Notes of Episcopal Polity
The Episcopal Church has more than 2.4 million members in 7,679 congregations in 110 dioceses (and one similar geographic convocation) situated in 15 countries plus the United States.
Note on Dioceses, Congregations and Church Structure:
- Dioceses and congregations remain part of the Episcopal Church even when local leaders and/or a number of parishioners opt to leave the denomination as a matter of personal choice.
- Dioceses are created by the General Convention and cannot be dissolved without action of the General Convention in accordance with the provisions of the churchwide constitution and canons. Congregations, likewise, are created by a local diocese and continue within that structure unless otherwise decided by the local bishop in consultation with other elected diocesan leaders.
- Since 2003, some 30 congregations are known to the Episcopal News Service to have experienced the vote of a majority of members to consider part of an overseas Anglican Province. In many of these cases, an ongoing - albeit smaller - congregation continues within the Episcopal Church, the local diocese, and with a newly elected vestry.
http://www.episcopalchurch.org/3577_51499_ENG_HTM.htm
How does the Episcopal Church differ from the Anglican Church?
The 2.4-million member Episcopal Church is part of the 77-million-member Anglican Communion that spans 164 countries worldwide.What is the Lambeth Commission, and what is its mandate?
The Lambeth Commission on Communion, chaired by the Primate of All Ireland, Archbishop Robin Eames, was requested by the Primates of the Anglican Communion at their meeting in London, October 2003. The commission was asked to report on how the worldwide communion's Anglican/Episcopal churches, or provinces, can maintain communion, especially amid differing viewpoints.[Note: The Lambeth Commission on Communion should not be misidentified as the "Eames Commission" which was a similar panel that in 1993 reported on the roles of women in ministry.]
The Commission was mandated by the Archbishop of Canterbury in October, 2003. The Archbishop of Canterbury requested the Commission:
To examine and report to him by 30th September 2004, in preparation for the ensuing meetings of the Primates and the Anglican Consultative Council, on the legal and theological implications flowing from the decisions of the Episcopal Church (USA) to elect a priest in a committed same sex relationship as one of its bishops, and of the Diocese of New Westminster to authorize services for use in connection with same sex unions, and specifically on the canonical understandings of communion, impaired and broken communion, and the ways in which provinces of the Anglican Communion may relate to one another in situations where the ecclesiastical authorities of one province feel unable to maintain the fullness of communion with another part of the Anglican Communion. Within their report, to include practical recommendations (including reflection on emerging patterns of provision for episcopal oversight for those Anglicans within a particular jurisdiction, where full communion within a province is under threat) for maintaining the highest degree of communion that may be possible in the circumstances resulting from these decisions, both within and between the churches of the Anglican Communion. Thereafter, as soon as practicable, and with particular reference to the issues raised in Section IV of the Report of the Lambeth Conference 1998, to make recommendations to the Primates and the Anglican Consultative Council, as to the exceptional circumstances and conditions under which, and the means by which, it would be appropriate for the Archbishop of Canterbury to exercise an extraordinary ministry of episcope (pastoral oversight), support and reconciliation with regard to the internal affairs of a province other than his own for the sake of maintaining communion with the said province and between the said province and the rest of the Anglican Communion. In its deliberations, to take due account of the work already undertaken on issues of communion by the Lambeth Conferences of 1988 and 1998, as well as the views expressed by the Primates of the Anglican Communion in the communiqués and pastoral letters arising from their meetings since 2000. http://www.episcopalchurch.org/3577_51047_ENG_HTM.htm
Theology
