With the coming together of the three St. Louis Provinces (the Anglican Catholic Church, the Anglican Province of Christ the King and the United Episcopal Church of North America), now is our chance to do some inventive things to solidify this unity, and grow the church at the same time. Following, I intend to put down my own ideas on how to bring this about, while at the same time honor the authority of the three different jurisdictions.
The first phase of my proposal involves the creation of an overall communion that will encompass all three of the jurisdictions until such time as corporate union is achieved. This Continuing Anglican Communion would serve to promote the advancement of the church through church planting, missions and other such things. The offices for this Communion would be opened in St. Louis, Missouri, with the eventual goal of building a Cathedral there and the establishment of an Episcopal See. This Episcopal See would eventually be the office of the Presiding Bishop of the new Communion, and a symbol of the unity of the Communion itself.
The second phase of my proposal would be to follow the lead of the new Anglican Church in North America, and begin a program of church planting, in order to build up our membership, and promote a better image of unity among Continuing Anglicans. We have had a history of argument and strife, and this would enable us to put all of that behind us in the pursuit of the advancement of the Kingdom of God. To assist with these new church plants, the three Provinces will begin to roll their Dioceses together to create regional Provinces. One in the Southeast, one in the Northeast, one in the Midwest, One in the Gulf States, and one on the Pacific Coast. To assist with this, a Seminary will be established in each of the five new provinces, building on the experience of the seminary already established by the APCK. These seminaries will be tooled to teach new Priests the techniques of establishing new churches.
In the third phase, the five new provinces will begin the establishment of Dioceses in each state, as they begin planting churches first in the big cities, then in the smaller cities across the country. This will work to bring the leadership of each Diocese to the local level, and alleviate the problem of Bishops having to do so much out of state traveling in order to make Episcopal Visits. The ultimate goal would be for each State to be a Province. Texas alone would be able to support two or three Dioceses alone, and North Carolina would be able to support two or three. As the new Provinces continue to grow, the old Provinces will be slowly done away with, or absorbed into the new ones, along with their churches.
If we don't set solid goals, we will fail to achieve the unity that we are striving for. Without that unity, then outside forces can come in and create even more strife with such things as Anglicanorum Coetibus. I feel that this is what God has called us to do, to advance the Kingdom of God and forget about our own little arguments that have driven a wedge between the Continuing Churches for such a long time. The time is now for us to act.
Thinking about my own parish and looking into the polity of the Church of England has me thinking about how we might go about building the Continuum up into a successful church. One thing that I saw that has my gears moving is the idea of the Parish Church. My own church is the only Continuum church in my county, so it got me to thinking about how to go about building it up.
If I see the county I live in as the Parish of the church, and then look at the way the Church of England has and does do things, then there is a model there that could be used, if adjusted just right. For instance, if we decide that the Parish Church will be the central hub (in the county seat) of the county, then we can move on from there. The Parish Church itself is what we will be working toward building. To that end, we establish several chapels throughout the county in population areas (small towns within the county, which my county has about 7 or 8 of). You build the Parish Church as a typical church building that can handle between 200-500 people in seating. The chapels would be in a store front, or some other convenient place near a major market.
The reason for this is because the center of our society at this time seems to be somewhere around Wal-Mart. If we can set our chapels in places where people go, it has the possibility of drawing some of those people in to see what's going on. In the Chapels, you offer daily Morning and Evening Prayer, and perhaps Eucharist once or twice a week (with one being set on Sunday at an hour that doesn't compete with the service at the Parish Church). In addition, you offer bible studies, and other devotional times to add to the life of the church.
But the Chapels could also serve another purpose. Perhaps a Christian Book Store, or a Coffee house, or a boutique of some sort. All that is really needed is a place to meet and worship. And if the Parish Church owns it, then the profits could be used for ministry.
Another thing that is needed, is to depart from the regional diocese model in favor of a State-by-State model. States with between 5 and 15 Parishes could be established as a Missionary Diocese, and those with above 15 should be organized into a Diocese. Any state that does not have at least 5 churches, those churches would fall under the Area Diocese, which would be styled an Archdiocese. This will accomplish a few things. First, it will ease the pressure on our Bishops to have to travel a wide area. Second, it will give people a local Bishop with fewer churches to oversee, giving them more personal leadership from their Bishop.
All of this is just ideas. It could be a way to establish the unity that we have needed. If we go with a State-by-State method, we can dispense with the Super-Dioceses that we currently have in favor of a more local (as in within ones own state) leadership style.
I just looked at a map of the churches in four of the major Provinces in the Continuum (ACC, APCK, UECNA, and just for the heck of it, the APA). I found that in my home state of North Carolina, there would be 14 churches. That's enough to form a Diocese. I haven't looked for other states, but I'm sure it holds true for most of the states that the Continuum are in.
I'm not advocating leaving the Provinces that these churches are in. No, I would advocate, instead, for union between them all and the formation of Dioceses, and perhaps some Archdioceses (to keep geography to a minimum). You could take the current Dioceses in the four Provinces (say for the Southeastern United States) and merge them all into one Archdiocese. Then form Dioceses and Missionary Dioceses as the needs fit for each state. There are plenty of Bishops to go around, so each Diocese and Missionary Diocese would likely have a Bishop. Once we run out of Bishops, then we can start electing for the Dioceses that don't have one.
Now, of course all of this is just wishful thinking. But I think it can be done within my lifetime, if not within the next 10 years if we work at it.
We in the Continuing Anglican Movement have had our ups and downs. Our whole movement began with a shaky start, and immediately fell into disunity. It has been our greatest weakness. What I intend to do with this little blog is promote the unity that is much needed amongst us. Not just among a few of the bodies, such as the Anglican Catholic Church, the Anglican Province of Christ the King, and the United Episcopal Church of North America. The aim of his blog goes much deeper than that. My aim in establishing this blog is to get people talking. To get them moving in the direction of unity.
The Continuing Anglican Movement began in the 60's when a much flawed, and opinionated Priest from Statesville, North Carolina left the PECUSA. It culminated in the Congress of St. Louis (which, incidentally, ignored and completely slighted the earlier movement which began in teh 60's), which eventually brought about the creation of the Anglican Catholic Church. Unfortunately, it also brought about quite a few other churches as well. Why? The unity wasn't there. Everyone had their own ideas about how things were going to work, and politics and ambition got in the way.
Now here we are 30 years later, and we are still as fragmented as we have always been. Precious few take us seriously because of it. There is a whole new movement of people out of the Episcopal Church of the United States of America, and because we are fragmented, we are not part of that. In fact, quite early on, we lost the one symbol of unity that Anglicans have had for centuries... the Archbishop of Canturbury. We have never replaced him with another symbol of unity. We have never done what has been needed.
I know a man who has a pretty good idea about this. He's in my own parish. He says that we need to get all of these Bishops together, lock them in a room, and not open the doors until they have hashed everything out. Well, I think that's a good idea. The Roman Catholics call that a Conclave, and its how they elect a new Pope. I think it is way past time that we call another Congress of St. Louis. A new Congress to push for unity. And I think EVERYONE should be brought to the table, whether it is believed their orders are valid or not (that can be very easily taken care of). One of the goals of this new Congress of St. Louis should be the establishment of a See of St. Louis. Put all of the Bishops together in one room, and don't let them out until they have decided on a new Archbishop of St. Louis, whose sole job it will be to promote unity among the Continuing Anglican Churches. Any other ecclesiastical authority could be decided upon at a later date. The initial intent of creating the position is to provide a mouthpeice for the movement, and an arbiter of disputes. This is something that might have saved the movement from splintering in the first place back in the 70's, but no one had the forethought to do it.
That is my intentions in creating this blog. To bring together people of like mind, who can work together to bring this unity about, and maybe even to eventually call that new Congress of St. Louis. 30 years is too long to hold to these petty differences, when they can be solved with a little effort and a lot of repentance and humility.