The Windsor Report 2004
Part II: Relationships of Communion
Article 6: The Divine Foundation of Communion
- Communion is a gift of God, who is a communion of three persons, to all member churches of the Anglican Communion.
- Our ecclesial communion is animated in the experience of God's work of redemption, and furthered or hampered by human action.
- The divine call to communion is inviolable and no member church may declare unilaterally irreversible broken communion with any fellow church.
Article 7: Communion in Membership, Relation and Purpose
- The Anglican Communion is a community of interdependent churches and consists of relations between each church, the See of Canterbury, and the fellowship of member churches worldwide.
- Each church acknowledges its Communion membership, and is constituted by, exists in and receives fullness of life in its relations to the other member churches.
- Ordained and lay persons in each church are in personal communion with those of other member churches.
- Each church shall serve the purposes of the Communion, which include:
- proclaiming to the world in common witness the good news of the Kingdom of God;
- fostering and protecting a common mind in essential matters; and
- achieving greater unity.
Article 8: The Process and Substance of Communion
- Communion, never perfected until God's Kingdom is all in all, involves unity, equality of status, and a common pilgrimage towards truth, each church in partnership with its fellow churches learning what it means to become interdependent and thus more fully a communion.
- Communion subsists in the mutual acknowledgement by churches of their common identity.
- Communion involves responsibilities so that each church may be more fully completed in, through and by its relations with other member churches, having regard for their common good.