"A fair question and one that in recent weeks has been much on my mind." (Monty Python's Flying Circus -- "Flying Sheep" skit)
(Edited substantially on 3/11/2016).
In connection with a recent post here, which has largely to do with the vexing question of Anglican identity, I thought it would be helpful to note Archbishop Havlerland's take on it. This is an article of his that dates back to 1995 but was reposted at the Continuum blog in 2007 shortly before it became a copyrighted article on the ACC's old web site. (See the ACC's new and improved web site here.)
It is clear from Haverland's article that "Anglicanism" is pretty much whatever one says it is. Referring to Fr. Aidan Nichols' book The Panther and the Hind: A Theological History of Anglicanism (see my recent post on that book here), Haverland argues essentially that since Anglicanism has been long plagued by doctrinal chaos, it's better to jettison the Anglican ideal of "comprehensiveness" and pick one of the strains. As for him and his house, they will serve Anglo-Catholicism:
Soon, I am willing to prophesy confidently, the official Anglican Communion will consist of nothing but a liberal Protestant rump. Those who do not want to be liberal Protestants will become Roman Catholics, Eastern Orthodox, stop going to church entirely, or (probably what will prove to be the smallest group) join the ACC (and similar bodies.)
What The Panther and the Hind shows is something well known to those who have studied Anglicanism closely. That is, Anglican history shows several broad strains of tradition, all of which can plausibly claim to be classically Anglican in that they have a long pedigree within the Church of England and her daughter Churches. Yet no one of these strands can claim to be Anglicanism in an exclusive sense if that claim means to imply that most Anglicans in fact historically held to that particular strand. Furthermore, these strands were and are often mutually contradictory and hostile. . . .
So how are we to define Anglicanism in this situation? It seems to me that there are two live possibilities before us. One possibility is that we define Anglicanism precisely by reference to its multiplicity of traditions and lack of uniformity, by its "comprehensiveness". This definition, however, reduces Anglicanism to liberal Protestantism and to the current state of collapse. The irony of Anglicanism-as-comprehensiveness is that persons with theological integrity have no desire to be comprehended by such a communion.
Persons with theological integrity have no desire to be comprehended by such a communion.
I have to say that I agree with that statement, and have quoted other notable Anglican writers here -- Packer, Pascoe, Mascall, Henson -- to the effect that Anglican comprehensiveness, which on the surface seem like such a broad-minded and intuitively unifying ideal, has turned out rather to lead only to shoddy theology and no true unity. It is truly either creed or chaos. It also means consistency in praxis, specifically in the area of holy orders. These dioceses and societies that practice an oxymoronic "dual integrity" need to repent, and stop ordaining women to the priesthood. Period.
Haverland continues:
The other possible definition is in fact something of a redefinition: we may redefine Anglicanism by reference to one of its classical strands or parties and then assert that that single tradition should henceforth be normative to the exclusion of the other classical Anglican parties. If we take the first option, as the old Anglican Communion has done, we are doomed. The ACC, therefore, has adopted the second approach. This approach does not, of course, require us to reject everything ever thought or prayed or developed within the other classical traditions. However, it does establish a norm and it does reject the longstanding Anglican tendency towards "comprehensiveness" or, if you prefer, vagueness. We say, in effect, that what was once merely a minority party within Anglicanism is the sole legitimate form in which Anglicanism can continue.
Haverland is probably correct that the only way to obtain theological integrity is to choose a strand and go with it. If the ACC has determined that this is true for itself "and similar bodies", the Anglo-Protestant parties could theoretically come to the same decision, and it's not at all evident that even Evangelicals would hang together, divided as they are over the Articles, the charismata, and the ordination of women. What then about orthodox Anglican unity? The ACC has recently signaled its intent to achieve a communio in sacris relationship with the APA. What then of the APA's relationships with the REC, the Anglican Church of Nigeria, and ACNA?
I do believe with Haverland that if Anglicanism is to survive in the future it must be far less comprehensive than it has been in the past. Liberalism must be read out of the Anglican Way, and allowed to go die its death. That being said, I'm still hoping for the kind of comprehensiveness that includes Anglo-Protestant and Anglo-Catholic, or both may become conservative "rump" churches. Unfortunately, at this point in time, neither side seems willing to engage in serious talks about unity with the other. Too many Anglo-Catholics want to read the English Reformation out of their hair, while hard core Anglo-Protestants such as Lee Gatiss who labor under the delusion that Anglicanism is simply "another branch of the international Protestant Reformed church" and speak fondly of "our beloved Puritans". (!?) Fr. Rob Desics responds to Gatiss and those who take his position:
An interesting piece, but may I offer some comments? It is fair to say that the history of what we now term 'Anglicanism' is very complex, intertwining cultural, political and theological causes and effects. It is also fair to say that the English (or 'Anglican') church predates the Reformation of the 16th century as well as post-dating it. I wonder whether it is too simple a statement to deny that 'Anglicanism' is a via media between Medieval Romanism and more radical expressions of Protestantism (including Geneva). After all, the English church retained many of the received practices and doctrines of the catholic church (such as liturgy, the historic orders of ministry, the Creeds etc.) whilst also embracing the desire to return to a study of Holy Scripture and the Early Fathers. I would question whether it is true to say that 'Anglicanism' is not Catholicism, after all Cranmer and his fellow reformers were firm in their conviction that they were restoring the English church to a purer form of Catholicism - the Catholicism set forth in the Scriptures and the early councils of the Catholic Church. Those bishops, such as Jewell (and theologians such as Hooker), who followed Cranmer in the late 16th and early 17th centuries, whilst firm in their adherence to the 39 Articles of Religion were clear that the English church was the true Catholic church of this land. This being the case, it is wholly inaccurate to label the view that the Anglican church is a 'church in continuity with the Catholic Church but reformed' to be a 19th century fabrication - a fair reading of the historical sources of the Reformation and immediate post-Reformation periods will not allow us to take seriously such a polemical and unscholarly sweeping denial. It is also unfair and historically inaccurate to believe that the Oxford Movement/Tractarian Movement was merely the expression of the whims and fancies of John Henry Newman. What of Keble? What of Pusey? Both these men were key players in the Oxford Movement, and both regarded Newman's secession to Rome as a great betrayal. For these men the Anglican church was the Catholic church in this land, expressed in doctrine of the Book of Common Prayer and the Articles. Of those Puritans of the 17th Century, may it not be possible that they were not Anglican in any meaningful sense? For some advocated Presbyterianism (as some who claim the name of Anglican do today). Some advocated abolishing the Prayer Book and the Articles (just as some also do today). Then, as now, such persons could not truly be identified as Anglicans in any meaningful sense. After all, Richard Hooker, the great Anglican divine, was critical of puritans who sought to take the English in the direction of Geneva. We must be careful to remember that the peculiarity of the English church owes as much to its political entanglements with the State as it does academic theology. The popular regard for the Church of England as Protestant owes perhaps more to the political machine which sought to preserve Elizabeth the First from Jesuit assassins than it does to reasoned theology! Anglicanism was certainly not invented in the 19th century, nor was it invented in the 16th century. It is the flowering of a rich, long and complex history of the One Holy Catholic and Apostolic Church in this land. It is the church founded upon the Apostles; the church of Augustine, Anselm, Cranmer, Jewell, Andrewes; and so down to our day. Beware of simplistic polemics!
I agree with Fr. Desics and others (such as Canon Arthur Middleton) that the only route to Anglican unity is to stress its inherently Catholic nature. Archbishop Haverland is correct in his observation that the Anglican Communion, at least as it exists in England, North America and Oceania, will soon mutate into a liberal Protestant rump. However, I would caution conservative Anglo-Protestants, especially those of the Anglo-Calvinist or Neo-Puritan variety and those who ordain women to the priesthood: if you don't seek true catholicity, you will most likely end up as a rump church as well.
Read the writing on the wall, folks. Observe how Protestantism in both its liberal and conservative varities have morphed wildly and keep on morphing since the Reformation. Only one conclusion can be drawn: there is no future in "Protestantism" as such.