Jo Bailey Wells Director, Anglican Episcopal House

As director of Duke Divinity School’s new Anglican Episcopal House of Studies, Jo Bailey Wells is keenly aware of the theological and political divisions roiling the 77-million-member Anglican Communion, which includes the Episcopal Church USA.

“There’s no doubt that we’re in a stormy season,” says Wells, an Anglican priest and associate professor of the practice of Christian ministry and Bible at the divinity school. “There has been a great deal of turmoil.”

Since the Episcopal Church USA’s General Convention approved the ordination of an openly gay bishop three years ago, divisions have threatened to splinter the church. Talk of impaired union and potential schism has become commonplace among the communion’s 38 global provinces.

Yet Wells, who came to The Divinity School in 2005 following 10 years as a professor, chaplain and dean at English universities and seminaries, is optimistic. She hopes that the Anglican Episcopal House—a program developed to help support and spiritually form the 40-or-so Anglican and Episcopal students at The Divinity School—will play a role in the healing process.

“I’m hopeful because a time of turmoil can offer a profound opportunity for growth,” Wells says. “Often it is in times of challenge or humiliation that we fall to our knees and learn more about God and ourselves.”

Wells reminds students and colleagues that the Anglican Communion has been tested before. For example, the Communion weathered upheaval and protest in the early 1990s when the General Synod of the Church of England ruled—by a single vote—that women could serve as Anglican priests.

“Some people predicted that this would be the end of the Church of England and the Anglican Communion,” says Wells, an English citizen who was among the first wave of women ordained in the Church of England. “Protestors carried out a mock funeral with a coffin representing the Church of England. But the Communion eventually learned to live with different practices in different places.”

Now in its first full academic year, the Anglican Episcopal House of Studies can contribute to that growth in several ways, Wells says. It can promote healthy dialogue by sponsoring church-related speakers from across the political spectrum. It can encourage student exchange programs that allow Anglican and Episcopal seminarians from around the world to learn and pray together. And, perhaps most important, it can assist in the spiritual formation of future clergy who themselves will pursue common understanding.

“The commitment first and foremost for this program is to build up the body of Christ,” Wells says. “That is why we will have such strong emphasis on formation. Anglican and Episcopal students who come should be equipped for a lifetime commitment to prayer and service. This only takes place within fellowship, where there are ongoing relationships of accountability and trust.”

The founding of the Anglican Episcopal House during a period of controversy is accidental, but perhaps providential, Wells adds. “We can make a contribution.” Ellen Davis, professor of Bible and practical theology as well as an Episcopalian, says that contribution includes supporting and advising Anglican and Episcopal students who find themselves torn as they approach ordination.

“Those planning to be ordained are going to have to make a decision about what part of the church they’re going to ally with at a time when they may not be happy with decisions any part of the church is making,” Davis says. “Certainly, they’re feeling the effects of what is happening in the church right now, and many of them don’t know how to position themselves.”

As someone with sympathies on both sides of current debates, Wells is prepared to promote dialogue.

Years of work with churches, universities and seminaries around the world have positioned her to understand and appreciate a variety of viewpoints. In addition to her work in England and the United States (which included three years as associate minister in a Minnesota church), Wells has traveled and worked extensively in such diverse settings as South Africa, Uganda, Haiti and India.

Among other lessons, this work has taught her humility and an appreciation for the gifts that all regional churches bring to the Communion.

“What we all need to realize is that we are one tiny strand of God’s tapestry,” says Wells, who is married to Sam Wells, dean of Duke Chapel and research professor of Christian ethics at The Divinity School. “Only when we take our place faithfully in the whole do we realize how great and how rich the picture is.”

To help students develop that perspective, Wells plans to introduce them to a variety of speakers in the coming year.

George Carey, former archbishop of Canterbury and an outspoken opponent of ordination for openly gay Anglicans, will give a talk at the school on Feb. 8. Wells also has arranged for Episcopal Bishop Michael Curry of North Carolina, who has supported ordaining those who are openly gay, to guest teach a course with her on Anglican polity this semester.

“My hope would be that people who differ with one another will still attend and listen and debate,” Wells says. “We may not end up agreeing, but if we are able to hold discussion together then we are learning to be a church that manages a level of diversity.” Craig Uffman M.Div.’08 welcomes the opportunity to hear a diversity of viewpoints through the Anglican Episcopal House. Open constructive debate contributes powerfully to the church, he says.

“One of the beautiful things about Anglican Episcopal House is that it enables students to discuss these differences and to recognize more of our commonalities,” says Uffman, a former officer in the U.S. Navy who plans to go into parish ministry. “We don’t need to rush out and splinter the church because we’re for or against a particular view of sexuality.”

Davis adds that the Anglican Episcopal House of Studies has great potential to broaden the view of students who otherwise might not consider the church in its global context. That is especially important at a time when the Anglican Communion is growing by millions of members in the Southern Hemisphere.

“Many people go to seminary really never having had a conversation with somebody who was an Anglican, but not a North American Episcopalian,” Davis says. “Part of the problem we are having in the Communion is that leaders are only now starting to reckon with the reality. I would hope that would be something we could help people begin to think about.”

Wells hopes the Anglican Episcopal House of Studies ultimately will encourage patience and humility among those involved in church debates. Americans, Europeans, Africans and others need to listen to one another, she says, and they should be willing to wait for one another rather than striking off in their own directions.

“The smaller our world becomes, the more we ought to be aware of the church across the globe, yet the more tempting it becomes to isolate ourselves,” she says. “Being faithful in the local church is having our hearts and minds stretched to begin to embrace every nation, tongue and tribe.”