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Contarini
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Well no. We believe that God has called all people to faith in Jesus Christ and membership in the One, Holy, Catholic, and Apostolic Church. So we owe no apologies for proclaiming that mission, although we do often owe apologies for how we carry it out.nobody has any business proselytizing with anybody. now make an apology on behalf of christianity.
However, we Anglicans do not believe that God has called all people to be Anglicans, so we have no business proselytizing for Anglicanism among members of other parts of the Church. For some Anglicans, that would include all Trinitarian Christians. For others, that would include members of churches in apostolic succession. I’m somewhere in the middle (yes, the middle of the middle–aren’t I a mess?). I would be slow to try to persuade a Baptist to become Anglican, but I would not try to discourage them either. I would try to discourage a practicing member of the Catholic or Orthodox Churches from becoming Anglican, with due regard to prudence and courtesy (i.e., I knew a guy in New Jersey who was in the process of leaving Catholicism for Episcopalianism, and I expressed some misgivings to him about it, but it was clear that I wasn’t going to have any influence on him in that regard, and I certainly did not want to make him feel as if I didn’t want him in my church, so I was cautious in how I expressed my views). The only kind of “Catholic” whom I would encourage to become Anglican would be one who had clearly already abandoned the Catholic Church.
Edwin
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Contarini
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You should ask the Orthodox. I suspect that they will tell you one of two things (or both): that they do not need to define dogmas, since the major dogmatic issues have been settled, or that they could conceivably do so still. I do not think that the Orthodox believe that there are dogmatic issues floating around that need to be settled but which they cannot settle.
But if, for the sake of argument, they did believe this, it would not therefore follow that the Roman Communion was any more qualified to do so than that of Constantinople. Perhaps neither side can call a true Ecumenical Council as things are. You are sidestepping the major point, which is that according to all of Christendom except your Communion, no one bishop within the Church has the authority to declare dogmas ex cathedra. Your Church has departed significantly from Christian tradition on this point, and that’s the real issue lying behind the question of the Assumption.
Agreed. The Assumption as a pious opinion goes back relatively early (fourth century?), though in my opinion not quite early enough to justify the declaration of the tradition as a dogma. It certainly long predates the Pope’s pronouncement, and you are right that this is standard procedure.
Edwin
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Contarini
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I am not suggesting that the people in question should be legally restrained from proselytizing. I am suggesting that what they are doing is unwarranted by the standards of Anglican ecclesiology.i was just being sarcastic. like why prohibit one and not the other? lets all respect freedom of expression, freedom of beliefs. as long as there is no arm twisting, it should be okay.
Edwin
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Brendan
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No, Anglicanism is “Catholic Lite”, the Episcopal Church is more like ‘Unitarianism in Chasubles.’
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tomarin
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ok, duly noted, but you make it sound like christianity is a democratic exercise whereas i believe that in matters spiritual it is both good and desirable to have a central authority. i don’t accept that we have departed from christian tradition, because i don’t believe in something called “christian tradition” that lies outside of the catholic church.
it seems to me your conception of christian tradition highlights the problem with ecumenical protestantism, which is that you have to invest all the various sects of christianity with a little bit of authority until there is none left for the religion as a whole. it seems to me that christianity taken as a whole is less than the sum of its parts – if you take all three branches and give each a vote, then we end up nowhere because the three contain too many disharmonious and contradictory elements.
i hope i don’t sound combative, i know you know much more than i do about the history and theology of christianity – and that’s precisely why i enjoy picking your brain on these questions, as i never fail to learn something.
now if you can show me that historically no one bishop had the authority to declare dogmas ex cathedra before the great schism, then i would have to rethink everything. but i’m assuming it’s difficult to prove that assertion.
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Tomster
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Let’s see here. On the one hand you are saying God has called all people to faith in Jesus Christ and membership in the One, Holy, Catholic, and Apostolic Church.
Then you say that the only type of “Catholic” whom you would encourage to become Anglican would be one who had clearly already abandoned the Catholic Church.
Why wouldn’t you encourage this person to return to the One, Holy, Catholic, and Apostolic Church that you stated God has called all people to?
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rr1213
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What approach, if any, would you take towards confessional Lutherans?
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Contarini
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This is a common slander. I have been an Episcopalian for nearly ten years now, and I have met few if any Episcopalians who could reasonably be described as Unitarians. We do, after all, have an explicitly Trinitarian liturgy, and I have rarely seen any reason to believe that the clergy (at least) using that liturgy did not mean what it says.
I don’t deny that we have “Unitarians in chasubles,” but the scandal is not that they dominate the Episcopal Church–they don’t–but that they are tolerated within it. It is easy for more conservative Christians to slide from the one to the other and to assert or imply that any error tolerated within a communion can be taken to be the teaching of that communion. This is patently false.
Edwin
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Gottle_of_Geer
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From which it follows that:
- Catholics have their explanations for verses & doctrines & dogmas - & so do Anglicans.
Unfortunately, a medium like the Net does not really encourage an understanding of the Christian faith at more than a rather superficial level.
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rr1213
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Among other things, the impression of others is shaped by Bishop Spong who, in his latest incarnations, may reasonably not even be described as Christian let alone non-trinitarian.
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Lepanto
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This fact alone should pretty much end the discussion regarding Anglicanism. Why on earth would one follow a religion founded on one man’s lust and greed? It just does not make sense.
At least Luther and Calvin originally split over theological principles (wrong as they were) rather than selfishness.
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Lepanto
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Caesaropapism is indeed an absurd concept.
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Contarini
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Anglicanism is not our religion. Christianity is our religion. Anglicanism is the particular cultural tradition of Christianity to which we belong.
Edwin
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Contarini
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First of all, I obviously do not think that the One, Holy, Catholic, and Apostolic Church can be simply identified with the Roman Communion (or the Roman Catholic Church, or the body-of-churches-in-communion-with-Rome, or whatever other neutral term you prefer).
But in the second place, I am talking about people who have clearly already made a decision. One of the weirdest features of Internet discussion forums is the confidence many people seem to feel in their ability to persuade just about anyone of anything if they try hard enough. I can be arrogant enough, God knows, but I’m not that arrogant.
Furthermore, it’s frankly rather cheeky of Catholics to expect other Christians to run interference for them, sending back to Rome those whom Rome has driven away. Mostly the people I have in mind are divorced and remarried. And mostly their disillusionment with Rome is the result of legalism and confusion rather than moral principle on the part of the Church. I think of the woman I knew in North Carolina who had been married and divorced twice (both times to alcoholics), and was told by a Catholic priest that to return to the Church she had to get both marriages annulled. This in spite of the fact that at the time I knew her she was not married (in the common sense–obviously from the Catholic perspective she was still married to her first husband) and seemed to have every intention of living celibately henceforth.
“You are an adulterer” I can have some sympathy with, even if I think there are better pastoral approaches. “Why not spend a few hundred bucks, fill out a mountain of paperwork, and get your marriage annulled”–that’s much harder to respect. And in practice most people get a confused mixture of the two messages. It’s not my business to clean up your mess for you. We have enough messes of our own. If people sometimes prefer our messes to yours, that’s their decision and your shame.
However, as a matter of fact I tried to persuade the woman I just described that the priest had probably given her the wrong message and that she might be able to return to the Catholic Church. Understandably after her experiences, she wasn’t interested.
The one case where I did recommend an ex-Catholic to look into the Episcopal Church was on a recent plane flight–the woman in question seemed very cynical about Christianity as a whole and clearly had no openness to returning to Catholicism. Under the circumstances, I thought that my own Communion offered the lesser of two evils (the other evil being complete abandonment of Christianity).
Edwin
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Contarini
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I certainly wouldn’t try to convert them, though I would try to persuade them that having bishops in historic succession would be a good idea. I have had this argument with conservative ELCA Lutherans, and it’s an uphill slog.
Edwin
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Contarini
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Yes, but people ought to have enough sense not to judge an entire group of Christians by one man, however loud and obnoxious he may be.
Edwin
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Tomster
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You’re right. It doesn’t make sense. But if that weren’t enough Anglicans will tell you that their approach is very near to the Catholic Church. They will tell you that their prayers and ceremonies are like many prayers and ceremonies of the Catholic Church, that their Creed is the Apostle’s Creed. But, in principle, they are far off. They profess to believe in one Church, which has, unfortunately, become more than one; in unity, which ceased to exist long ago, for want of a center; in authority, which nobody needs to obey, because it has lost the power to teach; in God’s presence with the Church, which does not keep her from errors; in Divine promises, which were made only to be broken; in a Divine constitution, which needs to be periodically reformed; in a mission to teach all nations, while she is unable to teach even herself; and in the sanctity of truths which their own sect has defiled, and which are profanely mocked to this very day by its bishops, clergy, and people.
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outfctrl
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That is exactly what he was telling me that night, to a Tee!!
The whole time I was confused. Same prayers, Communion, Apostle’s Creed.
Why was he so set on recruiting me? Why are they against the Pope?
Are their laws and beliefs more lax then ours?
I walked out of there thinking of this the whole time. I needed to pass this experience on to all of you to and try to make sense of it.
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Contarini
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Actually our principal Creed is the Nicene Creed–at least that’s the one we use at Sunday Eucharist.
And we will tell you that our prayers and ceremonies are similar because they are. All you have to do is make a comparison.
Right. We admit this, you don’t. At least you try not to. In recent years reality has been catching up with you, and you have nuanced your belief in the unity of the Church to the point that the difference between your view and ours (at least mine–admittedly I have a stronger view of the authority of the See of Rome than most Anglicans) takes a lot of explaining.
I would say that perfect unity has never existed and will never exist until Christ returns.
However, if you care about unity and we don’t, how come you are the ones who refuse us communion, and not the other way round? We’re happy to be united to you any time you want. All you have to do is accept us as we already accept you.
Authority is a problem in Anglicanism. But it’s clearly a problem in Catholicism as well. It is all very clearcut on paper, but I’m not really interested in a “paper church,” to adopt and reverse a telling phrase of Newman’s.
You mean, from the very specialized and closely defined kind of errors from which God’s presence allegedly keeps you? Sure.
Edwin
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