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Peter_J
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As someone who’s never been to England, could you clarify: do you mean that it’s more true of England than of other countries? Certainly in e.g. Italy or Greece, religion and culture are very closely connected. (A Ukrainian Orthodox woman told me of a conversation she had with another Ukrainian Orthodox woman, concerning receiving communion … at one point she asked whether the other woman was talking about receiving in an Orthodox church or a Catholic church, to which the other replied “What’s the difference? They’re both Ukrainian.”)
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GKC
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As with all his works, it is worth reading. Some more so than others, to be sure.
GKC
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GKC
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I like “The Articles say Blank, so that proves that Blank is what Anglicans believe”.
GKC
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GKC
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Seems reasonable. I shall adopt the same policy.Well that’s rather arrogant of you.
I just ask that everyone accept the truth, which I happen to have already accepted.
GKC
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GKC
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All too many think so, yes. I do my part, in the cause of accuracy.Well, I think that’s a tad more reasonable than “Martin Luther said Blank, so that proves that Blank is what Lutherans teach.”
GKC
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jimkhong
Guest
It is not more true. It is different with the English. I can’t really put my finger onto it. There is a detached (but obvious fondness) way of talking about religion.
Try saying something nasty about their national churches to an Italian, Greek or Ukrainian and you will get punched. I have seen it happen (OK, maybe I haven’t met the Ukrainians other than at the London Ukrainian cathedral but certainly have with the punchup with the Italian and the Greek, figuratively if not physically). Can’t imagine an Englishman getting all flustered if you criticise the CoE. He may even agree with you. Something about the Englishman’s self-depradation - interesting article on it here.
More than that love of their history, I admire the English’s ability to love their history in full view of its warts and all. Walking around England, one can see how the English love their history - every little village have a well with a plaque about a king who stopped by and drank there (or something like that). Not just in their monuments but also their actions. The opening of Parliament is replete with little stories from days gone by that still happens today (MPs held as hostages in the Palace, etc). Very much like the stories I tell the children about the Catholic Church - maybe that is why Canterbury has such affinity with Rome.
Sometimes, I see the CoE as the Catholic church frozen in 16th century, what with their benefits system still in place. I found a working cathedral in a tiny Welsh town of St Asaph (pop 3000+), that didn’t have a train station. It was an old cathedral town which the Industrial Revolution has passed by but the CoE (and later CoW) did not see fit to merge it with another diocese as the Vatican has done in Italy. Change (and new diocese) can come even more slowly to CoE than the Catholic church - I mean, the Catholic Archdiocese of Birmingham was set up before the Anglican diocese of Birmingham!
Yet, for all that, an Englishman can speak equally even-handedly about the 40 Catholic martyrs as he can with the Foxe book of martyrs. He can tell you about the murder of Dudley’s wife or the regicide of Charles I or the Gordon Riots without being involved emotionally at all, even if he disagree with the motives behind them and would oppose them if it happens today. Try talking to the Chinese, the Arabs or the Greeks about the more unsavoury parts of their respective histories. Can you see them talk about it without emotions? One Greek explained to me that Greeks are both Balkans and Mediteranean - you see his point.
The English are not more patriotic than most. If anything, patriotism is sometimes an emarassing thing (outside of jubilees and royal babies, when the best of British quirkiness and traditions are on parade), much like West Germans after the war.
No, the English approach to their history and traditions are just different from others. Need to think more about how and why.
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jimkhong
Guest
Its not David Jenkins that I am afraid of - it is the lightning strikes that follow him.
But I guess the man gets consecrated bishop only once.Actually, I don’t have much of an issue with his views - it is part of demythologisation ala Bultman. It is just that I don’t think he should have used the Easter and Christmas pulpit to explain his views.
I am in a Jesuit parish. One (very scholastic) priest once told the congregation at the homily that ‘prayers do not change anything’. If you follow his line of thought, it makes sense, but of course no one understood as they only heard the headline. That, unfortunately, was his last homily in my parish.
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Contarini
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N. T. Wright has been bishop of Durham, and has retired from that post, long since Jenkins was there. And yet, alas, people still associate Durham with Jenkins!No, I never Trolloped
Gosh!! How do you like living in Disneyland? Anyway, is it safe to go to Durham? David Jenkins still around?
I don’t know who is the bishop there now, but I finally got to visit the cathedral a few weeks ago. A wonderful experience, though I missed Bede’s tomb. I did see Cuthbert’s–actually my daughter freaked us all out (including the cathedral staff) by wandering off and was found playing on the steps to the shrine . . . .
Edwin
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jimkhong
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This is a lot of food for thought and reflection for me.
Of course, we are not representative of our co-religionists. To put it brutally, the average Catholic probably does not go to church.
This forum has been godsent (of course it has) to me in that it has allowed me to peer into the minds of other views in the Church and in other churches, and especially understanding the culture and the language of the Eastern Churches. Doing so, I am forced to reflect and articulate my stand on various issues and appreciate the views of others - some of which I reject (after justifying to myself why so), some of which I realise contain language that could be used to illuminate my views, some of which are areas of development that I, my local community, or the universal church could one day explore further.
A Sufi Muslim once explained that inter-religious dialogue is like opening windows into each other’s homes so that we can understand how each other lives and thinks. But windows, he continued, implies walls and one must always be concious of the walls of his own religion, beyond which he cannot step without turning away from his religion and tradition.
So, how do we view church union within this analogy. Do we break down the walls to build a single bigger house - as Catholics and Orthodox seek to do with each other? Do we begin to realise some (but not all) of the walls are really not there - as Catholic dialogues with Anglicans, Methodists, Lutherans, OO and Assyrians seem to imply? Or do we just ignore the walls and build a low fence around the whole area we seek to designate as the united church - as the Anglicans seem to have done?
Whichever model we choose, we need to know and celebrate what unites us. But depending on which model we choose, we may need to be concious also of what differentiate us.
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jimkhong
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I have never been to Durham but would very like to see the Durham Minster and while there, Lindesfarne and Whitby as well - all key places in the devleopment of the Church in England.
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Novocastrian
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Paul Butler, Bishop of Southwell and Nottingham, is to be translated to Durham quite soon, replacing now-Archbishop Welby, who was Bishop Wright’s successor. There are, of course, those of us who remember it as Cosin’s see!
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jimkhong
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Can you do that in the Anglican Communion? In the Catholic church, you may go to a parish outside the ares you reside because of the community, a priest you like or availability of facility, resources or formation there. But rarely for doctrinal reasons as to refuse to break bread with another Catholic community would mean you do not see the others are part of the same OHCAC, and thus breaking communion.
I know it has been happening with Anglicans of late but wouldn’t that be a step towards to fragmentation of the Church? How does Anglicans view this and the steps to prevent it?
It is interesting that you mention the TEC’s centralising tendency. All organisations do that, be it banks (they get bigger by the day), the presidency (compare the scope and reach of the administrations of Adams 2, Lincoln and Obama and you can see how that one branch of government has grown), and of course famously the Vatican. Does it work - there is an inevitable backlash as the centralisers at one point lose touch with the people they are supposed to represent. For us Catholics, there has been short but impactful pauses along the path of the centralising juggernaut. John 23 was followed by a curia that paid lip service to his revolution. Would Francis’ be any different?
Seeding the episcopate does not always work. JP2 appointed only conversative bishops and yet change still comes. The cardinals elected John 23 as a stop-gap to hold the fort until Montini comes ‘of age’. They also elected Francis to do the little bit of reform they wanted. But the Holy Spirit seems to have other ideas.
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jimkhong
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Thanks GKC but narcissisism can be contagious!
Which Elizabethan compromise? There has been two Elizabethan ages and both have come at turning points of English/British history and critical to development of the CoE. The current age is longer but not yet accumulate the antiquity that the English loves so much.
The first Elizabethan compromise was definitely successful in keeping the the CoE unitary. The current compromise (though I doubt Her Majesty has much of a hand in it) seems (from my perspective) to swept things under the carpet. At each Lambeth Conference, there is this big build-up and then nothing happens and all the bishops go home with a diplomatic choice of words. And they go home and proceed on the exact same path as before the Conference.
Part of it is of course due to the nature and differences in ecclesiology and church polity in the Anglican Communion. Each church is autonomous and communion with a new bishop is taken as automatic. This differs from the Catholics (where individual churches are not autonomous) or the Orthodox (where, correct me if I am wrong Peter, bishops can still make individual decisions based on their idea of the orthodoxy of the new bishop). Increasingly, conservative bishops are being forced to evaluate new bishops to define communion and I think, one day there will be a break.
I think the old categorisations of Anglicans as High and Low Church is also obsolete, if not misleading. The difference is now between liberals and (for want of a better word) conservatives, who may be High Church or Evangelical Anglicans. The category of Anglo-Catholics is probably useful in identifying those who would most likely call up Rome, if push comes to a shove.
To me, the surprise is that the Anglican Communion still remains unitary today, with only the odd ACNA here and there. But that body of common truths that hold the Communion together has shrunk and it seems likely to continue to shrink. Will there be a time when the body of common truths has shrunk to the point where one cannot call it a Communion of churches any longer? Will there be different degrees of communion with the lower degree of communion being attributed to churches formerly in communion? Will that open up the door to different degrees of communion being attributed to churches that was never in communion? In a way, it further extends a sense of communion heirarchy that already exists with the CoE seeing (say) TEC as having a higher degree of communion than with (say) Old Catholics, as having a higher degree of communion than with (say) Roman Catholics, as having a higher degree of communion than with (say) Methodists, etc, etc.
Will it advance the cause of ecumenism and church unions or will it set it back?
There are definitely lessons here for the Catholic Church, but I am afraid different Catholics will see different lessons that will only serve to confirm the views they already hold. This debate will run and run. Maybe the Holy Spirit guide it well.
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GKC
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The original Compromise, as seen in the Articles.Thanks GKC but narcissisism can be contagious!
Which Elizabethan compromise? There has been two Elizabethan ages and both have come at turning points of English/British history and critical to development of the CoE. The current age is longer but not yet accumulate the antiquity that the English loves so much.
The first Elizabethan compromise was definitely successful in keeping the the CoE unitary. The current compromise (though I doubt Her Majesty has much of a hand in it) seems (from my perspective) to swept things under the carpet. At each Lambeth Conference, there is this big build-up and then nothing happens and all the bishops go home with a diplomatic choice of words. And they go home and proceed on the exact same path as before the Conference.
Part of it is of course due to the nature and differences in ecclesiology and church polity in the Anglican Communion. Each church is autonomous and communion with a new bishop is taken as automatic. This differs from the Catholics (where individual churches are not autonomous) or the Orthodox (where, correct me if I am wrong Peter, bishops can still make individual decisions based on their idea of the orthodoxy of the new bishop). Increasingly, conservative bishops are being forced to evaluate new bishops to define communion and I think, one day there will be a break.
I think the old categorisations of Anglicans as High and Low Church is also obsolete, if not misleading. The difference is now between liberals and (for want of a better word) conservatives, who may be High Church or Evangelical Anglicans. The category of Anglo-Catholics is probably useful in identifying those who would most likely call up Rome, if push comes to a shove.
To me, the surprise is that the Anglican Communion still remains unitary today, with only the odd ACNA here and there. But that body of common truths that hold the Communion together has shrunk and it seems likely to continue to shrink. Will there be a time when the body of common truths has shrunk to the point where one cannot call it a Communion of churches any longer? Will there be different degrees of communion with the lower degree of communion being attributed to churches formerly in communion? Will that open up the door to different degrees of communion being attributed to churches that was never in communion? In a way, it further extends a sense of communion heirarchy that already exists with the CoE seeing (say) TEC as having a higher degree of communion than with (say) Old Catholics, as having a higher degree of communion than with (say) Roman Catholics, as having a higher degree of communion than with (say) Methodists, etc, etc.
Will it advance the cause of ecumenism and church unions or will it set it back?
There are definitely lessons here for the Catholic Church, but I am afraid different Catholics will see different lessons that will only serve to confirm the views they already hold. This debate will run and run. Maybe the Holy Spirit guide it well.
I disagree that the old categories of high/low and evangelical or reformed/ Anglo-Catholic are no longer pertinent,though they certainly are not nearly as exhaustive of Anglicanism as they once were. I do often say that that spectrum of doctrine in Anglicanism, which dates from Liz the First, and took its shape with the addition of the Tractarian and Ritualist movements, is complicated by a 3rd dimension of general Christian orthodoxy/otherwise, as Anglicanism understood it. To plot a position on the new scale requires 3, not 2 coordinates. And certainly it does make the practical divide between a high church/Anglo-Catholic parish, and a low/evangelical one, as would have been the essence of the range of belief in Anglicanism 50 years ago, narrow a bit as these two extremes take to one another, against what you characterize as liberals, and I have a harsher term for. Consider ACNA, as it exists, under the basically evangelical ++Duncan and the Anglo-Catholic +Iker. They make common cause, against what TEC is becoming. Whether they can come to terms with the contradictions in their concepts, say of Orders, I can’t say. At this point, neither can they.
And I disagree, further, that the concept of Anglo-Catholic is one who is ready to bolt for the Barque. Push has come to shove and I can’t see that occurred. But then, I know little of the numbers that have gone to the Ordinariate.
As to your point on the future of the Communion, I think quite possibly that it could reach a crisis. And is, in fact in the early stages of one. Impaired communion already exists between portions of the African jurisdictions and the First World ones. What comes next, I couldn’t say. But it is a theoretical consideration for me, as are all the discussions of TEC, CoE and the Communion. I am not in any of them, being a member of the fissiparous Continuing Anglican world. And I watch from outside what appears to me to be another fascinating train wreck.
GKC
Anglicanus-Catholicus, posterus traditus Anglicanus
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jimkhong
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Re-reading my earlier post, I agree my language could have been a little to dogmatic and a few more ‘could’ and ‘may’ would be have more appropriate.
The other interesting difference in categorisation in the Anglican Church is that they come in discrete multually-exclusive blocks. One is either Anglo-Catholic or Evangelical, for instance. And as they worship in different parishes, they do not necessarily interact except at episcopal meetings. So, the diversity among Anglicans is visible only at the high Church-wide level but not at the parish level.
Catholics are harder to pin down in those categories as opnions may differ depending on the issue concerned. I, for instance, may occassionally pray the rosary in Latin but will not agree to a Latin mass as the main Sunday mass in the parish even though I may attend weekday Latin masses when I could. Most Catholics are equally complex and you cannot take one’s opinion/practice on one issue to be indicative on another issue.
As we normally escape categorisation (there are exceptions of course, particularly among Latinist/traditionalists), we attend mass with people of different persuasions on various issues and that helps the sense of communion among the diverse. Not necessarily easy for someone pastorally-sensitive like me to deal with the Sola GIRM/Sola Canon Law Catholics, though.
Ah, I didn’t realise you are a Continuing Anglican. Not intended as a provocation, but didn’t the Continuing Anglicans continue to fracture after leaving the Communion while the Anglican Communion remain unitary. As you said, fissiparous.
I presume that Continuing Anglicans do not disagree with all of the Anglican Communion, but only with certain wings of (for instance)TEC. How do you continue your relationship with those in the Communion that you agree with? Does there continue to be mutual acceptance of each other’s bishops? If so, does it mean you have to evaluate each new bishop for his orthodoxy?
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Contarini
Guest
Sorry. I was unclear. I meant that I intend to become Catholic, but I was being a little coy. I’m still not entirely sure that I will manage to go through with it
.As a matter of fact, I did retain my official membership in my parish in NC throughout the three years I lived in NJ, and for the first few years that I lived in Indiana.
Also, it’s not about refusing to break bread. On the contrary, my primary reason for still hesitating to become Catholic is that I don’t want to break Eucharistic fellowship with Episcopalians, or indeed with any Christians. But I do want to be in communion with Rome, and I cannot in good conscience submit to the ecclesiastical authority of TEC. Nor do I wish to feed the schismatic tendencies within Anglicanism by joining a conservative breakaway parish.
Edwin
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