Editor’s note: The following is the author’s abridged version of a longer paper, laying out how an oratory model such as his offers a desirable Anglican path alongside other trajectories. The full, unabridged paper (18 pages) may be downloaded at the end of this article.
It is in part a response to Fr Jay Thomas’ final question in April’s Anglican Trajectories1 article,
“Can you convincingly answer the question: Where is the Anglican’s spiritual home most securely found?”
The Right Rev. Kevin Francis Donlon serves as Assistant Bishop of Zanzibar and Episcopal Vicar of the Anglican Union for the Propagation of the Gospel, an international ministry of ortatories.
Abstract
The contemporary Anglican Communion finds itself in a state of profound ecclesial fracture, characterized by a binary struggle between the strict Confessionalism of the Global South (GAFCON) and the increasingly liberal trajectory of the historic Communion. This polarization has driven a significant exodus of Anglo-Catholics toward the Roman Catholic Church via the Personal Ordinariates. This paper argues that this dichotomy represents a failure of imagination regarding the “Anglican Idea.” Drawing upon the insights of Rev. Canon Professor Arthur Middleton2 and the architectural blueprint of the Chicago-Lambeth Quadrilateral3 this analysis proposes a Fourth Way: a formalized orthodox Anglicanism that reclaims catholicity without Roman submission, transcends the current Global South/ Anglican Communion binary, and establishes a new structural unity grounded in the Creeds, Scripture, Sacraments, and the Historic Episcopate.
Introduction: The Crisis of the Via Media
Historically, the Anglican tradition has defined itself not by a rigid systematic theology, but by a distinctive method of holding together seemingly contradictory truths—autonomy and communion, scripture and tradition. Since the days of Augustine of Canterbury, the Anglican impulse has been to strive for the via media (middle way). However, the contemporary articulation of this middle way is frequently dismissed as a ‘lukewarm compromise,’ obscuring its original intent as a dynamic tension between the authority of Scripture, the reason of the church, and the tradition of the early fathers.
The current landscape is no longer defined by this creative tension but by a binary struggle. On one side stands GAFCON (Global Anglican Future Conference), which champions a return to strict Confessionalism, demanding adherence to the Thirty-Nine Articles and the Book of Common Prayer as exhaustive tests of orthodoxy.4 On the other stands the Communion, increasingly fractured by disputes over doctrine and practice, particularly regarding the ordination of women and the blessing of same-sex unions.
In this polarized environment, a significant number of Anglo-Catholics have concluded that the only viable path forward is migration to the Roman Catholic Church via the Personal Ordinariates established under Anglicanorum Coetibus. This migration, however, represents a capitulation to a false dichotomy. It ignores the possibility of a renewed, formalized Anglican orthodoxy that Wesley, the Tractarians, and their descendants sought—a path grounded in the Chicago-Lambeth Quadrilateral that offers a genuine fourth way, transcending the impasse between sectarian rigidity and liberal drift.
I. Reclaiming the “Catholic” Without Rome
The first pillar of this proposed Fourth Way is the reclamation of Catholicity independent of the Papacy. The flight of Anglo-Catholics to Rome is predicated on the belief that the Anglican Communion cannot uphold a unified doctrine and that the “Catholic” wing of the church has collapsed. This view assumes the fullness of the Patrimony—the liturgical, sacramental, and apostolic tradition—can only be preserved under the jurisdiction of the Bishop of Rome.5
However, the Chicago-Lambeth Quadrilateral (1886/1888) provides the theological architecture to challenge this assumption. The Quadrilateral explicitly affirms the Historic Episcopate and the two great Sacraments (Baptism and the Lord’s Supper) as essential to the Christian faith. An “orthodox Anglican” movement could formalize a structure that insists on these points as non-negotiable, effectively creating a “catholic” Anglicanism that does not require submission to the Papacy.6
By anchoring authority in the Ecumenical Creeds (Apostles’, Nicene, Athanasian) and the Historic Episcopate, such a body could reject the “liberal” drift of the Communion without adopting the rigid, often Protestant-leaning Confessionalism of GAFCON. The argument here is that the via media is not a compromise between Rome and Geneva, but a distinct ecclesial reality that holds the fullness of the ancient faith. It asserts that the catholicity of the church resides in the continuity of apostolic succession and the sacramental life, not in the juridical supremacy of a single bishop.
This approach enables a robust defense of the “catholic” identity within Anglicanism. It posits that the Thirty-Nine Articles, often wielded by confessionalists as a barrier against Rome,7 were never intended to be a substitute for Ecumenical Creeds but rather a historical document reflecting the Reformation’s specific controversies. By elevating the Creeds and the Episcopate as the primary standards, orthodox Anglicans can assert that the church is truly Catholic without becoming Roman, preserving the Patrimony within a distinctively Anglican framework.
II. Transcending the GAFCON-Anglican Communion Binary
The second pillar addresses the structural and theological deadlock between GAFCON and the Anglican Communion. The current crisis is often framed as a choice between two irreconcilable options: a fractured Communion that permits “creeping liberalism,” or a GAFCON-aligned Confessionalism that rejects the fullness of the Catholic liturgical and sacramental tradition.
Emerging formally at the 2008 Jerusalem Conference amid mounting disputes over sexuality, biblical authority, and ecclesial discipline, GAFCON represented a justified protest against what many perceived as doctrinal collapse within portions of the Communion. The movement’s emphasis upon the authority of Scripture, classical moral teaching, and ecclesial accountability reflected legitimate concerns regarding theological revisionism and institutional incoherence. Highlighting those realities when much of the Communion was putting its ecclesiastical head in the sand was a gift to the church!
However, what was once a Conference is now a movement which has increasingly grounded Anglican identity in a heightened confessionalism centered upon the Thirty-Nine Articles, Reformation formularies, and sharply defined doctrinal boundaries. In practice, this has often resulted in a tendency to identify authentic Anglicanism primarily with its Protestant distinctives rather than with its broader catholic inheritance. GAFCON has defined what it means to be Anglican in three documents: The Jerusalem Declaration 2008, the Kigali Commitment 2024, and the Abuja Affirmation 2026, which arguably completes the “distortion” Canon Middleton feared: that a reactionary Protestantism that loses its catholic phronema.
To summarize these well-intended, lengthy statements is perhaps unfair to the efforts of those who drafted them, but I assert that we can agree in general on the theme of the three documents, where the Jerusalem Declaration (2008) sought doctrinal assent from the GAFCON participants in an effort to replace Anglican comprehensiveness with “confessionalism.” The Kigali Commitment offered a resounding critique of the failure of the ecclesial structures, calling for a replacement of the Instruments of “Communion” with a complete realignment by virtue of a covenant. Such affirmations are understandable given the depth of the ecclesial crisis; they risk subtly transforming the Anglican Idea from a reformed catholic tradition into a species of Protestant confessionalism. It narrows Anglican identity to doctrinal distinctives arising from sixteenth-century controversies and risks subordinating the broader catholic tradition to polemical formulations shaped by the Reformation era. GAFCON’s theological motivation is rooted in fidelity to classical moral teaching; its method, however, is not a recovery of the Anglican Idea, but rather a profound structural and canonical novelty that forges an entirely new Anglican way.
Conversely, the Conciliar Creedalist perspective, influenced by the Tractarians, argues that the critical universal boundaries of the catholic faith are the Scriptures, the Ecumenical Creeds, and the Councils. This view sees the Thirty-Nine Articles not as a creed, but as a historical document that should not be elevated to the level of dogmatic necessity for all time. For the Creedalist, the via media is the space where the ancient catholic faith is preserved, and any addition of later confessional tests is seen as a departure from the primitive church’s simplicity.
A Quadrilateral-based structure resolves this tension by elevating the Creeds as the primary standard (satisfying the Creedalist) while interpreting the “Historic Episcopate” and “Scripture” in a way that demands a high view of sacramental life and apostolic continuity (satisfying the Anglo-Catholic). Crucially, this model renders the Thirty-Nine Articles as a subordinate, historical guide rather than a binding dogmatic test. This removes the friction point that drives Anglo-Catholics away from the Communion and prevents the “sectarian rigidity” that alienates the broader catholic tradition. For many traditional Anglicans, both Anglo-Catholic and Broad-Church Evangelicals who are creedally oriented, this appears not as a recovery of Anglicanism, but as a reduction of Anglicanism. Drs. Ephraim Radner and Philip Turner make this case as they stress that the Anglican Idea to be just that requires sacramental communion, conciliar patience, and visible catholicity.8
By transcending the binary, this Fourth Way acknowledges that the friction arises because the two approaches speak past one another. The Confessionalist sees the Creedalist as diluting the faith; the Creedalist sees the Confessionalist as creating a sectarian barrier. A formalized Orthodox Anglicanism, grounded in the Quadrilateral, demonstrates that the Anglican tradition is capable of being truly Catholic without becoming Roman, and truly
Evangelical without becoming sectarian. It creates a space where the “catholic” and “Evangelical” wings of Anglicanism can coexist not as enemies, but as complementary expressions of the one faith.
III. A New Vision for Anglican Orthodox Structural Unity
The third pillar of this proposal addresses the structural deficit that has plagued the Anglican Communion. The current crisis is partly structural: the Communion lacks a central governing body with teeth, leading to a “communion of provinces” that often acts as independent nations. This lack of central authority allows for a “lowest-common-
denominator” approach that fails to uphold the integrity of the faith, while simultaneously failing to enforce the boundaries necessary for unity.
The present Anglican crisis may be understood fundamentally as the collapse of balance between two essential ecclesial instincts that Anglicanism historically sought to hold together: the confessional instinct and the catholic-conciliar instinct. Both emerge from legitimate theological concerns. Both preserve genuine aspects of Anglican identity. Yet when isolated from one another, each becomes distorted in ways that threaten the integrity of the Anglican tradition itself. It is ironic to note that some within the GAFCON movement (such as the ACNA) have championed a “Three Streams” model as the way forward, calling for an orthodox integration of catholic practice, evangelical teaching, and preaching along with charismatic zeal. The irony is that this has been criticized within GAFCON itself as a modern invention that undermines the movement.9
This internal tension highlights the danger: in the push for a “coherent orthodoxy,” the movement may eventually “squeeze out” the Catholic stream to maintain a purely Protestant confession.
To address this, a formalized “orthodox Anglican” structure could adopt the Chicago-Lambeth Quadrilateral as its constitution, complemented by the Principles of Canon Law Common to the Anglican Communion. This structure would formalize the norms universally, highlighting the relationship between modality (the local church) and sodality (missional structures).
This proposal further recognizes that catholic communion requires not only theological affirmation, but canonical embodiment. The Anglican Communion has already taken significant steps toward articulating common juridical principles through the “Principles of Canon Law Common to the Churches of the Anglican Communion.” That text demonstrates that Anglican churches already share substantial canonical assumptions regarding episcopal oversight, sacramental order, synodical governance, and ecclesial discipline.10
The proposed structure would establish a clear definition of membership based on the four points of the Quadrilateral:
The Holy Scriptures as containing all things necessary to salvation.
The Creeds as the sufficient statement of the Christian faith.
The two Sacraments of Baptism and the Lord’s Supper.
The Historic Episcopate, locally adapted.
The Anglican Union for the Propagation of the Gospel offers the Fourth Way that transcends this binary reality. It accepts the GAFCON critique of doctrinal drift but rejects its method of fragmentation. Instead of creating a parallel jurisdiction, the Union invites GAFCON participants to renew the mission of the whole Communion, provided they adhere to the Quadrilateral.
Simultaneously, it challenges the See of Canterbury to re-center its mission on the Gospel rather than on institutional preservation. In some respects, given its hybrid dimension, the Anglican Union acts as a mediator of tension:
For the individuals who cannot abide by the trajectory of the collective statements of GAFCON, the Union offers a canonical home that respects orthodoxy without forcing individuals into a narrow Protestant confessionalism, anchoring them in the sacramental and episcopal life of the whole Church.
For those in relation to the See of Canterbury, the Anglican Union offers individuals and parishes a path to doctrinal clarity through the standards of the Union, without the need for schism.
For the Global South Fellowship of Anglicans (GSFA), it provides a structured, mission-focused alternative to the ad-hoc alliances of the past
Under this approach, a model is proposed for Anglican membership, which would be contingent upon acceptance of these four points. If a province or individual accepts the Creeds, the Bible, the Sacraments, and the Episcopate, they are in communion. If they reject them, they are outside the bounds of this specific Orthodox Anglican structure. This clarity would prevent the “creeping liberalism” that drives conservatives away and the “sectarian rigidity” that alienates Catholics.
Furthermore, this type of Union, which is non-jurisdictional, allows for a rigorous enforcement of the via media as a distinct ecclesial reality. It would move beyond the current “communion of provinces” model, which often results in a paralysis of decision making, to a more cohesive body capable of upholding the “Anglican Idea.” This does not necessarily mean a centralized hierarchy akin to Rome, but rather a robust network of provinces bound by a shared constitutional commitment to the Quadrilateral. Such a structure would provide the necessary stability to resist both the liberal drift and the confessional fragmentation, offering a genuine home for those who seek a Catholic faith within an Anglican identity.
The Quadrilateral does not render the Thirty-Nine Articles obsolete; rather, it restores them to their proper historical and theological function. By establishing the Ecumenical Creeds and the Historic Episcopate as the primary constitutional norms (Principles 2 and 4), the Quadrilateral ensures that the Articles are read not as a standalone Protestant manifesto, but as a reformed commentary on the ancient catholic faith. The Articles themselves (Article VIII) explicitly subordinate themselves to the Creeds, stating that they ‘may be proved by most certain warrants of Holy Scripture.’ Thus, the Quadrilateral acts as the hermeneutical key: it prevents the Articles from becoming a sectarian fence by anchoring them in the universal consensus of the undivided Church, while simultaneously preventing the Creeds from becoming abstract by demanding their concrete expression in the sacramental and episcopal life of a future orthodox Anglican Tradition
The classical Anglican via media has often been misunderstood as institutional compromise or theological ambiguity. Historically, however, it referred to a principled form of reformed catholicity: a Church committed simultaneously to apostolic continuity, evangelical doctrine, sacramental worship, conciliar order, and missionary adaptability.
A renewed Anglican orthodoxy must therefore reject both theological liberalism and sectarian reductionism. It must resist both centralized ultramontanism and fragmented provincial independence. The future of Anglicanism depends upon recovering a thicker ecclesiology in which visible communion is sustained through shared doctrine, canonical accountability, sacramental order, and common mission.
The goal is not bureaucratic uniformity, but communion in truth. Without structures capable of embodying doctrinal fidelity and ecclesial discipline, appeals to communion inevitably collapse into sentimentality or institutional incoherence.
A renewed Anglican orthodoxy capable of transcending the GAFCON–Communion binary will require similar trans-jurisdictional communities today: communities grounded in Scripture, sacrament, creed, liturgy, and apostolic mission that can sustain the classical Anglican synthesis beyond the failures of existing institutional polarization.
The goal of this Fourth Way (distinguishing from the proposals of IAFUSCO, Global South Anglicans, and GAFCON) is neither compromise nor vague centrism. It is the recovery of a deeper Anglican principle: that the Church may remain genuinely catholic without Roman centralization, genuinely evangelical without sectarian reductionism, and genuinely comprehensive without theological incoherence.
A further strength of this proposal lies in its recognition of the distinction between modality and sodality within Anglican ecclesiology. Historically, Anglican life has flourished through both territorial diocesan structures and trans-local missionary networks, societies, reform movements, and religious communities.
CONCLUSION
The Fourth Way is not a compromise, but a recovery of the Anglican genius for orthodoxy and ortho-praxis. It suggests the reality that the missing link in our ecclesial architecture is the long-maligned sodality.
By centering our unity on the propagation of the Gospel as articulated in the Quadrilateral, there is a dynamic space for dialogue. This Union offers a path forward that is neither a retreat into Rome nor a reduction into sectarianism. It is a bold, missional vision that trusts the Holy Spirit to work through a network of faithful communities, bound together by the Quadrilateral and the shared work of the Gospel. This is the future of Anglican unity: a dynamic, mission-driven communion that is capable of sustaining orthodoxy in the twenty-first century.
Ultimately, the ‘Fourth Way’ is the realization that the Quadrilateral is the synthesizing agent of the entire Anglican tradition. It is the lens through which the Book of Common Prayer is understood as a catholic liturgy, the Thirty-Nine Articles as a reformed confession, and the Ordinal as an apostolic rite. Without the Quadrilateral, these formularies can be pulled apart into opposing camps: the Articles used to exclude the catholic, or the Prayer Book used to dilute the Reformed. The Quadrilateral binds them together, asserting that true Anglican orthodoxy requires all four: Scripture as the source, Creeds as the summary, Sacraments as the means, and Episcopate as the order. This is the only way to prevent the ‘via media’ from collapsing into a ‘via media’ of compromise, and instead elevate it to a ‘via media’ of fullness, where the canonical tradition protects the integrity of the Prayer Book and the Articles against both Roman centralization and Protestant sectarianism.
If Anglicanism is to offer a credible witness within global Christianity, it must recover the conviction that catholicity requires both charity and order. The via media cannot survive merely as an ethos of moderation; it must become once again a confessing, conciliar, and canonically coherent communion rooted in the historic Anglican vision of reformed catholicity.
The full, unabridged paper (18 pages) may be downloaded here:
Part of a series, published April - May:
Part 1: Anglican Trajectories
Part 2: Anglicans and the Abuja Contradiction (at First Things)
Part 3: Anglican Identity after Abuja
Arthur Middleton., Restoring the Anglican Mind., Leominster: Gracewing Publishing, 2008. Pages 27-30
Paul Avis’., The Anglican Understanding of the Church., London: SPCK Publishing, 2013. Pages 11-15
Joseph Keith., The Challenge of GAFCON to the Unity of the Anglican Communion., Journal of Anglican Studies, Volume 20, Issue 1 , May 2022, pp. 3 – 21.
Michael Nazi – Ali., From Anglican to Catholic., First Things, April 2022. https://firstthings.com/issue/april2022
John Meyendorff, Imperial Unity and Christian Divisions (Crestwood, NY: St Vladimir’s Seminary Press, 1989), 89.
Oliver O Donovan., On the Thirty-Nine Articles: A Conversation with Tudor Christianity., Norwich: Hymns Ancient & Modern, Ltd, 2011. Page 13
Cf. Ephraim Radner and Philip Turner., The Fate of Communion: The Agony of Anglicanism and the Future of a Global Church., Grand Rapids: Wm. B. Eerdmans Publishing Co., 2007
Leander S. Harding., Three streams’ Anglicanism? Covenant: The Living Church Online Journal., August 23, 2017. https://livingchurch.org/covenant/three-streams-anglicanism-2
Mark Hill, Communion, Covenant and Canon Law: A Challenge and Opportunity for the 2008 Lambeth Conference., International Journal for the Study of the Christian Church. Vol 8., #2. May 2008, pgs. 63-68