The Lead

The Presiding Bishop and the President of the House of Deputies, and the Chair of the Covenant response Task force have co-signed a letter to the Episcopal Church calling on congregations to study the Anglican Covenant in advance of General Convention in 2012. If General Convention is going to reflect the mind of the Church when it decides on the Episcopal Church's participation in the Covenant, it can only happen if there is the broadest possible participation in the process.

From the letter posted online:

The final draft of the proposed Anglican Covenant was released in mid-December, 2009 for formal consideration for adoption by constituent Provinces of the Anglican Communion through appropriate processes.
The 76th General Convention further committed the Episcopal Church’s engagement with the covenant process (Resolution 2009-D020). As the highest legislative authority of The Episcopal Church, the General Convention is the body that will ultimately decide The Episcopal Church’s position with respect to participation in an Anglican Communion Covenant.

We strongly urge every congregation in this Church to engage in discussion of the proposed Covenant at some time in the coming two years. A discussion group could be organized during Advent (2010 or 2011) or Lent (2011 or 2012), or at another time before General Convention. In order for General Convention to reflect the mind of the whole Church, the bishops and deputies who participate in General Convention need to know the thoughtful and faithful reactions of the many and varied faith communities represented in this Church.

Comments (5)

Without a study guide and active promotion by dioceses, the PB and HoD President might as well save their breath to cool their soup. Most parishes could not care less such things.

Posted by Paul Woodrum | September 4, 2010 10:55 AM

There is a study guide available as a pdf if you follow the link.

Posted by Jim Naughton | September 4, 2010 11:08 AM

I thought we already did this and said "meh"

Posted by Ann Fontaine | September 4, 2010 11:58 AM

@Ann: I expect that even after study, "meh" will still be the answer. However, in order to ensure that the ultimate answer of the Episcopal Church is apprehended by the rest of the Communion, we will have to surround "meh" with an awful lot of verbiage that reduces to "meh", and study groups are the ideal places to produce that kind of thing.

Even if the Episcopal Church were to approve the Covenant, is there any certainty that the rest of the Communion would accept TEC's ratification?

My expectation is that most of the larger "first world" provinces will either not accept the Covenant or demand major changes to the "punitive" section. This includes the C of E. With the Archbishops having been defeated in General Synod over the woman bishops modification they wanted, GS now knows that the sky will not fall in if they defy the Archbishops. So the Covenant (which many have great reservations over) may be the second rebellion point.

Posted by Chris Hansen | September 4, 2010 12:29 PM

We'll be discussing it at All Saints in Pasadena in some programtic way. I think it's a great launching pad to get folks to take a look at what it actually means to say we're "Anglican" and what's at stake here if we let the schismatic tail wag Anglican Communion dog!

Posted by revsusan | September 4, 2010 1:42 PM

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