don’t know what was in them, just that they were commissioned, circulated and then disappeared. Some of these may have had to do with personnel matters, in which case I don’t think the wider church needs to see them, but others did not. Additionally, in the course of my work, I’ve been approached by advocates for victims of clergy sexual abuse. Their opinion of the way our church has handled the cases in which they have been involved in is not uniformly high.

There is no independent journalistic entity that covers the Episcopal Church in the fashion that the Church Times covers the Church of England, and thus no one to hold us accountable when we are being unnecessarily secretive, or when people in positions of authority insist on prerogatives that aren’t healthy for the wider church. We have to do that ourselves. And if we can't release this report--which no secular governing body would be able to suppress thanks to Freedom of Information laws--I am not sure we are up to it.

Comments (10)

Thanks for keeping this in the spotlight, Jim. I know you are taking some heat for doing so, but, as a garden-variety pew-sitter, I totally agree with you.

Secrecy is toxic, and I cannot, for the life of me, figure out how it advances the Gospel...

Posted by Paige Baker | June 23, 2011 1:05 PM

Jim, I join with Paige to thank you for continuing the requests for release of the report. Withholding the contents does the reputation of the Episcopal Church actual harm and is unwise in the extreme. What is in the report that must remain hidden at this time?

June Butler

Posted by GrandmèreMimi | June 23, 2011 1:18 PM

Keep the pressure on, Jim!

Posted by Jonathan | June 23, 2011 1:33 PM

I support you on this as well Jim, there is simply no justifiable reason to withhold the report now that Deputies and the press have asked for it.

As an aside, it might be worth a story on the new Title IV that goes full into effect a week from tomorrow. Given your comments above about some dissatisfaction with the way clergy sex abuse charges have been handled everyone would benefit from a look at the new Title and the process it creates.

Posted by Michael Russell | June 23, 2011 1:39 PM

I have given up on the church establishment so keep up the pressure. My own case in which an untrue allegation was made based on a supposed experience 30 years ago resulted in a 3 years suspension completed and a refusal to be relisted "in good standing," My wife's letter to all bishops involved and the Presiding Bishop netted no acknowledgement. I am left in limbo and we are left deeply hurt. So much for "clergy wellness!"

Posted by Canon K F KKing Tssf | June 23, 2011 2:58 PM

If I had to guess it would be that the report says there is no Constitutional or Canonical reason why TEC can't sign on to the Covenant and Council is afraid that will fuel the fires to sign. (As if there were any such fires!)

Posted by Chris Epting | June 23, 2011 2:58 PM

@Chris Epting. Whatever it says three months more of chatter about it won't make much difference one way or the other.

If there are no needful changes to the C&C that has nothing to do with reasons to refuse to sign on.

We should not sign a document that does not reflect our Anglican heritage in the hopes we can amend it from the inside. Nor can we sign it and continue to be on the inclusive path we have set.

If we sign we will immediately begin to hear calls to undo +Gene and +Mary and to scuttle any work on SSBs. So unless we are prepared to quit that, it is silly to sign believing the issue is no longer there.

Posted by Michael Russell | June 23, 2011 3:07 PM

Agreeing with you Jim. As Paige pointed out "secrecy is toxic."

The first thing that popped into my mind was, "Oh what a tangled web we weave..."

And so unecessary.

Posted by Bonnie Spivey | June 23, 2011 3:11 PM

I am particularly distressed about Canon King's experience, because it sounds similar to many others I have heard from Episcopal clergy. Early in my ministry I was able to mentor a former Episcopal priest into the restoration of his priesthood, after some 25 years in secular and then Unitarian ministry. The only way he could be restored was if he signed a promise never to serve in the diocese from which he renounced his ministry - presumably over the refusal of the bishop and his curia to integrate the diocesan camp. It was a bitter pill for him but one which I persuaded him was worth it in order to return to Episcopal ministry. As a young priest at the time I learned much about the secretive and outrageous aspects of our own church's guilt in abusing its power. Now in retirement I have much more to look back upon with similar disgust. Canon King, I do not know your circumstances but I pray for you!

Posted by Bob McCloskey | June 23, 2011 6:56 PM

To paraphrase Eric Law:

Secrecy = Power
Confidentiality = Upholding the dignity of the community and its members

On the other subject of this thread, the new Title IV (coming into effect next month) is intended to ameliorate capricious actions by ecclesiastical authorities by creating greater accountability (read: transparency).

Having written that, I can now see how the two subjects relate!

Posted by Richard E. Helmer | June 23, 2011 10:08 PM

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