As members of the Anglican Church of Canada we believe that we are called:
- To celebrate God’s self-giving grace, by which all people are offered healing, reconciliation, and new life;
- To continue the ecumenical faith journey, in which we discover in sign, symbol, and practice God’s presence in ourselves and in others, at the same time learning afresh from the living heritage of our Anglican identity;
- To encourage and equip all in the church to walk the way of ecumenism, so that all will come to know the hope for the restoration of the full visible unity of Christ’s church; and
- To recognize and respond faithfully to those moments when God in Christ reveals to us our mystical unity as one body and calls us to act in solidarity with others in resistance to the forces of death and darkness, in affirmation of life and light.
Towards a Renewed Ecumenical Strategy (2004)
Ecumenism is the ongoing effort by the separated Christian churches to call one another to visible unity in one faith and in one eucharistic fellowship. It is expressed in worship and common life in Christ, through witness and service to the world, and to advance towards that unity in order that the world may believe. The division of the church, in the words of the Second Vatican Council, “openly contradicts the will of Christ, scandalizes the world, and damages the holy cause of preaching the gospel to every creature.”
Ecumenism is at the very heart of Anglicanism, and one of our tradition’s distinctive marks has been our willingness and capacity to speak with other Christians from a diverse variety of backgrounds, and to seek reconciliation with them. Anglican churches have formed a part of the modern ecumenical movement from its very beginnings.
The Anglican Church of Canada seeks to help make visible the church’s unity at the local, national, and global levels. To that end, we are currently engaged in four broad areas of ecumenism:
The Anglican Church of Canada also collaborates with other churches in the creation of resources for the annual Week of Prayer for Christian Unity.