Why Isn’t the Anglican Church in North America More Comprehensive?

By Robin G. Jordan

Those who claim that there is no single way to be Anglican are displaying the influence of Anglo-Catholicism and liberalism. Both Anglo-Catholicism and liberalism have sought to expand the boundaries of Anglican comprehensiveness beyond those set by the Thirty-Nine Articles. According to one liberal view Anglicanism embraces anything and everything that a church identifying itself as Anglican believes or practices. All the church needs is some kind of historical connection with the Church of England and the recognition of the See of Canterbury.

While the eighteenth century latitudinarians may have been the first to assert that Anglican comprehensiveness is broader than its sixteenth century limits, the nineteenth century Anglo-Catholics were the most aggressive in pressing beyond those limits. They were intent on carving out a space for themselves in the Anglican Church. However, they were not satisfied to be one church party or faction among many. Their ultimate goal was to take over the entire church.

Their vision in the nineteenth century was to so Catholicize the Church of England that the Pope would readmit the English Church to the Roman fold. Their vision is still to Catholicize the Anglican Church. The Pope Leo XIII’ declaration of the invalidity of Anglican orders in 1896 and more recently Pope Benedict XVI’s creation of the Anglican Ordinariate have forced Anglo-Catholics to abandon the hope of reunification with Rome. In place of that vision they have settled for making Edward Bouverie Pusey’s theory of Anglicanism as a third great branch of Catholicism a reality.

In the second half of the twentieth century Anglo-Catholics found allies in the adherents of the convergence and Ancient Future worship renewal movements. The convergence movement began as a movement among evangelical and charismatic churches in the United States to blend charismatic worship with liturgies from the 1979 Book of Common Prayer and other sources. The Ancient Future worship renewal movement is a particular expression of the convergence movement that has encouraged evangelical and charismatic churches to incorporate liturgical forms and other traditional practices into their worship. The convergence movement would lead to the formation of the so-called “convergence communions.” Convergence theology has strongly influenced the Anglican Mission in the Americas and the Anglican Church in the North America.

One of the developments in the convergence/Ancient Future worship renewal movement is a growing receptivity toward Catholic doctrine, order, and practice. While supposedly bring together the three streams of Catholicism, evangelicalism, and Pentecostalism into one river, the Catholic stream has proven to be the strongest current in the river. This stream is not the reformed catholicism of historic Anglicanism but the unreformed Catholicism of Eastern Orthodoxy and Roman Catholicism.

The Catholic stream is so strong that what is happening in churches in which the influence of the convergence/Ancient Future worship renewal movement is the strongest may be described as a Catholic resurgence. Among the characteristics of the convergence/Ancient Future worship renewal movement is a rather naïve, romantic view of the early and medieval Churches, a penchant for antiquarianism, and an aversion to the Reformation. These same characteristics marked the Anglo-Catholic movement and the Catholic revival in the nineteenth century.

Adherents of the convergence/Ancient Future worship renewal movement claim what they perceive as the bringing together of the Catholic, evangelical, and Pentecostal traditions is the work of the Holy Spirit. One of the implications of this claim is that the Reformation was not the work of the Holy Spirit. Historically evangelicals have understood the Reformation to be the Holy Spirit’s work and have traced the roots of evangelicalism to the Reformation and its recovery of the Bible and the gospel. This may explain in part the redefinition of evangelical and evangelicalism in convergence circles and their claims of the existence of “Ancient Evangelicals.” Evangelicalism is reduced to an emphasis on the Bible and evangelism.

Adherents of the convergence movement are not the only ones who claim that the Holy Spirit is at work in their movement. So do liberals. The nineteenth century Anglo-Catholics also believed that the Holy Spirit was at work in their movement.

A part of the appeal of convergence theology to North American Anglicans is its claim that the convergence of the Catholic, evangelical, and Pentecostal traditions the Holy Spirit is bringing about is taking place in the  the Anglican Church in North America and the concomitant belief that the leaders and members of the ACNA are particularly anointed by God. As well as meeting a need for meaning in people’s lives, these beliefs also appeal to a common human weakness—pride. North Americans in the United States have also long viewed themselves as set apart by God for greatness: They have in their own estimation a special destiny to fulfill.

What is emerging in the  Anglican Church in North America is a synthesis of Pusey’s theory of Anglicanism as the third great branch of Catholic Christianity and convergence theology’s notion of one river in which flows three streams. The two views complement each other in a number of ways.

How do these developments have any bearing upon comprehensiveness in the Anglican Church in North America? They are actually very pertinent to why the ACNA is not more comprehensive than it is.

Anglo-Catholics have a history of demanding room for their theological tradition in the Anglican Church while at the same time refusing to make room for other theological traditions. In the nineteenth century they tried to drive the evangelicals out of the Church of England. Through their intransigence in response to the plea of conservative evangelicals for modest revisions in the American Prayer Book they forced these evangelicals out of the Episcopal Church.

For Anglo-Catholics, as for liberals, tolerance is a one-way street. You can travel down it only in one direction. They expect, even demand to be tolerated but are quite intolerant themselves. They expect others to compromise but are unwilling themselves to compromise. Where they do compromise, it is on matters that are not of great importance to them.

Anglo-Catholics favor the kind of comprehensiveness, if it can be called that, which provides ample room for their beliefs and practices but affords very little room for the beliefs and practices of other theological traditions, which are not compatible with theirs. It calls for the acceptance or tolerance of Anglo-Catholic views and the dismissal of incompatible views. It is essentially saying that Anglo-Catholic views should be recognized over the views of other traditions because Anglo-Catholic views are right and the views of other traditions are wrong. It is not really comprehensiveness.

Those who adhere to convergence theology display similar attitudes to Anglo-Catholics. They expect tolerance of their views but they are intolerant of views not in agreement with theirs. They are persuaded that the Holy Spirit is uniquely at work in themselves and that they are fulfilling a divine mission. Those who do not agree with them are either spiritually unenlightened or blind or they are deliberately opposing God. Convergentists suffer from all the shortcomings of the Corinthian pneumatics even though they as individuals may not have experienced the baptism or release of the Holy Spirit and may not practice the sign gifts such as speaking in tongues.

Like Anglo-Catholics, convergentists believe that their views should be accepted or tolerated because they are right and those who do not share their views are wrong. Tolerance of their views includes not putting up an argument, staying silent, and going along with whatever they say or do.

In their tendency to ignore or minimize the differences between the Catholic, evangelical, and Pentecostal traditions, adherents of convergence theology overlook the fact the Catholic and evangelical traditions represent not only conflicting interpretations of Scripture but disparate views of the Bible and revelation. As I previously noted, they take a reductionist view of evangelicals and evangelicalism. The end result is that unreformed Catholicism tends to dominate their theological outlook as well as their piety and practice.

A notable trend in convergentist circles is to equate the Pentecostal tradition that is converging with the Catholic and evangelical traditions in the Anglican Church in North America with Eastern Orthodoxy and its pneumatology, and not with the twentieth century Pentecostalism and the charismatic and third-wave movements. Those who take this view appear to be trying to redefine the Pentecostal tradition and provide it with Catholic credentials. Twentieth century Pentecostalism has its roots in the holiness movement and Wesleyanism and ultimately the Reformation and Protestantism.

Adherents of convergence theology favor the same kind of comprehensiveness as Anglo-Catholics. It would make plenty of room for themselves and those who have similar beliefs and practices to theirs but would give very little space to those who do not. The latter group would be required to go along with the beliefs and practices of the other two groups. As I noted earlier, it is not really comprehensiveness.

You may have noted that I do not refer to convergentists as charismatics. The convergence movement is an outgrowth of the charismatic movement. However, those who subscribe to convergence theology are not all charismatics. They may have a continualist view of the gifts of the Holy Spirit and they may have adopted the more free-flowing style of worship associated with charismatic churches. But they may not themselves have experienced the baptism or release of the Holy Spirit. They also may not practice the sign gifts. They do exhibit the tendency to view themselves as a spiritual elite, a tendency that marred the charismatic movement.

The limits of historic Anglican comprehensiveness are defined by the Thirty-Nine Articles. As J. I. Packer points out in The Thirty-Nine Articles: Their Place and Use Today, doctrinal requirements are kept down to the minimum and the maximum of flexibility and variety are allowed on secondary matters:

The Articles are in this sense minimal (they are the shortest of the Reformation confessions.) But they are meant to ensure that all Anglican clergy, whatever their views on other matters, should unite in teaching an Augustian doctrine of sin and a Reformed doctrine of justification and grace – should, in other words, unite in proclaiming what the Reformers took to be the New Testament gospel.

Within these limits, High Church Protestantism flourished alongside evangelicalism in the Church of England.

The “evangelical comprehensiveness” to which the Thirty-Nine Articles sets the boundaries is too restrictive to the tastes of Anglo-Catholics, convergentists, and liberals. They prefer a comprehensiveness the limits of which they themselves define and which benefits them the most. It is not inclusive of Anglicans faithful to the teaching of the Bible and the doctrine and liturgical usages of the Anglican formularies. It leaves out those who from perspective of the Anglican formularies are genuinely Anglican.

The situation in the Anglican Church in North America in the early twenty-first century parallels that in the Episcopal Church in the early twentieth century. Anglo-Catholic elements in the Episcopal Church joined with Broad Church elements in that province to remove the Thirty-Nine Articles from the back of the American Prayer Book and to produce the retrograde 1928 Book of Common Prayer. Traditionalist Anglo-Catholics in the ACNA have joined with convergentists—the new Anglo-Catholics—in the ACNA to produce an ordinal and eucharistic rites that also can be described as moving backward—returning to the beliefs and practices of unreformed Catholicism.

This partnership also produced the Common Cause Theological Statement which would be adopted as the Fundamental Declarations of the ACNA—a document that equivocates in its acceptance of the authority of the Thirty-Nine Articles; includes the Medieval Sarum Missal, the partially-reformed 1549 Prayer Book, and the retrograde1637 Scottish Prayer Book in its standard of worship; and takes an Anglo-Catholic position on the necessity of the episcopate to the existence of the Church. The Fundamental Declarations effectively bars from the ACNA faithful Anglicans who are firm in their adherence to the teaching of the Bible and the doctrine of the Anglican formularies and are unwilling to compromise their beliefs.

The canons of the Anglican Church in North America also contain doctrine, both stated and implied, over which Anglicans historically have been divided. The Thirty-Nine Articles reject the Roman Catholic sacramental system but the ACNA canons accept it.

For those who were paying attention, a number of then Bishop Robert Duncan’s speeches were red flags warning them of what lay ahead. In the days before the most recent Lambeth Conference Bishop Duncan dismissed the Elizabethan Settlement as being no longer relevant to the contemporary Anglican Church and talked about the need for a “new settlement.”  The Anglican formularies—the Thirty-Nine Articles, the two Books of Homilies, and even the 1662 Book of Common Prayer and the 1662 Ordinal—are an integral part of the Elizabethan Settlement.  The 1662 Prayer Book and the 1661 Ordinal are essentially the Prayer Book and Ordinal of the Elizabethan Settlement.  In later speeches he spoke about the need for regression in a time of crisis, for turning back the clock to an earlier time in the faith and life of the Church.

I personally question the genuineness of the Anglican identity of the Anglican Church in North America for the reasons I have outlined in this article. I do not believe that the ACNA can be viewed as Anglican because one group of faithful Anglicans who adhere to the teaching of the Bible and the doctrine of the Anglican formularies are presently maintaining a tenuous existence in that body. They are making compromises which eventually will lead to the erosion of their Anglican identity. The ACNA has not made any major changes to accommodate them.

The existence of this group of Anglicans in the Anglican Church in North America is not an indication that the ACNA is comprehensive in a true sense of the word.  It might be described as an accident. Some might describe it as providential but they are more optimistic than I am. The preponderance of evidence, when weighed, leads me to conclude that the days of this group of Anglicans are numbered. Those who exercise the most influence in the ACNA’s doctrinal and liturgical commissions and its College of Bishops are moving the ACNA in the direction of unreformed Catholicism. They are not making room for this group of Anglicans and their beliefs and practices. This group of Anglicans will, with the adoption of the ACNA Prayer Book and Catechism, be expected to conform more closely to the doctrine, discipline, and worship of the ACNA. If they are unwilling to do so, they will be given the option to leave.

This kind of exclusion is exactly what happened to the same group of Anglicans in the Episcopal Church. They could privately hold to whatever beliefs they liked. However, they could not publicly practice their beliefs or pass them on to others. It is the kind of exclusion that should prompt the intervention of the Global Fellowship of Confessing Anglicans. For reasons to which I am not privy the GFCA cannot bring itself to take such action.  The world once more will be treated to the spectacle of Anglicans suffering persecution in a purportedly Anglican church for being Anglican.

Photo: Overwhelmed by Grace