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News of the Diocese....
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Saturday, November 3, 2007 This bulletin will come on alternate Saturday mornings to provide a quick summary of what is happening in the Diocese and beyond. Rectors, especially those in the DHC, may wish to copy this Fortnightly to parishioners who have e-mail, or to have parishioners’ e-mail addresses sent to afdv1@yahoo.com. Report to the 14th Annual Forward in Faith Assembly on the Continuing Churches, 19 October 2007, at the Emmanuel Center, Westminster, London, by Bishop Hewett: In the United States we have the enormous task of building a single province for the orthodox. Solid progress has been made this past year. The continuing jurisdictions and allied bodies are networking together more strongly than ever. We are engaged in shared church planting, shared summer youth camps, Sunday School curricula, training for permanent deacons, seminaries, common standards for clergy training, discipline and marriage, reciprocity among our clergy and bishops, and gradual geographic alignment. The Federation of Anglican Churches in the Americas has grown dramatically. The Federation started out a few years ago with the Anglican Province of America and the Reformed Episcopal Church. The Anglican Mission in America joined, then the Anglican Church in America. The Diocese of the Holy Cross followed, and then the Episcopal Missionary Church and the United Anglican Church. Of the ten major jurisdictions and groupings in the U.S., seven are in the FACA, comprising over 500 parishes. The Federation exists for our common mission in the Gospel of Jesus Christ, for communication, cooperation, support and mutual accountability. The Federation’s Episcopal Visitor is Archbishop Gregory Venables, and two Foundation members, APA and REC, are in a covenant of union with the Province of Nigeria. Two members of the Federation, Anglican Province of America and Diocese of the Holy Cross, have covenants of intercommunion with Forward in Faith. The three major jurisdictions that are not in FACA are the Anglican Catholic Church, the Province of Christ the King and the United Episcopal Church. They are moving toward an informal federation which is actually quite dynamically linked through back doors with ours. I believe that this grouping and the FACA are on converging paths, and there are many who labor to make this so. Last week the Federation became a partner in Common Cause, the emerging new province in North America. In Common Cause, as with the FACA, member bodies retain their sovereignty and are this federated together. Forward in Faith North America is a Common Cause Partner. We are about where the Continental Congress was in the 1780’s, putting together the Articles of Confederation. Each of the 13 colonies retained its own sovereignty and entered voluntarily into a confederation with the others. Many of us in the FACA believe that our relationship with Common Cause has a prophetic element to it. We can witness it in regarding the apostolic ministry as instituted by our Lord and the apostles. It is a Gospel issue. The ordination of women, in Common Cause circles, is about where Soviet communism was in 1983. The one province for North America called for by the Global South primates is fast becoming a reality. Common Cause is the nucleus. FACA and Forward in Faith bishops (those who are orthodox on the ordination of women) will have the overwhelming majority vote in it. We see the hard work before us, but we also sense that we are well out of the first phase. We are grateful to Almighty God for the privilege of His call upon our lives, to secure the future of our Anglican heritage in North America. We are grateful to you for the invaluable help you have rendered thus far, and we look forward to your continued help and interest in the days to come. Report on the Forward in Faith/UK Assembly, 19-20 October, by Bishop Hewett: Bishop Jack Iker gave the report for FiF/NA; I reported for the continuing churches (printed above). FiF/UK is making course corrections and administrative improvements and is increasingly “living the new province.” That is to think, speak and act as though the new province were already in place. If it is not to be granted by General Synod, it will be taken by force. The gnostic bishops in England are reluctant to pursue their own agenda for the consecration of women bishops, now that they have seen the utter chaos of TEC. It would seem that the legislation enabling women bishops is somewhat delayed, but not interminably so. Things will come to a head in England in the not distant future. It is important that parishes that have not signed resolutions A, B and C to do so, lest they become engulfed in the storm that is surely coming. They must, before it is too late, learn the lesson of the scores of catholic parishes in the U.S. that were taken over and swallowed up because they would not place themselves under the protection of a catholic bishop. In Australia, FiF/UK supports the “real” FiF there, led by TAC bishops, John Hepworth (the Archbishop), David Chislett, Harry Entwistle and David Robarts. The latter three gave the report and told how the TAC works closely with FiF in Australia. Bishop-elect Roald Flemestad reported for the Nordic Catholic Church in Norway, and Bishop Goran Beijer for the Mission Province in Sweden. Both churches are stable and in the growth mode, with new vocations and missions. The Mission Province is expanding into Finland. There are a number of people thinking about our Anglican patrimony, the gift we bring to the rest of the Body, the unique elements in our tradition we want to carry forward. Fr. Aidan Nichols, OP, has asked that we identify these elements. Frs. Andrew Hawes, Arthur Middleton, Peter Moss, Geoffrey Neal and I discussed this over lunch. Canon Neal and Fr. Middleton are members of the Anglican Association, a body which shares this aim and includes Francis Gardom, Tony Kilmister and others. Some topics we touched upon were our Benedictine ethos (the family of God as our model), the Book of Common Prayer (as a Benedictine regula for the ordering of the whole of life), vocation (as including the laity and permanent deacons as well as the priesthood), the Anglican divines of the 17th century and the underlying affinity of Anglicanism with Orthodoxy. We will be e-mailing one another, sharing each other’s works and co-opting others in the on-going discussion. Pre and post-Assembly activities involved visiting Fr. David Wastie in Chesterfield, preaching at All Saints’, Northampton on October 21, and visiting Pusey House, Oxford. Both reports are available at www.dioceseoftheholycross.org under DHC Involvement.
Alabama
Birmingham – St. Bede’s, Episcopal Visit, November 3 – 4.
Pennsylvania
Rosemont – Clergy of the Anglican Fellowship of the Delaware Valley, Wed, Nov 14 at Good Shepherd, Rosemont, beginning with Mass at 12 p.m.
Virginia
Marshall – St. John the Baptist, Institution of the Rev. Canon Jonathan J. D. Ostman, SSC, as Rector, Sunday, November 18 at 10:30 a.m.
New York
Liverpool – St. Mary the Virgin, visit, Friday, November 30, 6:00 p.m. Liturgy.
Connecticut
Greenwich – Church of the Advent, Episcopal Visit on the 30th Anniversary of the Parish, December 1-2. Anglicans for Life: to sign up for the News Brief go to www.anglicansforlife.org. |