Archbishop Justin Welby is well known for his skills and devotion to reconciliation in conflict areas; he has made it a top priority in his role as Archbishop of Canterbury. Prior to participating in the consecration of the new chapel at Virginia Theological Seminary, he gave an address to the Council on Foreign Relations where he spoke of reconciliation being part of the DNA of Anglicanism (video below)
However, not everyone sees his efforts at reconciliation within the Anglican Communion as helpful. Mark Harris, writing on his blog, Preludium, says;
So what’s the big deal? It’s hard to say. Perhaps the ABC believes he has to intervene in order to get people talking to each other. Maybe so. But the backfire is this: The ABC is clearly becoming an activist in the effort to get members of ACNA and TEC (and the Anglican Church of Canada?) in the same room together. This may be a good idea indeed. But here’s the rub. For the ABC to mess about in his own yard is fine. For the ABC to mess about in our yard, for even the best sorts of reasons, is exercising a ministry of uninvited super – primatial oversight.
But others feel that this work is necessary and that a certain amount of “mucking about” is needed to address where the Episcopal Church (and Anglican Church of Canada and the Scottish Episcopal Church) has gone in its discernment of the Spirit to become more inclusive. Peter Carrell, a priest in New Zealand, has a short response to Harris on his blog, Anglicans Down Under, titled “What Preludium doesn’t get.” Though, we suspect that Mark Harris is fully aware that many other Anglican provinces view TEC as “Ecclesia non grata.”