A response to the Primates’ Statement of October 16, 2003, and a vocation for faithful Anglicans
While we can expect to hear more from our faithful brethren in Africa, Asia,and the Southern Cone, the Statement of the Primates ought not to come as a great surprise. Yes, the innocent souls that had hoped for a one-time, one-meeting solution to heresy and apostasy in ECUSA, Canada, or the Anglican Communion in general, do and will need a great deal of comforting.
Nevertheless, we believe it is time to remind ourselves that it was never reasonable to expect the Primates, even the orthodox Primates, to give the faithful in America an easy, painless victory.
The reformation of a particular national church has much in common with a war, and in particular with a "corrective war" of the sort known as a "war of liberation" or a "war of independence." Aquinas would describe such a struggle as an act of charity, not only in defense of the oppressed faithful, but also on behalf of those in error, who must be rescued from their error and deprived of the ability to do further harm to the lambs of Christ.
To use an analogy, American colonists, by and large, did not hate Great Britain. Rather, they loved Britain, her history, and her rule of law. When, however, the colonists had done their best to seek redress of their legitimate grievances and had been denied it, they could no longer put off action on their own behalf. Their Congress declared the independence of the American colonies from the governance of Great Britain, along with the new status of those colonies as an independent nation able to govern itself according to the rules of law and equity.
Indeed, those first American citizens had friends and allies in other nations, but the major burden of reforming American civil life rested on American shoulders. In the same way, the burden of reforming the American church is the primary burden of Americans, and not of our beloved brethren and friends in other countries. We cannot ask them to pay the price of our reformation; but we must demand of ourselves that we pay the price of fidelity and true Christian fellowship.
Warfare, even spiritual warfare, is an application of force--moral, temporal, and supernatural-- to achieve a defined purpose. It is a mistake to depend too much on the subjective models of our modern, secular & therapeutic culture, when the task before is the restoration of the objective faithfulness of the American Church to Jesus Christ, rather than on sharing our private feelings of disappointment or exile. We should never meet again to talk about how we feel, but only to plan a course of action. We must not be afraid to face the hard question of whether or not, despite our common opposition to the Griswold regime, we have enough in common to foster a single effort. It may be that we cannot abide in one household, but we will not know that until we have defined not just who and what we are right now, but more importantly who and what we intend to be for the sake of Jesus Christ when our labors, by God's grace, are successful.
The way to work with the Primates, and in particular with the Theological Commission which in the next year will look into acceptable ways of help being provided by one Province to another, where there is major internal disagreement in a given Province, is not to attempt endlessly to change their minds, looking for immediate and substantial help. Rather, it is to build a province and to seek their fellowship, in general or in particular, as our Lord will give us the light to see our duty. The way to build a province is to learn from the reorganization of the American church after the War of Independence and to adapt those lessons to our present needs and circumstances.
We can achieve, with God's help, a faithful province. We can make an honorable and charitable witness to the Anglican Communion and to the rest of the world. But we will not succeed if we keep asking permission to reform ourselves. It is time to rebel against the errors of men and to embrace the call of Jesus Christ to build up with him. God being our helper, there is nothing that is not possible to us now that was possible before the Primates issued their Statement.
Louis Tarsitano & Peter Toon
E Mail Peter@toon662.fsnet.co.uk
E-mail (Louis) episocas@bellsouth.net
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