From the President of Forward in Faith North America

23 May 2017

It is with much gratitude that we welcome the publication of the Final Report of the ACNA Holy Orders Task Force.  This completes a five-year project which was authorized by the ACNA College of Bishops and is designed as a resource to them in their conversations, particularly around the vexing matter of women’s ordination.  In the Recommendations by the Task Force at the end of the 318-page document, they state that “both positions on this issue cannot be right,” and acknowledge that the dual practice permitted at the founding of the ACNA as a condition of its launch is “an impediment to a unified sacramental ministry of our province.”  It is further acknowledged that “both positions are held by good and godly people” and that movement towards resolution “should be done with patience and the leading of the Holy Spirit.”

Nothing like this report has been done within Anglicanism, and we commend it to all of our members, whether in ACNA or another jurisdiction. Our consistent endorsement of the historic, received position can only be enhanced by this opportunity for open engagement with those on the other side from a foundation of hermeneutics and ecclesiology.

In his Foreward, ACNA Archbishop Foley Beach offers several helpful guidelines for those who are invested in this issue, and the first two are particularly helpful:

1) Don’t comment on the report until you have read it all.
2) Don’t comment on the report until you can fairly articulate the opposite point of view [to your own].

Faithfully,
The Rev. Canon Lawrence D. Bausch

The report may be downloaded here.