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Wednesday, November 02, 2011
The Anglican Pattern of Episcopacy
The clearest and most convincing statement of the distinctively Anglican tradition with regard to Episcopacy that I have ever seen is contained in a booklet just published by the Dixie Professor of Ecclesiastical History at Cambridge, Dr. Norman Sykes, the full title of which runs as follows: The Church of England and Non-Episcopal Churches in the Sixteenth and Seventeenth Centuries—An Essay towards an Historical Interpretation of the Anglican Tradition from Whitgift to Wake.1 In this paper I shall draw freely upon this invaluable essay, and I would strongly recommend every reader interested in the subject to obtain a copy and keep it as the definitive summing up of the historical Anglican position.
The chief of the relevant Anglican formularies are found in the Preface to the Ordinal, and Articles XIX, XXIII and XXXVI of the Thirty-nine. To read more, click here.
How would this fly? Retain episcopacy, but expand it. That is there should be no diocese. Each chief presbyter of each self sustaining congregation should be consecrated bishop. There should be no archbishops (such does not appear in Scriptures). The Bible does not differentiate between the presbyter (priest or elder) and the bishop. In this manner the episcopate may be retained without the egos of the some to distinguish themselves from others and begin to think that they are an esse to the church and a bene esse. In fact when the bishops begin to think of themselves as esse to the church then they have become malignant.
How would this fly? Retain episcopacy, but expand it. That is there should be no diocese. Each chief presbyter of each self sustaining congregation should be consecrated bishop. There should be no archbishops (such does not appear in Scriptures). The Bible does not differentiate between the presbyter (priest or elder) and the bishop. In this manner the episcopate may be retained without the egos of the some to distinguish themselves from others and begin to think that they are an esse to the church and a bene esse. In fact when the bishops begin to think of themselves as esse to the church then they have become malignant.
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