Anglican ‘conclave’ makes Roman version look transparent
It can be hard to make the Vatican look good these days, what with sex abuse victims suing the Pope for crimes against humanity and such.
But with the head of the Anglican Communion, Archbishop of Canterbury Rowan Williams, looking ready to retire next year, Nelson Jones at The New Statesman notes that the way a new Anglican leader is chosen is easily as obscure as a flock of cardinals meeting in a secret conclave in the Sistine Chapel — and the art isn’t as good:
The process of choosing bishops and archbishops of the Established church is convoluted and arcane, but its underlying philosophy (like much in Britain) seems to be that some matters are too important to be left to the vagaries of a democratic process. Technically, senior posts in the Church of England are appointed by the Queen, in her capacity as Supreme Governor and Defender of the Faith, on the recommendation of the Prime Minister (who isn’t required to have any religious affiliations at all). Some recent prime ministers, including Margaret Thatcher and Tony Blair, are rumoured to have intervened in the selection process. These days, however, the practice of submitting two alternative names to Downing Street has been superseded, which means that bishops and archbishops are now effectively chosen by an obscure committee.
The Crown Nominations Commission, as it is called, has some members elected by the General Synod, but that gives it only an indirect legitimacy. It deliberates in secret and never divulges details of its discussions. Some observers suspect that an informal “Buggins’ turn” system operates, with unofficial quotas for liberal, Anglo-Catholic and Evangelical bishops and Canterbury itself rotating. (Thus Rowan Williams was a throwback to the ceremonious fence-sitting of Robert Runcie after the somewhat more acerbic tenure of George Carey.) But this is speculation. All we can really say is that, as with the Conservative party in the days of the Magic Circle, soundings are taken and a consensus emerges.
Well, at least the Queen will have a say, which is one more woman’s vote than they’ll have in the conclave.
Cross-posted at “Sacred and Profane,” my new blog at RNS.
David, who cares! Really! A church so tied up with the State really doesn’t know what it wants. If it did, it would move way, way beyond the arm of the secular state and its partisan interests.
Disraeli once said, there’s no gambling like politics. Indeed, especially in the church/state/ establishment political mix of England!
It’s never good to trust important stuff to direct democracy. Roman conclaves may look democratic, but appearances are meant to mislead. Each voting cardinal is probably more a political community than a single individual.
Well, at least the Queen will have a say, which is one more woman’s vote than they’ll have in the conclave.
__________
That’s OK. The Holy Spirit has a say in the conclave. The Church of England can have the Queen instead.
David, interesting aside on the inner workings of the election of the ABC.
The ABC is not the “head” of the Anglican Communion in the way that the Pope is, though he has considerable influence … if he’s any good at his job. Runcie was completely at sea, but he was also faced with monumental changes in the CofE.
Of more interest to Catholics might be the contenders to replace Williams. AB Carey, Williams’ predecessor, tried for reunification with Rome (despite his own penchant for low church liturgy). AB Williams tried to build bridges with the Church while navigating some very tough times in his own denomination.
As a former Anglican, I DO care, and I hope whomever is selected is as good as Williams was in holding things together.
OTOH, there are nearly as many Muslims as Episcopalians in the U.S.–and and there are about twice the number of Muslims (approximately 1.5 billion) than Anglicans (77 million) worldwide. So, I don’t expect that the Church to put treating with the Anglicans at the top of its priority list.
Moreover, Islam seems to be growing in places that were once Anglican (largely former colonies in the Americas, Asia, and Africa), so relations with Islam may be a bigger issue for the worldwide Anglican communion than its dealings with Rome.
Will the growth of Islam (projected to double in the U.S. by 2030) encourage more ecumenism among Christians?
Jean, thanks for the leadership clarification. Interesting that one of the big debates, though lesser noted in our obsession with gays, is/was the push to give the ABC greater authority — which of course carried a whiff of papalism. But some say it’s needed.
I am a great fan of Williams, as an author and theologian, and I’m not sure anyone can do that job any better these days. It seems impossible.
I know nothing about possible contenders, and must bone up. I suppose they’d be going back to low-church evangelical, no? But what does that really mean?
Hi, Jean, just a persnickety math correction – you misplaced your decimal point :-). Based on the figures you’ve provided, Muslims outnumber Anglicans by a factor of 20.
I don’t claim to know anything about the Anglican Communion, but the reports I’ve read in recent years suggest that the communion is so badly fractured that it would seem a victory of sorts for this commission to reach a consensus on a selection to replace Archbishop Williams. Or perhaps the commission isn’t representative of the factions within Anglicanism? Or perhaps the things I’ve read have overstated the severity of the divisions?
“I suppose they’d be going back to low-church evangelical, no? But what does that really mean?” Putting “Protestant” back on the cover of the BCP, maybe?
Jim P., thanks for correcting my math. Most of the numbers in my world don’t exceed four figures. :-)
No, the commission isn’t representative of factions in Anglicanism worldwide; it’s representative only of the factions and church/state entanglement in the C of E.
In the U.S., the presiding bishop’s election is a much simpler affair. The PB is elected by the House of Bishops, but that selection must be ratified by a body made up of priests, deacons and the laity (forget what that’s called). The PB also serves a set term. (If I recall, in the Middle Ages, bishops were elevated by a similar “bottom up” selection process, and the Pope would send the pallium to seal the deal.)
Moreover, it is the nature of Anglicanism to be somewhat “fractured” in that each country’s church is in the communion but not subject to any central authority figure, though connected through the teachings promulgated through the Lambeth Conference.
Because I live in Greece and attend the Orthodox Church, I consider myself Orthodox even though I served as an Anglican priest for 35 years. I read these comments about Anglicanism in a periodical I have always admired, and I am struck by the tone of condescension.
We all live short of the mark – αμραρτια – or in sin, in the Greek. We Orthodox are bizarrely divided by jurisdiction if not faith. The Roman Catholic church is reeling from its wounds frcm clerical abuse of children intrusted to its care. Anglicanism is fighting to survive its encounter with changing sexual morality and gender confusion. Is there no compassion for fellow Christians all of us caught in our own problems?
Livy, I suppose condecesncion is in the eye of the beholder. I don’t think anyone here, or certainly anyone in the Catholic Church, could or should condescend to the Anglicans when it comes to issues (or dysfunctions) of church polity. Have you checked out the Vatican or a parish council or the Catholic blogosphere lately?!
Where is Anthony Trollope when we need him, with his fictional examinations of politicking and power plays in the Anglican Church?
Or, more to the point for this blog, perhaps, why do we not have a Roman Catholic Trollope, whom we may well need even more?
“I read these comments about Anglicanism in a periodical I have always admired, and I am struck by the tone of condescension.”
There are some strains of Catholic conservatism that now find the tenor and content of evangelicals and fundamentalists more comfortable than those of “mainstream” Protestants, though I have given up trying to explain to Catholics why Anglicans do not consider themselves “Protestants.” You will, I hope, also find many others here who watch with more interest and empathy the struggles Anglicans have had with the ordination of women, teachings on divorce and birth control, and issues of homosexuality.
“Or, more to the point for this blog, perhaps, why do we not have a Roman Catholic Trollope, whom we may well need even more?”
Perhaps because the workings of Anglicanism–even byzantine structure of the C of E–are still more transparent than the workings of Rome?
Jean, as usual you make sense. As I cast around for a place to go when I can’t be a “catholic” any more, I think of Anglicanism. My few dealing with it have been fruitful But as you point out , I would no more know who was who or what was what than being Roman.
Though they hardly rise to the level of Trollope, there have been two very good chroniclers of twentieth-century Catholic clerical culture in the English-speaking world.
The Scot Bruce Marshall (1899-1987). For example, “Father Malachy’s Miracle.”
And J. F. Powers (1917-1999), who taught for many years at St. John’s University, Collegeville. Among others, his award-winning “Morte d’Urban.”
John, I always liked the Don Camillo books, though that’s less about the larger church’s machinations and more about politics at the local level.
The Anglican Communion and in particular the Church of England have greatly benefited from Rowan Williams’ inspiring presence as ABC, which one hopes to see continue for many years more. Even the Vatican have sat up and taken notice of the merits of Anglicanism — human, theological, and liturgical — in a way we have not seen since the time of Paul VI.
“…Vatican have sat up and taken notice of the merits….”
Joseph,
They say Pope Benedict is a devotee Anglican choral music. I wouldn’t be surprised if that was one of the elements (of the Anglican Patrimony) he hopes ordinariate joiners will bring with them into the Catholic Church. Possibly the Anglican Use parishes in the US already have that musical component. The pinnacle of Anglican choral traditon, of course, is Evensong, which is already practiced in some Catholic parishes and universities.
That would be nice. I attended a mass at an unfamiliar church recently at which the music was, to my taste, um, suboptimal. Apparently, generations of American Catholics have grown up singing this stuff. How they’ve put up with it I have no idea. Of course, many have left, perhaps some of them at least partly for this reason.
@ David Gibson: Side question, but last I heard, there was no Anglican ordinariate in the U.S. (looking at a report this March from the American Catholic online).
As I understand it, Rome establishes the ordinariate as the channel through which Episcopal communities in this country would come into full communion with Rome, but maintaining its liturgical practices (and hymnal).
Any idea about where this is now in the States or how it’s working out elsewhere?