Anglicans called to accept Pope's primacy (Great Britain).

The Pope's authority over the Christian world has been recognized by an Anglican-Roman Catholic commission in a document released May 12, 1999, after five years of debate.

Called The Gift of Authority, the 43-page document was prepared by the 18-member Anglican-Roman-Catholic International Commission (ARCIC). This commission functions under the auspices of the Anglican Consultative Council and the Pontifical Council for Promoting Christian Unity.

The statement, which is not binding on either church, described the pope as a "gift to be received by all the churches" and accepted that the Bishop of Rome would exercise a universal primacy in a united church, reports the June 1999 edition of the Toronto-based Anglican Journal. The commission also proposed that Anglicans worldwide accept the pope's authority even before full communion is reached between the two denominations.

The Gift of Authority could be a great step forward in Anglican-Catholic relations, as disagreement over papal authority was the chief cause of the English Reformation in the 16th century, and has been a formidable obstacle to reunion of the two churches.

But it has drawn criticism from both the more Protestant wing of the Anglicans, and liberal Catholics. Mark Birchal, a member of the Church of England Evangelical council, as quoted in the Anglican Journal, said: "It speaks as if the Bishop of Rome has always been on the side of the angels, while it is well known that for several centuries past the Bishop of Rome was certainly not."

And piping up on behalf of "liberal" Catholics, Margaret Hebblethwaite, a frequent contributor to The Tablet, suggested that the document was an attempt by the Anglicans to appease the Vatican: "Everything most obnoxious to Anglicans about the (Roman) Catholic view of authority is here.... Even Catholics are alarmed by the current abuse of authority in the Vatican."

The document suggests that, in a new united church, decision would be made by consensus through councils, not based solely on the opinion of one man, the Anglican Journal stated. It pointed out that the document "remains ambiguous about what would happen when no agreement could be reached."

It also noted that publication of the statement doesn't mean, necessarily, that Anglicans "are about to accept the authority of the current Pope, John Paul II," as further discussions are required-and may last years-- if the proposals in the document are to be implemented.

The document is the result of further work on authority requested by both churches, and the document will be discussed by primates of the Anglican Communion and presidents of Catholic Bishops Conferences when they hold a first-ever summit in Toronto in May 2000.

The London Daily Telegraph said on February 19 that the particular focus of that meeting would be on how Anglicans could accept papal primacy. "At stake is the inflammable question of the papacy: In what circumstances could Anglicans envision entering into full communion with the Pope? And on the Catholic side, to what extent is the papacy prepared to accommodate the Anglican bottom line, whatever that may be?"

Comment

The Gift of Authority has the right title, something which people who are suspicious of authority may find strange. But in Christianity the authority of God-revealed by Our Lord Jesus-is the under-pinning of the whole structure of belief and therefore is seen as a gift from God. Through the direct succession of bishops from the days of the apostles to modem times, the Catholic Church, in accord with Scripture, has maintained the Primacy of the Bishop of Rome and thereby defended the "deposit of faith" under the guidance of the Holy Spirit.

One new book which is worthwhile reading is Upon this Rock: St. Peter and the Primacy of Rome in Scripture and the early Church by Stephen Ray (San Francisco, Ignatius Press, 1999, 333 pages, $16.95 US).