One of things that I find myself doing a lot here at St. Mark's is explaining to parishioners and our gobs of visitors (St. Mark's is kind of like a tourist destination here in Vero Beach) how we are not in communion with TEC and Canterbury. This usually takes these folk by surprise. They can't seem to imagine (or it never occured to them) how one can be Anglican or Episcopalian without being in TEC, or in communion with the Archbishop of Canterbury. This I find fascinating. It is like saying that a copy machine cannot be a copy machine unless it is made by the Xerox company. And as I have said before, it is like saying that Ford motor company owns the word "sedan". People wrongly think of the corporate structure of the "official" Anglican Communion and the ABC as being of the essence of Anglicanism.
We read these days that the average Anglican is probably is poor black woman in Africa, and how "Anglican" doesn't equal "rich, white, males" (and hasn't for sometime). Anglicanism is global and multi-cultural. This is certainly true. So likewise, being Anglican no longer only means being in communion with TEC and Canterbury (and hasn't for some time), or being part of their revisionist club. As those bodies have, on an official level, long since fallen into heresy in so many ways, we could not be in communion with them even if they paid us (NB: there are many faithful remnant parishes for the time being within these bodies). Our being seperate from these folk is not about being "schismatic", it is about preserving and continuing the orthodox faith. When the leaders of the Church fail to uphold the vows they made at their consecrations - spceifically about "banishing and driving away from the Church all erroneous and strange doctrine contrary to God's Word" (BCP, p. 555), others of us must act. By failing to uphold their vows, the leaders of TEC, the CofE, and many other provinces of the "official" Anglican Communion, have shown themselves to be the ones who are schismatic. If they want to ordain women and practicing gays, teach universalism, and so on, then so be it - they can do what they want to in their club. But as for us we will take the orthodox faith in its Anglican expression and continue fulfilling the Great Commission.
Anglicanism is, more than ever before, about an idea. It is about a common, reformed catholic theology and liturgy that is centered on the authority of the scriptures as interpreted by the tradition of the undivided Church and our formularies. Being Anglican is about being faithful stewards of the faith once delivered to the saints. In the long run this will prove to be one of our strengths. The obsession that some have about being in communion with the See of Canterbury is nothing but a distraction, and it is like making the ABC a "pope", or an intrinsic part of what it means to be Anglican. I reject that. The Roman Church can't exist without the pope, but we can certainly exist without being in communion with TEC, the ABC, and their associates.
