Communion crisis?

In Western Anglicanism, we seem to be at a particularly critical time in the life of the church.  Three events, which at first glance seem unrelated, but which share a commonality, have brought us to a point where the future of the church really does hang in the balance in England and the US.

1) The new Archbishop of Canterbury.  From a personal point of view, can't say he would have been my choice, since he seems dead set on the elimination of Anglo Catholicism by enforcing women bishops without any provision for 1/3 of the laity of the CoE who disagree (and maybe more, given that the trend for political correctness with CoE has of late been so strong, and traditionalists tend to respect the bishop commands, even one of the multitude of revisionist affirming catholic and "evangelical" bishops appointed in the last 10 years, whether they agree or not).  He has been, at least, something of a friend to the GS, and has stood, presumably, against gay marriage, and has been seen as in the conservative camp among "open evangelicals."  But his first statements upon election appear to be attempts to outdo his predecessor in obfuscation.  While the Global South, and even several Gafcon provinces, initially welcomed his elevation, it remains to be seen if he heeds the warnings evident in several of those welcomes, and indeed demonstrates a willingness to move to a governance model for the Communion that respects the theology of the vast majority of Anglicans worldwide, or continues in the current model, in which a small group of western revisionists control all the leadership positions and all the money and all the communications apparatus.

2) The vote on women bishops in the CoE.  To everyone's shock, while 90% of the bishops and 75% of the clergy are willing to break promises made to traditionalists and drive every Anglo Catholic out of the CoE, a few valiant laity were willing to stand up to them and vote down a measure they found unacceptable.  Now the bishops are labeling their own parishioners pariahs.  There will now be another vote in a few months, since the leadership has decided that women bishops must be fast tracked, rather than follow procedure.  Huge pressure will be brought upon the laity to change their votes, no matter how bad the new proposal is.  The coming few months will determine whether the leadership falls back on the proposals of the Rochester report, which, had it been acceptable to the revisionists, would have allowed for women bishops years ago, and a continuation of provision for traditionalists along the lines of that provided, and promised in perpetuity, in the PEV scheme (for Americans, in British English, the word "scheme" means "plan", not "nefarious plot" as it means in US English).  However, since the revisionist majorities have voted this down, even in terribly watered down form, it seems unlikely to garner support now.  More support appears to fall to the "no provision at all, they can leave if they want to, we will keep all the property" TEC type approach.  We will see what happens.  My guess is that in the end, the Archbishops will approach 6 or 8 lay members seen as "wobbly" in the 34% that voted "no," and will find out the absolute minimum they will accept in order to change their vote, then check with the most ardent "all or nothing" revisionists to make sure that is acceptable, and keep up this back and forth until next summer, and the measure will pass by a slim margin in the Synod laity.  Anglo Catholics and the "Reform" Evangelicals will then drift out of the Church over the next ten years, as their priests and bishops are replaced by women.  And we will probably see a few parishes leave enmasse, either for Rome or whatever new ACNA-like Anglican entity arises in England as a result.

3) The debacle in South Carolina.  Face it, at the top in TEC, there is no law, no justice, no Truth and no light anymore.  Canon law is merely a persecution mechanism.  Property is the theology, the ecclesiology, the scripture, tradition and reason of the current era House of Bishops.  I cannot detail this nearly so well as ACI has, so for more detail, read the Open Letter to the HoB, posted at anglicancommunioninstitute.com .

The commonality in these three events is that politics has become so entrenched in the church.  Very few (although thankfully there are a few) involved in the decisions that brought about these events were asking "what is Christ asking of me" or "what is best for the church" or "what will ensure the highest degree of communion possible within the church today, and with the church through the ages." Political expediency and calculation rule the day.

But in all of this, please keep in mind that while we see these as major crises, the REAL major crises are in Africa and Asia, where Christians are being persecuted not by lawyers and revisionist bishops seeking to deprive them of corporate property and using their diocesan name and seal, but by armed thugs looking to murder them, and burn their homes and churches to the ground.  So, let us be sure, that while +Mark Lawrence, +Justin Welby and the traditionalists of CoE all need our prayers, so too do the millions of unknown, unnamed fellow Christians in villages in Nigeria, Zimbabwe, Iran, and a hundred other places around the world.  Some shed their blood, almost every day, in the name of Christ.  All He has asked of us in the West, is to remain faithful to him, and do our best to stem the tide of revisionism in our churches.

TJ