How the Communion might vote on the Covenant

Table of Provinces and Member Churches in relation to the Covenant

There are 38 Provinces and 5 Member Churches. 

Please note: this is no more than my best guess today. A number of factors add to its unreliability, not least of which is that I can only go on publicly available sources and reported comments.

1. It's not clear how much persuasion to sign is being applied by the ACO and others – my guess is a lot.
2. It's not clear what the impact (if any) of the English vote against will be. I guess it might be of some help to those who wish to resist persuasion, but will probably not make a lot of difference to the basic decision.
3. There seems little reliable link between earlier critiques in official statements and the final vote (cf. Wales).
4. I have no way of judging any province's internal politics (cf. Japan).
5. I don't know whether the final revision to Section 4 will be sufficient for those churches (or their states) which I believe to have constitutional barriers to signing.
6. There is a good chance that a number of provinces simply won't come to a decision for a long time. Some (Nigeria?) will quite possibly ignore the question altogether.
7. I've marked a quarter 'Don't know' which is a very high proportion of the final vote.

Overall I think that, assuming the Covenant isn't wholly dead, this is probably too optimistic (from my perspective).  I would guess that 19 might be close to the maximum for the 'No' camp - and may itself be optimistic.

I've not included a separate category for 'still in the process of considering the Covenant'. I guess this is where the ACO will put England for some time to come. This would imply that it would be possible for a Church to flip from 'No' to 'Yes' and vice-versa.

I will update the table as information - or hints - come in. Contributions (especially evidenced) very welcome. Please leave a comment on any blog post or email paulbagshaw@gmail.com. 

Overall:

Confirmed No	Probable No	Constitutional barriers	Probable Yes	Confirmed Yes	Qualified Yes	Don't know
2	13	4	8	5	2	10
Total: 19 (43%)			Total: 15 (34%)			Total: 10 (23%)
Provinces: 17, Member Churches: 1			Provinces: 14, Member Churches: 1			Provinces: 7 Member Churches:3

My guess by Province and Member Church

Confirmed No	Church	Comment
P	The Church of England
P	The Episcopal Church in the Philippines
[Top]
Probable No	Church	Comment
P	The Anglican Church in Aotearoa, New Zealand & Polynesia	Tikanga Maori voted against (G. Conger) Nov 2011
P	The Anglican Church of Australia	Dioceses are beginning to vote no.
P	Igreja Episcopal Anglicana do Brasil	Opposed to Covenant in early days
P	The Anglican Church of Canada
P	Hong Kong Sheng Kung Hui	Opposed to Covenant in early days; also possible constitutional issues; I suspect they've been badly treated too.
P	The Episcopal Church in Jerusalem & The Middle East	Bishop Anis resigned from SCAC as too weak.
P	The Anglican Church of Korea	Earlier comments about Covenant as a colonial tool. But +Victoria Matthews reported to have visited recently
P	The Church of Nigeria (Anglican Communion)	I don't think will want anything to do with the Communion as it is at present
P	L'Eglise Episcopal au Rwanda	G. Conger, October 2010
P	The Scottish Episcopal Church	Most dioceses have said no
P	The Church of the Province of Uganda	I don't think will want anything to do with the Communion as it is at present
P	The Episcopal Church (USA)	Executive Committee opposed. To be debated at this summer's General Convention. Cf. Mark Harris.
M	The Lusitanian Church (E-P to the Archbishop of Canterbury)	Opposed to Covenant in early days; not sure what freedom of action they will feel they have
Constitutional barriers	Church	Comment
P	The Church of Bangladesh	A guess
P	The Church of North India (United)
P	The Church of Pakistan (United)	A guess
P	The Church of South India (United)
Probable Yes	Church	Comment
P	The Anglican Church of Burundi	Archbishop Bernard Ntahoturi chair of IASCUFO
P	The Church of the Province of Central Africa	Bishop James Tengatenga chair of ACC; much support for Zimbabwe; Bp Botswana very pro-West
P	Province de L'Eglise Anglicane Du Congo	To ratify Covenant at next General Assembly
P	The Nippon Sei Ko Kai (The Anglican Communion in Japan)	At its May General Synod, the Japanese church overruled a recommendation from the theological committee of its House of Bishops, and voted to go forward with discussions on an Anglican Covenant. (G. Conger) Dec 2010 Report
P	Anglican Church of Southern Africa	Archbishop Makgoba committed. With dioceses now, return for ratification in 2013
P	The Church of the Province of the Indian Ocean	In 2008 they “were firmly convinced that the proposal Anglican Covenant is crucial” (response, pdf), view repeated 2010.
P	The Church in Wales	Archbishop Barry Morgan changed his tune. Governing body commended to dioceses for ratification at Governing Body April 2012
M	The Church of Ceylon (E-P to the Archbishop of Canterbury)	I seem to remember affirmative comments
Confirmed Yes	Church	Comment
P	La Iglesia Anglicana de Mexico	Apparently by executive action
P	The Church of the Province of Myanmar (Burma)
P	The Anglican Church of Papua New Guinea
P	Iglesia Anglicana del Cono Sur de America
P	The Church in the Province of the West Indies	Well, not a surprise
Qualified Yes	Church	Comment
P	The Church of Ireland	But nothing in Covenant shall override autonomy (not clear how this was formally communicated to ACO, or whether merely reassurance given in debate). TA
P	Church of the Province of South East Asia	Long preamble effectively demanding the failed proposals of Primatial governance of the Communion
Don't know	Church	Comment
P	Iglesia Anglicana de la Region Central de America	Archbishop Armando Guerra Soria is much more conservative than his predecessor.
P	The Anglican Church of Kenya	Possibly a 'No' if it sides with Uganda and Nigeria
P	The Church of the Province of Melanesia
P	The Episcopal Church of the Sudan	Has officially recognised ACNA as the Anglican Church in US
P	The Anglican Church of Tanzania
P	The Church of the Province of West Africa	I'd guess 'Yes'; no evidence
M	Iglesia Episcopal de Cuba
M	Bermuda (Extra-Provincial to Canterbury)
M	The Reformed Episcopal Church of Spain (E-P to the Archbishop of Canterbury)
M	Falkland Islands (Extra-Provincial to Canterbury)	I'd guess 'Yes' simply on smallness and dependency