Anglican Communion News Service

A Profile

The Most Reverend Peter Carnley AO, Archbishop of Perth was elected Primate of the Anglican Church of Australia on Thursday 3 February. He was elected by a Primatial Election Board comprising all Diocesan bishops and twelve members of each of the Houses of Clergy and Laity who were elected by the General Synod. Archbishop Carnley is only the second West Australian to become Primate this century. The first was Archbishop Henry Frewen Le Fanu who was Primate from 1935 to 1946.

A man of warmth and intellectual vigour, Peter Carnley's face lights up when he talks with passion of his hobby of growing tulips at his farm at Naanup near Margaret River in Western Australia. His favourite is the beautiful long stemmed black tulip, Queen of the Night.

This Primatial result was a surprise to many in the Church who saw the election as a struggle between "the two Peters", and most predicted that Archbishop Peter Hollingworth from Brisbane would emerge as Archbishop Keith Rayner's successor to the Australian Primacy. But through the four ballots on the day, Archbishop Hollingworth was eliminated on the third ballot, and Archbishop Carnley defeated Archbishop Harry Goodhew from Sydney by 24 votes to 17 in the final ballot. Archbishop Goodhew had received the most votes of all candidates in the first two ballots and when it came to the final decision, the fact that he will be retiring in March 2001 on his seventieth birthday influenced some electors.

Archbishop Carnley is regarded as the leading theologian amongst the bishops of the Anglican Church of Australia and he chairs many of the Nation Church groups which have a theological enquiry at their base. He is presently Chair of both the Doctrinal Panel and the Panel set up to prepare a report for the next General Synod in 2001 on issues for the Church relating to human sexuality. He is a member of the Women's Bishops group who are also preparing a report for the General Synod. He says he may have to offload many of these posts now he is the Primate.

He is firmly opposed to lay presidency but believes that the Church at large needs to continue discussion on the matter and to listen and hear the arguments of those from the Diocese of Sydney who advocate this change in traditional Anglican liturgical practice.

Archbishop Carnley has also been involved in some major activities of the Anglican Communion. He was a member of the Inter Anglican Theological and Doctrinal Commission and drafted some sections of the Virginia Report that deals with the 'instruments of unity' within the Anglican Communion. He was a member of the Commission on Communion and Women in the Episcopate that prepared the Eames Report for the Anglican Communion.

Asked of his opinion of the recent consecration in Singapore of two bishops for the American Church by Archbishops Tay and Kolini and others, Archbishop Carnley described their action as 'wicked.' He said such 'vagrant' bishops are irregular and unlawful within Anglicanism.

It seems that, as a Province of the Anglican Communion, the Anglican Church of Australia will soon be encouraged by its Primate to give serious consideration to the issues emerging from the document The Gift of Authority which was issued recently by the Anglican and Roman Catholic International Commission. He stated that the issue of the 'universal Primacy' is important for Anglicans to examine since he believes there may be a role for such a voice in world Christendom. But alongside this he believes that the structure of decision making centred around the Bishop-in-Synod, including the laity, is a gift of genius from Anglicanism and that this is also an important model for the Roman Catholic world to contemplate and develop to remove from it the structure of a remote, lone voice issuing decrees and laying down practice from far away on the other side of the world.

There was a suggestion from a few participants at the Anglican Consultative Council meeting in Dundee, Scotland last September that Lambeth Conferences should be no more and that there should be Anglican Congresses held in their place. While he would support the idea of an Anglican Congress that included bishops, clergy and lay people, Archbishop Carnley stressed that he does not subscribe to any view that this model of Anglican gathering should replace the Lambeth Conferences, which he believes are important for consultation and collegiality among the bishops of the Communion.

On the somewhat inflammatory topic of human sexuality Archbishop Carnley said again that he is of the opinion that there are many conversations still to take place. He instanced the level of agreement emerging in the discussions of the Australian national groups that includes two theologians from the Diocese of Sydney. Archbishop Carnley dislikes the use of the term 'homosexual marriage' and prefer to cast the discussion in terms of 'friendship'. He says that the boundaries of friendship and the limits of touch need to be carefully explored.

Peter Carnley will not go to the Primates' meeting in Portugal in March ready to confront ECUSA but he will call for more conversation and listening from all sides of the debates. He will not support the concept of a second province within the American Church for bringing it close to home he will reject such a notion when it comes to discussions within the Anglican Church of Australia on lay presidency and women bishops.

Peter Carnley was awarded a Lucas Tooth Scholarship in 1966 that enabled him to undertake doctoral research at Cambridge University. The topic of his Cambridge doctoral thesis was "The Notion of Historical Memory in the Theology of John Knox" which was a study in philosophical theology of the insights of the North American New Testament scholar, John Knox, concerning "the Church and her memory of Jesus".

He returned to Australia to lecture in Systematic and Philosophical Theology in the University of Queensland and he was Warden of St John's College. He was elected Archbishop of Perth in 1981.

Contemplating the role of a Primate he said that it includes "explaining the part to the whole and the whole to the part." He says, for example, that as Australian Primate he will stress to the Anglican World that the Diocese of Sydney is not the ogre it is portrayed to be and that its arguments on various issues such as lay presidency need to be heard and understood. But he says that the Diocese of Sydney must also be encouraged to play its full part in the relationships and discussions of the Anglican Communion.

Archbishop Carnley said that the greatest problem facing the Australian Church is not issues such as human sexuality, women bishops and lay presidency. It is rather the decline in Church attendance as evidenced by the national Church Life survey statistics. Arresting this decline will be a prime focus from him during his primacy.

Peter Carnley is married to Ann who is a chaplain at a WA State Primary School. They have a son, Benedict, and a daughter, Sarah.

Article from: Anglican Media Sydney - by Margaret Rodgers