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was not clear to me whether Lionel Deimel was serious when he mused in
his paper, “Saving Anglicanism,” that “perhaps the salvation of the
Anglican Communion lies in less communication, less consultation, and
less caring for one another” (p. 13). Since Christian love begins at
home, it is hard to see how we could follow this suggestion and at the
same time be true to Deimel’s useful précis of Anglicanism as “an
approach to Christianity that fosters unity while encouraging advances
in Christian understanding” (p. 6).
Perhaps the bottom line, therefore, in
terms of reasonable response to Deimel would simply say: granting that
some conservatives have regularly asked for more than Windsor, this does
not mean that all conservatives “will not be satisfied irrespective of
what General Convention does” (p. 11). For many of us—along with most
Episcopalians?—hold a much more modest hope that a minimum offering of
conciliation and restraint, in the reasonable terms of Windsor,
is what is needed, and is easily graspable by General Convention. In
this case, of course, Deimel’s either/or between proper progressives and
“militant traditionalists” would give way to a genuine third option for
the Episcopal Church, namely, the opportunity to grow, for the first
time, into a more articulately catholic and evangelical way of being
church—precisely in communion with other Anglican churches,
gathered around the historic See of Canterbury, and with a view to wider
ecumenical usefulness and faithfulness. Such a development would be
consistent, as well, with the historical “genius” of Anglicanism as a
means to an end—in the Church, in Christ.
Previous: Conclusion by Lionel
Deimel
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