Anglicans/ Episcopalians: Do you know where i can trace the apostolic line?

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I’mReallyNice,

check out the sites:

anglicanfederation.org/

emchome.org/

I am a member of the EMC.

Stay away from the episcopal church of the usa they are pertty much a secular religion. Also watch out for some church’s that affiliate themselves with the African Anglican church’s they are pertty liberal also.
 
So, mutatis mutandis ( writing macaronically, just for gurney), there is a parallel between what happened in the story of AC and what happened with respect to Henry’s causa, in his quest for a decree of nullity. On the surface, each was a theological matter. In execution, each was a mixture of politics, theology, personality and history. Henry’s story was more complicated, lasted longer and had more consequences. But he and Cardinal Vaughan had similar roles. One of the more striking points in reading Hughes’ very detailed account of what happened, once the thing had morphed from what Halifax and Portal had originally hoped for (which was a sort of early ARCIC, to discuss areas of mutual interest, aimed at reducing the distance between the two Churches) and what actually happened (a RC only Papal commission to make a definitive statement on Anglican orders), is the open and naïve approach that Halifax took, with Vaughan, as the other side, in England, and the Machiavellian maneuvers the Cardinal took. I like how Halifax came out of it.

Context, providing a determinatio ex adiunctus, was a part of the rationale in determining the validity of intent. It seems plausible to do so. But as applied, it discounted, and all RC discussions since discount, a more immediate possible context with respect to the intent of the authors of the Ordinal: what they wrote in the preface. The form is judged on the context, including the fact that “priest” was not mentioned in the form. But it was mentioned 6 times in the preface, beginning with an observation that it is obvious that the 3 orders of clergy have existed in the Church since Apostolic times, naming them, and stating it was the intent (a document doesn’t have a sacramental intent, of course) that these Orders be continued. This seems at least a plausible source of a context for the form, but it not judged so, in the controversy, though Anglicans often mention it.

Hughes, in a 200+ page section of STEWARDS OF THE LORD (which is his theological discussion of the case, as ABSOLUTELY NULL is his historical one) does a detailed technical consideration of just what the authors of the Ordinal might have been meaning to exclude, based on an examination of period Eucharistic theology. It is far too esoteric, and too lengthy, to try to discuss it here. But it convinced me it wasn’t the sacrificing priesthood per se.

My conclusion on AC is like unto what I make of what happened to Henry’s Great Matter. Theologically, in the abstract, it was a toss-up, could have gone either way. Certainly Henry’s case wasn’t the strongest he could have made, though it was as strong as such things usually were, for a successful outcome. AC, on theological merits alone, could have gone either way. The votes of the eight commissioners were split, four for invalid, four for either valid or possibly invalid (the three commissioners sent by Vaughan were all for invalid). In the general, overall atmosphere of the day, some progress might have been made, with Halifax’s and Portal’s dream. In the specific context of the personalities, and the commission as it was brought about, there was no chance.

So, I believe that Anglicans orders are valid, and that the sacraments for which orders are required are validly confected and efficaciously convey grace. No RC should say the same.

GKC
 
Benidict, my prayers are with you.:crossrc:

My son is in the USMC.

Peace Be With You.
 
But don’t you think any council or papal/magisterial deliberations can always go either way? In every council from the Nestorian question to the Arian crisis to Monothelitism, they always can go either way. It’s what is finally decided that really matters.

Things could’ve gone either way in Vatican I but they went the pope’s way. From a Catholic point of view, it’s the Holy Spirit that guides such deliberations and councils. Take Humanae Vitae. That was not a landslide decision by any means. But one can’t look at it from a “mandate” stance I don’t think. It’s like they say in sports, “a win is a win.”

I think, like I’ve said before, that one must look at the entire picture and not just orders. Transmission of orders isn’t the only thing that makes one catholic (small c). My concern about Anglicanism is not just the usual Hank declaration of nullity (notice how I didn’t say divorce! ha! can’t get me! :p:cool:) stuff that bothers most. My concern is the inconsistency. Some Anglicans claim that the Church of England founded by Henry and ultimately cemented into the current structure by Elizabeth was already the Church in England centuries before the papists took it over in tyranny and that the Reformation in England did just that, it “reformed” and cleaned up “abuses.” Then there’s the view that the Church in England of the Reformation era was a new church. I always thought it was curious wording that Peter Martyr chose in 1549 when talking about Cranmer’s tireless work…

“Our most Reverend Archbishop fights strenuously , and with the highest commendation of all good men…I see that there is nothing more difficult in the world than to found a Church. The stones are generally rough and unpolished unless they are rendered smooth by the Spirit…May the Lord grant that among us there may be rightly planted a vine which in due time may produce fruit delicious both to men and to God.”

Now I know context is important but Martyr sure makes it sound like Cranmer and the boys were ARCHITECTS, not merely maintenance men. They built the Church of England. I think this is the most honest assessment.

Was the Church of England and thus Anglicanism just a continuation of catholicity in England or was the CofE just an attempt by Protestants to steadily move toward Continental Reformed Protestantism with some bells and whistles thrown in as well as rituals included to pacify conservatives and a populace that wasn’t all that opposed to the Catholic religion of the day?

I think Eamon Duffy does a compelling job of pointing out that the commoner in England at that time didn’t have much of a problem with the Catholic Church. And they played more a part in it than the Reformers and Anglican apologists have tried to portray in my reading of the matter.

With centuries of things like the Black Rubricks, the 39 Articles, an ordinal that omits sacrificial language, destruction of altars and iconoclastic carnage, conservative bishops who had Catholic sympathies being marginalized or killed, and a steady evangelical personality for hundreds of years, it’s a tough case that Pusey and the boys make that the Church of England was truly catholic.

I
 
I guess my question in all this A.C. analysis is what is the fruit of the Anglican Church? What fruit has it produced? We can measure the great fruits of Orthodoxy and Catholicism but what fruit has Anglicanism produced if it be truly catholic? That’s a question I ask myself. And perhaps there’s a good answer?

I see the liberal churches that broke ranks with Catholicism like the Old Catholics and Anglicans adopting women’s ordination, gay sympathies, etc. We don’t see that in Orthodoxy and Catholicism? We see mass chaos, lawsuits, hostility to life, and anglo-Catholics trying to minimize their own early important documents like the 39 Articles and trying to appeal to a celtic church (of which we know nothing) and a continuity in England for 2,000 years that supposedly existed that one cannot in good conscience prove has existed at all?

I think the Anglican question, the identity, the bigger picture is FAR bigger than apostolicae curae. That’s just a microbe compared to the big picture. Is transmission of orders all one needs to be a part of the catholic faith? I think the machinery of Anglicanism itself is doomed to make it an internal mess that can never arrive at “the truth.” Catholicism has the papacy, magisterium, college of cardinals, bishops, order. The Orthodox have councils and synods and good order. The Anglicans have so many different “brands” from within that they criss-cross, overlap, contradict, and can never arrive at anything? And the only things they have agreed on were negative things like birth control or women’s ordination or indaba encounters. I don’t see Anglicanism as being a productive vehicle for catholic teaching. How is conciliar christianity possible in Anglicanism?

I think the big picture of Anglicanism is far, far greater than proving her validity of orders. But that’s just yours truly weighing in.
GKC said:
So, mutatis mutandis ( writing macaronically, just for gurney), there is a parallel between what happened in the story of AC and what happened with respect to Henry’s causa, in his quest for a decree of nullity. On the surface, each was a theological matter. In execution, each was a mixture of politics, theology, personality and history. Henry’s story was more complicated, lasted longer and had more consequences. But he and Cardinal Vaughan had similar roles. One of the more striking points in reading Hughes’ very detailed account of what happened, once the thing had morphed from what Halifax and Portal had originally hoped for (which was a sort of early ARCIC, to discuss areas of mutual interest, aimed at reducing the distance between the two Churches) and what actually happened (a RC only Papal commission to make a definitive statement on Anglican orders), is the open and naïve approach that Halifax took, with Vaughan, as the other side, in England, and the Machiavellian maneuvers the Cardinal took. I like how Halifax came out of it.

Context, providing a determinatio ex adiunctus, was a part of the rationale in determining the validity of intent. It seems plausible to do so. But as applied, it discounted, and all RC discussions since discount, a more immediate possible context with respect to the intent of the authors of the Ordinal: what they wrote in the preface. The form is judged on the context, including the fact that “priest” was not mentioned in the form. But it was mentioned 6 times in the preface, beginning with an observation that it is obvious that the 3 orders of clergy have existed in the Church since Apostolic times, naming them, and stating it was the intent (a document doesn’t have a sacramental intent, of course) that these Orders be continued. This seems at least a plausible source of a context for the form, but it not judged so, in the controversy, though Anglicans often mention it.

Hughes, in a 200+ page section of STEWARDS OF THE LORD (which is his theological discussion of the case, as ABSOLUTELY NULL is his historical one) does a detailed technical consideration of just what the authors of the Ordinal might have been meaning to exclude, based on an examination of period Eucharistic theology. It is far too esoteric, and too lengthy, to try to discuss it here. But it convinced me it wasn’t the sacrificing priesthood per se.

My conclusion on AC is like unto what I make of what happened to Henry’s Great Matter. Theologically, in the abstract, it was a toss-up, could have gone either way. Certainly Henry’s case wasn’t the strongest he could have made, though it was as strong as such things usually were, for a successful outcome. AC, on theological merits alone, could have gone either way. The votes of the eight commissioners were split, four for invalid, four for either valid or possibly invalid (the three commissioners sent by Vaughan were all for invalid). In the general, overall atmosphere of the day, some progress might have been made, with Halifax’s and Portal’s dream. In the specific context of the personalities, and the commission as it was brought about, there was no chance.

So, I believe that Anglicans orders are valid, and that the sacraments for which orders are required are validly confected and efficaciously convey grace. No RC should say the same.

GKC
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gurneyhalleck1 said:
But don’t you think any council or papal/magisterial deliberations can always go either way? In every council from the Nestorian question to the Arian crisis to Monothelitism, they always can go either way. It’s what is finally decided that really matters.

Things could’ve gone either way in Vatican I but they went the pope’s way. From a Catholic point of view, it’s the Holy Spirit that guides such deliberations and councils. Take Humanae Vitae. That was not a landslide decision by any means. But one can’t look at it from a “mandate” stance I don’t think. It’s like they say in sports, “a win is a win.”

I think, like I’ve said before, that one must look at the entire picture and not just orders. Transmission of orders isn’t the only thing that makes one catholic (small c). My concern about Anglicanism is not just the usual Hank declaration of nullity (notice how I didn’t say divorce! ha! can’t get me! :p:cool:) stuff that bothers most. My concern is the inconsistency. Some Anglicans claim that the Church of England founded by Henry and ultimately cemented into the current structure by Elizabeth was already the Church in England centuries before the papists took it over in tyranny and that the Reformation in England did just that, it “reformed” and cleaned up “abuses.” Then there’s the view that the Church in England of the Reformation era was a new church. I always thought it was curious wording that Peter Martyr chose in 1549 when talking about Cranmer’s tireless work…

“Our most Reverend Archbishop fights strenuously , and with the highest commendation of all good men…I see that there is nothing more difficult in the world than to found a Church. The stones are generally rough and unpolished unless they are rendered smooth by the Spirit…May the Lord grant that among us there may be rightly planted a vine which in due time may produce fruit delicious both to men and to God.”

Now I know context is important but Martyr sure makes it sound like Cranmer and the boys were ARCHITECTS, not merely maintenance men. They built the Church of England. I think this is the most honest assessment.

Was the Church of England and thus Anglicanism just a continuation of catholicity in England or was the CofE just an attempt by Protestants to steadily move toward Continental Reformed Protestantism with some bells and whistles thrown in as well as rituals included to pacify conservatives and a populace that wasn’t all that opposed to the Catholic religion of the day?

I think Eamon Duffy does a compelling job of pointing out that the commoner in England at that time didn’t have much of a problem with the Catholic Church. And they played more a part in it than the Reformers and Anglican apologists have tried to portray in my reading of the matter.

With centuries of things like the Black Rubricks, the 39 Articles, an ordinal that omits sacrificial language, destruction of altars and iconoclastic carnage, conservative bishops who had Catholic sympathies being marginalized or killed, and a steady evangelical personality for hundreds of years, it’s a tough case that Pusey and the boys make that the Church of England was truly catholic.

I
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Ok. I’d suggest remaining RC, then.

GKC
 
gurneyhalleck1 said:
I guess my question in all this A.C. analysis is what is the fruit of the Anglican Church? What fruit has it produced? We can measure the great fruits of Orthodoxy and Catholicism but what fruit has Anglicanism produced if it be truly catholic? That’s a question I ask myself. And perhaps there’s a good answer?

I see the liberal churches that broke ranks with Catholicism like the Old Catholics and Anglicans adopting women’s ordination, gay sympathies, etc. We don’t see that in Orthodoxy and Catholicism? We see mass chaos, lawsuits, hostility to life, and anglo-Catholics trying to minimize their own early important documents like the 39 Articles and trying to appeal to a celtic church (of which we know nothing) and a continuity in England for 2,000 years that supposedly existed that one cannot in good conscience prove has existed at all?

I think the Anglican question, the identity, the bigger picture is FAR bigger than apostolicae curae. That’s just a microbe compared to the big picture. Is transmission of orders all one needs to be a part of the catholic faith? I think the machinery of Anglicanism itself is doomed to make it an internal mess that can never arrive at “the truth.” Catholicism has the papacy, magisterium, college of cardinals, bishops, order. The Orthodox have councils and synods and good order. The Anglicans have so many different “brands” from within that they criss-cross, overlap, contradict, and can never arrive at anything? And the only things they have agreed on were negative things like birth control or women’s ordination or indaba encounters. I don’t see Anglicanism as being a productive vehicle for catholic teaching. How is conciliar christianity possible in Anglicanism?

I think the big picture of Anglicanism is far, far greater than proving her validity of orders. But that’s just yours truly weighing in.
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Still, it sounds like you might want to remain RC, then.

GKC
 
Nine_Two said:
To clarify, bishops in the Anglican communion have always been appointed by other bishops laying on hands, which is the ancient tradition. Through this Anglicans claim Apostolic Succession.

The question is whether this is enough. I’ve never quite understood why the Catholic Church considers Anglicans to lack Apostolic succession while they consider other non-Catholic groups to have it.

But I do repeat my question, if you’re looking at the Anglican Church, why do you care what the Catholic Church says?
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The thread title is directed for Anglicans and Episcopalians. I never really was concerned on the vatican’s stance. I cared more for the Anglicans to prove their case, not defend it.
 
Cranmer2010 said:
Anglicans absolutely do have Apostolic Succession. This will be vehimately denied by Catholics by Apostolicae Curae. But this is very much debateable.
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Really? Interesting. How do they have it? I know the laying of the hands…but does it have the same lineage…of Bishop passing to Bishop all the way to the apostles?
 
Cranmer2010 said:
Anglicans absolutely do have Apostolic Succession. This will be vehimately denied by Catholics by Apostolicae Curae. But this is very much debateable.
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Really? Interesting. How do they have it? I know the laying of the hands…but does it have the same lineage…of Bishop passing to Bishop all the way to the apostles? Thank you so much for explaining. 🙂
Nine_Two said:
But I do repeat my question, if you’re looking at the Anglican Church, why do you care what the Catholic Church says?
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I’m not trying to insult the Catholics…just inform myself on the Anglican situation. The title is directed to Anglicans. Not that there’s anything wrong with Catholics discussion.
Soldier_X said:
Yes there has. See if this link helps at all. It only covers The Episcopal Church, but it’s a start. And don’t let any negativity in this thread get ya down. 🙂
en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Succession_of_Bishops_of_the_Episcopal_Church_in_the_United_States
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Hmm…interesting. Thank’s a ton! 🙂 I won’t get down, promise! I’m too inquisitive as it is.
 
gurneyhalleck1 said:
I guess my question in all this A.C. analysis is what is the fruit of the Anglican Church? What fruit has it produced? We can measure the great fruits of Orthodoxy and Catholicism but what fruit has Anglicanism produced if it be truly catholic? That’s a question I ask myself. And perhaps there’s a good answer?
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What is truly Catholic? Its not the Orthodox and Catholics are agreed on everything completely, and the issues that divide them are nothing to shake a stick at. In what sense has Anglican Christianity broken from the Catholicity of the Church? If its so divided, that may be a bigger task than we realize. The more conservative stripes of Anglicanism probably have not broken off too far, but each division must be measured on its own merit, not as a whole, in a Tradition so divided.

There are divisions among Catholics as well. The whole Novus Ordo vs Traditional Latin Mass stuff is a good example.
I see the liberal churches that broke ranks with Catholicism like the Old Catholics and Anglicans adopting women’s ordination, gay sympathies, etc. We don’t see that in Orthodoxy and Catholicism? We see mass chaos, lawsuits, hostility to life, and anglo-Catholics trying to minimize their own early important documents like the 39 Articles and trying to appeal to a celtic church (of which we know nothing) and a continuity in England for 2,000 years that supposedly existed that one cannot in good conscience prove has existed at all?
Click to expand...
I think the Anglican question, the identity, the bigger picture is FAR bigger than apostolicae curae. That’s just a microbe compared to the big picture. Is transmission of orders all one needs to be a part of the catholic faith? I think the machinery of Anglicanism itself is doomed to make it an internal mess that can never arrive at “the truth.” Catholicism has the papacy, magisterium, college of cardinals, bishops, order. The Orthodox have councils and synods and good order. The Anglicans have so many different “brands” from within that they criss-cross, overlap, contradict, and can never arrive at anything? And the only things they have agreed on were negative things like birth control or women’s ordination or indaba encounters. I don’t see Anglicanism as being a productive vehicle for catholic teaching. How is conciliar christianity possible in Anglicanism?
Click to expand...
I think the big picture of Anglicanism is far, far greater than proving her validity of orders. But that’s just yours truly weighing in.
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Catholicism and Orthodoxy both claim to be the one true infallible church, with no means to prove such. You have the Catholic church preaching out against condomns to fight AIDS in Africa, hiding and protecting pedophile priests, not allowing the laity to have their own opinions, but binding and loosing in the name of Jesus, adding more and more dogma making additional requirements for belief in order to obtain salvation-if you reject the assumption of Mary you will BUUURRRRRRNNNNNNN, oh, and if your reject transubstantiation, be sure to pick up some 10 million SPF sunblock for eternity because you are going to need it, etc…You have priests and religious and lay people who sit in the pews the reject Church teaching but part take in the Eucharist…very bad.

In other words, no church is perfect. People who live in stain glass houses cannot throw stones, my friend. Maybe a little more humility from Rome and the Anglicans would go a long ways in healing some rifts, Just my opinion.
 
gurneyhalleck1 said:
LOL…at least you didn’t just say “ok” LOL!
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I did that, on another board, recently, after a post in an exchange I was having, when the assertion was made (I paraphrase) that knowing too much stuff in a given area could be bad, because it might keep us from believing what we ought to believe; what was true.

What could I say?

Ok.

GKC
 
Well it’s not about me and what I should be. I’m not approaching it that way. I’m simply saying that I would’ve preferred, for the Anglican Church to be “catholic,” that it would’ve gone through a Catholic Reformation splitting off instead of a Protestant one.

Basically I see Anglo-Catholics arguing this (and please, GKC, tell me if I’m wrong!!..what am I saying? I know you will! :p)…

This is what I see anglo-catholics saying:

Henry VIII only took the Church of England back from the tyranny of Roman capture. There was a Church in England back in the earliest days of the Church (some say even back to Joseph of Arimathea). Henry, though his intentions were detestable and vile, did a good thing in taking the Church back from Rome and giving it rule by a godly prince (in principal, not in actuality!) like Constantine was for the early Church during the Imperial days of Rome. Even though Cranmer (influenced first by Osiander and later my buddy Martin Bucer), Ridley, Latimer, John Hooper, etc.all endorsed and enforced a program of iconoclasm, contempt for catholic forms of worship and the traditional understanding of sacraments, they didn’t realize they were paws in a history that would eventually lead to a new awakening of anglo-Catholicism in the 1800’s known as the Oxford Movement. The O.M. would be the ultimate plateau of what Anglicanism was meant to evolve into. Cranmer and his cronies were a necessary evil to take the CofE out of the Roman sphere and clean up some abuses, but they went too far. Men like Newman, Pusey, Wilberforce, etc. came along and helped re-adjust the lens of Anglicanism back to its real origins pre-Reformation while keeping a reformed spirit with regard to not needing Rome. Apostolic succession to Cranmer was NOT sacrificial but memorialist but now the Oxford guys are helping to re-adjust the lens back to a catholic, sacrificial, sacramental, more historic direction. The 39 Articles, once highly respected and considered a strong statement of Anglican belief, is now considered just a historical bunch of documents from a misunderstood time. They are to be ignored. The Church of England is catholic, sacramental, and a branch of the larger Catholic church of which Roman, Orthodox, and Anglicans comprise a tree. Each is an equal branch.

I’ve heard anglo-catholics speak different versions of history. Some say the Reformation was always catholic and that Cranmer and his pals were more Catholic than people give them credit for. They kept liturgy, real presence, apostolic succession, and the three-fold ministry pointing to their desire for a catholic church in England. Then you hear the other opinion that the Reformers were a bad burp in English history and they were valid even though heterodox and protestant, that apostolic succession didn’t die with them but kept going on until it could reach people that could appreciate and understand it like Newman and Pusey did. Which is true?

I think Peter Martyr, when he said that Cranmer and his contemporaries “founded a church,” meant it. Was the Church of England built on the Rock of Christ or on the views and opinions of Cranmer and the Edwardine Protestants?

One thing that is troublesome, from a Catholic point of view, I think, is how the Anglican Church needed Catholicism to get its start? Orthodoxy and Catholicism both came from Christ Himself. Anglicanism depended on getting apostolic succession from Catholic lines. And the same is true with the Dutch Touch or Polish Pat. They need Catholic renegades to give them validity. These things trouble me to be sure in my analysis of Anglicanism, which I openly admit is far below GKC’s historical knowledge of the subject.

To me a more consistent and logical appraisal would be that Anglicanism may have maintained an apostolic succession through the Parker consecration so they have valid sacraments, though illicit, but they lack a Catholic character that gets reinvented later in the 19th century. Catholicism can re-discover itself, can it? Can it go into 300 years of dormancy and then re-discover its roots and seek to set back the clock and re-invent itself as something different? When I see anglo-catholics celebrate St. Francis, for example, on their liturgical calendar, I think to myself that St. Francis was a hardcore Catholic saint? He believed in adoration and the papacy and redemptive suffering and the Catholic church polity. How can he be revered by anglicans? Or I see anglican parishes named after St. Cyprian? This guy taught that apostolic succession wasn’t worth Jack Squat outside of the Church, which at its core contradicts the Oxford Movement and anglo-catholicism?

Or take adoration and benediction. Anglo-catholics practice it yet the 39 Articles considered it monstrously bad. Anglo-Catholics simply say that the articles were boloney and may be ignored. I have never seen in either Catholicism or Orthodoxy this mode of thinking? Throwing away former major pieces of canon law or morality or strong belief and just jettisoning them as irrelevent later?

My rector at St. Paul’s has always called a spade a spade. He’s Anglican. He’s proudly Protestant. He likes Packer a lot. He believes the Articles are to be obeyed (even though he reserves the Host in an “ambry?”), doesn’t like confession or saintly intercession or holy water and grudgingly does the Stations. I think he’s a more consistent Anglican. Just my fifty-five cents LOL
GKC said:
Still, it sounds like you might want to remain RC, then.

GKC
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Ignorance is bliss can be a good thing at times! LOL…In Catholicism even there is “invincible ignorance” and it really says, in its own way, that if one comes to know Catholic teachings and turns away, he’s hell-bound but if he’s totally kept out of knowledge of it or prejudiced from it by forces that are awesome, he still has the possibility of salvation LOL…so ignorance can be bliss in some situations! LOL…
GKC said:
I did that, on another board, recently, after a post in an exchange I was having, when the assertion was made (I paraphrase) that knowing too much stuff in a given area could be bad, because it might keep us from believing what we ought to believe; what was true.

What could I say?

Ok.

GKC
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Hi Johnny. I appreciate the post. I don’t think the various strains of Anglicanism can be considered catholic from a Roman or Orthodox point of view ever even if they have more incense than the Temple of Karnak. The reason being they came from the same sour Protestant source in the 16th century and went hundreds of years as a protestant institution. What is Catholic? I think we need to come to a common definition of the term. When you say the more conservative stripes of Anglicanism have not broken off too far, what do you mean? Too far from what? My observation is that ACNA “conservative” Anglicans are mostly differentiated from Episcopalians because they are hostile to gay “marriage” and are anti-abortion (both laudable traits mind you!) Apart from that they permit divorce and remarriage, are very tolerant of the heresy of women’s ordination, and they’re drifting toward the TEC direction. Continuing Anglicans, like GKC’s church, they’re closer to a Catholic mode of worship and yet come from the same roots as the others.
JohnnyReb said:
What is truly Catholic? Its not the Orthodox and Catholics are agreed on everything completely, and the issues that divide them are nothing to shake a stick at. In what sense has Anglican Christianity broken from the Catholicity of the Church? If its so divided, that may be a bigger task than we realize. The more conservative stripes of Anglicanism probably have not broken off too far, but each division must be measured on its own merit, not as a whole, in a Tradition so divided.

Do you really think these “divisions” though are as profound and actually divisive as Anglican divisions? Catholic “divisions” are not really divisions at all but rather people who have PREFERENCES. Would I like to see Latin used in the Church again? Sure. Would I like to see incense at every Mass? Sure. If I go to a more happy-clappy Mass without those bells and whistles do I still receive the body and blood of Christ validly and a liturgy with all the essentials laid-out coherently and in proper form? Yes. So how is that a division? I may dislike communion in the hand (I do incidentally, it makes me naucious!) and holding hands during the Our Father (makes me want to puke!) and hearing “Amazing Grace” (finger down throat!) but if there’s the liturgy and it goes through the proper motions as per the rubrics and contains a valid procedure, it’s valid and licit. It’s not a division, it’s a preference and taste. In Anglicanism you have guys like John Stott who actually deny that there even IS a priesthood! Then you have Katharine Schiori saying the most outlandish theological and moral things you can think of. You have Anglicans ordaining ladies and others who find it anathema (understandably!). You have some ordaining homosexuals knowing they’re practicing sodomy. You have some ordaining women bishops? this is the heart of division. Comparing this to novus ordo is like apples and oranges to the nth degree.
There are divisions among Catholics as well. The whole Novus Ordo vs Traditional Latin Mass stuff is a good example.

I am failing to grasp your point here. You’re pointing out bad behavior on the part of Catholics with pedophilia and trying to paint the Pope a badguy for not dispensing condoms. Then you mention Marian dogmas and transubstantiation. I’m not sure what your point is? Are you saying the Church’s magisterium isn’t infallible because it has bad folks in the pews? By your standards, all churches should close next week, friend, because humans are sinners. The Catholic Church never claimed to be sin-free. It claims infallibility when teaching officially on faith and morals. I’m not sure what your conclusion is here? You seem to have the opinion that the priest at Mass can somehow use ESP to know that his flock is not in line with Church teachings and therefore deny them communion? How can the Church control people’s obedience or adherence to dogma?
Catholicism and Orthodoxy both claim to be the one true infallible church, with no means to prove such. You have the Catholic church preaching out against condomns to fight AIDS in Africa, hiding and protecting pedophile priests, not allowing the laity to have their own opinions, but binding and loosing in the name of Jesus, adding more and more dogma making additional requirements for belief in order to obtain salvation-if you reject the assumption of Mary you will BUUURRRRRRNNNNNNN, oh, and if your reject transubstantiation, be sure to pick up some 10 million SPF sunblock for eternity because you are going to need it, etc…You have priests and religious and lay people who sit in the pews the reject Church teaching but part take in the Eucharist…very bad.

**That’s what my dad calls a “no-brainer.” I don’t see the obstacles to reunion in ecumenical talks being due to a lack of humility but rather divergent histories, different moral and theological stances, women’s ordination, sticking points like infallibility and universal jurisdiction, etc.? I think Pope Benedict XVI isn’t lacking in humility nor is Rowand in England. They just see the Church differently. **
In other words, no church is perfect. People who live in stain glass houses cannot throw stones, my friend. Maybe a little more humility from Rome and the Anglicans would go a long ways in healing some rifts, Just my opinion.
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