Australia Fails to Adopt Covenant

Without fanfare, the following item was added to the page on the Anglican Communion Web site that keeps track of the status of “responses” to the Anglican Covenant:

• The Anglican Church of Australia declined to adopt the Covenant but adopted a resolution affirming its commitment to the Anglican Communion. July 2014.

In particular, on June 30, 2014, the General Synod of the Anglican Church of Australia passed the following motion:

That this General Synod:

1. Affirms the commitment of the Anglican Church of Australia to the Anglican Communion;
2. Affirms its openness to participating in any further consideration of a covenant proposal; and
3. Urges upon the Instruments of Communion a course of action that continues to seek reconciliation and the preservation of the Communion as a family of interdependent but autonomous churches.

In other words, while expressing support for the Anglican Communion, the Australian church pointedly declined to adopt or reject the covenant on offer. This is, of course, standard Anglican politeness. Apparently, Australia has no interest in the present Anglican Covenant and covets its autonomy.

The motion as passed and the record of amendments that were rejected can be found on page 15 of the minutes of the June 30, 2014, session of the General Synod, which can be found here.

More Bad News for the Covenant

We have received word that the synod of the Diocese of Newcastle, in the Anglican Church of Australia, has voted against adoption of the Covenant by a large majority. Dioceses in the Australian church are to comment on the Covenant by December 2012. The General Synod is scheduled to make a decision on the Covenant in 2013.

Perhaps more significant is the news, reported by Episcopal News Service, that the Executive Council of The Episcopal Church will submit a resolution to the 2012 General Convention to the effect that the church is “unable to adopt the Anglican Covenant in its present form.” The resolution pointedly avoids words like “reject.” The following paragraph from the ENS story suggests how the resolution will be framed:

The resolution also promises that the church will “recommit itself to dialogue with the several provinces when adopting innovations which may be seen as threatening the unity of the communion” and commits to “continued participation in the wider councils of the Anglican Communion” and dialogue “with our brothers and sisters in other provinces to deepen understanding and to insure the continued integrity of the Anglican Communion.”

Sydney Opposes Covenant

Responding to a report by the Standing Committee of the Diocese of Sydney, the diocesan Synod has gone on record as opposing adoption of the Anglican Covenant by the Anglican Church of Australia. The report objected that the Covenant is “fundamentally concerned with maintaining structural and institutional unity rather than biblical faithfulness.”

The motion opposing adoption of the Covenant was put forth by Dr. Mark Thompson, Head of the Department of Theology, Philosophy and Ethics at Moore College. According to Dr. Thompson, “Those who have created the problem [within the Anglican Communion] won’t sign it; and if they did without repenting of the departures from the teaching of Scripture it would only demonstrate the uselessness of the covenant itself.”

According to an October 13, 2011, report on the Sydney Web site by Russell Powell, Dr. Thompson advanced GAFCON and the Fellowship of Confessing Anglicans as offering a better approach to resolving conflicts within the Communion.

Archbishop of Sydney Peter Jensen is the General Secretary of GAFCON and the Fellowship of Confessing Anglicans.

A final decision on the adoption or rejection of the Anglican Covenant will be made by the General Synod of the Anglican Church of Australia.