A much recited mantra chanted especially by Mid-West ECUSA Anglo-Catholics has been and remains: “Schism is the worst form of heresy.” They resorted to this when some of their friends left the ECUSA in 1977 to form the Continuing Church in St Louis and they have held to it since, chanting it now as increasing numbers of mostly Evangelicals leave the ECUSA to join what is now often called “the Diaspora” of Anglicans outside the ECUSA.
What these Anglo-Catholics exhibit is a certain pride in what they have achieved in the ECUSA, including the “catholic” features of the 1979 Prayer Book, and also a concern that their claims to Catholicity may well be diminished or obliterated by an existence out there in the competitive supermarket of American religions.
What they, and many others of different churchmanship, seem not to take into account is the simple fact that -- excluding the massive Roman Catholic Church, which seems to have mechanisms to reform itself and stay united -- the one and only way that reforming groups within American churches and denominations have found to achieve their ideals is to separate from the mother institution and create a new institution wherein what they regard as fundamental, necessary and important is securely present. If one reviews the history of all the major denominations which were present from colonial times one sees example after example of the secession of a group in order to create afresh what has been lost or eclipsed. Many of the current denominations in the American supermarket of religion are not imports from abroad but are the result of secessions from denominations which were imports – Presbyterians, Congregationalists, Methodists, Lutherans, Episcopalians and so on. In fact, in the examples of thousands (yes thousands) of churches in the supermarket it is difficult, probably impossible, to find even one that took seriously the progressive liberal path and then did a complete U-turn back to a basic evangelical orthodoxy!
So the prevailing and dominant message in USA Christianity since the 19th century has often been, not “schism is worse than heresy”, but rather, “schism is the only way to avoid and get away from heresy.” Secession is the American Way!
Which brings us to the situation in the ECUSA as we know it in late 2005!
There have been secessions from the Episcopal Church in the last thirty years to create the Continuing Churches, the Anglican Mission in America, and a variety of congregational forms of relating to overseas bishops and archbishops -- The Rev. Fr Kim calls these “the alphabet of affiliations”. In all cases these groups fled from heresy, be that heresy the ordination of women or the consecration of a gay man in a partnership with another man as a bishop. Likewise the exit of what became the Reformed Episcopal Church some 130 years ago was also to flee from heresy – catholic ones!
Back in 1989-90 when the Episcopal Synod was at its height and it had the capacity and moral power to lead a major secession from the ECUSA, its leadership resorted to the old mantra: “Schism is the worst form of heresy.” So the marching army returned to base and gradually the troops went home. A few stayed on, especially women soldiers, to keep the organization going as the Forward in Faith movement.
Now The Network (with the American Anglican Council) is in a similar but not identical position to that of the Episcopal Synod in 1990. What is its basic mantra? Is it “Schism is the worst form of heresy” (a position that most of its bishops appear to hold, howbeit in a weak not a strong form) or “Secession from the ECUSA is the only way to keep the Anglican Way of Christianity alive and viable”? Many of us would like to know where it stands and what advice the overseas Archbishops of Nigeria and Uganda give as to whether they think that secession to form a new province is the right way.
What seems abundantly clear is that the ECUSA will NOT engage in any real and true reform. Its commitment to its innovations and the ideology under-girding them seems to be virtually total. So while it may engage in tactical moves to seek to accommodate some of its critics, it will not change as to become what it once was, a Reformed Catholic Church of the Anglican Way. To think and say that good organization and the spending of a lot of money, even with prayer warriors in attendance, will change the direction of the ECUSA at its Convention next year is to engage in wild imagination.
Thus if the “orthodox” do not secede from “the revisionists” of ECUSA it seems that the leaders of the Network will, like those of the Episcopal Synod before them, simply find ways to live reasonably peaceably within the ECUSA, making compromises and adjustments as necessary to preserve their existence, and allowing their army to return home from barracks. Of course, and this would surprise many, they may decide to take a strong and valiant and courageous stand for the Reformed Catholic Faith within ECUSA, and wait in due time to be sent to trial, found guilty of “heresy” [rejecting the liberal and progressive orthodoxy of ECUSA] and then sent forth into exile.
petertoon@msn.com November 17, 2005
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