By Robin G. Jordan
Anglican Ink has posted on its front page a press release from the organizers of the recent International Congress of Catholic Anglicans, which met in Fort Worth, Texas, on July 13-17, 2015. The Congress was sponsored
mainly by Forward in Faith North America. The Congress featured a number of preachers
and speakers, which included former ACNA Archbishop Robert Duncan, present ACNA
Archbishop Foley Beach, and ACNA Dean Ray Sutton. With the Congress its
organizers are hoping to revive the high successful Anglo-Catholic Congresses
of the early twentieth century, which one participant maintained caused the
occurrence of “a golden age” of Anglo-Catholicism. They are also hoping that “a
broad coalition of orthodox, catholic-minded Anglicans” will also come out of
the gathering. The Congress issued a statement, which is included in the press release.
Despite its elevated language, use of Greek terminology, and
citation of the Articles of Religion, which give all appearances of being
intended to impress readers, the Congress’ statement is a rehash of what are
established Anglo-Catholic positions. It covers no new ground. The statement essentially serves notice that
Anglo-Catholics are not retreating from the Anglo-Catholic movement’s
longstanding aim of Catholicizing the Anglican Church—to undo the effects of
the English Reformation and to change the Anglican Church’s identity.
The citation of Article XX in support of one of the
statement’s arguments struck me as particularly disingenuous. Throughout its
history the Anglo-Catholic movement has sought to dislodge the Protestant
Articles of Religion from their place as the Anglican Church’s confession of
faith. If any movement has been characterized by a tendency “to expound one passage of Scripture in such a way that it disagrees with another,” it is the
Anglo-Catholic movement.
John Henry Newman, one of the early leaders of the
Anglo-Catholic movement and later a Roman Catholic cardinal, tried to reinterpret
the Articles in a Rome-ward direction in an effort to reconcile the doctrinal
principles of the Articles with his own unreformed Catholic beliefs and
convictions. He eventually came to the conclusion that the Articles could not
be reconciled to unreformed Catholicism. Newman left a legacy of disregarding
the historical context and the intent of their authors in the interpretation of
the Articles and making the Articles do whatever the interpreter wanted them to
do—a legacy that has influenced Anglo-Catholic interpretation of the Articles
to this day.
Nineteenth century English Anglo-Catholics lobbied against
clerical subscription to the Articles of Religion. They described the Articles
as burdensome and onerous to “true Churchmen,” comparing the Articles with the
number of lashes the apostle Paul received the five times that he was scourged by the Jews—“forty
stripes less one” (2 Corinthians 11:24).They systematically went through the
Book of Common Prayer and identified every word, phrase, and text to which they
could give a “Catholic sense,” interpreting the Prayer Book without regard to
its historical context and the intent of its authors and the received
understanding of the meaning of words, phrases, and texts. They then demanded
that the Prayer Book should be recognized as the Church of England’s only
standard of doctrine and worship.
Twentieth century American Anglo-Catholics tried
unsuccessfully to have the Articles of Religion removed from the back of the
American Prayer Book in the 1920s. They joined forces with the Episcopal
Church’s Broad Church wing to adopt the retrograde 1928 Prayer Book, which made
a number of radical changes in the American Prayer Book and was itself a
repudiation of the doctrinal principles of the Articles. They were successful
in having the Articles relegated to a historical documents section in the 1979
Prayer Book.
More recently Anglo-Catholics in the Anglican Church in
North America were largely responsible for the language of equivocation that
the denomination’s fundamental declarations adopt in regard to the Articles of
Religion. Anglo-Catholics in the provisional Provincial Council would block
revision of the fundamental declarations that might have resulted in clearer
language.
The statement’s claim that there is no church without
bishops is reminiscent of the position American Anglo-Catholics took in the
nineteenth century, arguing that that bishops were of the essence of the
Church, its esse. They unchurched
evangelical Christians whose denominations did not have bishops, viewing their
churches as religious societies at best, and their ministers as laymen. They
insisted that denominations should not only have bishops but also have bishops
in a particular line of succession in order to be regarded as being a part of
the true Church and having valid orders and sacraments. They enacted a canon in
the Episcopal Church prohibiting evangelical Episcopal clergy from fraternizing
with evangelical clergy of other denominations, preaching in their churches,
and attending their gatherings and receiving the sacrament of Holy Communion at
these gatherings. This position is reflected in the fundamental declarations of
the Anglican Church in North America, which maintains that the episcopate is a
part of the apostolic deposit.
The English Reformers found no evidence that the Holy
Scriptures prescribed any particular form of church polity. They retained the
office of bishop because it was an ancient and was allowed by Scripture. From
their study of the Holy Scriptures they concluded that presbyters and bishops,
while they performed different functions, belonged to the same order. They
recognized the orders and sacraments of their Continental Reformed brethren who
had conflated the offices of bishop and presbyter into the office of pastor.
While the seventeenth century Caroline divines took a higher view of the office
of bishop, they also recognized the orders and sacraments of the Continental
Reformed Churches.
As Anglo-Catholics have in the past, the Congress characterizes
the Anglo-Catholic movement as a movement of renewal, a claim that rings hollow
in the light of the movement’s efforts to undo the effects of the English
Reformation and negate its influence in the Anglican Church. The Reformation
was in England as in other countries a spiritual renewal movement restoring the
Holy Scriptures and the gospel to the Church. Anglo-Catholic notions of renewal
of the Anglican Church are directly in conflict with those of the Global
Anglican Future Conference which calls the Anglican Church back to the Holy
Scriptures and its historic formularies.
Anglo-Catholics have not only taught doctrines and revived
practices that were abolished in the Church of England at the time of the
English Reformation on solid biblical grounds but also have introduced
doctrinal and worship innovations that the Roman Catholic Church had adopted
from the sixteenth century on. They have argued that if the English Reformation
had not occurred, these doctrinal and worship innovations would have been the
teaching and practices of the English Church.
Anglo-Catholicism with its emphasis on the role of the
Church in the interpretation of the Holy Scriptures, and its fostering of an
excessive dependency upon the teaching and sacramental ministries of the priesthood
has fostered conditions in the provinces of the Anglican Communion,
particularly the Episcopal Church, that have made these provinces vulnerable to
the inroads of liberalism and modernism. It has produced a laity who are woefully
ignorant of the Holy Scriptures and are unable to feed themselves upon the
bounty of God’s Word, and who are consequently unable to fulfill their primary calling
as ministers and missionaries of the Church. It teaches that there is no hope
of salvation except through the priest’s offering of mediation and sacrifice
between man and God and the sacramental grace that the priest dispenses. It has
turned the laity into lackeys and satellites of the clergy. It has not only
obscured the gospel with its teaching but has substituted error for the gospel.
Anglo-Catholics are hardly the force for the renewal of the Anglican Church,
which they see themselves. Rather they would lead the Church back into the
darkness and superstition of the early High Middle Ages.
Evangelical Anglicans need to respond to the challenge of
the Congress’ statement with a gathering of their own and a statement
reiterating GAFCON’s call for the restoration of the Bible and the formularies
to their rightful place in the Anglican Church as its authoritative standards
of doctrine and worship. What would be a better occasion to announce the
formation of an organization to bring together evangelical Anglicans in North
America for the advancement of the gospel and the furtherance of biblical
Christianity and authentic historic Anglicanism? It would also be the perfect
occasion to launch the movement to establish a second province within the
Anglican Church in North America, one which is fully committed to the teaching
of the Bible and the doctrine of the formularies. Such a gathering would also
show where individual ACNA leaders stand. Evangelical Anglicans have much to
gain and nothing to lose by convening their own assembly.
If the hope of the Congress’ organizers that a broad
Anglo-Catholic coalition emerges from the event is realized, Anglo-Catholics in
that coalition presently not in the Anglican Church in North America could
eventually become a part of that jurisdiction. The press release quotes one of
the Congress’ participants who identified the “proliferation of jurisdictions”
as one of the challenges facing the contemporary Anglo-Catholic movement and
the “overriding purpose” of the Congress” as addressing this “ecclesial
deficit.” With its endorsement of the
new baptismal and confirmation rites the ACNA College of Bishops has made the
jurisdiction more attractive to traditionalist Anglo-Catholics. What deters
traditionalist Anglo-Catholics from other jurisdictions from becoming a part of
the Anglican Church in North America is that the ACNA ordains women priests and
has made no provision for the retention and use of the 1928 Prayer Book and the
various Anglican missals to which traditionalist Anglo-Catholics have a strong
attachment. For most bishops in these jurisdictions becoming a part of the ACNA
would mean they would be bishops without jurisdiction over a diocese. They
would at best be relegated to the position of assistant or suffragan bishop.
An influx of traditionalist Anglo-Catholics from other
jurisdictions would bolster the size and influence of the Anglo-Catholic wing
of the Anglican Church in North America. How the wing of the ACNA that Gerald
Bray describes as “charismatic open evangelical ritualists” would respond to
such an influx is hard to say. Their own fidelity to the gospel and commitment
to evangelism and church expansion might be the deciding factors. The
traditionalist Anglo-Catholics in these jurisdictions are not gospel-centered
and they have not shown themselves as being adept at evangelism and church
expansion.
For Anglicans who fully accept the Bible and the formularies
as the Anglican Church’s authoritative doctrinal and worship standards but
whose beliefs and convictions do not enjoy official standing in the Anglican
Church in North America such an influx would, I suspect , seal their fate.
While I would not expect it to greatly increase the size of the Anglo-Catholic
wing, it would give the Anglo-Catholic – philo-Orthodox element occupying the
place of power in the denomination plausible grounds for ramping up their
Catholicization of the denomination. Making the Anglican Church in North
America more attractive to traditionalist Anglo-Catholics already to certain
extent provides these grounds.
Photo credit: Peter Cawley
It seems what they are looking for is not the Reformation of Luther, Calvin, and Cranmer at all. What they are describing is what the Conciliarists at Constance wanted in 1415, namely a Roman Catholic Church where the Pope is simply first among equals and the Church is presided over by councils.
ReplyDeleteAn excellent point, Austin. Similar thinking appears to underlie the form of governance adopted by the Anglican Church in North America, its actual operation, the preferred method for the selection of bishops identified by the ACNA canons, and the method for the selection of a new archbishop.
ReplyDeleteWhy don't you stop playing at being Roman
ReplyDeleteand come back to the one true church
ROMAN CATHOLICISM.
Good question. One of the answers is when there was a Rome-ward movement in Anglo-Catholicism, Rome made it difficult for Anglo-Catholics to reunite with Rome on their own terms. But as I expect that you know, a large body of independent Catholics exists outside the Church of Rome, independent Catholics who are Roman in doctrine and practice but who have not truck with papacy and its claims. The Roman hierarchy's mishandling of the sexual abuse of children by Roman clergy and religious certainly has not endeared papacy to these independent Catholics as it has not endeared that hierarchy to Roman Catholics, There have been calls for extensive reform of the hierarchy and for the establishment of lay oversight bodies. Too many foxes in charge of the chicken coop. The exodus from the Roman Church to evangelical and other denominations in the United States is far greater than the trickle of converts to Roman Catholicism. Why join a church that other people are leaving in large numbers? The Roman Church's positions on women in ordained ministry and same sex marriage are also real sticking points for younger and more liberal Roman Catholics. The early Celtic monks told would-be pilgrims to Rome, "you won't find Christ in Rome unless you take him with you." Those who are migrating to evangelical and other denominations from the Church of Rome are leaving because they did not find Christ in Rome. The Church of Rome is not all that its advocates make it out to be, something new converts who have not paid attention to what those leaving tell them must learn for themselves.
ReplyDelete