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Conflict as Communion: Toward an Agonistic Ecclesiology
Published online by Cambridge University Press: 16 July 2019
Abstract
Though Anglican theologians, clergy, and laypeople have written and spoken extensively about the current status of the Anglican Communion, the conceptualization and practice of conflict has itself remained largely unexamined. This essay argues for the necessity of a better theology of conflict, one rooted in a Trinitarian account of unity through difference. It shows that Anglicans have tended to think of conflict-as-sin or conflict-as-finitude. The essay commends a semantic shift that develops conflict-as-communion. Conflict is a means of grace that animates the divine life of the Trinity, enables God’s work of salvation in history, and is a natural part of good human sociality. This theology of conflict can allow generative relational practices, some of which are already in use across the Anglican Communion.
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- Research Article
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- Copyright
- © The Journal of Anglican Studies Trust 2019
Footnotes
1
Kyle B.T. Lambelet is a postdoctoral fellow at the Candler School of Theology, Emory University, Atlanta, GA, USA.
References
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