Feb. 6, 2008, London

The Covenant Design Group held its second meeting at the Anglican Communion Offices in London from Jan. 28 to Feb. 2, under the chairmanship of the Most Rev. Drexel Gomez, Archbishop of the West Indies.

The main task of the group was to develop a second draft for the Anglican Covenant, as originally proposed in the Windsor Report 2004; an idea adopted by the Primates' Meeting and the Joint Standing Committee of the Anglican Consultative Council and the Primates in their following meetings. At their meeting in January 2007, the CDG produced a first draft - the Nassau Draft - for such a covenant, which was received at the meeting of the Primates and the Joint Standing Committee in Dar es Salaam, Tanzania, in February of that year. This draft was subsequently sent to the Provinces, Churches and Commissions of the Anglican Communion for consultation, reflection and response.

At this meeting, the CDG reviewed the comments and submissions received and developed the new draft, which is now published. In addition to 13 provincial responses, a large number of responses were received from commissions, organisations, dioceses and individuals from across the Communion. It is intended that these responses will be published in the near future on the Anglican Communion web site. The CDG is grateful to all those who contributed their reflections for this meeting, and trust that they will find their contributions honoured in the revised text prepared.

The current draft - known as the St Andrew's Draft - will now be offered for reflection in the Communion at large, and in particular by the Lambeth Conference, which has been convened by the Archbishop of Canterbury to meet in his see City of Canterbury, England, between July 16 and August 3 of this year. The CDG hopes that bishops will study the present draft in their preparations for the Conference, consulting in their dioceses and sharing their reflections at the Conference.

The draft is accompanied by a number of supporting documents, including a brief commentary which outlines the thinking of the CDG on some of the issues considered, and which also gives responses to some of the specific suggestions and criticisms made to them. It also includes a tentative draft of a procedural appendix, the status of which is set out in the commentary.

Following the Lambeth Conference, the CDG will meet to review the progress on the development of the Covenant project within the Communion, and it will submit a Covenant draft to the Provinces and ecumenical partners of the Communion for formal comment and response.

The members present in the meeting in London were:

• The Most Rev. Drexel Gomez, Primate of the West Indies, Chair
• The Rev. Dr. Victor Atta-Baffoe, Anglican Church of West Africa
• The Most Rev. Dr. John Chew, Primate of South East Asia
• The Rev. Dr. A. Katherine Grieb, The Episcopal Church (USA)
• The Rt. Rev. Santosh Marray, Bishop of the Seychelles
• The Most Rev. Dr John Neill, Archbishop of Dublin
• Chancellor Rubie Nottage, Church in the Province of the West Indies
• Dr. J. Eileen Scully, Anglican Church of Canada
• The Rev. Dr. Ephraim Radner, The Episcopal Church (USA)
• The Rev. Canon Gregory Cameron, Anglican Communion Office, Secretary
• Professor Norman Doe, Cardiff University, Consultant
• The Rev. Canon Andrew Norman, Archbishop of Canterbury's Representative

The Covenant Design Group will meet again later this year after the Lambeth Conference.

The complete text of the draft is on this site and also is posted along with other resources to: www.aco.org/commission/covenant/index.cfm.