Archbishop Emeritus Duncan has weighed in via a letter released by Clark Lowenfield. He goes to some length to say that the current crisis has nothing to do with Holy Orders/women’s ordination. This indicates to me that there is agitation behind the scenes on this front, or why would he feel the need to address it? His letter follows.
11 November, A.D. 2025
Remembrance Day
Commemoration of St. Martin of Tours
Beloved in the Lord:
In earlier days when I did lots of spiritual direction for young believers I would, at some point, often ask: “What is your favorite picture of the Lord?” Sometimes the answer came very quickly. Sometimes there was some reflection before an answer was given. Generally speaking, the images were fairly few in number: Christ the Good Shepherd, especially the Christ with a lamb on his shoulders, body wrapped around the Shepherd’s neck… Christ with a small child on his lap… Christ on the cross, looking down with the words “Father, forgive” on his lips. The resurrected Christ lovingly addressing the Magdalene: “Mary.” Christ walking on the water speaking to Peter: “Come to me” with the sea raging all around. I often encouraged the directee to find a representation of the likeness to which he or she had pointed and then to place it on or over the desk where each labored, or by the prayer chair where each sat, or within sight of the bed by which each knelt and eventually slept.
Our Church, the Anglican Church in North America, is passing through a season of troubling crises. These crises have especially involved the disciplinary system we thought would be adequate at our birth and the apostolic office around which we built this church. Because my experience of institutions and organizations is that their development often parallels the phases of human development, I suspect that these crises might be likened to adolescent trials. Those who know me will not be shocked to know that my two favorite movies are Braveheart [“Men don’t follow titles, they follow courage.”] and Sound of Music [“I am sixteen, going on seventeen.”].
Eighteen of my first twenty years of ordained ministry were spent on campuses, largely ministering to late adolescents and early twenty-somethings. For those whose backgrounds included great trials (as mine had), I could say, with assurance, that the worst things you have endured are the things – if you will give them to the Lord – that the Lord will use as the greatest strengths of your future ministry and service to Him.
Will the Anglican Church in North America get through these present trials? Yes, if we give them to Him, if we do not run from them, if we allow everything that is wrong out into the light, if we submit again and again to His Word and His Way.
That is actually our DNA. We were willing to sacrifice all that we had to try to be a New Testament Church. We were so committed to trying to reach North America (and the world) with the transforming love of Jesus Christ, that we were willing to submit to a vision of being Biblical, Missionary, and United, all with the recognition that we were sinners and could not do this thing on our own.
There are those who would try to use of our initial and unanimously agreed “settlements” as the reasons for our present problems. Those who were our leaders in the Common Cause Partnership and Anglican Communion Network days (2000-2008) would attest that there was no other route to coming together, ending forty years of continuing orthodox fragments. We accepted the necessity of both complementarian and egalitarian integrities of women in Holy Orders at the parochial and diocesan levels, and we accepted the relational reality of overlapping episcopal jurisdictions based on the global lifeboats and existing dioceses out of which we were formed. The present difficulties, I would suggest, have little to do with the first settlement (it is a complementarian [all male] College of Bishops after all) and arguably little to do with the second. The early accommodations were about conflicts faced and a way forward accepted. Present troubles are about a needs-improvement disciplinary system, about apostles whose fallback is often unacceptable conflict avoidance, and about the simple reality of human sin, which, apart from God’s grace, leaders succumb to like all the rest of humanity.
What we did in the founding years we must do again. Face the troubles head-on. Put our failures and challenges in the light. Ask what the Lord wants of us for Kingdom outcomes… We can’t end the storm or still the sea, but He can. Give it to Him and He will.
Faithfully in Christ,
+Archbishop Bob
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