wfn.org | [ENS] Listening central as delegates,

["Matthew Davies" <mdavies@episcopalchurch.org>]

Daybook, from Episcopal News Service
June 10, 2005 -- Friday Forum

Listening central as delegates, observers prepare for ACC-13

Anglican Consultative Council to convene June 19-28 in Nottingham

[ENS] - Listening is a priority as delegates and observers prepare for
the
Anglican Consultative Council's 13th triennial meeting (ACC-13) to
convene
June 19-28 in Nottingham, England.

Participants in the international forum, whose president is Archbishop
of
Canterbury Rowan Williams, will exchange perspectives on issues of
global
concern, with emphasis given to the United Nations' Millennium
Development
Goals for the alleviation of poverty.

Understandings of human sexuality will be considered June 21 at the
request
of ACC leaders, who have asked representatives of the U.S. Episcopal
Church
and the Anglican Church of Canada to offer topical presentations. The
U.S.
Episcopalians will describe experiences around the 2003 election of an
openly gay bishop in New Hampshire, and the Canadians will comment on
the
Diocese of New Westminster's practice of blessing same-gender unions.

The presentations respond to specific requests of the Anglican
Communion's
Windsor Report (paragraph 135). In further cooperation with the report
and
with last February's meeting of the Anglican Primates (leading
archbishops),
the U.S. Episcopal Church and the Anglican Church of Canada have
formally
withdrawn their elected delegates from the ACC-13 proceedings. The
delegates, three from each nation, will attend as observers by vote,
respectively, of the Episcopal Church's Executive Council and the
Canadian
Church's Council of General Synod.

The U.S. and Canadian churches are among 38 member provinces of the
Anglican
Communion, which is composed of 77 million members in 164 countries. The
Council's purpose is to provide consultation and guidance on policy
issues,
including mission and ecumenism, for the Anglican Communion. Formed in
1969,
the Council includes clergy and laypersons as delegates.

While the ACC engages some legislative functions, membership in the
Anglican
Communion is a matter determined by each province's direct formal
relationship with the See of Canterbury. The 38 interrelated, yet
autonomous, provinces are recognized by four "instruments of unity": the
Archbishop of Canterbury, the Lambeth Conference of Anglican bishops,
the
Primates' Meeting, and the ACC.

"What I hope will evolve from the ACC is a greater respectfulness, a
greater
willingness to listen and honor the different ways in which the Gospel
is
articulated in different places," said the Episcopal Church's Presiding
Bishop Frank T. Griswold. "It is only through listening -- listening
deeply
with an undefended heart -- that we can hear the richness of God's
truth....
In spite of differences, in spite of tensions, the overwhelming reality
of
the church is people engaged in mission for the sake of the world. It is
through listening that I hope we can become better partners across the
Communion."

Griswold will join six presenters in Nottingham June 21. The presenters
are
Bishop Neil Alexander of Atlanta; Bishop Charles Jenkins of Louisiana;
Bishop Suffragan Catherine Roskam of New York; the Rev. Michael Battle,
academic vice president of Virginia Theological Seminary; the Rev. Susan
Russell, president of Integrity and an assisting priest at All Saints'
Church in Pasadena, California; and Jane Tully, founder of CFLAG (Clergy
Families of Lesbians and Gays) and a parishioner of St. Bartholomew's
Church
in New York City.

Roskam is one of the Episcopal Church's three elected delegates to the
ACC,
as are Josephine Hicks of North Carolina and the Rev. Robert Sessum of
Lexington.

Concurrent with the June 21 presentation, a written response will be
posted
online at www.episcopalchurch.org and www.anglicanlistening.org. Copies
of
the text are not available for release prior to the presentation. A news
conference is scheduled to follow the presentation. Information about
the
Canadian participation is online at
http://www.anglican.ca/news/news.php?newsItem=2005-05-25_a.ans.

The dialogue will also continue as ACC-13 discusses the formation and
structure of a listening process as requested by Lambeth resolution
1.10.

The agenda for ACC-13 and a list of its approximately 75 participating
members are posted online at
http://www.aco.org/acc/meetings/acc13/index.cfm, where details for media
coverage and credentialing are also offered.

The Anglican Communion website also includes links to information about
each
of the 38 Provinces, among which there is a diversity of practice in
terms
of governance, polity and structure.

More on these unique contexts will be reported by the Episcopal News
Service
as ACC-13 approaches and convenes.

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