Common Cause Partnership

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The Common Cause Partnership was an alliance and then a federation of orthodox Anglican bodies in North America, formed in 2004, that became the Anglican Church in North America (ACNA) in 2009. Its history involves three distinct kinds of relationship that are often confused: membership in a common province, recognition between churches, and agreement on the theology of Holy Orders. The partnership brought together bodies that disagreed about the ordination of women to the diaconate and the priesthood, while agreeing that women would not be consecrated bishops. Traditionalist bodies participated on the basis of protected diocesan freedom and stated hopes for future agreement, not on the basis of a founding agreement that the practice would end by a fixed date; no such province-wide agreement has been documented.

The June 2004 alliance

On 6 June 2004, Trinity Sunday, six leaders wrote jointly to the Archbishop of Canterbury, Rowan Williams, announcing that their bodies would "make common cause for the gospel of Jesus Christ and common cause for a united, missionary and orthodox Anglicanism in North America."[1] The letter was explicit about what the alliance was not: "This is not a declaration of organic unity — far from it."[1] The accompanying release described the alliance as representing approximately 200,000 Christians, a figure given as the release's own claim.[1]

The six signatories were:[1]

  • The Rt. Rev. Robert Wm. Duncan, Moderator of the Network of Anglican Communion Dioceses and Parishes;
  • The Most Rev. Leonard W. Riches, Presiding Bishop of the Reformed Episcopal Church;
  • The Rt. Rev. Charles H. Murphy III, Bishop Chairman of the Anglican Mission in America;
  • The Rev. David L. Moyer, President of Forward in Faith North America;
  • The Most Rev. Walter H. Grundorf, Presiding Bishop of the Anglican Province of America;
  • The Rev. David C. Anderson, President of the American Anglican Council.

Neither the Church of Nigeria nor the Convocation of Anglicans in North America (CANA) was an original signatory. Nigeria's involvement came through separate arrangements described below.

Three distinct bodies: AAC, FiFNA, and FACA

The American Anglican Council (AAC), Forward in Faith North America (FiFNA), and the Federation of Anglican Churches in the Americas (FACA) were distinct organizations with different characters, and none of them simply became ACNA.

American Anglican Council

The AAC describes itself as an independent nonprofit organization founded in 1996. It states that it does not carry out ordinations or consecrations and is a non-ecclesial body.[2] It helped organize the realignment movement and develop ACNA, and it remains independent of ACNA while being listed by ACNA as one of its officially recognized Ministry Partners.[2][3] The fact that an AAC president, David Anderson, transferred his personal canonical residence to CANA and became a CANA bishop in 2007 did not make the AAC itself a Nigerian jurisdiction; the AAC's institutional identity remained separate from any province.[2]

Forward in Faith North America

FiFNA traces its roots to the Episcopal Synod of America, founded in 1989, and took the Forward in Faith North America name in 1999. Its 2000 assembly called for "an orthodox Province of the Anglican Communion in North America."[4] FiFNA's distinctive concerns have been apostolic order, sacramental life, and a male priesthood. It is also listed by ACNA as an officially recognized Ministry Partner.[3] FiFNA's Missionary Diocese of All Saints was formed alongside the creation of ACNA in June 2009; its first bishop, William Ilgenfritz, was the first bishop consecrated of Forward in Faith North America in ACNA, on 22 August 2009, and the diocese was formally recognized as a full ACNA diocese in 2013.[5]

Federation of Anglican Churches in the Americas

FACA was a separate federation, formed in 2006, of Continuing Anglican jurisdictions. In an April 2008 synod address, Bishop Paul Hewett of the Diocese of the Holy Cross listed its members as the Anglican Province of America, the Reformed Episcopal Church, the Anglican Church in America, the Episcopal Missionary Church, the Anglican Mission in America, and the Diocese of the Holy Cross, "some 500 parishes altogether," and described the federation as "now a partner with Common Cause, itself a federation."[6] FACA was therefore a partner of the Common Cause Partnership, not a part of it, and it did not merge wholesale into ACNA. Its members made separate decisions: the Reformed Episcopal Church entered ACNA as a founding jurisdiction, while the federation itself continued as a distinct body. The federation's later history and present status are not documented in the sources consulted for this article, and no dissolution date is asserted here.

From alliance to federation to province

The alliance developed in stages, with encouragement from overseas Anglican leaders but without admission to the structures of the Anglican Communion.

In September 2006, the Global South meeting at Kigali, chaired by Archbishop Peter J. Akinola of Nigeria, declared that "the time has now come to take initial steps towards the formation of what will be recognized as a separate ecclesiastical structure of the Anglican Communion in the USA."[7]

In December 2007, the Common Cause Leadership Council, with three delegates from each partner, met in Orlando, elected Duncan as moderator, and ratified a theological statement and articles of federation. The December 2007 communiqué stated that partners would "continue to live out [their] unique role, maintaining [their] distinctive ministry and character," and that the articles called for partner autonomy unrestricted by membership.[8] The partners listed at that date included the Network of Anglican Communion Dioceses and Parishes, the AAC, the Anglican Coalition in Canada, Anglican Essentials Canada, the Anglican Mission in America, the Anglican Network in Canada, the Anglican Province of America, CANA, FiFNA, and the Reformed Episcopal Church.[8]

In June 2008, the Global Anglican Future Conference (GAFCON) in Jerusalem stated that "the time is now ripe for the formation of a province in North America for the federation currently known as Common Cause Partnership to be recognised by the Primates' Council."[9]

On 3 December 2008, the Common Cause Council announced the emerging province, adopting a provisional constitution and nine initial canons. The inaugural Provincial Assembly met 22–25 June 2009 in Bedford, Texas, where the constitution and canons were amended and finally ratified and Duncan was installed as the first Archbishop.[2]

Nigeria's three distinct relationships

The Church of Nigeria related to the North American realignment in three different ways, and they should not be collapsed into one.

1. CANA: canonical shelter

In 2005, the Church of Nigeria established the Convocation of Anglicans in North America (CANA) as its North American missionary jurisdiction, giving clergy, congregations, and bishops direct canonical oversight under Nigeria. A letter of 7 April 2005 announced the mission; constitutional changes by Nigeria's General Synod in September 2005 completed its legal framework; contemporary reporting described CANA as a "safe harbour" for alienated Anglicans.[10] CANA participated in the Common Cause federation and became a founding jurisdiction of ACNA in 2009, while retaining its Nigerian affiliation. That dual arrangement lasted until 2019 (see below). Nigerian canonical residence did not automatically produce universally accepted status within the Anglican Communion, and the legitimacy of overseas intervention was contested by The Episcopal Church and some Communion authorities.

2. The 12 November 2005 covenant with the REC and the APA

Separately, on 12 November 2005 in Pittsburgh, Archbishop Peter J. Akinola entered a covenant of concordat with the Reformed Episcopal Church and the Anglican Province of America, signed by Akinola, Presiding Bishop Leonard Riches (REC), and Presiding Bishop Walter Grundorf (APA).[10][11] The covenant pledged mutual cooperation, support, discipline, and accountability; provided that ministers of each church, subject to their own jurisdictions' regulations, might exercise pastoral ministry in the others; and, in Article 6, expressed the intention "to initiate a process that will permit us, in due course to enter into an agreement of full communion."[11] A contemporary editors' note observed that the REC and the APA were "not in Communion with the See of Canterbury."[10]

3. The March 2009 declaration of communion

In March 2009, the Standing Committee of the Church of Nigeria resolved to be in "full and abiding communion with the Anglican Church in North America," as quoted in a contemporary excerpt of the resolution.[12] Contemporary reporting described Nigeria as the first province formally to accept the emerging North American province.[12] This was recognition by one province. It was not admission to the Anglican Communion as a whole: the Archbishop of Canterbury had said it would take years for the new province to gain official recognition from the rest of the Communion, and ACNA remains outside the Communion's formal membership.[12]

Duncan's deposition and Southern Cone reception

Robert Duncan's personal jurisdiction after 2008 is distinct from CANA and from Nigeria's sponsorship. On 18 September 2008, the House of Bishops of The Episcopal Church voted 88–35 to depose Duncan for "abandonment of the communion of this church."[13] The Presiding Bishop signed the sentence of deposition on 19 September, effective 12:01 a.m. on 20 September 2008.[14] Duncan's diocese disputed the deposition's legitimacy, and the diocesan convention on 4 October 2008 voted to realign with the Anglican Province of the Southern Cone.[13][14] The Southern Cone's primate, Gregory Venables, stated that Duncan was "effectively immediately" a member of that province's House of Bishops.[14] Duncan's immediate overseas reception was therefore into the Southern Cone, not into Nigeria or CANA.

The two integrities

ACNA's own explanatory material states that, "in respect of the two integrities concerning Holy Orders, three matters were specifically agreed in Constitution and Canons": first, that the Constitution's Article VIII provides that no diocese may be deprived of its right to determine its own practice; second, that Title III, Canon 1, § 4 assigns diocesan norms for ordination; and third, that Title III, Canon 8, § 3(7) requires a bishop candidate to be "a male Presbyter at least 35 years old."[15] In other words, the constitution protects differing diocesan practices on the ordination of women to the diaconate and the priesthood, while the episcopate is restricted to men across the province.

The College of Bishops' statement of 7 September 2017, adopted unanimously at Victoria, British Columbia, after a five-year study by the Theological Task Force on Holy Orders, held both parts of that arrangement together. Its preamble recorded that, "in an act of mutual submission at the foundation of the Anglican Church in North America, it was agreed that each Diocese and Jurisdiction has the freedom, responsibility, and authority" to determine its own convictions and practices on women's ordination to the diaconate and priesthood, and that "it was also unanimously agreed that women will not be consecrated as bishops."[16] The statement itself called women's ordination to the priesthood "a recent innovation to Apostolic Tradition and Catholic Order" and found "insufficient scriptural warrant to accept women's ordination to the priesthood as standard practice throughout the Province," while continuing to acknowledge "that individual dioceses have constitutional authority to ordain women to the priesthood."[16]

The traditionalist interpretation: protected participation without theological endorsement

Traditionalist participants have consistently described their position as protected participation, not agreement with both practices. Five distinctions matter for understanding their case: (1) constitutional permission for a diocese to ordain women is not theological approval of the practice; (2) theological approval is not recognition of the resulting orders as valid; (3) recognition of orders is not the same as sacramental participation; (4) sacramental participation in a common province is not the same as membership in the same diocese; and (5) membership in a common province is not membership in the Anglican Communion.

The Reformed Episcopal case

The Reformed Episcopal bishops' pastoral letter of 2 October 2017, written in response to the College of Bishops' statement, is the fullest traditionalist account of why a male-only jurisdiction remains in ACNA. It states that the REC "retains its conviction that the threefold-ordained ministry of bishop, presbyter, and deacon are reserved for males only," grounded in Scripture as understood by the Great Tradition, and that the REC has restored the ancient lay Office of Deaconess as a distinct, non-ordained ministry for women.[17]

The letter welcomed the 2017 statement's language as "stronger than ever before," noting that the phrases "innovation to Apostolic Tradition and Catholic Order" and "insufficient warrant in Scripture" "negate the notion that both practices have an equal 'dual integrity,'" and quoted the Task Force's conclusion: "Both positions cannot be right."[17] It described the REC's participation as a federated relationship based on catholicity — "according to the whole" — and on the retention of its own jurisdiction and canons, and reported that "the vast majority of dioceses do not ordain women to the priesthood."[17] Its sacramental boundaries were stated plainly: "We do not receive Holy Communion where a woman consecrates the elements," and at provincial or GAFCON gatherings "male bishops preside."[17] The letter also recorded that at the first GAFCON meeting in Jerusalem in 2008, Archbishop Akinola had "instructed us to direct our concordat with them through a new, North American province, which became ACNA," saying that GAFCON would recognize "only one new province," not many small jurisdictions.[17]

The letter's account of continued participation is conditional, not unconditional: the bishops wrote that they participate "as long as our convictions and jurisdiction are not compromised," that "if ACNA were to try to coerce us away from our special jurisdiction status, we would leave," and that they "pledge vigilance in and ongoing evaluation" of the relationship.[17]

The Forward in Faith case

Bishop Hewett's 2008 synod address stated the FACA traditionalist position in its strongest form: "We cannot be in communion with anyone who ordains women, nor will the Federation of which we are part."[6] He predicted that the ordination of women "will come to an end among those who aspire to be orthodox," while acknowledging a fallback: "Should that not happen before we commit completely to one another, we in the Federation can step back, and align only with Forward in Faith."[6] The address thus treats federation as a provisional and revisable arrangement, with a stated exit, rather than as an unconditional merger.

Hopes for agreement, and the limits of the evidence

The REC letter expresses hope, not a founding promise. Its bishops wrote: "We still want to see the latter come about" — that is, the reversal of women's ordination — and prayed "that in the course of time the Holy Spirit will use the acknowledgment of Holy Scripture and the Great Tradition of historic interpretation to transform ACNA into greater consistency with the Word of God."[17] They added a caution drawn from experience: "many of us who were there from the beginning realized that no single study and meeting of bishops would immediately change an erroneous practice deeply imbedded in culture for decades," and that the hope had been for "a serious study that allowed for the Biblical view to be presented and discussed among the Bishops."[17]

Three limits on the evidence for an explicitly temporary founding settlement should be stated plainly:

  • The June 2004 founding letter contains no settlement of the women's ordination question at all; it does not mention ordination, set an expiration date, or promise abolition.
  • The 2017 Victoria statement, the fullest province-wide statement on the subject, contains no expiration date, moratorium, or commitment to end women's ordination; it affirms both the theological criticism and the continuing constitutional authority of dioceses to ordain women.
  • A promised "serious theological study of the ordination of women" is attested as an expectation of the Network period in a participant history of the movement, which also warned that the protections agreed were "likely sufficient for the orthodox bodies for the short term" but asked whether such co-existence "can such co-existence, which signals in practice that the matter is at best of secondary importance, be acceptable over the long term?"[4] That is a participant's hope and reservation, not a constitutional provision, and it should not be presented as a founding commitment binding every body.

In short, the documented traditionalist position is: protected participation, stated sacramental boundaries, conditional continuation, and hope for eventual agreement — without a documented province-wide agreement that the arrangement was temporary or that women's ordination would be abolished.

Duncan's November 2025 retrospective

In a letter dated 11 November 2025, Robert Duncan defended the founding settlement on different grounds from the REC's. He wrote that leaders in the Common Cause Partnership and Network period (2000–2008) would attest that "there was no other route to coming together, ending forty years of continuing orthodox fragments," and that "we accepted the necessity of both complementarian and egalitarian integrities of women in Holy Orders at the parochial and diocesan levels, and we accepted the relational reality of overlapping episcopal jurisdictions."[18] He described the early accommodations as being "about conflicts faced and a way forward accepted," and attributed present troubles to the disciplinary system, conflict avoidance, and human sin, having "little to do with the first settlement (it is a complementarian [all male] College of Bishops after all)."[18]

Duncan's retrospective should be read as his own defense of the settlement, not as evidence of what every founding body committed itself to. The REC's account emphasizes conditional participation and hope for reversal; Duncan's emphasizes the necessity of the accommodation for gathering a fragmented movement. Those are compatible descriptions of the same events from different positions, and neither should be substituted for the other.

The May 2019 CANA clarification

The dual arrangement between CANA and ACNA came to an end in 2019. Under an agreement signed 12 March 2019 between the Church of Nigeria and ACNA, the three dioceses that had resulted from CANA's activity in the United States — the Missionary Diocese of the Trinity, the Missionary Diocese of CANA East, and the Missionary Diocese of CANA West — were each permitted to decide their own provincial affiliation. The agreement followed a dispute arising from Nigeria's election of four suffragan bishops for the Missionary Diocese of the Trinity without consultation with the ACNA College of Bishops. On 21 May 2019, CANA East announced its decision to withdraw from the Church of Nigeria and become solely a diocese of ACNA, with the new name of the Anglican Diocese of the Living Word. On 23 May 2019, CANA West and the Missionary Diocese of the Trinity each announced their decision to remain dioceses of the Church of Nigeria. The dioceses remaining with Nigeria were, by the agreement, considered ministry partners of ACNA. These decisions are described here as they stood at that time; later developments are outside the scope of this article.

The chaplaincy jurisdiction was handled separately. The Jurisdiction of the Armed Forces and Chaplaincy, which had become an ACNA jurisdiction under a previous agreement in 2014, was unaffected by the 2019 agreement. In a joint statement of 28 July 2021, ACNA and the Church of Nigeria affirmed: "There is no longer a question of the place of the Jurisdiction in the Anglican Church in North America. The Jurisdiction is fully integrated with the Anglican Church in North America, will continue to be, and we celebrate that."[19]

Chronology

  • 1989 — Episcopal Synod of America founded; later becomes Forward in Faith North America (name taken 1999).[4]
  • 1996 — American Anglican Council founded as an independent nonprofit organization.[2]
  • 6 June 2004 — Six-party Common Cause letter to the Archbishop of Canterbury; public release 17 June 2004.[1]
  • 2005 — Church of Nigeria establishes CANA as its North American missionary jurisdiction (announced 7 April 2005; constitutional framework completed September 2005).[10]
  • 12 November 2005 — Church of Nigeria, Reformed Episcopal Church, and Anglican Province of America enter a covenant of concordat in Pittsburgh.[10][11]
  • 2006 — Federation of Anglican Churches in the Americas formed.[6]
  • 19–22 September 2006 — Global South meeting at Kigali calls for initial steps toward a separate ecclesiastical structure in the USA.[7]
  • December 2007 — Common Cause Leadership Council meets in Orlando; theological statement and articles of federation ratified; Duncan elected moderator.[8]
  • 22–29 June 2008 — GAFCON Jerusalem conference; Jerusalem Statement calls the time "ripe for the formation of a province in North America."[9]
  • 18–20 September 2008 — House of Bishops votes to depose Duncan (18 September); sentence signed 19 September, effective 20 September; Southern Cone receives Duncan; Pittsburgh convention realigns 4 October 2008.[13][14]
  • 3 December 2008 — Emerging province announced; provisional constitution and nine canons adopted.[2]
  • March 2009 — Church of Nigeria Standing Committee declares itself in "full and abiding communion" with the emerging ACNA.[12]
  • 22–25 June 2009 — ACNA inaugural Provincial Assembly, Bedford, Texas; constitution and canons ratified; Duncan installed as first Archbishop; FiFNA Missionary Diocese of All Saints formed.[2][5]
  • 22 August 2009 — William Ilgenfritz consecrated as first FiFNA bishop in ACNA.[5]
  • 7 September 2017 — ACNA College of Bishops' statement on the ordination of women adopted unanimously at Victoria.[16]
  • 2 October 2017 — Reformed Episcopal bishops' pastoral letter responds to the College statement.[17]
  • 12 March 2019 — Church of Nigeria–ACNA agreement permits the three CANA dioceses to choose their provincial affiliation.
  • 21–23 May 2019 — CANA East joins ACNA solely as the Diocese of the Living Word (21 May); CANA West and Trinity remain with Nigeria (23 May).
  • 28 July 2021 — Joint statement affirms the Jurisdiction of the Armed Forces and Chaplaincy as fully integrated with ACNA.[19]
  • 11 November 2025 — Duncan's retrospective letter defends the founding settlement.[18]

See also

References

  1. ↑ 1.0 1.1 1.2 1.3 1.4 Common Cause Partnership, letter to the Archbishop of Canterbury, 6 June 2004, released 17 June 2004. https://hopeanglican.us/hope1/alliance.pdf
  2. ↑ 2.0 2.1 2.2 2.3 2.4 2.5 2.6 American Anglican Council, "Frequently Asked Questions." https://americananglican.org/faq/
  3. ↑ 3.0 3.1 Anglican Church in North America, "Ministry Partners." https://anglicanchurch.net/ministry-partners/
  4. ↑ 4.0 4.1 4.2 John Tanghe, "Birth of a province," New Directions, January 2009, archived at Forward in Faith North America. https://ndarchive.forwardinfaith.com/2017/10/01/birth-of-a-province/
  5. ↑ 5.0 5.1 5.2 Diocese of All Saints, "About Us." https://allsaintsdiocese.org/about-us/
  6. ↑ 6.0 6.1 6.2 6.3 Paul C. Hewett, address to the Synod of the Diocese of the Holy Cross, 23 April 2008. https://dioceseoftheholycross.org/bishop_address/bpaddress_23april08.htm
  7. ↑ 7.0 7.1 Global South Anglican, Kigali communiqué, September 2006.
  8. ↑ 8.0 8.1 8.2 Episcopal News Service, "Common Cause partners organize, elect Duncan moderator," 19 December 2007. https://digitalarchives.episcopalarchives.org/cgi-bin/ENS/ENSpress_release.pl?pr_number=121907-01
  9. ↑ 9.0 9.1 GAFCON, "The Jerusalem Statement," 29 June 2008. https://gafcon.org/about/the-jerusalem-statement/
  10. ↑ 10.0 10.1 10.2 10.3 10.4 Anglican Communion News Service, "Church of Nigeria covenants with two North American church bodies," 17 November 2005.
  11. ↑ 11.0 11.1 11.2 Reformed Episcopal Church, "Ecumenical Relationships" (covenant text, revised 11 November 2005). https://rechurch.org/about/ecumenical-relationships/
  12. ↑ 12.0 12.1 12.2 12.3 Church of Nigeria, Standing Committee resolution, March 2009, as excerpted in "Church of Nigeria on ACNA," Anglican Church League, 20 March 2009. https://acl.asn.au/church-of-nigeria-on-acina/
  13. ↑ 13.0 13.1 13.2 Episcopal News Service, "House of Bishops votes to depose Pittsburgh bishop," 18 September 2008. https://digitalarchives.episcopalarchives.org/cgi-bin/ENS/ENSpress_release.pl?pr_number=091808-03
  14. ↑ 14.0 14.1 14.2 14.3 Episcopal News Service, "Jefferts Schori removes Pittsburgh bishop from office," 22 September 2008. https://digitalarchives.episcopalarchives.org/cgi-bin/ENS/ENSpress_release.pl?pr_number=092208-02
  15. ↑ Anglican Church in North America, "About." https://anglicanchurch.net/about/
  16. ↑ 16.0 16.1 16.2 Anglican Church in North America, College of Bishops, "A Statement from the College of Bishops on the Ordination of Women," 7 September 2017. https://anglicanchurch.net/college-of-bishops-statement-on-the-ordination-of-women/
  17. ↑ 17.0 17.1 17.2 17.3 17.4 17.5 17.6 17.7 17.8 Bishops of the Reformed Episcopal Church, "A Pastoral Letter," 2 October 2017. https://www.rechurch.org/resources/a-pastoral-letter-2017/
  18. ↑ 18.0 18.1 18.2 Robert Wm. Duncan, letter to the Church, 11 November 2025. https://americananglican.org/abp-emeritus-duncan-writes-a-letter-to-the-church/
  19. ↑ 19.0 19.1 Anglican Church in North America and Church of Nigeria, joint statement on the Jurisdiction of the Armed Forces and Chaplaincy, 28 July 2021. https://anglicanchurch.net/wp-content/uploads/2021/07/20210728-ACNA-JAFC-CONNAM-a-Joint-Statement-.pdf
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