News
Anglican Consultative Council Meeting
05/13/2009
The Episcopal Church is one of 38 independent provinces of the world wide Anglican Communion. In most respects each province is fully autonomous but we are bound together by history, worship, and a "catholic" understanding of Word and Sacrament.
In recent decades there has been growing desire to formalize the relationships among the various provinces. The Anglican Consultative Council is one of the bodies created in 1971 to address this desire.
Anglican Consultative Council to meet May 1-13 in JamaicaBy Matthew Davies, editor of Episcopal Life Online and international correspondent for Episcopal Life Media.
The Anglican Communion's most representative legislative body, the Anglican Consultative Council, will meet May 1-13 in Kingston, Jamaica.
The ACC'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 lay people, as well as bishops, among its delegates.
Two key documents to be discussed by the ACC are the proposed Anglican covenant and the Windsor Continuation Group's final report that was made public during the early February meeting of Anglican primates.The Windsor Continuation Group was charged with addressing questions arising from the 2004 Windsor Report, a document that recommended ways in which the Anglican Communion can maintain unity amid diversity of opinions, especially relating to human sexuality issues and theological interpretations.
The ACC membership includes from one to three persons from each of the Anglican Communion's 38 provinces. Where there are three members, there is a bishop, a priest and a lay person. Where fewer members are appointed, preference is given to lay membership.
The Episcopal Church is represented on the ACC by Josephine Hicks of North Carolina; the Rev. Ian Douglas of Massachusetts; and Bishop Catherine Roskam of New York.
Hicks is a member of the Episcopal Church's Executive Council and serves as chair of its Administration and Finance committee. Douglas, also a member of Executive Council and its International Concerns committee, is Angus Dun professor of World Christianity at Episcopal Divinity School in Cambridge, Massachusetts. Roskam is bishop suffragan of the Diocese of New York.
The main working sessions at the ACC meeting will be divided into information plenary sessions and discernment groups. The whole meeting will be supported by Bible study, prayer and small group discussion. The daily Bible study groups will explore the gospel of Mark. There will also be two business sessions scheduled for legislative action. The discernment groups are an addition to the ACC's usual format.
Those groups will be modeled on the small group process known as "indaba" that was used during last summer's Lambeth Conference of bishops. Based on a Zulu concept, indaba means purposeful discussion and refers to a group meeting where differences can be aired and a consensus agreement reached.
In a letter sent to all ACC members, the Rev. Canon Kenneth Kearon, secretary general of the Anglican Communion, said: "Our 11 days together will provide an opportunity for us to engage with the mission of the Anglican Communion through the work of its commissions, networks and working groups as well as experience something of the life and vitality of the local Anglican church."
The ACC will begin with a quiet morning May 2 led by Archbishop of Canterbury Rowan Williams, following a trend adopted at the Lambeth Conference and the Primates Meeting.
The ACC's opening service will be held on Sunday, May 3 at the National Arena in Kingston, and on Sunday, May 10, ACC delegates will participate in Mission Sunday at various churches across the Diocese of Jamaica and the Cayman Islands. The closing service will be held at the Cathedral of St. Jago de la Vega in Spanish Town on May 12.
The ACC is one of the four instruments of communion, the others being the Archbishop of Canterbury (who serves as president of the ACC), the Lambeth Conference of Anglican bishops, and the Primates Meeting.
Presiding Bishop Katharine Jefferts Schori said that she anticipates the Kingston meeting "will be an opportunity for reconnecting with old friends, meeting new ones, and learning more about the vast and diverse ministry within the Anglican Communion."
Jefferts Schori, who will attend the meeting in her role as a member of the Primates Joint Standing Committee, said she expects the delegates "will return to their provinces with a deeper understanding of our interconnectedness as Anglicans and the distinctly different realities of our varied contexts."
For more information about the ACC's upcoming meeting in Jamaica check out the following link: www.anglicancommunion.org
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