The Vatican has signaled it may be open to ecumenical dialogue with the new, conservative breakaway Global Anglican Communion, a move that would upend decades of Catholic-Anglican relations centered on the See of Canterbury, the English church’s historic “first among equals.”
In a significant development first reported by the German Catholic outlet Katholisch, a top Vatican official publicly questioned who the Catholic Church’s official dialogue partner will be following the Anglican Communion’s recent historic split.
Cardinal Kurt Koch, a Swiss cleric who serves as head of the Vatican’s Dicastery for Promoting Christian Unity, made the remarks at a symposium held in his honor in Vallendar, Germany.
Cardinal Kurt Koch
Koch noted the appointment of Sarah Mullally as the archbishop of Canterbury — and her positions on sexual ethics — had led to the formal split between the conservative GAFCON movement and the more liberal Church of England.
This division, Koch stated, raises a critical question for the Catholic Church: “Who will we dialogue with in the future if the Anglican world community is so divided?”
Koch’s question is the first public acknowledgment from a high-ranking Vatican official that the GAC — the new body formed by GAFCON — is being taken seriously as a potential ecumenical partner.
For decades, the official Anglican-Roman Catholic International Commission has been conducted exclusively with the Anglican Communion as represented by the archbishop of Canterbury.
The GAFCON/GAC schism occurred in October. Citing “moral compromise” and the election of Mullally, GAFCON provinces, which claim to represent the majority of Anglicans worldwide, declared themselves the true Anglican Communion and broke all ties with Canterbury.
Cardinal Koch’s comments explicitly link this split to the ongoing debates over the blessing of same-sex unions and other “sexual ethics issues” that have divided the communion.
They are also different compared to more irenic remarks he had made just one month earlier, where he lamented the divisions in the Anglican Church: “Such profound division within individual communions makes reconciliation between separated communions and churches much more complicated to achieve. We need to recall that our divisions are scandalous counter-signs and so redouble our efforts to transcend them. Above all, we need to intensify our prayer.”
While the motive behind this ostensible change in tune is unknown, one thing remains certain: While not a formal offer of dialogue, Koch’s public musing sends a powerful and unignorable message. If there is going to be Anglican-Catholic dialogue, it must seriously account for this new expression that claims millions of Anglicans, most of whom live in the Global South.