Lambeth - Interview with the Director of the Anglican Centre in Rome

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Lambeth Daily
An Interview with the Director of the Anglican Centre in Rome
Posted On : July 29, 2008 5:03 PM | Posted By : Admin ACO
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Rome’s concern highlights importance of Gospel message of unity

Some in the Anglican Communion may have found 
themselves a little irritated by the amount of 
rhetoric that has issued from the Vatican in 
recent weeks on the divisions facing the church. 
The Anglican Representative of the Archbishop of 
Canterbury in the Holy See, the Very Revd David 
Richardson, says that instead, the concerns of 
the Roman Catholic Church should be taken as a 
very positive reminder that the unity of the church is God’s will.

While the Pope was in Australia celebrating World 
Youth Day, he urged the Anglican Church to avoid 
schism, and Cardinal Dias warned in his address 
to the Lambeth Conference about the dangers of disunity to evangelism.

“My take on it at this stage,” says Revd 
Richardson, “is that there is a lot of investment 
from the Roman Catholic Church in the Anglican 
Church cohering, for a whole range of reasons 
 
the last thing they want to see is a church 
structurally split.” Schism, from the point of 
view of the Roman Catholic Church was therefore, 
he said, “a really much more serious issue than 
the discipline or moral theological issues with which we’re wrestling.”

That’s not to say that the Vatican is not 
concerned with the issues of women bishops or 
homosexuality (although the latter may be more of 
a priority for the press than for Rome or indeed 
the entire Anglican Communion).

“Ecumenical processes never run smoothly, and 
life moves on,” Revd Richardson says. “While 
you’re writing a report, at the end of it you 
find that something different has taken place. It 
may be that women have been ordained or a Pope 
has died, or an Archbishop of Canterbury has 
resigned. We’re an evolving institution.”

Revd Richardson is excited by the questions 
canvassed in the nature of the various ARCIC and IARCCUM documents:

“What is the faith? Is the apostolic faith 
something that was parcelled up and completed at 
Chalcedon or is it something that is still 
emerging? That is a theological question that is 
part of the wrestle. That’s an exiting thing that 
the two parties are committed to continuing.”

Being Director of the Anglican Centre entails 
more than exploring the minutiae of ecumenical 
relationships however, and it is a very different 
sort of job than his previous role as Dean of St 
Paul’s Cathedral, Melbourne, Australia.

“It’s a multi layered role, and it’s a role that 
in a sense each person creates,” he says. “Part 
of creating it is getting to know people, making 
networks, listening, interpreting, and 
understanding. Then there’s teaching, running 
courses, and developing the educational 
programs.” With the current lack of 
infrastructure, he says he is learning a lot of new skills “at great speed”.

While he had more staff to take care of things in 
Melbourne to do some of the more mundane tasks, 
he says, “I suppose a great deal of what I’m 
taking into my role is stuff that I learned 
accidentally in Melbourne. I hope in some sense 
Melbourne matured me, and helped me to look for 
other interpretations, explanations, and nuances, 
than the one that immediately hits you in the 
face. And so I suppose [I’ve gained] a level of 
theological reflection, of being able to talk to 
people, get beside people, and understand where they’ve coming from.”

“What am I bringing to the role? I think I’m 
bringing me, who for nearly a sixth of my life 
was formed by being Dean of Melbourne.”

- staff writer