From the Revd F. G. Downing

Sir, — “We” have not agreed the statements of the Anglican-Roman Catholic International Commission; so Professor Allen Brent (Letters, 27 August) has no justification in accusing “us” of having “violated” any of them. Only Commission members agreed them, and offered them for discussion and possible adoption. They are not synodically adopted statements of faith in our Communion, and indeed have been but coolly noted in the Vatican.

Provinces of the Anglican Communion retain the right to adapt the forms of apostolicity better to express our fundamental and biblically founded faith in our common — female and male — creation and recreation in the image of God in Christ in the power of the Spirit. It is for other parts of God’s Church to consider and perhaps in due time catch up, even show our move unblessed.

“We” are under no obligation to wait interminably for abstract discussions to bear fruit — even for the dropping of the Western unilaterally and divisively imposed Filioque.

F. GERALD DOWNING
33 Westhoughton Road
Adlington
Chorley PR7 4EU