Canadians on the commission include Toronto Anglican Bishop Linda Nicholls and Anglican co-secretary Rev. Canon Alyson Barnett-Cowan. The commission consists of 10 Anglicans and eight Catholics, plus the co-secretaries. It is jointly chaired by Catholic Archbishop Bernard Longley of Birmingham and Anglican Bishop David Moxon of Waikato in New Zealand.

Nicholls is very aware of the standard set by previous incarnations of ARCIC.

“Absolutely it’s intimidating,” Nicholls told The Catholic Register. “It’s a privilege, an honour and a deep responsibility.”

Nicholls is also aware her status as a female bishop is one area where the two churches disagree. She hopes her ordination is not a distraction.

“My whole ministry has been in the context of women being fairly new on the scene,” she said. “I hope that’s not on the forefront.”

This round of dialogue will be a second look at both ethical issues and the idea of the Church as communion for ARCIC. The commission made a statement on the “Church as Communion” in 1990 and tackled “Life in Christ, Morals, Communion and the Church” in 1993.

The idea of communion isn’t as theologically abstract as it may at first sound, said O’Gara.

“If you want to go after the disagreements and try to resolve them, then we will need to talk more deeply about the Church,” she said.

“The Church as communion means we’re interdependent. We’re together. We can’t ignore each other. It underlines some of the areas of tension now between Anglicans and Catholics. So, it’s a great topic.”

Theological dialogue between the churches isn’t aimed at an eventual corporate merger, said O’Gara.

“It’s a search for the truth together, and that’s what John Paul II said was important,” she said. “It’s not relativism. It’s a discovery of different aspects of the truth. That’s different from negotiating and it’s certainly not a political model.”

There’s nothing at all strange about Catholics and Anglicans starting another round of ecumenical dialogue at the same time some groups of disaffected Anglicans are being welcomed into Roman Catholic Ordinariates.

“It’s not that surprising. It’s the policy of the Catholic Church to have an ongoing dialogue with the Anglican Communion,” said O’Gara. “This is just picking up the dialogue that has been going on for a very long time.”

Relations are strained between the churches over women’s ordination and acceptance of homosexual relationships and the issues have threatened to split apart the worldwide Anglican Communion. But that doesn’t mean Catholics and Anglicans don’t have plenty to talk about, said O’Gara.

“When our friends are in trouble, we don’t talk less to them,” she said. “We should talk more.”

Divisions among Anglicans will be part of the picture for this round of ARCIC, said Nicholls.

“We don’t just bring our perfection to the table,” she said. “We bring our differences and our challenges to the table. I think that’s true on both sides.”

Ultimately, only good things can come of a really serious discussion of the nature of the Church and our unity in Christ, said Nicholls.

“My hope is that we come as baptized children of God who have been asked to come together to think about the life of the Church,” said Nicholls. “We come to seek a kind of unity in our working together that we long for for the whole Church, even in the midst of the differences that will inevitably be present.”