Please Explain

Sorry for this 'please explain', but I figure some of you may be able to explain in a way that helps me and maybe others as well.

A friend sent me an article about Orthodox Anglicans rejecting + Welby as leader of Anglicans in response to a decision to permit the blessing of single-gender unions. The then followed a discussion on Cairo 2024 and the Cairo Covenant, with some serious concerns about the Sola Scriptura stance being taken as Scripture without tradition.

I am sure we have got into this at times here, what I don't understand is the bodies involved. Particularly in this case is the Global Anglican South Fellowship which I think is different from GAFCON though I don't know how.

We have a Gafcon Church in Australia with six parishes in one State (not the one I live in) and a seventh in Western Australia. As yet there does not seem to have been the impact that was experienced in North America. I suspect section 6 of the Constitution of the Anglican Church of Australia:

This Church will remain and be in communion with the Church of England in England and with churches in communion therewith so long as communion is consistent with the Fundamental Declarations contained in this Constitution.
https://anglican.org.au/wp-content/...ution-of-the-Anglican-Church-of-Australia.pdf​

 

Global South has more of a South American/Polynesian center of gravity. GAFCON is more Afrocentric. A number of provinces have dual affiliation but there is not 100% overlap.

An excerpt from the GSFA which may be of interest:
1.5 Scriptura sacra locuta, res decisa est. Sacred Scripture has spoken, the matter is decided. The authority of the Holy Scripture within the Church is a function of the Scripture’s authority over the Church. The Scripture is to be translated, read, preached, taught and obeyed in its plain and canonical sense. The authority of the Scripture is its Spirit-bestowed capacity to quicken the Church to truthful speech and righteous action. We reject therefore the hermeneutical scepticism that commits the Church to a near-infinite deferral of decisions on matters of faith and morals.

A few other worthwhile excerpts on the structural nature of GSFA:
3.1.1 Membership The fundamental unit of membership within the Global South Fellowship of Anglican Churches (GSFA) is the Diocese.
3.1.2 Admission to Membership a) Any duly constituted diocese, province or regional Church from the Anglican Communion, and any otherwise duly constituted diocese, province or regional Church recognized as such by the GSFA, may apply in writing to the Board of the Assembly. b) The application shall include acceptance of the Doctrinal Foundation of the GSFA as expressed in the Fundamental Declarations and Relational Commitments (Sections 1 and 2), as well as a statement that the Fundamental Declarations of the diocese, province or regional Church applying are not inconsistent with the Doctrinal Foundation of the GSFA. c) The Board and the Primates Council shall consider the application and may admit such duly constituted dioceses, provinces or regional Churches to membership.
3.1.3 Full Communion between Members of the Global South Fellowship of Anglican Churches (GSFA) By their acceptance of the Doctrinal Foundation and Relational Commitments of the GSFA (Sections 1 and 2 of this Covenant) members are in full communion with one another.

 

XX. Of the Authority of the Church.
The Church hath power to decree Rites or Ceremonies, and authority in Controversies of Faith: and yet it is not lawful for the Church to ordain any thing that is contrary to God's Word written, neither may it so expound one place of Scripture, that it be repugnant to another. Wherefore, although the Church be a witness and a keeper of Holy Writ, yet, as it ought not to decree any thing against the same, so besides the same ought it not to enforce any thing to be believed for necessity of Salvation.​

Thanks for the response @Shane R. I had seen that and wondered about it. Having spent some time in and around the Diocese of Sydney, I am familiar with the concepts, and whilst seeming they might be thought to be close to Article XX on this, it does also push it further in the path of the Continental Reformation. Sydney has traditionally accorded more reverence to Calvin and Zwingli than to Cranmer and Parker. There was a body in Sydney called The Reformed Evangelical Protestant Association, I don't know if it still exists, which was for some time a force seeking to drive the Church in a particular direction. (I was never a member).

What I don't really understand is why there are two bodies, whose purposes seem aligned and whose membership has significant crossover.

 

Anglican

Anglicanism has always been in a bit of a muddle for those outside the faith community and sometimes the subject of ridicule based on having no absolute and clear line of absolute authority, modest doctrinal requirements of its adherents and a wide range of viewpoints. The old gag was Anglicans are a diverse group of people loosely bound together by a Prayer Book. In the last century, there have been many moves to revise and update The Book of Common Prayer around the world with many national editions and local adaptations, so now the old gag is in tatters.

The origins of Anglicanism are clearly within the Church of England. Colonial expansion took with it the Church of the Colonial Power, in this case, England and various national Churches came to be, often called The Church of England in XYZland. Most of these national Churches retained a connection with the Church of England yet existed in an autocephalous form.

The First Lambeth Conference of 1867 is generally seen as the foundation date of the Anglican Communion, though the term had been used earlier, this certainly saw the body formally organised, with each member church managing their affairs, bound tother by a common history, a common orthopraxis, with the Archbishop of Canterbury as first among equals leading the Church. We spoke of being in communion with Canterbury, almost as the measure of what it was to be Anglican.

Within the first ten years, there were a lot of questions about what it is to be Anglican, and this ultimately was set out in the document which has a couple of forms known as the Chicago-Lambeth Quadrilateral at the 2nd Lambeth Conference.

1. The Holy Scriptures of the Old and New Testaments, as "containing all things necessary to salvation," and as being the rule and ultimate standard of faith.
   
   
2. The Apostles' Creed, is the Baptismal Symbol; and the Nicene Creed, is the sufficient statement of the Christian faith.
   
   
3. The two Sacraments ordained by Christ Himself – Baptism and the Supper of the Lord – ministered with unfailing use of Christ's words of Institution, and of the elements ordained by Him.
   
   
4. The Historic Episcopate, locally adapted in the methods of its administration to the varying needs of the nations and peoples called of God into the Unity of His Church.

One might have thought it was settled, yet seemingly not as the current state of things suggests. We have often wanted to speak of Unity in Diversity, yet some have championed Diversity ahead of Unity.

The declaration has fallen from the general vocabulary of Anglicans, and I suspect many Anglicans in the pew do know of the existence of such a document.

There has been division in the Anglican World for all its history. The Elizabethan Settlement, of which the 39 Articles form part, was an attempt to address diversity, providing some guard rails to keep us all on track.

 

My perception was that GSFA was more cautious about breaking from the Anglican Communion. It seems that leading up to and since the last Lambeth, they have been increasingly less amenable to the established way of [not] doing things and more open to GAFCON's ideas. There are, no doubt, some cultural differences in play between the two groups that make merger challenging.

 

Historically various groups have parted company from the Church of England, The Methodists, The Salvation Army, The Unitarians, and some others have followed a course that separated themselves from the Church and they had no desire to go on wearing the badge.

Like everything in Anglicanism, there are exceptions. In 1844 The Free Church of England was set up in reaction to the rise of the Oxford Movement and its Romeish tendencies. Similarly, in 1873 the Reformed Episcopal Church came to be in North America.

The busyness of the 20th Century saw many social changes take place. Like all national churches, Anglicans can lean a little in an Erastian way, seeing the interests of the State and the Church through a singular lens. On the one hand, a post-enlightenment post-reformation rise of individualism saw an increased dissatisfaction with organised religion and the embrace of a private and personal spirituality. On the other hand, the Church tended to respond with an increase in more accessible activities with a greater accent on temporal service rather than aspirational worship of God.

As such, the Church came to be understood as an organisation like other organisations, and needing reform and change. In the second half of the century the rise of calls for the ministry of women to be recognised on a par with the ministry of men, and to be recognised in the ordination of women to the three sacred orders of ministry, (Bishops, Priests, and Deacons).

These moves were initially opposed both by the Catholic and Evangelical bands of the Church (though perhaps for different reasons). The seventies and eighties saw fracturing with some people moving to the Roman Church, and some moving to breakaway Churches such as the Anglican Catholic Church.

Through a succession of national debates the Anglican Churches in the Communion moved increasingly on this issue, and women are now accepted for these ministries in most Anglican Churches.

This was then followed by an increasing push towards the acceptance of single-gender relationships, and quite possibly brought to a head by the election of Gene Robinson as Bishop of New Hampshire, generally thought to be the first openly gay Bishop of the Anglican Church.

This in part was a reflection of moves in many Western nations that had moved in the first instance toward the decriminalisation of homosexuality, and then increasingly to allow for same-sex marriage. This single issue which is far from resolved has led to a further schism in the Anglican World, and the conservative voices in Africa, Asia and South America are unlikely to budge on these matters in the foreseeable future.

So today we find an enormous mix in the Anglican world.

Firstly we have The Anglican Communion, whose member churches are part of the Anglican Consultative Council, and whose members (currently 47 Provinces) are in communion with the Historic See of Canterbury.

Secondly, we have the Global Anglican Future Conference (GAFCON) whose member Churches (currently 14 Provinces) include some who are in communion with Canterbury and some who are not.

Thirdly we have The Global South Fellowship of Anglican Churches (GSFA) whose member churches (currently 12 Provinces) are mainly also members of GAFCON, they also list two associate members and a further 13 Provinces in association (This list includes the Diocese of Sydney which is technically not a province).

Fourthly we have a movement under the banner of the Anglican Realignment and this seeks to refine The traditional Anglican format allowing Dioceses and Provinces to seek an alternative episcopal jurisdiction. Part of this has seen the rise of The Anglican Church of North America (ACNA) which was more formally constituted in Texas in 2009. A number of provinces have declared that they are in communion with ACNA which of itself is not in Communion with Canterbury.

Worldwide, as far as one can track we have 47 Anglican Provinces in the Communion and around 150 give or take not in Communion, and the relationships between these Churches are mixed, and not being in communion with Canterbury does not mean you will be in communion with all of the others.

Now it must be said that the numeric strength of many of these bodies is not super strong, and sometimes the membership is heavily clerical, which may be understandable and problematical. Understandable, in that it is likely that clergy are more likely to be discontent with failures in church polity and theology, and problematical in that without lay people the risk is that the clergy may become self-serving.

It is also true that numbers of them are very strong numerically, and well funded and organised soundly and well with real and renewed purpose and mission. There has been some suggestion that 85 % of Anglicans are now not in the Communion, however, that is, at this stage, an overcall, as many of the Churchs aligned to other bodies and movements are at the same time still in the Communion.

 

This informative op-ed just came from Stephen Noll, sometime special advisor to the ACNA Archbishop and a participant in drafting some of the GAFCON documents. He sets forth an agenda for full cooperation with GSFA: https://anglican.ink/2024/01/08/are...al-to-the-global-south-fellowship-and-gafcon/

 

CHAPTER I. - FUNDAMENTAL DECLARATIONS ​

1. The Anglican Church of Australia,2 being a part of the One Holy Catholic and Apostolic Church of Christ, holds the Christian Faith as professed by the Church of Christ from primitive times and in particular as set forth in the creeds known as the Nicene Creed and the Apostles' Creed.
   
   
2. This Church receives all the canonical scriptures of the Old and New Testaments as being the ultimate rule and standard of faith given by the inspiration of God and containing all things necessary for salvation.
   
   
3. This Church will ever obey the commands of Christ, teach His doctrine, administer His sacraments of Holy Baptism and Holy Communion, follow and uphold His discipline and preserve the three orders of bishops, priests and deacons in the sacred ministry.

You need to connect the point to at least one of the three Fundamental Declarations to argue that the point has already been reached. I am not entirely sure what body has the authority to determine that the point has been reached. I think you should take care of using apostasy in this context, for by natural reading that may well be to situation of those who have broken away, though I too would restrain myself from that use as well.

There are many who will want to tear down on every side, yet it is Christ who builds and is indeed the chief corner stone.

 

I think you need to make a case, not simply allude.