Since its founding more than two centuries ago, the Episcopal Church has often struggled to keep disparate factions unified under its diverse umbrella.
Repeated controversies — over slavery, the ordination of women and even the role of children in church life — have threatened to tear at its religious fabric.
“In most of the rest of the church,” she said, “people are moving on with feeding the hungry, providing housing for low-income people and doing creative things to build what we call the reign of God in their own communities.”
Sayeth the Presiding Bishop. What about bringing people to Christ? Does that have anything to do with “the reign of God?”
Pass the carrot slicer, please.
I’m not sure that it’s [i]historically[/i] lopsided (it is theologically lopsided) so much as present-minded in its thinking. Even nineteenth century Broad Churchmen were fairly “puritanical” in their cultural thinking – Brooks’s evangelical training died hard.
The big omission is one that has never been fully explored, but which Robert Prichard referenced some years ago, namely the impact of New York’s Union Theological Seminary. Not an Episcopal foundation, it nevertheless prepared both James Pike and, perhaps more importantly, a generation of Episcopal seminary faculty, who went on to teach many of those now in leadership positions within the Episcopal Church.
[url=http://catholicandreformed.blogspot.com]Catholic and Reformed[/url]
Kendall, I’d like to know how you, our principal reasserter, interpret the break in 1873 and the founding of the Reformed Episcopal Church. I have long been interested in this schism, and am curious about current Common Cause/Network courtship of this group which clearly left us and abandoned Anglicanism.
Come on, everyone. This is the LA Times – being a California reader, I can honestly say they aren’t interested in presenting both sides – really – many of their reporters’ worldview does not acknowledge that there should be two sides.
I too, am curious about the break of 1873 in that relatives of mine have started attending a REC church. From the looks of their web site, I have mostly positive reaction….
“In most of the rest of the church …”
Has anyone looked into these sorts of comments? What percentage of the average TEC congregation’s membership is involved in volunteer work in these areas? What about percentage of budget, etc?
The REC has been changing in the past few years. It is no longer, in many places, very close to the anti-ritualist group it was in the late nineteenth century. Numbers of people and parishes who love the traditional Anglican Prayer Book and are not “high” enough to call themselves Anglo-Catholic are moving into the REC.
Of course the REC founders may be doing a little grave-spinning. I’d like to think it’s not as severe as the turbulence in mainstream TEC cemeteries. (Figuratively speaking, naturally.)
Kevin Babb [#1] writes: “What about bringing people to Christ? Does that have anything to do with “the reign of God?†”
The following response will take us even further off-topic than Kevin’s original comment, but what the heck:
Bringing people to Christ is a means to an end, the end being all of humanity working together to advance God’s purposes as best as we can discern them. (Incidentally, it’s certainly not for us to say whether that’s the only possible means to that end.) In totality, the Gospel accounts leave the clear impression that, when Jesus reportedly said “believe also in me,” it was not “because I’m the Christ and I said so”; it was because he felt compelled to help his fellow Jews find their way (back) to God.
D. C. (#8)
But the works of mercy are also means to an end – the end being the spread of the Kingdom of God. They are not an end to themselves. I believe that was Kevin’s point. TEC has forgotten its reason for existing and has become a society that concentrates on “justice issues” and dresses up in funny clothes and has an interesting liturgy.
Justice is a byproduct. It is not a goal. The goal is union with God through Jesus Christ.
YBIC,
Phil Snyder
Gee … and I applauded it as “let’s set some of the record straight” journalism out in the public sphere about the Episcopal Church!” on [url=http://inchatatime.blogspot.com/2008/12/putting-episcopal-rift-in-historical.html]my blog[/url]!
Susan+, I tried to respond on your blog, but it wouldn’t let me. So I’ll respond here. The article seemed to take a pretty narrow historical context, tying the current row only with slavery and WO, which are totally irrelevant, especially when the current matter of sex outside of marriage and ssb and ssm are looked at in terms of scripture, tradition and reason. The one surely correct thing in the article came from Fr. Ian, who said basically that TEC would wrestle with the issue de jour in American culture, due to its growing up alongside the American “democracy.” Putting the word “democracy” aside (since we are a representative republic), I would definitely agree with him that such wrestling is what TEC is all about because TEC is certainly not offering anything else to our world – no atonement (good word – not heard in your Good Friday sermons), no request or requirement for turning from a life sin (repentance – good word, not heard in TEC) for a life in Christ (also, a good proper name often not heard in many parts of TEC for fear of offending). A decent history of TEC should surely show these parts of the Christian life and theology that have been abandoned in favor of wrestling with the American culture’s issue de jour, n’est ce pas?
Billy, I beg to differ with you. Progressive Episcopal priests and bishops are preaching repentance, atonement and all the other elements of the Christian Gospel. It is one of the horrendous myths from the right that paints progressive clergy as preaching only a politically and socially liberal agenda. The obverse of that is to paint conservatives and “orthodox” clergy as preaching only hate and distrust instead of the Christian Gospel. Both caricatures are false — and the leaders from all sides of our disputes have a duty to remind their followers of the truth, not the distortions people are using to instill loyalty and raise money.
#12, I wish you were correct … I truly do. But if you listen to the PB’s interview on another thread on this blog, and if you hear the sermons I hear from reapprasing priests and bishops that never mention Christ or atonement (read last Good Friday’s sermon from Susan Russell and Ed Bacon), you’ll see the gospel of cheap grace is alive and well and the leading gospel of TEC. Read the article on another thread today on this blog from Dean Shepherd – another cheap grace advocate.
The article does not seem that bad to me. It seems less partisan then most secular news articles. I just don’t think TEC justifies all the bad press and as much ink as all this is generating. I feel the press has really been hard on us, at least where I am, so I welcome something less sensational and more even handed. I’m sick of it all.
Let’s say it once more with feeling:
The Mainstream media is not biased. The mainstream media is not biased.
Believe it yet?
Me, neither.
Peace
Jim Elliott <>< Florida
I’m not surprised that you are sick of “it,” Frvan. War wears out the the flesh and and wearies the very marrow. The trouble is this, as billy noted above (and many others have as well) that we either fight or we die because TEC wants us and all we stand for, destroyed.
This is not a case of sitting quietly on the sidelines while the big boys shed their blood on the playing field. We ARE one of the big boys, like it or not. I refer you in this case to the last stanza in Arnold “Dover Beach.” It is well to say – we all say to each other at some point – “Ah, love, let us be true to one another/ For the world that lies before us….” And so these two stand on the sidelines when the ignorant armies clash by night. Do you really want to stand on the sidelines while others fight pointlessly? Arnold’s man and woman are very 19th century post -Romantic, but they essentially declare themselves helpless. Do you wish to stand with them?
ACNA has chosen to fight. Should they not? The Susan Russell’s of the world, like the Schori’s, don’t look like members of a weapon bearing phalanx, but they members of an ignorant army – that is, they are members of a church that pretends to be Christian but most obviously is not – and they use the weapons that a rich and powerful church gives them to create a soft domination that requires that all agree with them… or else. This most tolerant of non- Christian churches is in actual fact, quite intolerant. The bless with one face, and they bully and threaten with the other. The facts here are too clear to need listing. And when they attacked, they turn the soft face to the onslaught, that all the world may see how ill used they are. Seeing this hypocrisy over and over and discovering that head to head confrontation will not serve, ACNA has chosen to build a new city on the hill, and they will now compete with the Cities of the Plain to see which will throw the finer light.
What side do you wish to be on? Larry
[b]Justice is a byproduct. It is not a goal. [/b]
If that’s the mission statement for your church, count me out.
Historically it hasn’t been a byproduct. Which would be the problem.
I am reminded of comments made by the leader of the first medical mission that I went on to Central America (supporting the work of Friend Wife, who is the doctor, not me.) This man was a life-long missionary who was the son of career missionaries–the kind of guy who has led a life such all of want to be where he is going, but none of us want to be where he has been. And he said, as close to verbatim as I can make it: “As beneficial as your care is for them, the patients that you treat today will go on to die later of something else. As much as these people need the food you give them today, they will be hungry again tomorrow. But if you lead them to Christ, they will ultimately enjoy perfect health in a place where there is no illness, and eat the food that satisfies them forever.”
Sidney – the mission of the Church is not justice. The mission of the Church can be summed up in the Great Commission:
[blockquote]And Jesus came and said to them: “All authority in heaven and on earth as been given to me. Go, therefore, and make disciples of all nations, baptizing them in the Name of the Father and of the Son and of the Holy Spirit, teaching them to observe all that I have commanded you. And lo, I am with you always, to the close of the age.”[/blockquote]
One of the reasons that justice has not been a byproduct is that we haven’t been making disciples. We have been making members. We have not been teaching the people of God to observe all that Jesus commands us. True Justice will only occur when people follows the commands of Jesus.
YBIC,
Phil Snyder
Phil,
Frankly I don’t care all that much for the current pop use of the word ‘justice’ in the church either. But I would emphasize “observe all that I have commanded you” as the key statement in your excerpt – that being a ‘follower of Christ’ is more about behavior than belief and doctrine.
But you express a point that I think reasserters and reappraisers could agree on: we have been making members instead of disciples. This is a long term problem, and the solution that the Presiding Bishop and many liberals like her put forward is to emphasize the behavior over the beliefs. This solution has the advantage of addressing the issue directly, and the disadvantage of risking syncretism for which she has been criticized.
My question for you is: what’s [i]your [/i] solution to the problem? Keep going the way the traditional church has for centuries, producing lots of ‘believers’ who cheerfully ignore the commandments when convenient? Or something different?
Sidney, this is a false dichotomy. (See the last paragraph.) the solution does not rely on remaking human nature, which will say the words in church and then go out into the world and do the same old wrong things that it has been doing since Woga sold Umph a broken stone ax by giving it a new paint job. What our church needs to do is
(a) develop a true American identity) and (b) got back to scripture to find fresh insights that will bring the Long Past to the Present so that the former casts fresh light on the latter. We must remember that, for us, the past is at our very elbow as we write. We are not “cutting edge” anythings. We are Continuities, voices which integrate the long past, the Christian past, and refill that chalice with this century’s wine. Vague, ambiguous.
Well, let me refer you to Joseph Campbell, Hero with a Thousand Faces, 1, Myth and Dream, the paragraph starting, “The hero is the man of self-achieved submission.” He is of course not talking about Christianity at all, but consider well what he says about that which re-vivifies. This is called, “growing up,” and this is absolutely what we need to do, but see how he says it must be done. Do you see itw relevance? I am sure you will. Larry
Sidney – “my” solution (and it is not really mine) is to emphasize belief and praxis. Combine orthodox belief with orthodox living. Getting people to take their stated beliefs seriously and to put them into practice. Of course, this takes seriously the call to die to self and to be raised in new life. This requires that we rely on God’s grace for everything in our lives and for the strength to live that new life. Righteous living (living in right relationship with God) is only possible through God’s grace. That grace only grows in us through faith – which is more of a interpersonal relationship than a set of beliefs. But the beliefs act as a form of warning or guard on the faith. We each believe in a God that is somewhat false because we each have our own ideas about God. The doctrines of the church act as identity markers for God. Let me use an illustration from my Systematic Theology professor. I will never fully understand my wife. She will forever remain a mystery to me – one that I take great joy in exploring. But I am not free to sleep with another woman because of “mistaken identity.” If I get into bed and there is a 5’8″ blonde woman next to me, that is not my wife and I better leave the bed quickly. The doctrines of the Church (and not just the creeds, but the Scriptures and the Tradition of the Church) tell us who God is. If the God we worship is different from the one proclaimed by the doctrines of the Church then we need to rethink our god.
YBIC,
Phil Snyder
Dear Larry Morse: Thanks, I needed that!