Why get married?

The Exhortation in the Marriage Services of 1928, 1979, 2000 & 1662

Marriage is usually presented as a natural contract between a man and woman for a life-long union. The Marriage ceremony is a public ratification of this contract or covenant in the presence of witnesses. The two persons (the two parties to the contract) marry each other and are the ministers of the nuptial bond.

When matrimony takes place in Church or under the direction of a Priest or Bishop, then the Church both witnesses to this covenant and also bestows in Christ’s name a blessing on it, with suitable prayers for the couple that they will receive grace to remain faithful to each other and create a Christian family and home.

1928 U.S.A.

The first part of “The Form of the Solemnization of Matrimony” in The Book of Common Prayer (1928) of the Protestant Episcopal Church of the U.S.A. is an Exhortation, which is a shortened & edited form of that found in the English Prayer Book of 1662 (for which see below).

"Dearly beloved, we are gathered together here in the sight of God, and in the face of this company, to join together this man and this woman in holy Matrimony; which is an honourable estate, instituted of God, signifying unto us the mystical union that is betwixt Christ and his Church; which holy estate Christ adorned and beautified with his presence, and first miracle that he wrought in Cana of Galilee: and is commended of Saint Paul to be honourable among all men: and therefore is not by any to be entered into unadvisedly or lightly; but reverently, discreetly, advisedly, soberly and in the fear of God. Into this holy estate these two persons present come now to be joined."

This Exhortation proclaims and emphasizes that marriage is a holy and sacred state of human life. It was given by God as a divine institution for humanity from the beginning (Genesis 2:18, 24 & Matthew 19:5) and further, it was declared by the apostle Paul to be an expression between a man and a woman of the love that Christ Jesus, the Bridegroom has for his Bride, the Church (Ephesians 5:22-33). Therefore, matrimony is a unique relation between two persons and is to be entered into by them reverently, soberly and in the fear of God.

1979

In 1979 the Episcopal Church gave final approval to its new Prayer Book which contained a service entitled, “The Celebration and Blessing of a Marriage”. This is wholly in “contemporary” English and it represented changes in emphasis from the service within the 1928, 1891 & 1789 editions of The Book of Common Prayer in the U.S.A. The initial address in that service made by the Priest to the Congregation is as follows:

"Dearly beloved: We have come together in the presence of God to witness and bless the joining together of this man and this woman in Holy Matrimony. The bond and covenant of marriage was established by God in creation, and our Lord Jesus Christ adorned this manner of life by his presence and first miracle at a wedding in Cana of Galilee. It signifies to us the mystery of the union between Christ and his Church, and Holy Scripture commend it to be honoured among all people.

The union of husband and wife in heart, body, and mind is intended by God for their mutual joy; for the help and comfort given one another in prosperity and adversity; and, when it is God’s will, for the procreation of children and their nurture in the knowledge and love of the Lord. Therefore marriage is not to be entered into unadvisedly or lightly, but reverently, deliberately and in accordance with the purposes for which it was instituted by God."

The first paragraph repeats what is found in the Exhortation of 1928. In the second paragraph, an attempt is made to state the purpose of marriage as a divine institution. What is stated as a purpose for all times and for all couples is mutual help, comfort and joy through their union. In contrast, the procreation of children is of more limited reference for it is only “when it is God’s will”. The latter expression could mean when the natural desire to procreate actually becomes a reality (that is, where the providence of God causes conception and birth) or it could mean (and has come to mean) when and if the couple decide they want to have children.

2000

The Church of England introduced in 2000 a whole new set of services as alternatives and additions to those in The Book of Common Prayer (1662). The collection which is vast and growing is entitled, Common Worship. Within the volume devoted to Pastoral Services, there is “The Marriage Service”. At the beginning of the service, the minister reads the following:

"In the presence of God, Father, Son and Holy Spirit, we have come together to witness the marriage of N and N, to pray for God's blessing on them, to share their joy and to celebrate their love.

Marriage is a gift of God in creation through which husband and wife may know the grace of God. It is given that as man and woman grow together in love and trust, they shall be united with one another in heart, body and mind, as Christ is united with his bride, the Church.

The gift of marriage brings husband and wife together in the delight and tenderness of sexual union and joyful commitment to the end of their lives. It is given as the foundation of family life in which children are [born and] nurtured and in which each member of the family, in good times and in bad, may find strength, companionship and comfort, and grow to maturity in love.

Marriage is a way of life made holy by God, and blessed by the presence of our Lord Jesus Christ with those celebrating a wedding at Cana in Galilee. Marriage is a sign of unity and loyalty which all should uphold and honour. It enriches society and strengthens community. No one should enter into it lightly or selfishly but reverently and responsibly in the sight of almighty God."

Here, as with the 1979 American service, there is much emphasis upon the mutual love, joy, affection and trust between the man and woman. Sexual union is specifically stated as part of the mutuality. However, procreation of children is not directly stated as a normal, specific purpose of marriage. Rather, within the mutuality of the togetherness of the couple, children can be conceived and born or they can be adopted, to be raised in a Christian family. Even so, the duty & possibility of procreation seem stronger here than in the 1979 address.

1662

The only service for use at a marriage available in the Church of England for three centuries was “The Form of Solemnization of Matrimony” from The Book of Common Prayer (1662). This service is a revised form of the Latin service used in England in the late medieval period. Here is the Exhortation with which the service begins:

"Dearly beloved, we are gathered together here in the sight of God, and in the face of this congregation, to join together this man and this woman in holy Matrimony; which is an honourable estate, instituted of God in the time of man’s innocency, signifying unto us the mystical union that is betwixt Christ and his Church; which holy estate Christ adorned and beautified with his presence, and first miracle that he wrought, in Cana of Galilee: and is commended of Saint Paul to be honourable among all men: and therefore is not by any to be enterprized, nor take in hand, inadvisedly, lightly or wantonly, to satisfy man’s carnal lusts and appetites, like brute beasts that have no understanding; but reverently, discreetly, advisedly, soberly, and in the fear of God; duly considering the causes for which Matrimony was ordained.

First, it was ordained for the procreation of children, to be brought up in the feat and nurture of the Lord, and to the praise of his holy Name.

Secondly, it was ordained for a remedy against sin, and to avoid fornication; that such persons as have not the gift of continency might marry, and keep themselves undefiled members of Christ’s body.

Thirdly, it was ordained for the mutual society, help, and comfort, that the one ought to have of the other, both in prosperity and adversity. Into which holy estate these two persons present come now to be joined. "

The similarity between this Exhortation or Address and all the others is clear. Marriage is ordained of God and is for the mutual help, comfort, fellowship and joy of the couple.

The difference is also clear. First, procreation is made to be a primary purpose of marriage. Having a family is a normal outcome of getting married unless there are good reasons (infertility, old age and the like). In marrying one intends to have children.

Further, this Exhortation alone sees marriage as a provision in a fallen world, where sexual temptations are common and powerful, for people to live according to God’s will.

Of course, much water has flowed under the bridge of the marriage service (better over the institution of marriage) since the publication of the 1662 Prayer Book. We have seen the acceptance of women’s rights as part of the human and civil rights movement, the arrival of contraceptives making for “safe sex”, the advent of the divorce culture, and the common practice of co-habiting (with or without a view to getting married). In this changed situation, very few people in the church would go as far as to say that procreation is a basic purpose of marriage. They would prefer to say that it is a possible purpose depending upon the desires and wills of the couple. There is no doubt but that the emphasis today is on mutuality and this of course is made possible and sustained by contraception as well as by the divorce culture.

In this context, where co-habiting is common, where couples marry without necessarily intending to have children, where marriage is seen primarily as for self-realization and gratification within mutuality, and where divorce followed by remarriage is common ( as common amongst church members as others), it is not surprising that “same-sex couples” have successfully gained their civil rights in western society and are much on the way to gaining full rights and blessings within the churches.

Perhaps the churches of the Anglican Way need to recover the teaching of the Exhortation in the Prayer Book of 1662.

The Rev'd Dr. Peter Toon M.A., D.Phil. (Oxon.)

Inferiority, no; Subordination yes; in family and church.

Adelphoi,

A discussion starter.

Those who argue that it is only men, called, prepared and tested, who are to be ordained as presbyters and bishops in the Church of God have to explain their position most carefully these days (if and where people are willing patiently to listen or read!). The reason for such clarity is that their doctrinal stance for this conservative position can be so easily misheard, misunderstood and misinterpreted. And they can be villified.

First of all, they have to make clear that they accept wholly the equality of women before God for the gift of his salvation & their equal dignity and worth with men in human society. They must make very clear that they do not propose any doctrine of the inferiority of a woman to a man, as was assumed by such great thinkers as Thomas Aquinas & Richard Hooker, based on the science of Aristotle. In fact, they need to teach that man and woman are so created as to be complementary the one to the other, equal but different.

In other words, they must make it abundantly clear that they do not espouse but rather they reject any notion of the inferiority of woman. And here they depart from much of the medieval, Reformation and post-Reformation teaching.

In the second place, they have to make clear that the only sound biblical and theological argument for allowing only some men to be ordained and thus against the ordaining of women to offices of pastoral leadership and oversight is based on the doctrine of Order. In the strict meaning of the word, they believe in the subordination of woman to man, that is, that woman is second in order to man in God's divine ordering of his creation. The basic biblical text is from Genesis 1:27, "God created man in his own image, in the image of God created he him; male and female created he them." Here there is man whom God has made as two sexes, male and female. The order of the two sexes is the male first and the female second, but this ordering does not imply any inferiority whatsoever of the one who is second in order. In fact one has to be first in order and the other second.

Within the Order of the Holy Trinity, as revealed unto us, the Father is always the first, the Son second and the Holy Ghost third, but each of the Three Persons is equal in deity, glory and majesty to the Others (see the splendid statement of all this in The Athanasian Creed). It was Arianism not Orthodoxy which proposed a Trinity of three Persons not equal in deity and glory.

Man, made in the image and after the likeness of God the Holy Trinity, is an ordered creature and the ordering is first male and second female.

Now a prohibition of the pastoral leadership of a woman in the church has been often based in the past on the old Aristotelian biology and anthropology (accepted regrettably as true by many churchmen over the centuries). That is, women are deemed to be inferior to men. Such a position, though held by many of the great minds of the Church from ancient through to relatively recent times, must be rejected and rejected soundly.

Often the Aristotelian science has been fused with the biblical and patristic doctrine of Order. Today we must tear them apart to reject one and to keep the other.

Not sufficiently often has the biblical and patristic argument of Order been used carefully and in its fullness by those who believe, teach and confess that only certain males are proper candidates for ordination. Here the ordering of humanity is seen as reflecting the Order within God the Holy Trinity. Further, and specifically, the Order within the Church as the Family of God is also seen as reflecting the internal Order of God as God. In the New Testament this doctrine of Order is expressed in various ways, one of which is the Pauline doctrine of "headship". Again it must be emphasised that second in order is not inferiority.

Further arguments such as (a) that Jesus Christ only chose man as apostles and that the apostles only chose men as presbyters and bishops, and (b) the celebrant at the Eucharist is to be a man in order truly to represent the action of Christ who is Man, are probably best used as supportive rather than primary.

The only way to teach and defend the ordination of only some men (duly called and prepared) is on the basis of the Name and Nature of God as the Holy Trinity and the Order that He has placed within Man, within humanity, within male and female and within the family. In other words unless a high doctrine of Scripture is accepted and the patristic dogma of the Blessed, Holy Trinity is received, there can be no sound doctrinal argument in favour of the long tradition of a male-only presbyters and bishops.

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The Rev'd Dr. Peter Toon M.A., D.Phil. (Oxon.)

Why "YOU" as second person singular in the ORDINAL?

The use of the 2nd person singular in The Form and Manner of Making, Ordaining and Consecrating of Bishops, Priests and Deacons [ = The Ordinal] printed inside The Book of Common Prayer (1552, 1662, 1928) is most interesting, opening a window upon mid-sixteenth century English.

In all Three Services, God is addressed as "Thou/Thee" and "Thy" and "Thine" are often used. There are no exceptions to this rule. God is never the "You-God".

Further, in each of the Three Services, the candidate is ordained with words that also use the second person singular - e.g., "take thou authority" & "committed unto thee" & "be thou a faithful" & "thou stir up".

However, in the last of the Three Services, involving the Bishop, the Archbishop delivers to him a Bible after he has been ordained and as he delivers it addresses him. In the first part of this brief address the Archbishop uses the words "thyself" "thou" and "thee". Then, perhaps surprisingly, in the second half the Archbishop switches to "ye" and "you": "Be so merciful, that ye be not too remiss; so minister discipline, that you forget not mercy." With each set of pronouns, he is addressing the one and the same person.

There is another surprising thing in the Service for the Ordaining & Consecrating a Bishop. It is this. In each of the eight questions put to the Bishop-elect as well in the introduction and final statement of the questioning, the Archbishop addresses him as "you" and "ye". "Are you persuaded.?" "Will you maintain.?" and so on.

Now in the parallel questions addressed to the candidates within the other Two Services there is also the use of "you"; but, in these it is assumed that several men are being ordained together and thus the "you" is the 2nd person plural form.

So it appears that there is the use of "you" as second person singular in a large part of the Service for Bishops and that in one particular paragraph (the address as the Bible is delivered) the new Bishop is first addressed as "thou/thee" and then as "you/ye".

What are we to make of this?

We can see that both "thou/thee" and "you/ye" functioned as second person singular in the mid sixteenth century. At that time "you/ye/you" was a polite form (hence "your majesty"). Since a bishop belonged to the Lords spiritual, he was addressed as an Earl, Duke, Lord & King - "ye/you/your". However, in divine worship before God he is the equal of all the baptized and so he could also be addressed "thou/thee/thine/thy".

Further, most importantly, God who is the King of kings, lords, dukes and earls is always in the Ordinal (as in the Prayer Book itself) addressed as "Thou/Thee/Thy/Thine". That he is so addressed represents a definite choice by Archbishop Cranmer and his colleagues. Thus the English language of public prayer is no accident. It was planned! And when many ditched it in the 1960s and afterwards they lost a great treasure.

(To read more about the use of pronouns for God and for man in the English
language of public prayer, see Toon & Tarsitano, Neither Archaic nor
Obsolete: The Language of Common Prayer & Public Worship, 2003. ISBN 0
907839 75 4 available from Edgeways Books or The Anglican Marketplace In the USA call 1 800 727 1928)

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The Rev'd Dr. Peter Toon M.A., D.Phil. (Oxon.)

Dumbed down Collects

Adelphoi,

If you wish to see the dear old Church of England, my "Mother", at her worst in her prayer, go to the latest and final edition of the new collects meant for those folks who find ordinary collects too difficult!

The General Synod is about to debate the proposed Additional Collects again, following revisions in response to consultation. You can see the final version - it will not be changed again - at:

www.cofe.anglican.org/synod/GS1493A.doc

I cry for my beloved Mother.
===

The Rev'd Dr. Peter Toon M.A., D.Phil. (Oxon.)

How Collects get changed!

The Collect for the Fourth Sunday after Trinity both in The Book of Common Prayer (1662 & USA 1928) and in Common Worship (2000, England) is based upon the original Latin Collect from the Sacramentary of Gregory, via the Sarum Missal.

The original Collect may be translated:

"O God, the protector of all that hope in thee, without whom nothing is strong, nothing is holy; multiply upon us thy mercy; that, thou being our ruler and guide we may so pass through the good things of time that we lose not the good things of eternity; through Jesus Christ our Lord."

Archbishop Cranmer translated & edited as follows:

"O God, the protector of all that trust in thee, without whom nothing is strong, nothing is holy: Increase and multiply upon us thy mercy; that, though being our ruler and guide, we may so pass through things temporal, that we finally lose not the things eternal: Grant this, O heavenly Father, for Jesus Christ's sake our Lord."

Cranmer changed "hope" to "trust", added the verb "increase", and changed "the good things of time" to "things temporal [=things of time]". Thereby he gave the prayer a somewhat different emphasis. Passing through the "good things of time" is a more restricted reference than all the things of time. The original Latin presupposed that there are specific temptations in the enjoyment of the good things of time, temptations which may cause us to stumble and thus lose the gifts of forgiveness of sins, eternal salvation and life in the presence of the Lord with the beatific vision. Cranmer included good things and bad things by his "things temporal" and thus widened the reference of the petition greatly.

The editors of Common Worship generally followed The Book of Common Prayer but made their own additions/changes and in these substantially changed the meaning of the Prayer.

"O God, the protector of all who trust in you, without whom nothing is strong, nothing is holy: increase and multiply upon us your mercy; that with you as our ruler and guide we may so pass through things temporal that we lose not our hold on things eternal; grant this, heavenly Father, for our Lord Jesus Christ's sake."

Instead of "we finally lose not things eternal" [eternal life, eternal enjoyment of the beatific vision, eternal fellowship with the angels and saints, and so on] this prayer has "we lose not our hold on things eternal". The idea seems to be that we are grasping by our own power, or hanging on to by our own energy, the things of eternity and that there is the real possibility that due to the pressures of living in this [sinful] world we shall lose our grasp of, and be unable to hang on to, them now. That is we shall lose our hold on our union, communion, and relation to God the Father in the present.

Further, the deletion of "finally" removes the reference to the Last Judgment and makes the reference to be primarily in this world. Thus the problem with this rendering is that it makes too specific the human side of holding on to God and at the same time does not allow for God's holding on to us; further, it takes out of the whole prayer the sense that we all have to appear before the judgment seat of God to give an account.

If the editors of Common Worship wanted to change the Cranmerian rendering why did they not provide a good translation of the original Latin Collect?

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The Rev'd Dr. Peter Toon M.A., D.Phil. (Oxon.)

IMPLICATIONS FOR A CHURCH PROVIDING BLESSINGS FOR SAME-SEX COUPLES

a discussion starter

If the Episcopal Church accepts at its General Convention in August 2003 the practice of blessing same-sex couples (where each of whom claims a sexual orientation to the same sex only) in “a faithful relationship or partnership”, what will this imply in terms of “the development of doctrine” by the ECUSA?

I make various suggestions but do not supply a complete statement:

1. That the church believes that some human beings though biologically of a specific sex (male or female) are so constituted that they do not have a normal internal ordering towards the opposite sex but rather an orientation towards the same sex. And that their sexual organs and their expressive natures are at odds with each other.


2. That two such persons therefore have the right within the friendship and “faithful partnership” of being such a couple, to perform acts of a specifically sexual nature on a regular basis as appropriate and right, and expressive of mutuality and love.


3. That the virtue of chastity does not apply and is not demanded in this case of two persons of the same biological sex in a “faithful relationship”


4. That the fact that two persons are “FAITHFUL” to each other gives to their relationship a kind of divine approval making it “special” in the order of things and conformable to God’s law.


5. The purpose of such a union is the most complete form of self-expression and self-development possible for each of the two.


6. For all practical purposes such a couple is to be regarded as a “married couple” who can adopt children or if lesbian one can bear a child (the sperm supplied by a donor). Further, that they are to be given rights in terms of healthcare, inheritance and so on.


7. Such couples are to have the same rights in terms of “divorce and remarriage” as their heterosexual colleagues.


8. That the church’s teaching and practice on human relations and rights should follow that of enlightened western culture and secular laws. Thus in this regard it is the culture that is “the salt of the earth” and the “light of the world”.


9. That such persons in this form of partnership be entitled to full membership of the church and thus potential & possible candidates for all offices, lay and ordained of the same.


10. For any to oppose these rights and privileges is to be prejudiced and to destroy the unity of the Body of Christ.


11. That active, occasional homosexual contacts outside a faithful relationship are to be regarded as a kind of fornication and thus seen as the same kind of sin as committed by heterosexual persons in extra-marital sexual experience.


12. That the Bible has been interpreted in a new and significant way so that it now allows that which it was previously thought to forbid. And that this new form of hermeneutics has dramatic implications for other areas of Christian worship, doctrine & discipline - as time will quickly make clear.


13. That the use of the orthodox dogma/doctrine of the Holy Trinity in terms of explicating what it means for man to be made in the image and after the likeness of God and to be a relational creature has to be abandoned, and replaced by a doctrine of God which allows for this innovation of same-sex partnerships.


14. That the received doctrine of holy matrimony (as laid out in say the BCP Marriage Service 1662) has been abandoned as the norm and that it has become one option amongst others and thus can make no special claim on church members. Further, the important duty and privilege to procreate is no longer part of the nature and vocation of marriage.


15. That in principle the ECUSA can now decide at will to change any other received doctrine or form/shape of worship and manner/type of discipline.

The Revd Dr Peter Toon July 8th 2003

Canon John resigns as bishop-elect of Reading; The Bishop of Oxford ought also to go.

(July 7th, 2003)

This morning (July 7) I heard interviews on BBC Radio with the Dean of Southwark (where Dr John is a Canon) and with the Bishop of Manchester about the resignation. I also heard a summary of what the British newspapers say this morning about the affair. I have read the various Letters that have been released.

His resignation came after a long meeting at Lambeth Palace with the Archbishop and advisers. It is being commended from there as for the maintaining of the unity of the Anglican Communion of Churches and of the Church of England. In other words, the massive pressure exerted by the evangelicals around the world and in England has worked and the man they targeted has had to withdraw.

We feel deeply for the pain that Canon John has suffered through this long and bitter controversy.

There has been no triumph in terms of the accepting of a traditional doctrine & morality. Not arguments but sheer pressure has been victorious. Thus there remains a sizeable group of Anglicans, mostly in the "West", who believe that within the doctrine of human worth & dignity and of human rights "gay" people should be encouraged in their same-sex partnerships to be faithful. Likewise, there is en even larger group of Anglicans, mostly in the "South", who see all forms of homosexual behaviour as wrong and contrary to the way God has made the human race.

This means that the underlying cause - the call for the rights of gay priests to full acceptance in the Anglican Way in all its 38 Provinces - has merely been put on hold for a short time. It will be back in full swing in the General Convention of the ECUSA about lst August 2003, when there is voting on matters directly related to this issue.

While Canon John should never have been appointed, the person who ought now to resign is the Bishop of Oxford, who knew when he made this appointment what were the deep convictions of many Anglican leaders worldwide and of committed Evangelicals in the C of E. He even knew that the C of E (on the view that it is slowly becoming more liberal) was not itself yet ready for this kind of appointment. Further, as one who is often on Radio & TV the Bishop also would have been aware of the publicity it would cause and bring. It is he who caused all the controversy and brought the Church to shame in the media. There were other men he could have nominated but he chose this man deliberately knowing the consequences (but not necessarily the intensity of them). The Bishop of Oxford should resign not only for his deliberate decision to cause this controversy but also for what he has said and written since in defence of his action and in defence of homosexual practice.

The Archbishop of Canterbury, we hope, has learned a lesson from all this and will be most careful in this sensitive area of homosexuality in the future. He could have blocked this appointment early on in the process before it was a public matter and did not so do. This failure was a serious error of judgment.

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The Rev'd Dr. Peter Toon M.A., D.Phil. (Oxon.)

Gay priest rejects bishop post

Canon Jeffrey John says he is now celibate
(From the BBC) Gay priest Canon Jeffrey John has said he will not take up the post of Bishop of Reading.
It follows weeks of bitter argument within the Anglican Church about whether or not he should be allowed to hold the position, because of his sexuality.

Dr John said he made the decision because of the "damage" his consecration might cause to the "unity of the Church".

Read the rest of this story

EXPERIENCE, Experience & experience

Adelphoi,

If you want to know where the innovations of the ECUSA come from, read on...

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ECUSA,1&2&3&4&5 - Welcome to Experience

In the latter part of the reign of Elizabeth I , there began the custom (first in the sermons of Lancelot Andrewes, who became the major editor and translator of the King James Bible of 1611) of explaining the doctrinal foundation of the reformed Catholic & National Church of England (ecclesia anglicana) through the use of the numbers 1 through 5. This was a simple device and most helpful for memorization. I still use it when referring to the Church of England and the Anglican Way as a form of reformed Catholicism.

There is ONE CANON of Scripture, wherein are TWO TESTAMENTS, and to provide a summary of the Christian Faith based on these there are THREE CREEDS. Then there are the first FOUR ECUMENICAL COUNCILS, wherein the classic, foundational dogma of the Church is set forth, and there are FIVE CENTURIES of life of the One, Holy, Catholic and Apostolic Church wherein the principles of canon law, liturgy, ordained ministry and other important matters were developed and established as principles or guides for all time.


Since the 1960s this foundation (reflected in the classic Formularies of the BCP, Ordinal and Articles of Religion) has been increasingly eroded and even abandoned by modern Anglican Commissions, Synods and Conventions, and thus locally by clergy and parishes.

The emerging foundation on which modern doctrine, morality, canon law and liturgy is unstable; but, it can be summarised in five parts as the classic foundation has been so described.

There is EXPERIENCE as the only foundation, and this comes in TWO PARTS (that recorded in the Bible and that in the life of the Church in the world for 20 centuries). The THIRD CENTURY is the most important period for providing models for Worship and Doctrine. The modern Church benefits from FOUR REVOLUTIONS in the history of the Church; and the same Church utilises FIVE (a plurality) of forms of worship, types of theology and morality.

EXPERIENCE is a very wide category and includes direct personal experience & the study of human beings as experiencing persons and is all about the observation of persons, facts and events as a source of knowledge. Thus it is never fixed but always changing and developing, revising and expanding.

In the Bible there is a special kind of record of human experience - experience in search of God and finding him. However and regrettably it is much more the experience of males than of females and so it is imbalanced, needing careful interpretation. Yet it is unique in that it is primary and irreplaceable. In the life of the church and her members over the centuries there has been a continuing experience of God, the world, themselves and each other. Christians today are most aware of their own experience and look into it for revelation from God. So EXPERIENCE COMES IN TWO PARTS (within the Bible and outside the Bible) and is fundamental in the modern Church.

In terms of providing guidance for the modern Church, the THIRD century has been regarded as the most important. The Church then found herself in a multi-racial, multi-religious and multi-ethnic world, and she was not favoured by the Emperors and thus not corrupted by the world. She was free to be herself before she was trapped into conformity to alien principles from Greek culture and Roman law by her being adopted by Constantine the Great and his successors. So it is to this THIRD century that we must look for guidance as to the Shape and Content of Liturgy, for Doctrine that is not over defined, and for freedom to be her true self in a rich cultural environment.

Further, the Church of today has to recognize that she has been through FOUR major revolutions and all these have shaped her and what she can be. By the Reformation, she left behind medieval ways and superstition; by the Enlightenment she began to do theology "from below" rather than "from above" and she embraced the full use of modern reason & science; by Liberal Theology (of the 19th Century & early 20th) she learned to read the Bible in new and critical ways and see it as a human document; and by the tremendous changes after the 1960s and after the impact of Vatican II, she has felt wholly free to dislodge and abandon traditional doctrine, language, discipline, liturgy, morality and canon law and introduce innovations.

FIVE is not to taken literally but rather as meaning "many" or "multiple" - many options within prayer books for all services and to suit all tastes; many permissible forms of morality; & many types of theology and doctrine (except the classic & traditional). The result of all this is that relativism is part of this modern mindset.

In the ECUSA this type of Foundation is more apparent than anywhere else in the Anglican Communion (but other Provinces are catching up quickly) for though the Bible and Tradition are respected, it is generally as Bearers of Religious Experience to be evaluated for words from God, rather than God's Word to be heard and received. Further, much of the argument for modern innovations - in doctrine and morality - concerning sexual matters is from Experience with material from the Bible arrived at by new forms of interpretation being used to support this. (How often do we hear not "Scripture, Tradition & Reason" but "Scripture, Tradition, Reason and Experience" where the latter two are at least as important if not more important than the first two!) It was the claim of the primary architect of the American 1979 Prayer Book that it was modelled on the early Church - especially the 3rd century and St Hippolytus' writings. We know now that this model was used in a most selective way!

Where this type of Five Point Foundation is in place, or in the process of pushing out the old norms, there is no possibility of the genuine Renewal of the Church. The new foundations have to be shaken by a great earthquake from heaven for there to be real Reformation and Recovery of the inherited biblical and orthodox Faith!

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The Rev'd Dr. Peter Toon M.A., D.Phil. (Oxon.)

Sermon for July 4th

"Thou shalt fear the LORD thy God; him shalt thou serve, and to him shalt thou cleave, and swear by his name. He is thy praise, and he is thy God, that hath done for thee these great and terrible things, which thine eyes have seen" (Deuteronomy 10:20-21).

In the late 1960s, the television show Star Trek ran an episode that was meant to be a parable. The Enterprise had encountered a more or less duplicate Earth, with this exception-instead of a modern civilization, the crew observed two warring tribes, the Yangs and the Coms, slowly exterminating one another.

Captain Kirk, accompanied by his usual helpers, landed in what should have been "North America" and "the United States" to investigate. To make a long story short, it turned out that on this twin Earth the Cold War had gone hot, so that the Yangs were all that was left of the Yankees, and the Coms were all that was left of the Communists. Both groups has slipped into an utter primitivism, so that the hunted Yankees, living in the wild, had adopted a way of life very similar to that of the American Indians when the first European settlers arrived, included medicine men, totems, and secret words of power.

The original point of this story, in the 1960s, was the pious hope that World War III and a nuclear exchange could be avoided. And, so far, in the intervening years, that hope has come true. What's interesting on this Independence Day, however, is the fact that we did not avoid another kind of war-an internal war of traditional Americans against revisionist Americans, a spiritual war of vain and arrogant human beings against God Almighty.

Both God and the devil are in the details, and in the details of that old television show an unintended prophecy was made. The totem of the barbaric Yangs' medicine man was a tattered American flag. His secret words of power were the Preamble to the Constitution of the United States, reduced to an ignorant, illiterate jumble, in which the words "We the People" had become the gibberish "Wi plan ista."

And this is the unintended prophecy: our moral and cultural disorder, based in our growing national alienation from God, is much more likely to reduce our beloved flag to a totem for savages and to transform our Constitution into useless gibberish than any foreign enemy, than any technology of modern war. In our contempt for God's Word and Commandments; in our contempt for the family, for the marriage bed, and for the innocent life conceived there; and in our contempt for the hard lessons to be learned from the history of Christendom and from the history of our own nation, we are already more primitive and more barbaric than the imaginary Yangs of the 1960s.

When I say "our," of course, I mean for us to think of ourselves as a single nation, under God, rather than as a collection of disconnected human atoms with no interest in anyone but themselves or a loose association of Pontius Pilates, who wash their hands of any responsibility for whatever their government or their neighbors do. As a nation, we are being dragged farther and farther from God and from God's protection every day, and the real question is, are we resisting this hijacking of our nation as well as we can, so that there is no doubt that we are, at least, being dragged kicking and screaming?

Those who would expel the God of the Bible from American life have been and remain well organized, but can the same be said of us? The typical enemy of God (and do not doubt that the celebrity, media mogul, politician, judge, or plain neighborhood slob who rebels against God's truth and righteousness, and would deny them to others is God's enemy) lies awake nights thinking of ways to fight against God's kingdom and to undermine the faith and morality of his neighbors. On the other hand, can it be said of us that we lie awake nights thinking of ways to serve God and his kingdom or to support our neighbors in the divine obedience that gives eternal life? The practical results say "no."

But we do have an alternative to watching helplessly as our nation sinks into barbarism. We can get help, and that help is the Lord God Almighty. We can begin what amounts to a counter-revolution in our very own homes and with our very own families by begging him for the restoration and renewal of a submissive awe and wonder before the Almighty and Eternal God: namely, for that gift of the Holy Ghost that the Bible calls "the fear of the Lord." When we, and our parents, and our children, and our husbands and wives have received this gift and cultivated it, we will be able to begin keeping again the commandment that God makes both for individual persons and for nations: "Thou shalt fear the LORD thy God; him shalt thou serve, and to him shalt thou cleave, and swear by his name."

George Washington once predicted that if the oath "so help me God" every became meaningless, our nation, our government, and our system of justice would crumble, and his prediction has been proven true before our very own eyes in our very own lifetime. But decay into the modern Sodom and Gomorrah need not be the end of the American story. When we fear God again, we will be grateful to God again, recognizing that every good thing about ourselves and our nation is his doing alone. As Moses reminded another rebellious people: "He is thy praise, and he is thy God, that hath done for thee these great and terrible things, which thine eyes have seen."

God can save us if that is his will, and all of our lives, publicly and privately, should be dedicated to seeking God's good will for our nation's conversion and for its rescue from self-destruction. The more we love the United States of America, the more we must love God, who is the sole surety of a person or a nation.

A place to start, today, is with an experiment. On this Independence Day, as you hear praises heaped upon the United States of America, take each of those praises in turn and prefix it with "God did this." Some of those praises will be consistent with the God of the Bible and his promises. Those are the things for which we must thank God and for which we must fight. On the other hand, some of those praises will be unimaginable as the work of God, since they will praise actions or states of life that we know God has forbidden in his commandments. These are the sins for which we must beg forgiveness, and it is against these things that we must fight.

Continue this experiment for a while, and you will discover in quite practical terms the nature of a real and true patriotism. What God wills is the only health of a nation, and those who resist God, whatever they say about loving their country with their mouths, hate their country just as much as they hate the God who made it: "Thou shalt fear the LORD thy God; him shalt thou serve, and to him shalt thou cleave, and swear by his name. He is thy praise, and he is thy God, that hath done for thee these great and terrible things, which thine eyes have seen." In other words, Happy Independence Day.

(WRITTEN BY LOU TARSITANO)

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The Rev'd Dr. Peter Toon M.A., D.Phil. (Oxon.)