wfn.org | ACNS3713 The Archbishop of Canterbury's Commission

["Anglican Communion News Service" <acnslist@anglicancommunion.org>]

ACNS 3713     |     ANGLICAN COMMUNION	   |	 18 DECEMBER 2003 

The Archbishop of Canterbury's Commission

The full Commission will meet as a whole on three occasions: in
February; June; and September 2004. It intends to complete its initial
report on the nature, extent and consequences of Impaired Communion in
the Anglican Communion as a result of recent developments by the end of
September 2004 for submission to the Archbishop of Canterbury in
October. Intensive work will also be commissioned from individual
members of the Commission and others, and undertaken beyond the main
sessions set out above.

As required by its mandate, the Commission will begin by considering
recent work elsewhere on the issue of Communion. It will give primary
consideration to the resolutions of the Lambeth Conferences of 1988 and
1998 on this issue, together with a consideration of what has been
achieved in the Grindrod, Eames and Virginia Reports, which addressed
matters of Communion, particularly in relation then to the issue of the
ordination of women to the episcopate. It will also wish to give
especial attention to the recent work of the Inter Anglican Theological
and Doctrinal Commission on the theological nature of Communion, and the
various statements and pastoral letters issued by the Primates at their
recent meetings.

There are no plans at this stage to hold sessions of the Commission in
public, but it is felt that it will be important for the work of the
Commission to be as open as possible. For this reason, evidence
considered by the Commission will generally be published on the web site
associated with the Commission, and it is intended to publish interim
reports of the work of the Commission following each plenary session.
Specific submissions to the Commission will be invited from particular
groups or individuals, both in written form and by the reception of
evidence in interview, either at plenary sessions, or at subsidiary
meetings and sub-committees. The Initial Report in its final form will
not be published until it has been received formally by the Archbishop
of Canterbury.

Submissions of evidence may be forwarded unsolicited for the
consideration of the Commission, provided that the following criteria
are met:

* Submissions must relate strictly to the terms of reference of the
Commission (key questions are set out below), and be sent in electronic
format to the email address of the Commission's Secretary set out below.

* Submissions should be in word processed format, and no longer than one
side of an A4 sheet of paper or the equivalent. 

The Commission may decide to request clarification or development as it
feels appropriate. All submissions may be published on the Commission
web site at the direction of the Commission's Chair, Archbishop Robin
Eames.

The Commission should be grateful if members of the Anglican Communion,
and our ecumenical partners, will hold the Commission's work in their
prayers, together with the life of the Anglican Communion.

Information on the Commission and its ongoing work may be found on the
web site:
(www.anglicancommunion.org/ecumenical/commissions/primates/index.cfm),
or by contacting the Secretary to the Commission, the Revd Canon Gregory
Cameron, on commission.secretary@anglicancommunion.org.

Media enquiries should be addressed to the Press Officer of the
Archbishop of Armagh:

The Revd Brian Parker
Tel: +44 (0) 28 90 232909 
Mobile: +44 (0) 7775 927807
Email: press@ireland.anglican.org

The Commission's Key Questions:

Taking into account work on issues of communion carried out by Lambeth
Conferences 1988 and 1998, and the views of the Primates Meetings since
2000:

1. What are (a) the legal and (b) the theological implications flowing
from ECUSA decision to appoint a priest in a committed same sex
relationship as one of its bishops? (See LC 1998 Res. I.10)

2. What are (a) the legal and (b) the theological implications of the
decision of the diocese of New Westminster to authorise services for use
in connection with same sex unions?

3. What are the canonical understandings of (a) communion, (b) impaired
communion and (c) broken communion? (What is autonomy and how is it
related to communion?)

4. How (do and) may provinces relate to one another in situations where
the ecclesiastical authorities of one province feel unable to maintain
the fullness of communion with another part of the Anglican Communion?

5. What practical solutions might there be to maintain the highest
degree of communion that may be possible, in the circumstances resulting
from these two decisions, within the individual churches involved? (eg
[alternative] episcopal oversight when full communion is threatened)

6. What practical solutions might there be to maintain the highest
degree of communion that may be possible, in the circumstances resulting
from these two decisions, as between the churches of the Anglican
Communion? (eg [alternative] episcopal oversight when full communion is
threatened)

7. Under (a) what circumstances, (b) what conditions, and (c) by what
means, might it be appropriate for the Archbishop of Canterbury to
exercise an extraordinary ministry of pastoral oversight, support and
reconciliation with regard to the internal affairs of a province to
maintain communion between Canterbury and that province? (see LC 1998,
Res. IV.13)

8. Under (a) what circumstances, (b) what conditions, and (c) by what
means, might it be appropriate for the Archbishop of Canterbury to
exercise an extraordinary ministry of pastoral oversight, support and
reconciliation with regard to the internal affairs of a province to
maintain communion between that province and the rest of the Anglican
Communion? (see LC Res. IV.13)

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