Video: Bp. Nazir Ali on the Anglican Covenant, Christian Unity and....the Pope.

Given the thrust of Bishop Nazir-Ali's speech, I find it very encouraging that there is a picture of a young John Henry (Cardinal) Newman between the bishop and the interviewer, almost as if he were an angelic guest working quietly and hopefully for something Spirit-led and transformative (there is currently a movement among Anglo-catholics in the CofE to consider the potential of a new Oxford Movement). As a prayerbook Anglo-catholic, it is fascinating to me that the picture is actually of Newman when he was still an Anglican, but I really have no idea what to make of it (the vibrant "evangelical Catholic" movement within the Roman Catholic Church in the U.S. is principally a movement of young adults and thirty-somethings, and draws significant inspiration from the thought of Cardinal Newman).

And then again, in the video clip we have the sad but not at all surprising picture of an English bishop, tremendously eloquent when speaking his mind, holding himself back, diminishing his personality and talking all too often in that tone of "extreme moderation" that has become the hallmark of so many CofE leaders. Obviously, political concerns drive his tone, but what message does that send to the faithful?

Last fall, I commented to one of my parish priests that Bishop Nazir-Ali is one of those high church evangelicals who appears to grown more and more traditionally catholic-minded year after year. Whatever one may think of the Romanesque perspectives that came out of the different high church camps formed in the wake of the Oxford Movement, we all should pray that God continues to tear down the rhetorical barriers between orthodox Anglican church parties in a covert way so that none of us will be tempted to throw up the same old ideological arguments to resist it. I think it is important to consider how more and more traditional high churchmen and Anglo-catholics are beginning to properly and incrementally incorporate the richer dimensions of the evangelical and charismatic visions into their spirituality and the corporate life of their parishes. I hope more evangelical Anglican leaders on this side of the Atlantic will allow themselves to draw from the depths of the Anglo-catholic way of practicing the historic Faith of the undivided Church.