Collect for the Tenth Sunday After Trinity

That’s Enough Flannel About Women Bishops

Though the author of this piece is Roman Catholic and therefore, as she says, doesn't believe in the validity of Anglican orders, I just had to quote her.  It is a delighfully wry comment on the feminists and infidels in the Church of England:

The Church of England has agonised for 12 years about whether to ordain women as bishops and at last has come to a decision, viz, to put the whole thing off until November. Or possibly February, so the new Archbishop of Canterbury can get to grips with the question. (And you wonder why there aren’t any outstanding candidates?)

The proponents of women bishops, you see, are hugely exercised by the opt-out clause in the deal. That allows opponents of women’s ordination to call on bishops for their parishes who are not only male but have been ordained by men.

There aren’t many of these parishes: think very camp Anglo-Catholics, or evangelicals with strong views about women ordering men about. But these harmless dissidents are enough for the would-be women bishops to refuse to play. Nope. If they’re not going to be ordained on their own terms, they won’t be ordained at all. There are so many occasions when life calls out for Trollope, and this is one of them.

I’ve got no business, myself, getting involved, given that I’m a Catholic and we don’t actually believe that any of them are properly ordained. But I do get a bit restive when I hear the likes of the Rev Miranda Threlfall-Holmes, one of the many media-friendly female clerics, declaring that “the whole point of having women bishops was to say that the Church of England believes that women and men are equal and made in the image of God. I do not want it enshrined in law that we officially do not believe that.” Hang on there. Our lot don’t have women bishops either but I’ve never had any problems on being made in the image of God, thanks all the same, Miranda.

The whole thing is preposterous, and not just for unbelievers who can’t quite get their heads around the notion that this is being debated at all. The point of the C of E is that it’s recklessly inclusive, a national church that seems incapable of turning anyone away. You can have ordained Anglican clergy who believe that God was made man and born of a virgin and those who can’t quite buy the Virgin Birth. You can have bishops who believe in the Resurrection and those who believe it is true in a very real sense, ie, not at all.

I would have said once that the only thing that actually unites the Anglican communion is a belief in God but that was before the Right Rev Richard Holloway came along, the former primus of the tiny Scottish Episcopal Church, who couldn’t make his mind up about it.

And with this extraordinary latitude on the things that actually count, the one thing they’re going to make a stand on is women bishops? Christ.

The Lords Prayer in Old English from the 11th Century

A right mystical and very well done video about the prayer Our Lord taught us to pray, in medieval Anglo-Saxon:

James K.A. Smith: Tradition For Innovation

"We cannot hope to restore the world if we are constantly reinventing the church, says a Calvin College philosophy professor."

Read the article here.  a couple of snippets:

Evangelicalism in North America today is a vibrant and lively affair, abuzz with innovation and activity. Across the United States and Canada, evangelicals are stepping forward as never before to help restore a broken world.

At the same time, in keeping with their historic entrepreneurial spirit, evangelicals are constantly creating and spinning off new and different ways of doing church.

Often overlapping, these two trends at first glance might seem to emerge from the same innovative spirit, two complementary and intertwined developments, working together for the good of the church.

In fact, however, these are not complementary trends but competing trajectories, at odds with one another. However unintended it might be, the latter works inevitably to undermine the former. In short, we cannot hope to restore the world if we are constantly reinventing the church; the hard work of innovation requires grounding in a tradition. . . .

If the church is going to send out “restorers” who engage culture for the common good, we need to recover and remember the rich imaginative practices of historic Christian worship that carry the unique story of the gospel.

Consider just a few of the many ways in which the liturgical tradition nurtures and replenishes the imagination: 

• Kneeling in confession and voicing “the things we have done and the things we have left undone …” tangibly and viscerally impresses upon us the brokenness of our world and humbles our own pretensions;

• Pledging allegiance in the Creed is a political act -- a reminder that we are citizens of a coming kingdom, curtailing our temptation to overidentify with any configuration of the earthly city;

• The rite of baptism, where the congregation vows to help raise a child alongside the parents, is just the liturgical formation we need to be a people who can support those raising children with intellectual disabilities or other special needs;

• Sitting at the Lord’s Table with the risen King, where all are invited to eat, is a tactile reminder of the just, abundant world that God longs for.

In these and countless other ways, the liturgical tradition orients our imagination to kingdom come, priming us for the innovative, restorative work of culture making. In order to foster a Christian imagination, we don’t need to invent; we need to remember.

Of course, whether or not our culture can be "restored" remains to be seen.  I for one am skeptical, and hold more to the notion that we are to hunker down and await the "New Benedict":

It is always dangerous to draw too precise parallels between one historical period and another; and among the most misleading of such parallels are those which have been drawn between our own age in Europe and North America and the epoch in which the Roman empire declined into the Dark Ages. Nonetheless certain parallels there are. A crucial turning point in that earlier history occurred when men and women of good will turned aside from the task of shoring up the Roman imperium and ceased to identify the continuation of civility and moral community with the maintenance of that imperium. What they set themselves to achieve instead -- often not recognizing fully what they were doing -- was the construction of new forms of community within which the moral life could be sustained so that both morality and civility might survive the coming ages of barbarism and darkness. If my account of our moral condition is correct, we ought also to conclude that for some time now we too have reached that turning point. What matters at this stage is the construction of local forms of community within which civility and the intellectual and moral life can be sustained through the new dark ages which are already upon us. And if the tradition of the virtues was able to survive the horrors of the last dark ages, we are not entirely without grounds for hope. This time however the barbarians are not waiting beyond the frontiers; they have been governing us for quite some time. And it is our lack of consciousness of this that constitutes part of our predicament. We are waiting not for a Godot, but for another -- doubtless very different -- St. Benedict.  (Alasdair MacIntyre)

A related issue is this:  will Evangelicals ever come to a sense of realism about their overall importance in the big scheme of things, and learn to bow to Tradition?  I expect this sort of response from the "redeem-the-culture" Evangelicals who might agree with Smith's argument:  "Yeah.  Liturgy.  Great idea.  Let's create one."

The Elizabethan Settlement and the Catholicity of Anglicanism

Over at The Anglican Diaspora recently, several forum members discussed the merits of the Elizabethan Settlement.  One member there who posts under the handle of "manciple" wrote the following:

Given that this English form of Christianity has now become globalized, even spreading to places which were never part of the British Empire, I would suggest that the Elizabethan Settlement may have been more successful than anyone in the 16th century could possibly have envisaged.

Even as late as the 19th century it was argued that the C. of E. shouldn't send out missionaries as Anglicanism couldn't possibly take root outside of England.

I have to say I agree. While on one level the Anglican Church is a “national” and even “ethnic” church much like the Orthodox churches, the Anglican Church continued to be, even after its reforms, the Church Catholic, and as the Church Catholic not simply the property of Englishmen.  The argument of the English Reformers (and of Good Queen Bess herself) was that the Reformed Catholic Church of England was simply the old Catholic Church of the Church Fathers, shorn of many of its unbiblical medieval accretions.  What we believe as Anglicans can be believed, and is believed, by Africans, Indians, Latin Americans and other non-white folks. What we believe is simply the one, holy, catholic and apostolic faith without Roman hegemony or Orthodox parochialism. But with the Orthodox and against Rome, however, we believe, as I’ve said, that the Catholic faith is incarnated ecclesially as specific national churches, and so there is a sense in which the original Anglican church is the native church of the Anglo-Saxon peoples and the British Empire. And yet there is another sense in which "Anglican" has nothing to do with Englishness, and that is the fact that it is merely the Catholic, which is to say the universal, faith.

One Man Anglican Militia

Here's a blog entry from Fr. John at Anglican Catholic Priest about a young man who stands guard with his .308 AK-style underfolder outside of an Anglican Catholic Church mission in the Diocese of Lahore.  Here (from a recent issue of the Trinitarian, the ACC's official newspaper) the Rt. Rev. Brian Iverach, Episcopal Visitor to the Diocese of Lahore, salutes another person apparently holding the same weapon who stands guard there at the same mission church. 

I'm always happy to see such manifestations of "Muscular Christianity", especially in the face of Islamic oppression.  I am neither a pacifist nor a believer in dispensational otherworldliness, both of which have no room in their thinking for Christian resistance.  The struggle in Lahore, like in other places around the world, is simply a continuation of the war started by Muslim imperialists back in the 7th century, to which the Crusades were but a defensive response. 

May God bless that little Anglican church in Pakistan, as well as the church everywhere in the Islamic world.   And God bless our missionaries there.

The Lord is my shepherd (Psalm 23) - Chant: C.H. Stewart

Anglican Chant: Psalm 104:1-23 from the 1662 Book of Common Prayer

By the Bramdean School Chapel Choir, courtesy of Dr. Westbury's YouTube channel:

Psalm 104. Benedic, anima mea

PRAISE the Lord, O my soul : O Lord my God, thou art become exceeding glorious; thou art clothed with majesty and honour.
2. Thou deckest thyself with light as it were with a garment : and spreadest out the heavens like a curtain.
3. Who layeth the beams of his chambers in the waters : and maketh the clouds his chariot, and walketh upon the wings of the wind.
4. He maketh his angels spirits : and his ministers a flaming fire.
5. He laid the foundations of the earth : that it never should move at any time.
6. Thou coveredst it with the deep like as with a garment : the waters stand in the hills.
7. At thy rebuke they flee : at the voice of thy thunder they are afraid.
8. They go up as high as the hills, and down to the valleys beneath : even unto the place which thou hast appointed for them.
9. Thou hast set them their bounds which they shall not pass : neither turn again to cover the earth.
10. He sendeth the springs into the rivers : which run among the hills.
11. All beasts of the field drink thereof : and the wild asses quench their thirst.
12. Beside them shall the fowls of the air have their habitation : and sing among the branches.
13. He watereth the hills from above : the earth is filled with the fruit of thy works.
14. He bringeth forth grass for the cattle : and green herb for the service of men;
15. That he may bring food out of the earth, and wine that maketh glad the heart of man : and oil to make him a cheerful countenance, and bread to strengthen man's heart.
16. The trees of the Lord also are full of sap : even the cedars of Libanus which he hath planted;
17. Wherein the birds make their nests : and the fir-trees are a dwelling for the stork.
18. The high hills are a refuge for the wild goats : and so are the stony rocks for the conies.
19. He appointed the moon for certain seasons : and the sun knoweth his going down.
20. Thou makest darkness that it may be night : wherein all the beasts of the forest do move.
21. The lions roaring after their prey : do seek their meat from God.
22. The sun ariseth, and they get them away together : and lay them down in their dens.
23. Man goeth forth to his work, and to his labour : until the evening.

Glory be to the Father, and to the Son, and to the Holy Ghost;

As it was in the beginning, is now, and ever shall be, world without end. Amen.

Martin Thornton: Christian Proficiency

This entry marks the beginning of what will be many such entries on the topic of Anglican spiritual life.  I say "spiritual life" rather than "spirituality", as the latter term too often these days smacks of the "democratization of mysticism", which I treat below.  Christianity isn't a "spirituality", but it is to be marked by a "spiritual life", or more precisely, a life in the Spirit, which we call "holiness" or "sanctification."

Thorton's book was instrumental in the renewal of my own spiritual life some time ago, and I heartily recommend it to all, Anglicans and non-Anglicans, though it was written for the former.  Here's a book review:

Christian Proficiency

By Martin Thornton. Cowley Publications.  Pp. 201.  ISBN 093638462X

First published in 1959, Martin Thornton's Christian Proficiency must be regarded as a classic of Anglican spirituality.  Unlike many earlier manuals on the spiritual life which were written for "professional" theologians and spiritual directors, this book was written for the ordinary Christian.   Thornton, who died in 1986, did not believe that the pursuit of proficiency in the spiritual life is a matter of self-improvement or self-realization.  Nevertheless, the preface asserts that in this book he was writing for the "faithful laity".  He wrote other books (Pastoral Theology: A Reorientation, Spiritual Direction) for clergy, but this book is an attempt to provide the laity with a theological and practical introduction to essential principles of the spiritual life.

As the author himself readily acknowledges, "proficiency" is not a term that readily comes to mind when one thinks of the spiritual life.  Nevertheless, it is the term used by medieval writers on spirituality to distinguish those who are no longer beginners but who have not yet attained to perfection.  The "Proficient" is best described as one who has an adult relationship with God.  The book sets out to describe what this level of spirituality looks like and how one might achieve it--with the help of a capable spiritual director.  Although many of his illustrations are drawn from English sports, like cricket, which are a bit of a mystery to most American readers, Thornton's comparison of the spiritual life to athletic training puts the subject into both biblical and practical modern context.  St. Paul is the first to use this analogy and the Greek word for athletic practice or discipline is askesis, the root of our word "ascetic", meaning one who practices serious spiritual discipline.

From this it will quickly be inferred that Thornton has little interest in spiritualities which are based on emotion, enthusiasm, or other rarified states of mind or spirit.  There is a legitimate place for what might be described as mystical experience.  The emotions of ordinary Christians are a significant part of their spiritual lives.  But neither is at the heart of Christian proficiency, which is characterized by order and balance grounded in what Thornton unapologetically describes as a "system".  Heightened emotion and enthusiasm cannot be sustained indefinitely.  For some people, interest in the spiritual life may begin in an experience which is emotionally charged and, for many, the ongoing practice of the spiritual life may have moments of a deeply felt assurance, or of a sense of inner peace, or possibly even more profoundly mystical moments.  However, Thornton is concerned with what happens in the large gaps between such experiences, and with the spiritual lives of those who may never experience such heights of spiritual exaltation.  His approach is objective--not cold or indifferent, but practical.  He is, above all else, a pastor, and he is concerned, once again, with ordinary Christians and how they may become efficient in their essential work as members of the Body of Christ.

Christian Proficiency is a singularly Anglican approach to the spiritual life.  The essentials of the system, as Thornton describes it, are found in the Book of Common Prayer, in the threefold practice of Eucharist, Daily Office, and private prayer.  He provides a theological rationale and traces his understanding of this system back to its theological roots and the experience and teaching of the great spiritual writers of the Church, particularly those who figure in the development of English spirituality.  From the beginning, he makes it clear that the spiritual life is the life not of individual Christians but of the Body of Christ, of which each of us is a member, dependent upon and responsible to the whole.  The purpose of this work is not merely the salvation of the individual, but the incorporation of the whole world into Christ.  The accomplishment of so great a task is not dependent upon us alone, but it does require us to be efficient.

http://www.amazon.com/Christian-Proficiency-Martin-Thornton/dp/1608996638

The Democratization of Mysticism

Some astute observations from Ross Douthat on how mysticism can and has gone awry:

In a sense, Americans seem to have done with mysticism what we’ve done with every other kind of human experience: We’ve democratized it, diversified it, and taken it mass market. No previous society has offered seekers so many different ways to chase after nirvana, so many different paths to unity with God or Gaia or Whomever. A would-be mystic can attend a Pentecostal healing service one day and a class on Buddhism the next, dabble in Kabbalah in February and experiment with crystals in March, practice yoga every morning and spend weekends at an Eastern Orthodox retreat center. Sufi prayer techniques, Eucharistic adoration, peyote, tantric sex — name your preferred path to spiritual epiphany, and it’s probably on the table.

This democratization has been in many ways a blessing. Our horizons have been broadened, our religious resources have expanded, and we’ve even recovered spiritual practices that seemed to have died out long ago. The unexpected revival of glossolalia (speaking in tongues, that is), the oldest and strangest form of Christian worship, remains one of the more remarkable stories of 20th-century religion.

And yet (Luke Timothy) Johnson may be right that something important is being lost as well. By making mysticism more democratic, we’ve also made it more bourgeois, more comfortable, and more dilettantish. It’s become something we pursue as a complement to an upwardly mobile existence, rather than a radical alternative to the ladder of success. Going to yoga classes isn’t the same thing as becoming a yogi; spending a week in a retreat center doesn’t make me Thomas Merton or Thérèse of Lisieux. Our kind of mysticism is more likely to be a pleasant hobby than a transformative vocation.

What’s more, it’s possible that our horizons have become too broad, and that real spiritual breakthroughs require a kind of narrowing — the decision to pick a path and stick with it, rather than hopscotching around in search of a synthesis that “works for me.” The great mystics of the past were often committed to a particular tradition and community, and bound by the rules (and often the physical confines) of a specific religious institution. Without these kind of strictures and commitments, Johnson argues, mysticism drifts easily into a kind of solipsism: “Kabbalism apart from Torah-observance is playacting; Sufism disconnected from Shariah is vague theosophy; and Christian mysticism that finds no center in the Eucharist or the Passion of Christ drifts into a form of self-grooming.”

Is Christianity a "mystical" religion? Some say yes, others say no. I'm inclined to agree somewhat with the latter. One searches the New Testament in vain for any kind of mystical system such as set forth even by Christianity's official "mystics" (e.g., Evelyn Underhill). One finds instead the dramatic, death-undoing culmination of a salvation history that began with the divine call of Abraham back around 2100 B.C. It is a history, as Douthat suggests, rooted in immanent things such as the Eucharist and the Passion of Christ, and not so much in the process of "purgation, illumination and union." This is not to say that there isn't a proper mystical expression of the Christian faith, but to the extent that a mysticism is neither trinitarian nor christocentric, it defaults naturally to pagan mysticism. C.S. Lewis compared the proper Christian mysticism to being in the right boat and setting sail with the right tools:

Discovering spirituality is like discovering you are in a boat. Mysticism is like pushing off from the dock. Since many leave safe mooring and perish in the waves, this is not to be done in a cavalier fashion - even though it can be exciting to push off into the deep.

The issue is not of whether we should push off, for Christians must do so as well if they intend to get anywhere (and that is what boats are for), but rather of where you are going...The Christian casts off from this world as well, but with clear intent to where he is headed, with the best of maps, circumspectly, deliberately.

The Christian Mystic arrives, against all dangers and odds. Thus we launch out with fear and trembling, but trust that He who commanded us to do so can calm the waves, and see us through to His real, safe port.

That is to say, if our navigation system isn't correct, or if we don't have "the best of maps" (Holy Scripture and Tradition), our mysticism is worthless, even dangerous. Christians have set sail for the "heavenly Jerusalem", not the "heavenly Athens" or the "heavenly Mecca" or the "heavenly Lhasa," and sometimes even Christian mystics haven't been as clear as they need to be about this.

Peter Toon: Evangelical and Catholic

H/T Will at Prydain:

It is possible to be evangelical and effectively to disown Christ. It is possible to be catholic-minded and effectively to betray Christ. This is possible, and this in fact happens, because either a system of doctrines or a system of ritual becomes primary in Christian experience. Even as Marxists are committed to an ideology, so religious people may be committed to an ideology – a system of beliefs – in such a way that this system is their basic interest and primary commitment. The personal relationship to Jesus Christ is thereby eclipsed or made ineffectual. Much the same applies to an excessive commitment to ritualism and ceremonial. Here persons are so involved with the apparatus, structure, and functioning of things that they miss the divine Reality behind the appearances. There is little possibility, therefore, for a dynamic relationship with Jesus Christ because a false barrier exists to prevent such a relationship.

To say this is not to say that commitment to the Gospel and commitment to Catholicity are wrong. It is to say, rather, that both only take on their true meaning and function when they are in the right relationship to Jesus Christ; or, put another way, when the Christian, who is in a right relationship to Jesus Christ, knows how each of them should function in his experience and faith. There must always be the primacy of Jesus Christ, who is the same yesterday, today, and forever. Without him there is no Gospel and without him there is no Catholicity. The Gospel exists and is proclaimed because he not only rose from the dead but ascended into heaven to sit at the Father’s right hand, from where he sent the Holy Spirit to be his representative on earth. He is the Lord of the Church; it is he who not only guides and rules the Church but who also gives the Church spiritual life. He is the One who provides the gifts of the Spirit to all believers, according to the wisdom of God. He is the One who is present at, and in, every sacrament. It is Christ who presides at the Holy Communion and gives the food of his own crucified and now glorified body; it is Christ who acts in every baptismal service giving his Spirit to the one who is baptized and making that person a member of his spiritual body, the Church…

On the one side, Jesus Christ is seen as tremendously active in the creation of the Gospel and the foundation of the Church; yet he is dismissed as basically ‘inactive’ throughout the centuries until the birth of Protestantism in the sixteenth century (or even to the birth of modern denominations in the nineteenth and twentieth centuries). On the other side, Christ is seen as active throughout history guiding the Church from the first through to the present century, but he is not wholly recognized as the One who created the Gospel and is ever concerned to renew the Church by the Gospel. These two sides are the two extremes of the pendulum and in what they positively affirm they are right. Of course Christ created the Gospel: of course Christ ruled and rules the Church. What we do not want is merely one swing of the pendulum in one direction or the other. We want the whole movement of the pendulum swinging in both directions and covering all space between each extreme; we want to be committed to the Evangel and to Catholicity. We want the Christ who created the Gospel as well as the same Christ who has ruled and rules the Church today.

O God Our Help In Ages Past

Sunlight Through Incense

St. Mary's Anglican Catholic Church, Denver, CO

Cymen's Conversion

Clodesuida, a peaceful heart to you now.

I am well; I have seen our terrible gods come down

To beg the crumbs which fall from our sins, their only

Means of life. This evening you and I

Can walk under the trees and be ourselves

Together, knowing that this wild day has gone

For good. Where is the Briton? You still think

You must be afraid and see in him

The seed of a storm. But I have heard

Word of his God, and felt our lonely flesh

Welcome to creation. The fearful silence

Became the silence of great sympathy,

The quiet of God and man in the mutual word.

And never again need we sacrifice, on and on

And on, greedy of gods' goodwill

But always uncertain; for sacrifice

Can only perfectly be made by God

And sacrifice has so been made, by God

To God in the body of God with man,

On a tree set up at the four crossing roads

On earth, heaven, time, and eternity

Which meet upon that cross. I have heard this;

And while we listened, with our eyes half-shut

Facing the late sun, above the shoulder

Of the speaking man I saw the cross-road tree,

The love of God hung on the motes and beams

Of light. . . .

(From "Thor, With Angels," a play by Christopher Fry)

"Eastern Right": Rod Dreher on Orthodoxy and Political Conservatism

When I opened the June issue of The American Conservative (TAC) last night, I was greeted by this article from Rod Dreher.  The following comment from the article stood out to me in light of the combox discussion that recently took place here at OJC  ("For Evangelicals and Others Considering Eastern Orthodoxy",  hereinafter "Considering Orthodoxy"):

On a practical level, any conservative who believes he can escape the challenges of modern America by hiding in an Orthodox parish is deluded. All three major branches of Orthodoxy in America have suffered major leadership scandals in recent years. And while Orthodox theology does not face the radical revisionism that has swept over Western churches in the past decades, there are nevertheless personalities and forces within American Orthodoxy pushing for liberalization on the homosexual question. And in some parishes—including St. Nicholas OCA Cathedral in Washington, D.C.—they are winning victories.

Dreher therefore corroborates what both Fr. Gregory Jensen and I have experienced in the Orthodox Church, as I set forth in "Considering Orthodoxy",  which is the increasing "Episcopalianization" of that communion.  If that weren't enough, several individuals commenting at Dreher's TAC article have also experienced it, and at least one person commenting there is an Orthodox Episcopalianizer.   The two individuals commenting at my "Considering Orthodoxy" article, Fr. John Morris and an "Orthodox Christian" who represents himself as a recently minted deacon, protested loudly about the liberalism charge, but here is yet one more witness to its reality in the Orthodox Church.  I reiterate, therefore, my caveat emptor to Evangelicals (who tend to be politically and culturally conservative) and other traditionalists considering Orthodoxy.

Here are some quotable quotes from the combox discussion at TAC (where, by the way, Fr. Morris carries forth his desperate apology):

As to Americans going to Russian or other Orthodox churches, I would have thought that men deserving of the name would stay and fight for what is theirs. Not slink off to someone else’s church, except under the sort of conditions that led to so many Protestants coming to this country in the first place. Until such conditions obtain here the rubric should be “I’ll take my stand” rather than “I’ll stand over there instead”.

______________________________________________

Interesting piece, although, I think the bishops census of only 800,000 Eastern Orthodox adherents in the USA seems off by several million… And, more importantly, aside from the admittedly compelling, ancient beauty of its churches and liturgies, there can only be a tiny minority of Orthodox adherents or converts who experience or understand the church and its teachings at the level discussed in this piece. One wonders where the author and some of those commenting here are plugging into Orthodoxy. It cannot be solely from their experiences attending services or bible classess, can it?

Having grown up in a large Catholic enclave, and judging from what we constantly see going on in the headlines, on contraception, gays and gay marriage, abortion, sexuality in general, etc., I’ve always experienced the Orthodox church to be relatively liberal and non-doctrinaire, particularly when compared to Catholicism and many other US Christian denominations. I know Orthodoxy has largely conservative, unchanging views on all of these “values” issues, which do not substantively differ from those flowing from Catholic or Evangelical doctrine, but Orthodoxy does not seem to spend much energy on any of it, at least not here in the US. It has always felt more like “don’t ask, don’t tell”, its all good, do the best you can with your personal circumstances, God is with you just the same.

And, we’ll never see any Orthodox clergyman in the US refusing an Orthodox politician Communion because the politician commits to enforcing the laws of the land even if they may conflict with his personal views or the teachings of his church. We’re also not very likely to see any Orthodox clergyman suing the government…

________________________________________________

Four years ago I resigned as the Rector of an Episcopal Church, left a decade long priesthood, renounced my orders, and along with the rest of my family became Eastern Orthodox. The particular jurisdiction that we became a part of was the Orthodox Church in America. I was sent by my Archbishop to an Orthodox Seminary in Pennsylvania for a year.

My family gave up a great deal so that we could become Orthodox, and we didn’t expect to be congratulated for that, but didn’t expect the cold reception that we got from many quarters either. We were ready to embrace Orthodoxy wholeheartedly, but never really felt like we were embraced back. The Sacraments that I had administered during my ten years of priestly ministry in the Episcopal Church were repeatedly characterized as being without any validity for the people I served. But, despite the arrogance, we found the OCA to be every bit as dysfunctional an institution, in it’s own way, as is the Episcopal Church. There seemed to be a disconnect between the sublime theology of the Church Fathers and our actual experience in the OCA. The reality we found in the OCA as an institution included an ethnocentric insularity and xenophobia among a great many ethnic Russians; anti-Semitism; a latent fundamentalism among a great many of the converts; shocking corruption and abuse of power in the hierarchy; and a good deal of hateful anti-Americanism among immigrant priests and monks, and even some American ones, that caused some members of my family to struggle with their faith in ways that they never had to do while we remained Anglican. That is perhaps the most pertinent reason that we decided to return to the Anglican Communion. But still it was a gut wrenching decision to make.

I was drawn to the Orthodox Faith because of it’s faithfulness to the ancient understandings of the Faith. My theology is very heavily informed by the theology of the Orthodox Church. I understand sin as bondage and sickness rather than as transgression. As a result, I have an Orthodox transformative understanding of salvation rather than a judicial one, meaning that the real object of salvation is God effecting an inner change in us. Again, the model of atonement I have is an Orthodox one of recapitulation, rather than appeasement. In other words, the need for the atonement was not to satisfy a need God had for punishment, but rather to recreate in us the image of God that we had lost, and to free us from the bondage of sin. I also share with the Orthodox church the focus on theosis – our participation in the divine life which changes us into the likeness of Christ. In that sense I see salvation not as a one time act, but as a growing relationship with God. I also am certain that the Orthodox church is right in their understanding of original sin, not as inherited guilt, but as our inheriting the consequences of living in a sinful world.

There is nothing keeping me from believing as I do and being Anglican. The Orthodox Church is however, at least as I have encountered it in the OCA, very defensive and aggressively anti-Western whenever talking about differences that exist between the two, no matter how small, no matter how long ago. I’m sorry but I’m simply not interested in nursing some old grudge about the Fourth Crusade, or about Eastern-Rite Roman Catholicism in the Ukraine. The Eastern Orthodox can be very enthusiastic grudge-holders.

I found that I needed to return to the Anglican Communion because I am culturally a Western Christian, and I see more clearly now than I did two years ago that the Western culture I was raised in is an inseparable part of who I am. It cannot be set aside without setting aside some things basic to who I am. Some might say, “What profit is there in saving your culture only to lose your soul?” However, I think that would be a false dichotomy. As I look around at the mostly eastern European congregations that are gathered in any Orthodox Church during the Divine Liturgy, I see that it is most often said at least partly in Slavonic, Greek or some other eastern language. It is obvious to me that, for those congregations, their ethnic identity and their being Christian are practically co-terminus. And perhaps that is not entirely a bad thing. The Christian Faith is fundamentally incarnational, and thus it naturally incarnates itself in a culture — be it Russian, or Greek, — or American, or British, or Chinese, or whatever.

I do not now belong to the Eastern Orthodox Church because I am not culturally Eastern, and I am unwilling and unable to live my life as a pretend Russian, or a pretend Greek. The faults of the Western Churches are the faults of Western culture. Eastern Orthodox Churches suffer from the faults of Eastern cultures. In the words of John Henry Newman, ”the Nation drags down its Church to its own level.”

Simply put, I was born and raised in the West so I am a Western Christian, I don’t think that I have any real option to be anything other than that. I have returned to trying to live out the ancient faith as best I can in the place in which I was raised and live. The Eastern Orthodox world, despite the things that it has to commend it, nevertheless has it’s own profound problems and I don’t think that running to it is the answer to what is wrong in the Western Church.

That last comment was, of course, particularly apropros.  Though I don't agree with every sentiment expressed therein, he got to the nub of it in his comments about Orthodox anti-Westernism.  If you convert to Eastern Orthodoxy, prepare to check your execrable Westernism at the door and to embrace the Eastern Orthodox ( = Byzantine) "phronema."

A Bit of Anglican Sacred Space at the Foot of the Ozarks

St. Matthew's Anglican Church (UECNA), Rogers, AR, where I attended Mass this morning.  (My wife and I are here in NW AR visiting relatives.)  A wonderful bunch of people led by a wonderful priest, Fr. Jerry Ellington.  May God continue to bless Continuing Anglicanism in Northwest Arkansas through this parish.

How To Become A Christian

A statement from a former metropolitan of the Anglican Catholic Church, M. Dean Stephens:

Just What is Faith in Christ, Anyway?

A message from the Most Rev. M. Dean Stephens, Metropolitan of the Anglican Catholic Church and Archbishop Ordinary of the Diocese of New Orleans, reprinted from The Trinitarian,
Volume XV, No. 1, February, 1996.

---

If I were to ask you, "Do you have faith in Christ," how would you answer? Some of you would answer in the affirmative with a resounding "yes". Others might answer, "I'm not sure that I have any faith." Still others would respond by saying, "Is it possible to know if one has faith in Christ? What is faith anyway?"

The question about faith in Christ is of the utmost importance because the Bible says that, "Nor is there salvation in any other; for there is no other name under heaven given among men whereby we must be saved" [Acts 4:12]. God has appointed one man, the man Christ Jesus in whom we must be saved. There is no other name or revelation that God has given mankind which will save us from the judgment to come or give life full meaning now. But what a glorious name, the name of our Lord Jesus!

Gabriel, the Angel of the Annunciation, told the Virgin Mary that the child to be conceived in her womb by the Holy Spirit was to be called Jesus, which means -- "God is Help," or more succinctly, "Captain of our Salvation." Jesus is the beginning and the end of our salvation. He is, in himself, the guarantee that we shall be saved if we believe in Him. Romans 10:9 tells us, "That if you will confess with your mouth the Lord Jesus and believe in your heart that God has raised him from the dead, you shall be saved."

But you say: "What does it mean ïto have faith,to believe? That’s a question that many have wrestled with. When, as a young teenager, I heard that I was to believe in Christ to be saved, I questioned in my own heart as to whether I had faith to believe in Christ as Saviour. Was my faith strong enough to save me? Was it real faith?

The word "believe" in today's language has changed and does not fully convey its full meaning of "trust" as it did a century or two ago. To "believe" actually means "to commit oneself to, to trust, cling to, or rely on." Today, in this latter part of the 20th century, you may "believe" something to be true, but not necessarily act upon that belief. Let me give you two simple examples.

We all know that if a person stands in the middle of a busy highway that he will be hit by oncoming traffic if he doesnÍt move. We all believe that to be a true statement of fact. However, the person may not act upon that belief and remove himself from harm. In that case, we all know what will happen. It is possible to believe something to be true but yet not act upon its truth.

A second example is of a person who is sick and will die if the right medicine isn't administered. If that medicine is available, the patient may "believe" that the medicine will save, him, but he must also act and take the medicine to be healed. You see, there has to be an act of the will to decide to take the medicine. The same holds true in the spiritual realm. The "medicine of salvation" has been provided in the life, death and resurrection of our Lord Jesus Christ. We can be saved if we respond in faith to Christ's invitation to believe on Him.

Some years ago, the story was told of a missionary who was translating the Bible into the language of a certain tribe. He couldn't seem to find just the right word to describe what it means to "believe" on Christ. One day, as he was struggling to translate John 3:16, a man appeared at this door to talk about this new faith with the missionary. As they talked, the missionary asked his new convert what he thought was the best way to translate the word "believe" into his own language. The man thought for a moment and said: "I think the best way to describe the word "believe" would be to say, "to sit down." Puzzled, the missionary asked him to explain. He replied, "you are sitting on a chair. Therefore, you must believe the chair will hold you." The missionary translator caught his meaning and quickly translated John 3:16 as follows: "For God so loved the world, that he gave his only begotten son, that whosoever sits down on (believes on) Him should not perish, but have everlasting life."

Isn't that the true meaning of faith, to place the weight of our soul's eternal destiny upon Christ? In other words, true faith relies upon the promise of Christ that He will save us if we entrust our soul to Him. Just as a drowning man needs to entrust himself to the lifeguard to be rescued, so we too must lie still in the arms of Christ, not trying to save ourselves, but trusting Him to do the work of saving us.

Dear reader, have you entrusted your soul's eternal destiny to the Lord Jesus Christ? I said above that it is possible to believe something is true, but not act upon it. It is the same with our eternal salvation. Many believe in their minds that Jesus is Lord but do not act upon that belief. There must come a time, in each of our lives when we make the decision to ask the Lord to save us and take Christ into our lives. Have you done that? Why not do it now and pray the following prayer with faith:

Lord Jesus, I have sinned and have not lived my life for you and I ask you to come into my heart and forgive my sins. I believe that you died on the cross to save me and I ask you to make me your child. Come into my heart, Lord Jesus! I believe your promise that if I would trust in you that you would save me. I now commit my life to you. Thank you, Lord Jesus, for hearing my prayer. Amen.

If you meant that prayer from the bottom of your heart, God has heard you. Jesus said: "The one who comes to me I will by no means cast out" [John 6:37]. In other words, if you come to Christ, He will not turn you away. He must keep His word for God cannot lie. You can be assured that our Lord will keep His word and cleanse you from every sin and make you His child.

Having taken this step, the step of following Christ, don't try to do it alone. Come and join us. . .  (in the church), where the strength of fellowship with others will help sustain you in your new faith.

If you have not been baptized, speak to the priest about it. Jesus said: "He who believes and is baptized shall be saved" [Mark 16:16]. If you are a church member but have been lax in following Christ, renew your baptismal vows today and enter into that personal relationship with Him.

What Is The Gospel?

Consecrations

Consecration of Damien Mead as the Bishop of the Anglican Catholic Church's (ACC) Diocese of the United Kingdom, and consecration of the Anglican Church of the Epiphany (ACC) by The Rt. Rev. Denver Presley Hutchens, retired Bishop Ordinary of the Diocese of New Orleans and presently Episcopal Visitor and Vicar Capitular to the Diocese of the Holy Trinity.

Is Traditional Anglicanism Calvinist or Arminian?

Edit, 9/8/2024:

Since I posted this 12 years ago, my thought on this matter has changed somewhat.  Today I view the God's sovereignty/human volition conumdrum as quite irresolvable, both true, but a paradox that we simply have to live with. See also:

J.B. Mozley on Tolerating Augustinian Predestinarianism in the Church as a Valid Catholic Theologoumenon

_______________________________________________

The answer to that question depends upon whom you ask.  There are Calvinistic Anglicans who, pointing to a term commonly used to describe Anglicanism, "Reformed Catholicism", place the emphasis on "Reformed" and will correctly note the role the Swiss Reformation played in the thinking of Anglicanism's original divines, such as Thomas Cranmer.  These Anglicans tend to be found in "low church" denominations such as the Reformed Episcopal Church and in the Evangelical wing of the Church of England.  Anglo-Catholics on the other hand play down the Reformation, play up the late Caroline, Oxford and Ritualist Movements and stress the Anglican tradition's medieval Catholic roots.  The "Old High Churchman" curses both camps and celebrates high Catholic ritual and Catholic church order while at the same time owning the Protestant roots of the Church of England and her daughters throughout the world.  Old High Churchmen tend to be Arminian (though not in the exact way the Remonstrants were Arminian), but there have been Calvinists among them, such as Archbishop of Canterbury John Whitgift.

Certain Anglican writers have mentioned the "Pelagian" tendency of the British people (Pelagius himself was from the British Isles), and it shows up in Anglicanism, rather paradoxically, in both the conservative High Church/Anglo-Catholic types on the one hand and liberal Anglican Protestants on the other.  Anglican theologian C.B. Moss notes, for instance:

(Pelagianism) is very attractive to the ordinary man of independent will and common-sense religion and morals; and particularly to the Englishman.  Probably 90 per cent of the English laity (that is, practising members of Christian congregations) are unconscious Pelagians.  (The Christian Faith: An Introduction to Dogmatic Theology, p.155)

Theologian W. Taylor Stevenson agrees:

While it may be of very limited historical import, it is certainly appropriate that the only heresy associated traditionally with Britain is that of the British (or Irish) monk Pelagius (active 410-418) who argued that the individual, apart from divine grace, makes the initial and fundamental steps toward salvation.  That is a practical, a 'sensible' idea.  It is more significant historically, and quite in keeping with the English ethos, that English piety and theology has had a an earnest Pelagian flavour extending from the Puritanism of the seventeenth century through the Evangelical movements of the eighteenth and nineteenth centuries.  ("Lex Orandi - Lex Credendi", The Study of Anglicanism, p. 192)

One often hears the argument from Old High Churchmen and Anglo-Catholics that since "God gave us free will" and desires all men to be saved, Christians become Christians by an act of their will as they respond positively to the Gospel, and likewise persevere as Christians by an exercise of holy volition (or not persevere, as the case may be, by an exercise of unholy volition).  C.S. Lewis can be cited as one notable individual who held to this view.

The rub, of course, is that to the extent that such a belief is Pelagian, it is heretical.  Pelagianism was condemned not just at the local Council of Carthage in 418, but at the ecumenical Council of Ephesus in 431 as well.  Anti-predestinarianism did not suddenly evaporate, however, and a view later arose that avoided certain fundamental teachings of Pelagius while maintaining the free will doctrine.  This view is called Semipelagianism, and while it was condemned at the Second Council of Orange in 529, it was never condemned at an ecumenical council, as Pelagianism was.  Moreover, anti-Augustinianism (of which Semipelagianism is one variety) remained prevalent in the East and in some places in the West, so the free will doctrine survived intact as a fundamental Christian theologoumenon in much of the church. 

But even the anti-predestinarian Old High Churchman Moss sees a continuing danger here. Quoting N.P. Williams, he writes (parenthetical comments mine):

Pelagianism is "fundamentally irreligious, so far as it tends to destroy in the heart of man the feeling of childlike dependence on his Maker" (presumably a reference to man's salvation).  We have not got the unlimited power of free will asserted by Pelagius; man is weaker and more vicious than that sheltered monk knew (to which the Augustinian and the Calvinist say, "Amen").  The discoveries of Freud (and others), even though we accept them with great qualifications, at least show that there are vast depths of evil in the subconscious mind of man, of which he is usually quite unaware (to which the Augustinian and Calvinist again say, "Amen").  (The Christian Faith, p.155)

Does it follow from any of this, however, that the Calvinist system must be accepted?  Only Calvinistic Anglicans would say that it does.  Most traditional Anglicans would not say so, however.  The only things they must say are that 1) Pelagianism is heretical and 2) the notion that the human will is situated neutrally between good and evil and therefore is always perfectly and arbitrarily free to choose one or the other is both empirically suspect and lacks clear scriptural support.

Moss affirms, correctly in my view, that "antinomy" marks much of what is affirmed theologically in the Bible.  An antinomy is an apparent paradox, "two sides, which cannot be fully reconciled by reason."  (The Christian Faith, p. 49.)  While I personally lean Augustinian as do many Anglicans, I do so because I think Augustine's theology more accurately reflects the soteriology of the New Testament, and especially Pauline soteriology.  In a nutshell, that soteriology is this:  we do not become Christians, or stay Christians, due to our own power.  God must graciously make us Christians, which is to say that faith is a gift, not something we exercise naturally.  Our coming to faith in Christ is quite supernatural, actually.  Some representative texts from St. Paul (bolded emphases mine): 

And you hath he quickened, who were dead in trespasses and sins; herein in time past ye walked according to the course of this world, according to the prince of the power of the air, the spirit that now worketh in the children of disobedience: Among whom also we all had our conversation in times past in the lusts of our flesh, fulfilling the desires of the flesh and of the mind; and were by nature the children of wrath, even as others.  But God, who is rich in mercy, for his great love wherewith he loved us, even when we were dead in sins, hath quickened us together with Christ, (by grace ye are saved;) and hath raised us up together, and made us sit together in heavenly places in Christ Jesus:  That in the ages to come he might shew the exceeding riches of his grace in his kindness toward us through Christ Jesus.  For by grace are ye saved through faith; and that not of yourselves: it is the gift of God: Not of works, lest any man should boast. For we are his workmanship, created in Christ Jesus unto good works, which God hath before ordained that we should walk in them. (Eph. 2:1-10, KJV)

Wherefore, my beloved, as ye have always obeyed, not as in my presence only, but now much more in my absence, work out your own salvation with fear and trembling. For it is God which worketh in you both to will and to do of his good pleasure. (Philippians 2:12-13, KJV)

And St. Augustine's favorite text:

. . . and what hast thou that thou didst not receive? now if thou didst receive it, why dost thou glory, as if thou hadst not received it?  (I Cor. 4:7, KJV)

However, I am unwilling to draw certain of the same conclusions Augustine and some of his followers (especially the Calvinists) did.  It is quite clear from the New Testament, against the Calvinists and against certain things that even Augustine seemed to say concerning the limited scope of the atonement, that Christ died for all men and that God therefore wills the salvation of all men.  But that does not commit me to a Pelagian, Semipelagian or Semipelagian-like conclusion that God has given all men free will (defined as an uncaused cause of human behavior) and looks nervously down from heaven to see who among these "all" will take Him up on his offer and who will not.  There very well may be other theological options.

However, it's a difficult theological area to be sure.  Ignoring the phenomenon of antinomy in the Bible and accordingly trying to boil down rationally the predestinarian or the voluntarist theology tends to land us in trouble.  But that doesn't mean we don't have a clear choice to make.  Augustine scholar Gerald Bonner summarizes the argument of the Anglo-Catholic theologian J.B. Mozley (again, bolded emphasis mine): 

In a study of Augustinian predestination first published in 1855, J.B Mozley, brother-in-law of John Henry Newman and later Canon of Christ Church, Oxford, and Regius Professor of Divinity, theologically orthodox but fair-minded and aware of the limitations of the human intellect, noted the ideas of Divine Power and human free will, while sufficiently clear for the purposes of practical religion, are, in this world, truths from which we cannot derive definite and absolute systems. "All that we build upon either of them must partake of the imperfect nature of the premise which supports it, and be held under a reserve of consistency with a counter conclusion from the opposite truth." The Pelagian and Augustinian systems both arise upon partial and exclusive bases. Mozley held that while both systems were at fault, the Augustinian offends in carrying certain religious ideas to an excess, whereas the Pelagian offends against the first principles of religion: "Pelagianism . . . offends against the first principles of piety, and opposes the great religious instincts and ideas of mankind. It. . . tampers with the sense of sin. . . . (Augustine's) doctrine of the Fall, the doctrine of Grace, and the doctrine of the Atonement are grounded in the instincts of mankind." (Freedom and Necessity: St. Augustine's Teaching on Divine Power and Human Freedom)

In other words, to paraphrase Mozley, it is better to err in the direction of St. Augustine than Pelagius.  Augustine is a saint and Doctor of the Church, and widely regarded to be the greatest of all the Church Fathers; Pelagius is a heretic and the Semipelagians have been more or less judged by the Church to be the bearers of errant doctrine.  Augustine points us to the hope of grace, Pelagius to the hopelessness of free will and works salvation.  Augustine, following St. Paul, taught that the will was not free without grace, and even then needed the constant assistance of God's grace to choose daily to live the Christian life.  Salvation is not by works, but grace.  If anything is clear from the New Testament, it is that.  But we must be careful about what conclusions we draw from all this.  Most Anglicans are thus careful, and so when they are asked whether traditional Anglicanism is Calvinist or Arminian, they will answer with a deliberate and clear "yes."

That's our story, and we're sticking to it.

Ergo: the potential Evangelical convert to traditional Anglicanism who happens to be on the Reformed side of things should not be put off by Anglican anti-predestiniarianism.  The Augustinian (and in some churches, the Calvinist) doctrines of grace are held by a goodly number of Anglicans.  Whether the anti-predestinarian Anglicans want to admit it or not, Augustinian soteriology is an acceptable theologoumenon in the Continuing Anglican Church, just as it is in the Roman Catholic Church.  And the Arminian Evangelical who joins Anglicanism will be welcomed with many open arms, including those of old St. Clive himself.

How I Got There: An Evangelical Converts to Anglicanism

By Fr. Doug:

Part I

It’s been said that a paradigm shift occurs for one of three reasons: 1) a crisis situation; 2) an influential individual; or, 3) an overload of information. When I became an Anglican, all three of these influenced my decision.

In 1989 I graduated from Dallas Theological Seminary (ThM) and became the pastor of a Bible Church in North Dallas. At that time, I knew nothing of Phillip Schaff and his subtle diagnosis of American Protestantism.

"Tendencies, which had found no political room to unfold themselves in other lands, wrought here without restraint. Every theological vagabond and peddler may drive here his bungling trade, without passport or license, and sell his false ware at pleasure. What is to come of such confusion is not now to be seen (The Principle of Protestantism, Phillip Schaff, 1844)."

One hundred-forty-five years after Schaff penned those prescient lines, I not only saw what he predicted, I experienced it. When I entered the pastorate my priorities were to teach God’s Word and to shepherd God’s people, but the congregation that called me was a loose confederacy with no system of doctrine to galvanize it. In addition, its growing number of programs demanded an administrator, not a preacher.

During this pensive season, I lingered over the Protestant visage. I read her magazines and journals. I listened to her music. I watched her television programs. I wasn’t a participant, but a curious observer.

What I witnessed still baffles me. Her children lumbered to Weigh Down and bought t-shirts emblazoned with, "Food Cannot Meet My Needs." They loaded onto busses and headed to Promise Keepers where they cried and vowed to burn their Swim Suit edition of Sports Illustrated. Then they spent the night on the sidewalk to be the first in line to purchase The Prayer of Jabez, a book that promised to change their lives.

From where I was standing, much of the Protestant Church looked like a lab rat in a maze, frenetically searching for the next, new experience. Its appetite was insatiable. Nothing satisfied. Nothing lasted. Nothing remained the same. It couldn’t remain the same, or its children would get bored and boredom was a sin.

I was on a journey, and the Protestant path had led me to a wasteland where God was trivialized and His Church was marginalized. I remember writing in my journal, struggling to describe the shift that was taking place inside of me. From the walls of my study, the ink portraits of Hodge, Calvin, and Edwards watched quietly.

But they had no answers.

My heart was hungry for something more than barren sanctuaries, long lectures, and prayers during worship that were made up on the spot and for the most part were bereft of serious forethought, Scripture and theology.

A. W. Tozer, a respected Evangelical of the earlier part of this century wrote the following. "We of the non-liturgical churches tend to look with disdain upon those churches that follow a carefully prescribed form of service . . . The liturgical service is at least beautiful; ours is often ugly. Theirs has been carefully worked out through the centuries to capture as much of the beauty as possible and to preserve a spirit of reverence among worshipers. Ours is often an off-the-cuff makeshift with nothing to recommend it. In the majority of our meetings there is scarcely a trace of reverent thought, no recognition of the unity of the body, little sense of the divine Presence, no moment of stillness, no solemnity, no wonder, no holy fear." (God Tells the Man That Cares, A.W. Tozer)

And this is what my heart craved - the solemnity, stillness and wonder described by Tozer. I was searching for serious worship and a sacramental life that would immerse me in the life of the Holy Trinity.

It was during this period that I asked myself, "Is my faith something I invented? Or, is it the faith of the prophets, the apostles, the Early Church Fathers and the martyrs? How can I know?"

It dawned on me that I was sitting in judgment of the historic Church. I had annointed myself the final arbiter of what was orthodox doctrine and worship. I alone had decided what I would believe and how I would worship. I was shocked to find that I looked a whole lot like the folks I had been watching!

In 1990 my children were baptized and my family became Anglican.

Part II

After last week’s post, I received an email from a friend, who wanted to know why I converted to Anglicanism. He pointed out that my post didn’t explain my reasons for ambling down the Canterbury Trail. Here is an edited copy of my response to him. Proverbs 27:17 “As iron sharpens iron, so one man sharpens another.”

Dear ______________:

Thank you for your response to last week’s blog post, “How I got Here from There: My Conversion to Anglicanism.” Your queries caused me to pause and ponder again the beauty of Anglicanism and how God drew me to her. You didn’t ask for a lengthy explanation like this. In fact, you asked to visit over coffee, or scotch – an offer I still plan to take you up on.

I wrote this for two reasons. First, I wanted to revisit and savor what happened to me 20 years ago. Second, I’m a firm believer in writing’s ability to sharpen wooly headed thinking.

You mentioned in your email that twenty years ago there was a mass migration from what you call “Word based” worship into more reverent, sacramental worship. You are spot on. Robert Webber chronicles this exodus in his book, Evangelicals on the Canterbury Trail. In Evangelical is not Enough, author Thomas Howard articulates why these people left. As best as I can tell, their departure wasn’t an emotional reaction brought on by an unbridled desire for aesthetics. Instead, these people wanted worship that conformed to the heavenly pattern of Revelation 5-7.

In your email you asked why I became an Anglican. I may have unintentionally mislead you in my original blog post by intimating that irreverent worship was the reason I left my roots. In fact, that is not true. My reasons for converting to Anglicanism were many.

In the early 90’s I was looking for a church that valued the Scriptures. I found it. Anglicans read (present tense) from the Old Testament, New Testament and Psalter each day during Morning Prayer and Evening Prayer. Its Lord’s Day worship includes lengthy readings from the Prophets, the Psalter, the Epistles, and the Gospels.

A perusal of the 1662 and 1928 editions of the Book of Common Prayer reveals that the Scriptures are woven into the warp and woof of every service and office. It’s been estimated that upwards to 75% of the Prayer Book is either a direct quote or accurate summary of Scripture.

During worship, Anglicans pray the Word, chant the Word, hear the Word, and eat the Word. In short, Anglican worship is saturated with the Word.

So, this is the first reason I’m an Anglican and not a Lutheran, Roman Catholic, or Presbyterian. In my estimation, Anglicanism is unsurpassed in its appreciation of Scripture.

A second reason I converted to Anglicanism is that the Anglican ethos is pastoral. Now, that’s more than a mere slogan. It’s a truth that springs from the Thirty-Nine Articles of Religion.

When you have a moment, read through the Articles of Religion. You’ll notice that they take up a few pages at the back of the Prayer Book. There’s a good reason for this. The Articles of Religion outline the Christian faith in broad brush strokes, so as to create a sheepfold for all who believe the Creeds, the Lord’s Prayer and the Ten Commandments.

You’ll also find that the Thirty-Nine Articles sound as if they were written by a pastor. In fact, Article XVII was penned with a genuine concern for how people might respond to the doctrine of election. Also, couched within the Article is a pastoral admonition regarding an improper preoccupation with the doctrine of predestination.

All of that to say this - I gravitated toward Anglicanism because of its pastoral ethos, its culture of incarnational theology that vivifies truth in worship and ministry. The Ordinal of the Book of Common Prayer (1549) further illustrates this. In the past Anglican parishes were often called “Cures,” and priests were referred to as “Physicians,” who administered the “Medicine of Immortality.” Hence, when a priest was ordained, the Bishop said:

Have in remembrance into how high a dignity and to how weighty an office and charge ye are called: that is to say, to be the messenger, the watchmen, the pastor and the steward of the Lord; to teach, and to premonish, to feed and provide for His children in the midst of this naughty world, that they may be saved through Christ forever. . .

See that you never cease your labour, your care and diligence, until you have done all that lieth in you, according to your bounden duty, to bring all such as are or shall be committed to your charge, unto that agreement in the faith and knowledge of God, and to that ripeness and perfectness of age in Christ, that there be no place left among you, either for error, or viciousness of life.

Mark the incarnational and relational images. The priest is a father and the parishioners are his children. He is responsible for raising and nuturing them.

The poet-priest, George Herbert wrote the following about the pastoral culture of Anglicanism. “The country parson is not only a Father to his flock, but also professeth himself thoroughly of the opinion, carrying it about with him as fully as if he had begot his whole parish. For by this means, when any sins, he hateth him not as an officer, but pities him as a Father.”

Another reason I became an Anglican is that my study of the Scriptures and Church history convinced me that both the Word and the Sacraments are vital to worship. So, in my estimation, it’s ill advised to bifurcate between the two. It has been my experience that when false distinctions like that are made, pastors become imbalanced and to do things like preach 87 messages on John 3:16 and to spend three years expounding the Ten Commandments. It seems to me, that kind of lopsidedness feeds the Gnostic idea that worship is primarily mental. When I jumped off the Protestant ship, I was searching for worship that encompassed both the physical and the mental, the Word and Sacrament, the kind of worship found in the Book of Common Prayer.

My reasons for converting to Anglicanism are almost too numerous to number. I suppose I could cite five or six more critical issues that prompted my conversion, including Anglicanism’s historic episcopacy, and its time-tested model of spiritual formation.

I trust this note has answered your questions.

Regards,

Fr. Doug