Catholics and Anglicans: Upon What Do We Base Our Morals?

In the first half of the fifty-year post-Vatican II period, international and national interchurch dialogue commissions addressed a range of doctrinal differences inherited from the 16th century Reformation era and produced joint or agreed statements on them. In the last twenty-five years or so, the perception has grown that Christian unity is now hampered more by emerging differences over current moral questions than by historic Reformation issues.

In 1994, the Anglican-Roman Catholic International Commission (ARCIC) published an agreed statement on morals entitled Life in Christ: Morals, Communion and the Church. In it, differences in the articulation of moral vision are presented as a matter of varying emphasis rather than substantive disagreement, or as different applications of agreed-upon principles which are not seen to present a significant challenge to moral teaching.

There has been in the history of Christian ethics a long standing debate as to what forms the primary ground of ethics: is it character or behavior? In other words, is the fundamental moral question �What kind of persons are we called to become?� or �What ought we to do?�

An example of the tension between the two approaches is found in two documents prepared independently of one another and published just months apart. In 1993, the papal encyclical Veritatis Splendor, basing its moral vision primarily on the concept of divine law, came down clearly on the side of behavior, while the ARCICLife in Christ document, taking a more relationship-responsibility angle of approach, tilted to the side of character.

As a result, in 1995 the Anglican-Roman Catholic Theological Consultation in the U.S.A (ARC-USA) produced a statement on Christian Ethics in the Ecumenical Dialogue in which it called for more attention to be given to �the contemporary influence of theological, geographical, and cultural diversity on the formulation of Anglican doctrines concerning moral questions, by contrast with the universal teaching that characterizes the Roman Catholic magisterium in such matters; and the role of ecclesiastical authority in shaping the formation of moral judgments by individual Christians and the whole Church.�

Last month, the current ARC-USA dialogue released a joint statement which did precisely that. Entitled Ecclesiology and Moral Discernment: Seeking a Unified Moral Witness, the statement, �submitted to the leadership and to all the faithful for their prayerful consideration,� focuses on how we teach and how we learn.

In its introduction on morals and church teaching, it identifies the relationship of ecclesiology�the nature, constitution, and functions of the church�to moral discernment as �the main issue before us. . . . It is critical to acknowledge how differently our two communions structure and exercise authority (3,4).�

The document describes the Anglican pattern of moral teaching as �dispersed and non-centralized, subject to possible error and correction.� While the Roman Catholic Church has �a supreme and authoritative teaching magisterium, . . . the particular churches of the Anglican Communion, by contrast, are episcopally ordered and self-governing, with shared bodies or �instruments� for consultation and the articulation of teaching across the Communion� (par 23).

Such �articulations� of common teaching depend upon its reception within each particular church. �The absence of an authoritative universal magisterium among the churches of the Anglican Communion marks a signal difference in the structure of teaching authority� (29).

To be sure, there are Communion-wide gatherings such as the Lambeth Conference (decennial assemblies of bishops of the Anglican Communion convened by the Archbishop of Canterbury), �but Lambeth does not legislate for the churches of the Anglican Communion; its statements or resolutions must be adopted or otherwise accepted and received by the various self-governing churches of the Communion� (30).

Thus, over time, given theological, geographical, and cultural diversity it is not surprising that a plurality of practices and teachings emerge. Ecclesiology and Moral Discernment looks at two case-studies.

The first is Migration/Immigration. The Catholic Church�s shaping of the question takes place in papal encyclicals such as Pope John XXIII�s Pacem in terris or Vatican II�s Gaudium et spes.

In the U.S., the Anglican/Episcopal moral teaching on immigration titledThe Nation and the Common Good (September 2010) �is couched as a theological resource of the House of Bishops, not as a pastoral letter or teaching . . . and recognizes a variety of reasonable positions legitimately held by American citizens on this issue� (41).

The second case study examines each church�s teaching around same-sex relations, saying in summary at the end: �The Roman Catholic magisterium has articulated a definitive and universal teaching about sexual relations according to which the proper context for genital sex is marriage between a man and a woman whose union possesses the potential for creating and nurturing new life. The Catholic Church holds that same-sex unions, lacking this procreative and unitive potential, cannot be considered marriages.

�The Episcopal Church has authorized, for provisional use, liturgical resources for the blessing of same sex-relationships, and it offers theological reflection as rationale for the practice. It requires that these resources be used under the direction and with the permission of the diocesan bishop, provides safeguards for members of the church who decline to use them, and recognizes a diversity of teaching and practice within the Episcopal Church (58),� the statement says.

Whereas people might be tempted to say, �The Catholic Church teaches this on that question, and the Episcopal Church teaches the opposite,� it would be truer to say, �The Episcopal Church has no formal teaching on that question.�

Appropriately titled, Ecclesiology and Moral Discernment makes clear that the way in which each church teaches flows from its structures, which in turn shape the content of its teaching.

May 5, 2014

Fr. Thomas Ryan, CSP, directs the Paulist North American Office for Ecumenical and Interfaith Relations in Washington, DC.