Fr. Mark Harris, Executive Council member, parish priest, and author of the blog Preludium, has post a clarification concerning the polity of the Anglican Communion and the Episcopal Church entitled, “Things I Wish We Could Get Right. Technically, I agree with what he has written – it is true, factual. But, is the restatement of our polity within the Communion simply to clear up of misunderstandings (which are rampant), a justification of what we have done in the past, or perhaps the all-too-American unilateralism in the assertion of our “rights?”
I don’t know – and I don’t infer any negative reasoning behind Fr. Mark’s post. Here is how I responded and what I asked:
Mark – I agree with you concerning the above, technically. However, where does and how does an honest and respectful interdependence within the Communion come into play (regardless of how the other guys act toward us)?
For example, there is a push to have BO33 overturned/overruled/called moot during our upcoming GC. We know how a good part of the Communion will react, even among those who are sympathetic to our position. Technically, we absolutely have the right within the Communion and within our polity to act however we determine we want to act. Yet, sometimes to act in ways that are technically permissible do not bring us to a good end.
As a priest that happens to be gay, I do not see the exercising of our right to forgo BO33 or rejecting the call of most of the rest of the Communion to maintain the moratoria as a positive way forward.
Why? Not because we do not have the right to do as we please for whatever reason(s), but because we do not live on an ecclesiastical island. If we exercise or legal right to determine for ourselves what we shall do regardless of international/inter-provincial reactions (even when we hate the other position), what comes of our GLBT brothers and sisters in most of the rest of the Communion where their only option is silence or violence when our place and voice and influence is denigrated even further or removed altogether from the greater Communion?
There has to be a point where our all-too-American hubris and unilateralism gives way. For the safety of and the yet-to-be-realized justice within the rest of the Communion for GLBT people (or anyone else), we may need to put aside full implementation of what we believe to be true and just within our own Church. For their sake, I’m willing to sacrifice a bit longer and steer away from what we have the technical right to decide and do.
Can we do that? Can we act in ways other than our American cultural proclivity towards hyper-individualism and unilateralism? I’m just asking, or perhaps seeking a different way forward.