Why Rowan Williams should respond early to AMIE

First, some news.

The good folk who previously bought you Anglican Mainstream and the Fellowship of Confessing Anglicans UK have a new venture.  The Anglican Mission in England has been announced at conference for conservative evangelicals last week.

Paul Perkin and Chris Sugden are the two names given on the press release, with Paul Perkin Chairman of the AMIE steering committee (also Chair of FCA UK and Anglican Mainstream Steering Committee member) and Chris Sugden in his usual role as secretary (also secretary of FCA UK and Executive Secretary of Anglican Mainstream).

This organisation appears to be a new name for the previously announced Saint Augustine Society.

The declared aims of the new society are the re-evangelisation of England, church planting and to provide alternative episcopal oversight to clergy who don't think their existing bishop is up to the mark.

And this is a pretty big warning sign.

We are told that AMIE has a steering committee and a panel of bishops overseeing the society, but we're not told who these people are.  Anglican Spread was at the launch, and tells us that the panel of bishops is Bishops Michael Nazir Ali, John Ball, Colin Bazley, Wallace Benn and John Ellison.  So no surprises there.

The next warning sign is this mention in the press release:

At the London conference three English clergy who have been ordained in Kenya for “ministry in the wider Anglican Communion” with the support of the GAFCON Prımates’ Councıl were welcomed and prayed with by bishops and church leaders in support of their ministry.

So perhaps a little context is required.

Anglican Mission in the Americas was formed in 2000 by the Rwandan Church when they thought the official Anglican churches in the US and the Canada were heading too far in the wrong direction (too gay friendly).  This has eventually led to the Anglican Church in North America being formed as a separatist movements, still claiming Anglican heritage, but outside the official Anglican Church structures.

So naming a society after this, with the involvement of clergy ordained in Africa is more than a coincidence.

Another piece of context worth remembering are the repeated threats from Reform, the chairman of which was present at the launch of AMIE and gave it his fulsome support.  Repeated threats have been made by Reform along the lines of "if you don't do what we want on gays and women bishops then we'll take our ball and play somewhere else".  More specifically, they threatened to stop sending ordinands to Anglican colleges and stop paying parish shares to dioceses.

This has been a pretty hollow threat until now, partly because the numbers involved are not worth worrying too much about, but also because there has not been a credible alternative destination for ordinands and funds.

It appears there is now.

Before we jump to any conclusions, we don't have any information yet on the intentions of AMIE - and in itself evangelism and church planting are good things.  But there are pretty ominous signs that this organisation's intent is to become a church within a church.  This could lead to 'irregular' ordinations, outside those approved by regular diocesan procedures.  In the US, this included the irregular ordination of bishops.

So, Mouse's question is how Rowan Williams will respond.

Mouse strongly recommends he does something.  Whilst a number of the bishops involved are retired, a number are still serving clergy, as are Chris Sugden and Paul Perkin.  Either way, the Church has the authority clergy disciplines measure at their disposal.  This applies to all members of the clergy, whether in active ministry or not.  The clergy discipline measure is rather hard to pin down in some respects, but it does give grounds for misconduct as acting in a way that is unbecoming or inappropriate to the office and work of the clergy.

Now, Mouse wouldn't want to suggest that this has already taken place, but it might be wise for Rowan to outline the circumstances under which this would be invoked.  For example, would irregular ordinations by AMIE result in discipline? Or what about simply accusing serving bishops of "failing in their canonical duty to uphold sound teaching".  This is the grounds on which 'alternative episcopal oversight' is being offered by AMIE.

Mouse suggests Rowan does two things.  First he should speak with the leadership of AMIE in its entirely and set out his views on how he will respond under various scenarios which could develop.  Second, he should make his views public, so that those who may be tempted to follow this organisation are aware of where they stand.