In the spirit of trying to write charitably (which the written word doesn’t always convey well) and pose a question I’ve often had, and which I think sincere Anglicans should have as well, I’ll post this. First the background needed for the question.
I don’t know what exact interest the original poster had here, who is a candidate for ordination in an Anglican church, but it seems to me that there’s essentially three types of Anglicans, which are:
- Anglicans who are fully protestant and disregard the positions of Catholics and Anglican who are “Catholic” in their view about the nature of their church. These people don’t believe in the Real Presence, they don’t worry about holy orders being valid as they don’t regard any of them as really special in that sense, etc. To them, I guess, being an Episcopalian is simply a tradition, or perhaps familiar.
- Anglicans who do believe in the Catholic position in general but are satisfied with their Church’s claims on apostolic succession and are liberal in their views, where they insist on the ordination of women and perhaps other liberal positions.
- Anglicans who fully believe that their church has valid Holy Orders, etc. and that its essentially a “catholic” church the same way the Catholic Church and the Orthodox Churches are.
So, here’s my questions.
For those for whom Holy Orders and validity are important (group 3), who are often the most devout and thoughtful of the Anglicans, why risk any doubt? Wouldn’t it make much more sense to remove the doubt and become Catholic? It seems like gambling with your soul not to do so.
For those who are fully protestant (#1), shouldn’t they reconsider the position of their own church which maintains that these questions are important, and which has occasionally gone to some very great lengths to try to make sure that it does address them?
As for group #2, I guess I my point would essentially be the same as for group #1, but if you’re in group #2 that sort of points you to group #3 which gets you back to my original question.