New Power Brokers Discuss Future of Anglicanism

Tuesday, Apr. 27, 2010 Posted: 5:57:54PM HKT

The Most Revd. Gregory James Venables, Primate of the 40,000-strong Iglesia Anglicana del Cono Sur de America (Anglican Church of the Southern Cone of America) and Chairman of the Primate’s Council of the Fellowship of Confessing Anglicans, on the Anglican Covenant

First of all although the Covenant is a wonderful effort it looks as if it’s not going to succeed because it doesn’t really get to grips with what the problem is. There are two versions of Christianity: the original version and the new version which isn’t true Christianity. It does not address and we are not going to resolve it. Really the Covenant seems to be a way of holding together a marriage which is no longer a marriage.

Also even if we sign the Covenant and believe that there is enough there to work through the problems, the Anglican Church does not have a structure to implement how it would be worked out. We haven’t got a leadership, we haven’t got anybody who can say right now that we’ve done this, this is what’s going to happen.

And the worst thing about it is that now it looks as if there is going to be a standing committee which could fulfil that role but the standing committee is representative of the problem rather than the solution so it doesn’t look very hopeful.

The Most Revd. Henri Kahwa Isingoma, Primate of the 500,000-strong Province de L’Eglise Anglicane Du Congo (The Anglican Church of the Province of Congo), on the Anglican Communion Covenant

Many people felt that the Anglican Communion is going to be divided but I don’t think that. There is really only one Anglican Communion. It is the North American Churches that have gone far from the roots of our common faith. The Global South is a movement that was started to resist theological liberalism in the Anglican Communion and to uphold orthodoxy. The liberals can go their own way, but we will remain in the Anglican Communion. If they should decide to repent, we are ready to receive them back.

The Most Revd. Dr Mouneer Hanna Anis, Primate of the 30,000-strong The Episcopal Church in Jerusalem & The Middle East, on the Anglican Covenant

I think the Covenant is a very good initiative. It requires truthfulness. So those who sign the Covenant should be truthful to the Covenant. If people are not truthful who can sign and think they can go ahead and go their own ways the Covenant in this case would be a bit weak and so there is a problem.

For this reason, the Covenant require very strong instruments of unity and also the rest of the Instruments of Unity like the Primates Meeting and the Lambeth Conference and the Archbishop of Canterbury it should be strong enough and take actions with authority to make sure that the Covenant would be really applied.

So the idea of the Covenant is a very good idea and we as a Global South participated in writing the first draft of the Covenant which was taken and the current Covenant is derived from it.

There are some weak areas in the Covenant but we as a Global South again we can strengthen this by writing another amendment to the Covenant, an addition to the Covenant which we promise among each other that we would keep it.

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Edmond Chua
edmond@christianpost.com