Anglican bishops’ consultation helps keep Communion together, says Canadian Primate

Seven years after the first Consultation of Anglican Bishops in Dialogue was held at the Anglican Communion offices in London, England, in 2010, a record 24 bishops – including four primates – came together in Accra, Ghana, from 25 – 29 May to learn about the unique contexts and challenges different parts of the African, North American and English churches are facing. In a testimony released following the consultation, titled “Unity in Diversity,” the bishops looked back on what has been accomplished since 2010, and said that in order to build a stronger sense of unity, the Communion needs to turn to the past.
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Posted: July 4, 2016 • Permanent link: ecu.net/?p=9311
Categories: ACNS • In this article: Anglican Communion, Consultation of Anglican Bishops in Dialogue Transmis : 4 juillet 2016 • Lien permanente : ecu.net/?p=9311
Catégorie : ACNS • Dans cet article : Anglican Communion, Consultation of Anglican Bishops in Dialogue

Orthodox-Anglican dialogue explores “complex ethical concerns”

Members of the official Anglican-Orthodox dialogue have met this week to discuss a range of bioethical and moral issues. The discussion was “a practical follow-up” to their agreed statement In the Image and Likeness of God: A Hope-Filled Anthropology, which was published last year after their talks in Buffalo, New York. At this week’s talks in Armagh, Northern Ireland, the International Commission for Anglican–Orthodox Theological Dialogue (ICAOTD) began to explore issues including contraception, abortion, reproductive technology, stem cell research, organ transplants, artificial life support, assisted dying and euthanasia.

The Commission studied four papers unpacking the themes: “Christian Ethics and the Beginning and End of Life: Themes in Anglican Reflection”, by the former Archbishop of Canterbury Rowan Williams; “Bioethical Themes: Transplants and Euthanasia”, by Metropolitan Chrysostomos of Kition; “Survey of Anglican Church Documents on Beginning and End of Life Issues”, by the Revd Canon Philip Hobson; and “Medical Bioethics: An Orthodox Christian Perspective for Orthodox Christians”, by Protodeacon Basil Andruchow.

“What is new for Anglican-Orthodox dialogue is the discussion of morals, and the practical outworking of the common vision of the human person finalised last year in the agreed statement,” the Anglican Communion’s director for unity, faith and order, the Revd Canon John Gibaut, said. “This year’s meeting signals a new direction, which is both theological and deeply pastoral.
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Posted: September 30, 2016 • Permanent link: ecu.net/?p=9557
Categories: ACNS • In this article: Anglican Consultative Council, dialogue, ethics, moral discernment, Orthodox Transmis : 30 septembre 2016 • Lien permanente : ecu.net/?p=9557
Catégorie : ACNS • Dans cet article : Anglican Consultative Council, dialogue, ethics, moral discernment, Orthodox

Archbishop Welby welcomes Patriarch Kirill to Lambeth Palace

The leader of the Russian Orthodox Church, Patriarch Kirill of Moscow and All Russia, paid a private visit to the Archbishop of Canterbury Justin Welby at Lambeth Palace yesterday (Tuesday). Patriarch Kirill was in the UK to mark the 300th anniversary of the Diocese of Sourozh – the Russian Orthodox Church in Britain and Ireland. Earlier, Archbishop Welby and the Bishop of London, Richard Chartres, were in attendance when Patriarch Kirill visited The Queen at Buckingham Palace.

Bishop Chartres takes the lead on the C of E’s relationships with the Orthodox Churches, and was also present at Lambeth Palace for the meeting with Patriarch Kirill and his delegation.

Archbishop Welby and Patriarch Kirill spoke about “their shared compassion for Christian, and other, minorities in many parts of the world, especially in the Middle East, where they have been systematically targeted and persecuted and their communities decimated,” a Lambeth Palace spokesperson said.
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Posted: October 19, 2016 • Permanent link: ecu.net/?p=9535
Categories: ACNS • In this article: Justin Welby, Kirill, Lambeth Palace, Moscow Patriarchate Transmis : 19 octobre 2016 • Lien permanente : ecu.net/?p=9535
Catégorie : ACNS • Dans cet article : Justin Welby, Kirill, Lambeth Palace, Moscow Patriarchate

Bishops say Church has failed children, women, and indigenous peoples

A group of Anglican and Roman Catholic bishops have acknowledged both churches’ failure to protect children, women and indigenous peoples. In a statement issued by the International Anglican-Roman Catholic Commission for Unity and Mission (IARCCUM) today following the group’s historic meeting in Canterbury and Rome last month, they call on the Church to repent and seek justice for victims. They say that, “at the foot of the Cross we, as bishops, have reflected on an ‘ecumenism of humiliation’. We lament our failures and share the brokenness of our church communities.”

They continue: “We failed to protect vulnerable people: children from sexual abuse, women from violence, and indigenous peoples from exploitation.

“In this communion of shame, we confess that our own feeble witness to God’s call to life in community has contributed to the isolation of individuals and families, and even to that secularisation which removes God from the public space. We, as bishops, are called to lead the church in repentance and to seek justice for the abused.”

The bishops have called their statement “an appeal from the IARCCUM bishops to the bishops and the people of the Anglican and Catholic communities.”
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Posted: November 25, 2016 • Permanent link: ecu.net/?p=10388
Categories: ACNS • In this article: Anglican, bishops, Catholic, IARCCUM, pilgrimage Transmis : 25 novembre 2016 • Lien permanente : ecu.net/?p=10388
Catégorie : ACNS • Dans cet article : Anglican, bishops, Catholic, IARCCUM, pilgrimage

Reformation Anniversary: Statement from the Archbishops of Canterbury and York

“This year, churches around the world will be marking the great significance of the 500th anniversary of the beginning of the Reformation in Europe, dated from Martin Luther’s 95 Theses protesting against the practice of indulgences, on 31 October 1517 at Wittenberg. The Church of England will be participating in various ways, including sharing in events with Protestant church partners from Continental Europe.

The Reformation was a process of both renewal and division amongst Christians in Europe. In this Reformation Anniversary year, many Christians will want to give thanks for the great blessings they have received to which the Reformation directly contributed. Amongst much else these would include clear proclamation of the gospel of grace, the availability of the Bible to all in their own language and the recognition of the calling of lay people to serve God in the world and in the church.

Many will also remember the lasting damage done five centuries ago to the unity of the Church, in defiance of the clear command of Jesus Christ to unity in love. Those turbulent years saw Christian people pitted against each other, such that many suffered persecution and even death at the hands of others claiming to know the same Lord. A legacy of mistrust and competition would then accompany the astonishing global spread of Christianity in the centuries that followed. All this leaves us much to ponder.
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Posted: January 17, 2017 • Permanent link: ecu.net/?p=9615
Categories: ACNS • In this article: Anglican, Christian unity, Church of England, John Sentamu, Justin Welby, Reformation Transmis : 17 janvier 2017 • Lien permanente : ecu.net/?p=9615
Catégorie : ACNS • Dans cet article : Anglican, Christian unity, Church of England, John Sentamu, Justin Welby, Reformation

The sweet song of Christian unity

Our Lord and his apostles used many figures of speech to describe the Church. From our beloved St. Paul: “We are God’s fellow labourers; you are God’s field, God’s building” (1 Cor. 3:9). “You are the body of Christ and individually members of it” (1 Cor. 12:27). Or Jesus’ words: “Fear not, little flock” (Luke 12:32a). “I am the vine; you are the branches” (John 15:5a).

Many of us have admired a well-ordered cathedral, such as St. Paul’s, London, or All Saints, Nairobi. We recognise — almost unconsciously — the beauty of the human person, of a pastoral scene or vineyard. No wonder they make fitting images for the Church, the heavenly Jerusalem, a city “at unity with itself” (Ps. 122:3).

Our experience of the Church’s unity tends to fall short of these glorious figures. We see “hatred, discord, jealousy, fits of rage, selfish ambition, dissensions, factions” (see Gal. 5:19-21).

In recognition of this, Anglicans have turned to other images over the past 14 years: among them, “walking together in synodality,” “walking apart,” or even “walking at a distance.” This language proves useful, vividly illustrating different degrees or intensities of communion: some choose to be close; some go their own way; some wander onto the wrong path.

Through such images, we see how harmony, order, and unity are gifts received, but also unwrapped and used. A field must be cultivated, a building maintained, a vine pruned.
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Posted: January 18, 2017 • Permanent link: ecu.net/?p=9621
Categories: ACNS, Opinion • In this article: Anglican, WPCU Transmis : 18 janvier 2017 • Lien permanente : ecu.net/?p=9621
Catégorie : ACNS, Opinion • Dans cet article : Anglican, WPCU

Archbishop of Canterbury calls on Christians to join global wave of prayer

The Archbishop of Canterbury is encouraging Christians of all denominations to join in with a ten day global prayer initiative “Thy Kingdom Come” from Ascension Day to Pentecost. What began last year as an invitation from the Archbishops of Canterbury and York to the Church of England has grown into an international and ecumenical call to prayer. Last year more than 100,000 people joined in and in 2017 it’s expected to be on a bigger scale. Launching the initiative, which runs from 25 May to 4 June, Archbishop Justin said: “When the wind of the spirit is blowing, hoist the sails and go with the wind. It’s not a Church of England thing, it’s not an Anglican thing, it’s a Christian thing.”
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Posted: February 9, 2017 • Permanent link: ecu.net/?p=10397
Categories: ACNS • In this article: Justin Welby, prayer, spiritual ecumenism Transmis : 9 février 2017 • Lien permanente : ecu.net/?p=10397
Catégorie : ACNS • Dans cet article : Justin Welby, prayer, spiritual ecumenism

Anglicans and Roman Catholics agree statement on ecclesiology

Anglicans and Roman Catholics should see in each other “a community in which the Holy Spirit is alive and active,” the latest communiqué from the official ecumenical dialogue between the Anglican Communion and the Roman Catholic Church says.

Members of the third-phase of the Anglican-Roman Catholic International Commission (ARCIC) met in the central German city of Erfurt early this month for their seventh meeting. They chose to meet in the city to mark the 500th anniversary of the Reformation – it is here that Martin Luther was ordained and lived as a monk.

During their meeting, the members of ARCIC agreed the text of a new statement looking at Anglican and Roman Catholic ecclesiology. Walking Together on the Way: Learning to be Church – Local, Regional, Universal, to be known as The Erfurt Document, will be published next year.
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Posted: May 30, 2017 • Permanent link: ecu.net/?p=9695
Categories: ACNS, Communiqué • In this article: Anglican, ARCIC, Catholic, ecclesiology Transmis : 30 mai 2017 • Lien permanente : ecu.net/?p=9695
Catégorie : ACNS, Communiqué • Dans cet article : Anglican, ARCIC, Catholic, ecclesiology

Anglican and Roman Catholic leaders in Ireland herald 20th anniversary of Belfast Agreement

The leaders of the Roman Catholic and Anglican Churches in Ireland have issued a joint statement celebrating “all that has been achieved in building peace” since the historic Belfast Agreement was signed 20 years ago. In a joint statement on eve of the 20th anniversary of the agreement, which is also known as the Good Friday Agreement, as it was agreed by political parties on 10 April 1998 – Good Friday – Archbishops Richard Clarke and Eamon Martin, say that the agreement “has continuing potential to transform society and life for all of us. Nothing remotely its equal has been outlined then or since.”

Archbishop Richard is the Anglican Archbishop of Armagh and Primates of the Church of Ireland; Archbishop Martin is the Roman Catholic Archbishop of Armagh and leader of the Catholic Church in the country. They say that the Good Friday Agreement “sought to address contentious political problems in the context of decades of violence, divided communities and immense suffering and death on our streets. As such it was a complex and, in places, controversial document.
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Posted: April 9, 2018 • Permanent link: ecu.net/?p=10353
Categories: ACNS • In this article: Anglican, bishops, Catholic, Ireland, peace Transmis : 9 avril 2018 • Lien permanente : ecu.net/?p=10353
Catégorie : ACNS • Dans cet article : Anglican, bishops, Catholic, Ireland, peace

Informal group of Anglican–Roman Catholic theologians discusses “new layers of unity”

An informal but officially-sanctioned ecumenical dialogue between Anglican and Roman Catholic theologians has met to consider “the difficult question of Anglican Orders.” The Malines Conversation Group was originally established in the early 1920s by Cardinal Désiré-Joseph Mercier, the Roman Catholic Archbishop of Malines-Brussels; some 24 years after Pope Leo XIII declared that Anglican Orders were “absolutely null and utterly void”. The 1920s Malines Conversations Group envisioned the restoration of communion between Anglicans and Roman Catholics in the phrase l’Église Anglicane unie non absorbée – united, but not absorbed.

Since then, a number of formal dialogues and relational groups between the two churches have been established, including the Anglican Roman Catholic International Commission (ARCIC), which undertakes theological dialogue; and the International Anglican-Roman Catholic Commission for Unity and Mission (IARCCUM), an episcopal commission which seeks ways to put joint agreements into practice.
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Posted: May 1, 2018 • Permanent link: ecu.net/?p=10247
Categories: ACNS • In this article: Anglican, Catholic, dialogue, Malines Transmis : 1 mai 2018 • Lien permanente : ecu.net/?p=10247
Catégorie : ACNS • Dans cet article : Anglican, Catholic, dialogue, Malines