An analysis of the development of local traditions within the Anglican Communion, shedding light on issues of unity and diversity in the global Church.Anglicans around the world have responded to the gospel in many different cultural contexts. This has produced different customs and different ways of thinking about church issues. In the process of enculturation Anglicans have found themselves encountering social and political realities as malign forces against which they have had to struggle. As a consequence, the personal and local dynamic in Anglicanism has created not just diversity of custom and mental habits, but it has done so at points that have been vital to the way Anglicans have been committed to the gospel. Conflict and the Practice of Christian Faith looks at the process by which local traditions developed in Christianity and how these traditions have related to other sub-traditions of the universal church. It assesses some specifics of the Anglican experience and argues for a significant re-casting of some prominent elements of that tradition, at the same time clarifying some of the distinctive elements in the Anglican tradition. This leads to a more nuanced appreciation of the force of the social and political framework within which Anglicans have had to work out their salvation and of the different forms of secular society and different understandings of plurality and diversity. It also entails showing how the imperial route to catholicity took no firm root in Anglicanism. Going global has been a significant experiment in Anglican ecclesiology that is by no means over yet. The terms of that experiment lie at the heart of the current Anglican debates. The book will be of interest to Christians generally who belong to faith traditions spread across different cultures. It is also a case study of the issues of global reach and local tradition.
Thanks for the memories--well, maybe not. It has been hard work getting over the break up of the fifteen-hundred-year Anglican marriage of church and state--the so-called English Christendom. It is still a work in progress because the marriage left behind so many unconscious assumptions about power, institutions, and community relations. The first group of essays in this book challenges some of the frozen elements in church institutions, in particular habits of orthodoxy, catholicity, and canonical Scripture. They are framed in the context of the struggles of the Anglican Communion. The second set of essays refer to the Anglican Church of Australia and some attempts at de-frosting its institutions. These are lectures and papers given across Australia mostly during the author''s time as General Secretary of the Anglican Church of Australia. The last essay is an account of a current struggle over the blessing of a same-sex couple legally married under recently changed civil law. It illustrates the role of the constitution of the church in this dispute. The loose federation of dioceses in the constitution has generally enabled dioceses to live separately. The danger in this has been the specter of a church made up of diocesan silos rather than of engaged fellowship. However, the federal structure does not need to work that way. Indeed, in the present conflict situation this very looseness could be used to provide space for more respectful engagement. How this crisis is handled will be an early clue as to whether the church is up to it.