A friend who is deeply read in Anglican history and theology predicted that Lambeth 2008 would give a negative response to gay and lesbian people on the matter of their full inclusion in the life and orders of the church and that at Lambeth 2018 the discussion would be about banning women priests and bishops. So far his prediction has come fairly accurately true. On this most perplexing matter dividing our communion, the Lambeth’s Reflections do not even clearly call for continuing dialogue and listening to gay and lesbian people””despite the resolutions of Lambeth 1998.
From a theological perspective, the finest documents to emerge from this Lambeth Conference were the Archbishop of Canterbury’s presidential addresses, but it is also clear that many of the other addresses were rich in theological content (eg. the Chief Rabbi’s lecture on Covenant). From an ecclesiological perspective, his decision to make this Lambeth a conference has been, in my view, a major step forward. The Reflections document issued at the end is by its very nature vague, and reflective of the multiplicity of positions on most of the questions that perplex us. This may be a healthy stage of conversation; it offers us all a clearer picture of the range of diversity and contexts in which we seek to live our mission.
More depressing, in my view, is that despite all protestations to the contrary and arguments about confrontation with Islam in Africa and elsewhere, the evangelical side of Anglicanism is leading us more and more toward a form of Christianity which is simply another variant of fundamentalist Islam….
This article sets scripture against Jesus.
[blockquote]the evangelical side of Anglicanism is leading us more and more toward a form of Christianity which is simply another variant of fundamentalist Islam….[/blockquote]I realize Prof. Deller has a Th.D. and I do not. However, here he reveals a profound ignorance, at the very least, about fundamentalist Islam. The Qur’an and sunna are entirely different in character from the New Testament.
Is it his supposition, then, that the “real” Jesus is someone different from the Jesus about whom the Apostles tell us in the New Testament? How can he, or we, know anything about Jesus if we cannot believe the testimony of the Apostles?
Professor Deller seems to suffer from “buffet Christianity” in that he likes to pick and choose from parts of the Scripture, forgetting that Jesus repeatedly tells us that all the prophets, psalmist, historians and Moses wrote was about Him.
I think it is the LGBT faction, with their assertion of a centrally controlled, (canon) law-driven “church”, and their equation of church with the LGBT civil rights agenda, who are much closer to “fundamentalist Islam.”
It is both sad and infuriating that the revisionists simply can’t see their own capacity to do the evils they profess to hate. For all of their noise about tolerance and freedom, they always seem to serve a narrow elite and seek forms of governance which are most intrusive and restrictive of everything but what the elite enjoys.
#4, I agree with you about the intolerant elite, but I can’t agree that they, either, are anything like fundamentalist Islam.
[blockquote] More depressing, in my view, is that … the evangelical side of Anglicanism is leading us more and more toward a form of Christianity which is simply another variant of fundamentalist Islam. This is most evident in the insistence on treating the scriptures as the centre of faith rather than the living Lord Jesus Christ (book as authority rather than the uniquely Christian revelation of God), and on the inability to articulate Christian moral positions that may be distinctly different from the taboos of Islamic and animist culture. [/blockquote]
Two objections: (1) (with Br. Michael, above) how do we have the “uniquely Christian revelation of God” [i] apart from [/i] the Scriptures? and (2) what sane person would virtually equate evangelical Anglicanism with fundamentalist Islam?
Katherine #5 – I agree. Sometimes my polemic gets overheated. My main point is not that they are anything like Fundamentalist Islam (I don’t think a TEC revisionist would resort to the kind of physical violence and intimidation that we see in the Islamic world). My main point is that their criticisms of orthodox Christians (“Nazi” is employed quite a bit, and now “Taliban” and “militant Islam”) are truly absurd. They are based on syllogisms like, “Nazis imposed uniformity, and orthodox Christians want a creed or covenant, therefore orthodox Christians are Nazis.”
So, I was pointing out that their own standard works against them. “Totalitarians centralize political power, and revisionists are centralizing power in TEC, therefore revisionists are totalitarians.”
I stand by my thought that revisionists have so jettisoned the traditional language of sin and repentance that they have impaired their own capacity for self examination.
Laura R. (#6) raises the question:
“…and (2) what sane person would virtually equate evangelical Anglicanism with fundamentalist Islam?”
Sane or not, but more than a few otherwise sane Episcopalians partipating in book clubs that read the works of Karen Armstrong, for example (A History of God), and those who consider J Spong a “scholar,” do not hesitate to lump evangelical Christianity and perhaps Orthodox Judaism together with fundamentalist Islam.
Pax Christi!
Chuck Bradshaw
#8 Chuck – indeed, I’ve known parishes to teach classes on “the dangers of fundamentalism”, in which the “CNN” approach is used and fervent Evangelican Christians are lumped in with Wahabi Muslims.
Often, Christian “end-times” preachers are quoted and presented as the same as Mahdists… with no mention of the fact that the Christians are saying “This is what God will do” and the Mahdists are seeking nukes to do it themselves (with Allah as a justification).
Uggh sorry for the spelling errors in #9
The connection with fundamentalist Islam is not the result of reason, it is simply the result of a desire to poison the well. The word “fundamentalist” itself, in America, means all that is narrow, petty, rigid, meanly doctrinaire, ignorant, and, of course, totalitarian. This is simply one of the Left’s snarl words, like homophobe or bigot. Joining “fundamentalist” with “Islam” is merely adding nicotine to the arsenic in the water. The essay above is without and real substance. It is just an extended form of name calling, nothing more. And of course, Katharine is right; the connection asserted is nonsense, but name-calling doesn’tr hang on sense. Larry
I would like to agree with those who think it is a bad idea to complain against what the American Episcopal Church is doing by comparing Christianity to Islam. Islam is a false religion which does not have a right to dictate to the Christian faith. Christianity must stand on the truth as revealed in Christ, regardless of what Muslim friends may think or expect. Complaining about what the American Church is doing to Islamic relations is simply a false paradigm that misses the real issues.
Question: Why have our African brethren decided to frame their arguments in this manner? They must believe that Christian revelation is superior to Muhammad’s revelation, so why would they frame their arguments with relation to Islam rather than Christ?
Here we see Ann Redding was a few years ahead of her time. Anglican/Muslim….What’s the difference? Though by this reckoning she is Muslim because she is *fundamentalist* Anglican. What an interesting religion.
#12, I don’t think they do “frame their arguments with relation to Islam rather than Christ.” It’s Deller who is saying, wrongly, that they resemble the Islamists. What they DO say is that, since Christianity has always taught that same-sex activity is sinful, when Western Anglicans say otherwise, it places them in a difficult evangelical position.
Interesting. Walter Deller is a smart man. This is a polemic piece written in support of a position he holds. He is smart because he is not writing as a theologian or in any official capacity. He has set aside his credentials and taken a polemic shot across the bows. It is an opinion, ill informed and poorly expressed.
Really Walter, Christian Evangelicals and Islamic Fundamentalists? Who can take you seriously? You are smarter than this.
“at Lambeth 2018 the discussion would be about banning women priests and bishops” Well one could certainly hope so. But if I really believed it were possible, I would have stuck it out as an Anglican. It this were to happen, resistance would not come from the Anglo-Catholic movement that descends from Newman, but from Evangelicals or perhaps a new, historically aware, catholic revival movement. Something worth praying for.