Lambeth Conference beginning of “Transformed Relationships”

The second week of the Lambeth Conference, the once-decade meeting of the leaders of the Anglican Communion, begins today. Once-decade meetings of worldwide churches are not often covered in the news, and if they are it isn’t for very long. This meeting, though, seems to be attracting more attention that usual.

A significant reason is that this is the first formal, official, and full meeting of the Anglican Communion since the Diocese of New Hampshire elected V. Gene Robinson to be their bishop and the Episcopal Church ratified that election in 2003. This election of a non-celibate gay man to the episcopate sparked a worldwide furor from many of the communion’s conservative voices, and it forced into the limelight an issue that garners strong opinions from both sides.

As much as this issue is about full recognition of the ecclesiastical rights of a member of the lesbian and gay community, it also concerns the appropriateness of one segment of the communion voting to allow something that has never been allowed before. Many of the same issues emerged when the Episcopal Church began ordaining women to the priesthood in 1976. As of 2008, twenty-eight of the thirty-eight provinces in the Anglican Communion ordain women as priests, and seventeen provinces have made it possible for the elevation of women to the rank of bishop.

Given this model, some say that it is only a matter of time before gay and lesbian people receive full rights to be made bishops. Others say that these ordinations are a bridge too far. What remains to be seen, though, is how the Anglican Communion at large will contend with this issue in the coming decades.

One indication comes from the Rowan Williams, the Archbishop of Canterbury. In his opening address to the Lambeth Conference, he states:

“…the greatest need of the Communion now is for transformed relationships. This does not mean simply warm feelings about each other, but new habits of respect, patience and understanding that are fleshed out in specific ways and changed habits–in responsible agreement and search for the common mind, in constant active involvement in the life of other parts of the family, and…in shared commitments to a rule of life and a pattern of prayer, so that it remains possible to see in the other person another believer…”

This charge for transformed relationships is not likely to quell all the confusion or heal all the pain, but it is the kind of language that will lead to complex, balanced discussions and fruitful dialogue as this issue helps to further clarify the Anglican Communion’s responsibilities to itself and its members.

By Clint Williams, Executive Director

Xenia Institute