Though I often think of myself as a closeted Episcopalian, I don’t usually comment on Anglican matters. But I thought this piece from the always-interesting Theo Hobson was worth pointing out. Hobson argues that, in trying to hold the Anglican Communion together come hell or high water, Rowan Williams has unwittingly doomed the Church of England.

Obviously, I’m in sympathy with the “revisionists” here, but it’s worth pointing out that, at least as far as I can tell, the “conservatives” have been proposing a radical revision of their own in the understanding of the Anglican Communion itself. They’ve sought to change it from a loose confederation of autonomous national churches held together by “bonds of affection” into a much more centralized institution with quasi-universalist pretensions. That alone would be enough to get my localist/libertarian hackles up.