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VICTORIA, BC: Christian Episcopal Church Leader Calls for Full Communion among Continuers
By David W. Virtue in Victoria, BC
www.virtueonline.org
June 2, 2011
The Bishop of the Richmond, BC, based Christian Episcopal Church called on the Congress of Traditional Anglicans meeting here to unite all the Continuing Anglican bodies in "one bond of communion and fellowship within that Body which is His holy Catholic Church."
Bishop Robert D. Redmile said the congress focus on "reaffirmation" needed "real oneness in the Body of Christ and needed to be united together. "I believe this can be achieved is we can only agree on a 'Basis for full Communion' upon which we can build together in unity, an irreducible minimum of principles that will become for us the foundation of our common fellowship."
"I propose that we here at this Congress should formulate just such a 'basis for full communion' amongst ourselves, an d that we come together to form a communion of Catholic and apostolic Anglican churches and that we then take this back with us to our respective jurisdictions to be considered by our several Synods for their approval."
Redmile added that it should contain the following fundamental principles: That full and visible communion should exist between all Anglican Christians who uphold, maintain, preserve, and teach the true orthodox Christian Faith and Catholic Religion as set forth in the canonical Scriptures of the Old and New Testaments, and as are expressed in the three great Catholic Creeds, and the Dogmatic Definitions of the undisputed Ecumenical Councils; who accept the two Sacraments of the Gospel, that is to say, the sacred mysteries of Baptism and the Lord's Supper, as being generally necessary to salvation, and who believe and teach the Catholic doctrines of the Eucharistic Sacrifice and the Real Presence of Christ in that Holy Supper; who accept those five other sacred mysteries also commonly called sacraments, that is to say Confirmation, Penance, Matrimony, Orders, and Unction, as means of grace imparted to faithful Christians according to their calling in Christ; who uphold, maintain and preserve the Three-fold Ministry in its fullness and integrity, and the unbroken Apostolic Succession; who uphold, protect, and defend the sanctity of human life from conception to natural death, and the sanctity of marriage and the family; and who strive to live as true and loyal Christians in this present world as they look for the long-awaited fulfillment of the blessed hope, and the glorious appearing of the great God and our Savior Jesus Christ, and the establishing of His everlasting kingdom.
"These, for me, are the essential truths of the Catholic Religion, and the doctrinal foundation of the Anglican Tradition, and the irreducible minimum for full communion of traditional Anglicans one with another.
"Then we can leave this Congress, not only feeling that we have, by the grace of God, come to the point where we can agree together, but where we can also begin to walk together in that agreement, and start again to rebuild our portion of the Catholic Church upon the sure foundation of Jesus Christ."
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