Anglicans claim to be part of the Reformed Western catholic tradition and one of the most visible ways that continuity over the centuries is maintained is through episcopacy, which the English evangelical reformers of the 16th century quite deliberately retained in contrast to their continental counterparts.
Was that wise? In the present-day Anglican Provinces of the West, the claim to Reformed catholicity is looking ever more dubious as apostolic substance ebbs away. Moreover, disunity and doctrinal incoherence in the Anglican Communion has been an episcopally led phenomenon.
The current crisis was triggered by the consecration of Gene Robinson in 2003 as bishop of New Hampshire, despite his being quite openly in a same sex partnership, and the English bishops are all too often weather-vanes of the liberal establishment.
Presbyterian and Independent Evangelicals might therefore feel confirmed in their views about episcopacy, even if not subscribing to the judgment of the anonymous Puritan author of the late 16th-century Marprelate Tract that all bishops are ‘pettie Antichrists’.
Bishop Andy Lines
However, a much more positive picture of episcopacy is emerging from the Anglican realignment. Where bishops have failed to preserve apostolicity and unity, others need to arise, and this is precisely what is happening, first in North America, more recently in Brazil and now in Great Britain. As an initiative of Jesmond Parish Church and its plants, Jonathan Pryke has already been consecrated as missionary bishop for the north east of England and, following the Scottish Episcopal Church’s decision to adopt same sex marriage, Gafcon has announced that Canon Andy Lines is being consecrated as a missionary bishop for Scotland and elsewhere in Europe as necessary.
Gafcon does not have a monopoly on the global reformation that is taking place within the Anglican Communion, but it does have a leading role. Canon Lines’ consecration is taking place at the General Assembly of the Anglican Church of North America (27-30 June), in which the Gafcon Primates are all participating, and this is really just one manifestation of how the role of the bishop is now being recovered and used to lead mission and bring about godly unity.
Bishops enthused for mission
Central to the vision of a gospel-hearted episcopate is Gafcon’s Bishops’ Training Institute. Based in Kenya, it opened its doors in October last year and now sees a steady flow of recently-consecrated bishops from around the Communion being enthused for mission and teaching the Bible. The Director, recently-retired Bishop Samson Mwaluda, is a gifted evangelist and writer. His experience of leading a growing diocese in Kenya is reflected in his book Re-orientat- ing a Church for Accelerated Growth, and his conviction that a bishop must be a leader in evangelism shapes the structure of the course.
As a course designed to equip bishops for ministry in a global Communion, the course also builds networks between biblically-minded bishops and seeks to enhance their understanding of the challenges facing the Communion.
In contrast to the ‘Orientation’ courses offered by Lambeth, at which new bishops from the global south suddenly find themselves ‘unequally yoked’ with others who are teaching a false gospel, the Bishops’ Training Institute is a safe place for the gospel. Here, senior bishops and Gafcon Primates equip a rising generation to be courageous guardians of God’s Word and to recognise the ways that secularism, liberalism and Postmodernist trends can subvert the church.
Potential for good
Anglicans believe that episcopacy has potential for great good in the church of God, but it also has the capacity for great harm when the shepherds start to act like wolves. The harm is becoming increasingly obvious to those with eyes to see, but, in the mercy of God, that harm is becoming the catalyst for recovering the good.
