Diocesan News09 Jun 08

Bishop Colton: Anglican Covenant raises issues of canon law

Speaking to members of the Church of Ireland in Cork, Cloyne and Ross at their annual Diocesan Synod on Saturday 7th June, the Bishop of Cork, the Rt Revd Paul Colton, said that the proposed Anglican Covenant which will be debated at next month’s Lambeth Conference raises some major issues for the Church of Ireland.

The Bishop said ‘... the proposed Anglican Covenant, if progressed through the central Anglican structures, the so-called Instruments of Unity, and if it is to be binding on the Church of Ireland, will have to come to the General Synod for ratification and incorporation into the law of the Church of Ireland.’

However, he said: ‘We already have our Preamble and Declaration.  It too is a solemn document and covenantal in character: a covenant with and between ourselves formulated at a cathartic time of crisis. Drawn up in 1870 in anticipation of the disestablishment of the Church of Ireland, it is for us one of our title deeds. ‘

Bishop Colton raised questions which he said would have to be addressed, among them:

• ‘Is the proposed Covenant entirely consonant with our existing formularies, including the Preamble and Declaration?
• What will its status be as a solemn covenant alongside the Preamble and Declaration?
• In places each says the same things, but using different language and in different ways: will that prove enriching or problematic?
• In some matters the Preamble and Declaration are silent where the Covenant is not; and conversely, the Covenant has things to say which the Preamble and Declaration do not.
• The Anglican Covenant will become the yardstick of communion throughout Anglicanism, whereas the Preamble and Declaration states that the Church of Ireland will maintain communion with the sister Church of England, and with all other Christian Churches agreeing in the principles of this Declaration. 
• The Preamble and Declaration declares that the General Synod of the Church of Ireland shall have chief legislative power in the Church of Ireland and such administrative power as is consistent with its episcopal constitution.  The proposed Covenant would require the Church of Ireland to look beyond its General Synod and to consult with other churches and with the instruments of unity before making certain decisions; a compromise on our autonomy.
• Some of the Instruments of Unity will acquire a quasi-judicial character which may, in some measure, eclipse our own autonomous legislative and judicial bodies.’
 
See also Bishop Colton encourages a new approach to Canterbury appointment