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Windsor Report Abstracts of Papers

Investigative and Reflective Papers by Students of The General Theological Seminary from the "Seminar in Anglican Ecclesiology and the Windsor Report." (Spring 2005 ) Prof. J. Robert Wright

Abstract from The Windsor Report: Ecclesiological Departures for the Anglican Communion by Scott MacDougall

The debates that have surrounded the Windsor Report of the Lambeth Commission on Communion can, to some extent, be viewed as definitional struggles. These are not at all mere semantic debates—what terms like communion, family, federation, diversity, difference, unity, uniformity, adiaphora, authority, instrument, and consultation are ultimately taken to mean in the global Anglican context will determine the resulting shape of Anglican ecclesiology. The manner in which the Windsor Report and commentators on the report have deployed certain terms has not only been, in some cases, unclear and unhelpful, but, in other cases, has reflected a desire to move Anglican ecclesiology away from its historical form toward another kind of structure. While the framers and supporters of the Windsor Report claim that the Report’s recommendations represent ecclesiological shifts only of a positive nature (when such shifts are, in fact, admitted at all), critics of the report contend that the ecclesiological changes it represents and recommends are not positive and are out of keeping with historical forms of Anglican polity and governance. This paper argues that attention to the language used by both sides can provide a means of navigating through these issues and can indicate what may be at stake for the worldwide Anglican Communion.

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Abstract from Is the Windsor Report a Good Therapist? by Matthew Moretz

In response to the family rhetoric of the Windsor Report, I examine the inter-Anglican family dynamics that the Windsor Report reveals and critique the Windsor Report as if it were a family therapist for a quarrelling couple. The writers of the Windsor Report seem to have little grasp of how families and other similar emotional units function. The Report serves as a distraction from some of the conflict dynamics that are at the root of the Communion’s troubles. The Windsor Report appears to be demarcating villains, rather than seeking out patterns of mutual influence that govern the conflict. The Windsor Report’s focus on symptoms tends to be at the expense of attending to systemic sources. Also, the Windsor Report ends with veiled threats of divisive consequences rather than earnest hope for healing. Healthy resistance, a hallmark of healthy families, to the Windsor Report is too easily dismissed. Barring its anemic understanding of lay ministry, the Windsor Report does well in its focus on realigning boundaries and strengthening hierarchical organization. It asserts structure in the face of conflict. Yet, the Windsor Report does little to dissolve the emotional triangle that has developed around this crisis. This triangle is comprised of the North American churches, the dissenting groups, and the Office of the Archbishop. Through enhancing the Archbishop of Canterbury’s role and emphasizing top-down recommendations, the Windsor Report reinforces a family dysfunction where the Archbishop is inducted into conflicts of which he is not a part. By not thinking outside of the box of third party initiatives, the Windsor Report distracts us from countless opportunities for healing and reconciliation between the quarrelling provinces and dioceses. We can learn to talk to each other. We do not always have to talk to each other through other people.

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Abstract from Oversight or Autonomy by Robert F. Solon, Jr.

In 2003, the General Convention of the Episcopal Church in the USA (ECUSA) consented to the election of V. Gene Robinson to the See of New Hampshire, and the Diocese of New Westminster in the Anglican Church of Canada authorized a Rite of Blessing for same-sex unions. In October of 2003 the Primates’ Meeting requested the Archbishop of Canterbury to convene a commission to address the ecclesiological implications of these decisions. The report of the Lambeth Commission on Communion, commonly titled The Windsor Report, addressed in some detail the purposes and benefits of communion, fundamental principles undergirding communion, and the maintenance of communion. This paper is intended to further the discussion of “Vertical Oversight” within the Anglican Communion, by reviewing the ecclesiological status quo, analyzing the Windsor Report’s call for Vertical Oversight, examining the background and provenance of the term and its meaning, and then offering some concluding observations and alternatives.

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Abstract from A Way Forward by Timothy A. Boggs

The Windsor Report claimed that inculturation is “an essential part of the Christian mission.” Yet the report has almost totally ignored the fact that the North American churches of the Anglican Communion have been active in creating and contextualizing the profound and liberating changes that their cultures reflect for gay and lesbian people. The inculturating actions of these churches should be seen as faith-filled work to “proclaim the Gospel of Christ into the context of the world in which it is living.” By documenting the profound contextual shifts in the status of homosexuals in these cultures, this paper argues that the church is being precisely true to this responsibility. Also by way of the historical example of the course of the Communion’s position on the 20th century controversy regarding contraception, this paper shows that the Communion is capable of collaborative and faithful inculturation even on the most difficult of topics.

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Abstract from Via Adiaphora by Ben Thomas

This paper presents a limited response to the second question posed by the Windsor Reception Committee: “In which ways do the proposals in Section [sic] C & D flow appropriately from the description of the Communion’s life in Sections A & B?”1 Focusing on a careful exegesis of Romans 14 and how it is used in paragraphs 87- 96 of the Windsor Report, this paper argues that the polity of the Anglican Communion makes it legitimate to apply the behavioral guidelines from Romans 14 to local disputes as well as the issues addressed by the Report. Treating the current dispute as adiaphora facilitates dialogue by moving the discussion away from the hot-button issue of human sexuality toward an investigation of how Paul’s expectations about Christian behavior can move into the twenty-first century. Thus, Anglicans are challenged to view themselves in the Pauline categories of weak and strong rather the increasingly polar theological positions on committed same-sex relationships. The categories of weak and strong provide something other than new ways of disagreement; these categories map out an attitude of mutual respect and the obligations required by this respect. The Windsor Report suggests that as members of the Anglican Communion we should hold Scripture as the highest authority.2 It is my hope that this investigation shows how the suggestion, if taken seriously, would do much to “maintain the communion with [every] part of the Anglican Communion.”3
1 Email from the Anglican Communion News Service to J. Robert Wright. November 5, 2004.
2 Windsor Report, paragraphs 53-62.
3 From the Archbishop of Canterbury’s Mandate to the Windsor Commission.

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Abstract from "People, look east and sing today: Love, the guest, is on the way." by Gideon L. K. Pollach

A central issue within The Windsor Report is its view of the locus and scope of authority within the Anglican Communion. In this essay the author looks at how The Windsor Report speaks about authority, addresses some of the unanswered questions about our common understanding of ecclesiology within the Anglican Communion as expressed in The Virginia Report and received by The Lambeth Conference, points to places of conflict between The Windsor Report and The Virginia Report, and ultimately looks at Orthodox understandings of communion, primacy and autonomy for possible parallels with our life as Anglicans. The author finds much in commonbetween Anglican and Orthodox understandings and experiences of authority: in particular the notion of "primacy of honor" versus "primacy of function" and authority based on witness versus authority understood as power. Finally, the author offers possible ways in which we as a communion might find solutions to the issues of dispersed authority from the Orthodox Church.

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Abstract from When is a Primate like a King? by Thomas K. Heard

This paper briefly explores the polity of The Church of England, The Episcopal Church (USA), and the Church of Nigeria (Anglican Communion). Specifically considered are the rights, responsibilities and authority of Bishops in the churches in their various roles. Of particular interest are the Primates of the provincial churches of the Anglican Communion and whether their relationships and attitudes are a reflection of the disparity in canonical and constitutional authority between provinces, or are symptomatic of something deeper.

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Abstract of Uses of Authority by Jefferson R. Hulet

In this essay, Mr. Hulet explores the uses of authority in the text of the Lambeth Commission on Communion’s Windsor Report 2004. He identifies several points in the Commission’s narrative where a crux interpretum appears in their argument, several of which are not overtly stated and others of which become apparent only when diverse elements of their structured argument are seen in juxtaposition. Mr. Hulet’s thesis is that the Commission’s understanding of authority is discernable, and that it is an integral component of their findings and recommendations. He goes on to argue that the understanding of authority presented in the Report is important to understanding the Commission’s vision for the future of the Anglican Communion. From this perspective, he seeks to make their uses of authority clear in order to enlighten the debate about the Communion’s future, which will be shaped in significant measure by the Report and the reaction to it.

Mr. Hulet concludes that the Commission’s use of authority establishes their view that doctrine constitutes both the threshold of division within the Anglican Communion currently, as well as the potential means of unity. He also concludes that the Commission’s vision constitutes a call for greater centralization of authority, particularly with the Archbishop of Canterbury and the Lambeth Conference; anda view that the latter possesses the authority to establish doctrine, legislatively and by imprimatur, on behalf of the entire Anglican Communion. In his concluding remarks, Mr. Hulet questions the propriety of granting to the concept of doctrine the authoritative uses to which, he argues, it is put by the Commission.

Mr. Hulet, a Senior at The General Theological Seminary, is a Postulant for Holy Orders from the Diocese of New Jersey. He is a retired Lieutenant with the Los Angeles Police Department. A graduate of the University of San Francisco, he has also completed post-graduate degrees in theology at Harris Manchester College, Oxford. His MSt is in Christian ethics.

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Abstract from The Morn of Song by Amy Real Coultas

The first question we must ask ourselves as divided Christians is ‘Do we believe we are called to unity?’ If our answer is ‘yes’, then we must seek out that unity. The way to pursue such a mission is as people gathered in the name of Christ, with Him as the Head of the Body, following and manifesting the reality of the indwelling of the Holy Spirit in its members, praying and worshiping together, proclaiming the Gospel as we promote justice, peace, and love through the ministry of all those gathered.

To seek after unity is intentional. It requires listening to the voices of all those gathered under the Headship of Christ. From such sharing and listening, discernment can begin. Discernment not of our will, but of God’s, as made evident in Scripture, by the fruits of the Holy Spirit, by the coming together as the Church in worship and prayer. The Anglican Communion has struggled with whether it is possible to both claim unity and claim deep division. I believe it is only possible to claim real unity as we live through deep division. Our hope is in reconciliation through Christ, it is in hope that we must put our trust. To put our trust in division is to put our trust in sin. The Gospel tells us we have unity in Christ, to believe otherwise is to deny the Gospel.

The Eames Commission and Monitoring Group Reports, the Virginia Report, and the Windsor Report all address these issues, offering the process of Reception as a means for ‘decision-making’ while maintaining unity. I offer here a description and endorsement of Reception as opposed to an increase in formal structures as suggested in the Windsor Report. I advocate increased cultivation of dialogue in commitment to unity as proposed by the Chicago-Lambeth Quadrilateral, the Eames Commission and Monitoring Group Reports, and the Virginia Report. Simply put, I believe the only real means of maintaining unity is by continual, collective claiming of unity. Legislation seems only to address the symptoms of division. Without a clear foundational commitment to unity first, legislation will only provide a veneer of Communion.

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Abstract from Consecrated Bridges and Holy Cohesion by Barrett Van Buren

The author of this commentary is attempting for others to identify and explore a balanced approach to appreciate both sides of the issue of the polity and decisions of ECUSA, and to find theological and ecclesiological justifications by agreeing with the current appeal against any unnecessary punitive actions of the Lambeth Commission. The author is hoping that this term paper fosters how justification comes from the life source of Christ that is within each of us, and that Christ’s life within the Anglican Communion will not produce inferior people or ministries because of our indissoluble bond in God.

Supporting continued holy cohesion of the Anglican communion will require working together with the Baptismal Covenant and the Chicago-Lambeth Quadrilateral as our foundation to unity and to recognize how God can use all of us to bring the Good News of Jesus Christ to our humanity, establishing the reign of God by transcending beyond individual theology, provincial scriptural interpretation or Cultural dynamics. We are one in Christ, period.

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Abstract from A Proposal for Reconciliation by Patrick A. Collins

This paper explores some of the visions of communion as stated by both the Windsor Report and the Virginia Report, by looking at some theological implications. The author argues that communion is both a gift and a responsibility from God and states that keeping the communion together is an imperative. Unity within the Anglican Communion is understood as being both in our understanding of scripture and our common worship practices and liturgical acts. Reconciliation is a part of the Christian experience and it needs to be a part of the Anglican Communion during the current disagreements. The author explores reconciliation as a sacramental act intentionally using the general confession as an example. The author then offers a proposal for using the general confession as a model for reconciliation within the Anglican Communion.

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