Eames & Akinola: The old boys network & the new upstarts

Archbishop Eames of Ireland, and an elder statesman of Anglican Communion affairs, recently gave three lectures on the present state and the future of the Anglican Communion in two liberal Seminaries of the ECUSA. One of these also gave him the D.D. degree. The lectures have been circulated by both the Anglican Communion Office and the Episcopal Church news-service. Their content seems most acceptable to the ECUSA leadership and worrying to more conservative Anglicans.

In one lecture he criticized the recent action of the Synod of the Church in Nigeria when it made commitment to the classic Anglican Formularies (BCP, Ordinal & Articles of Religion) the basis of its common life and of its fellowship with other Anglican Churches. Previously, its fellowship had been based on the See of Canterbury and with all who were in communion with the Archbishop there.

[What many people do not know about the Church of Ireland is that in 2004 it took the same path as the ECUSA did in 1979 and the West Indies did in the 1990s. It made a “Book of Alternative Services” into its formulary, “The Book of Common Prayer,” and it abandoned its edition of the classic Book of Common Prayer (derived from the English edition of 1662). Thus the Irish Church has lost its nature as Reformed Catholic and has become whatever succeeding Synods determine it shall be. Further, it relies on its fellowship with the See of Canterbury to assure its Anglican standing. What it has rejected in terms of Standard it seek to replace by association.]

Rightly, Archbishop Akinola has responded and protested to the Eames criticisms, pointing out that neither he nor his Church were consulted before, or informed of, the attack by Eames. Further, he has justified the commitment of his Church to the classic Anglican Formularies (wherein of course the full authority of Scripture, the full doctrine of Christ as Lord, and the rich nature of Reformed Catholicism is set forth). Well done, Akinola, say thousands around the world.

Questions arising:

• Does Archbishop Akinola realize that the Church of Ireland and Dr Eames have abandoned the classic Formularies and followed the example of ECUSA? This may in part explain the outburst of Eames against the going back to old standards by Nigeria.
• When will the Network and the American Anglican Council commit themselves unreservedly to the received classic Formularies and wholly forsake their present commitment to the false formularies of the ECUSA (those in the 1979 prayer book)?
• Is not Akinola a hero for them?
• Do they share his Faith?

The Rev'd Dr. Peter Toon MA., D.Phil (Oxford)

The Church of God, where is it? Is it INVISIBLE?

Let us begin with a contrast between the “theoretical doctrine” and the “practical reality.”

The Lord Jesus Christ taught that there is one Church --- “upon this rock I will build my Church”; his apostles taught that there is one Church and they identified this Church through the use of various metaphors or models – e.g., the Body of Christ, the Bride of Christ and the royal Priesthood; and the ecumenical Creed declares in summary of the biblical teaching that there is “one, holy, catholic and apostolic Church.”

What the eyes see in the USA is not one Church, not even one Anglican, one Lutheran, one Presbyterian, one Baptist, and one Orthodox Church. They behold a vast array of denominations, which are distinguished from each other by name, by what they stand for, by their ecclesiastical polity and organization, and so on. Each of them claims either to be the whole of, or to be a part of, the Church of God and some but not all of them are in fellowship with others.

How can we maintain the belief in the One Church of Scripture and Creed, and at the same time live within the massive variety of competitive denominations and congregations in the West and in the world generally?

First of all, we need to realize that this is not in essence a new problem for sensitive souls. In other forms and manifestations, it has in principle been addressed by Christian philosophers and theologians in the past. From the patristic period, St Augustine is the obvious example (remember he had to address the Donatist schism] and at the Reformation of the 16th century, the reality of national churches, not always in communion with each other and not in communion with the Church of Rome and the Orthodox Churches of the East, raised serious questions for all the leaders about the unity of the Church.

Further, added to this problem of unity there always was the problem of the presence of those who deny the Faith by word and deed and who are members of parishes and national churches. Not all church members were of the elect of God, not even in apostolic times!

In England, these problems were addressed by the divines who met in Westminster Abbey, London, in the 1640s and who produced the Westminster Catechisms and Confession of Faith. In Chapter XXV of the Confession they wrote this “Of the Church”:

1.The catholic or universal Church, which is invisible, consists of the whole number of the elect, that have been or are, or shall be gathered into one, under Christ the Head thereof; and is the spouse, the body, the fulness of Him that filleth all in all.
2. The visible Church, which is also catholic or universal under the Gospel (not confined to one nation, as before under the law), consists of all those throughout the world that profess the true religion; and of their children; and is the kingdom of the Lord Jesus Christ, the house and family of God, our of which three is no ordinary possibility of salvation.
3. Unto this catholic, visible Church, Christ hath given the ministry, oracles, and ordinances of God, for the gathering and perfecting of the saints, in this life to the end of the world: and doth by His own presence and Spirit, according to His promise, make them effectual thereunto.
4.This catholic Church hath been sometimes more, sometimes less, visible. And particular Churches, which are members thereof, are more or less pure, according as the doctrine of the Gospel is taught and embraced, ordinances administered, and public worship performed more or less purely in them.
5. The purest Churches under heaven are subject both to mixture and error; and some have so degenerated, as to become no Church of Christ, but synagogues of Satan. Nevertheless, there shall be always a Church on earth to worship God according to His will….

In making a distinction between (a) the One true Church of God, known only in its entirety to God and thus invisible to man who belongs to space and time, and (b) the variety of visible national Churches (or later of national Churches and denominations) together making up the One mixed and divided Church of God visible on earth, this Confession stated what was held in common by all Protestants. (Roman Catholics made the same essential distinction between the invisible and visible but stated the relation between the two in terms which effectively identified the visible with the R C Church only- or the R C and Orthodox Churches.)

So we return to the present day and the supermarket of Christian groups in the USA!

I cannot see any other way out of our dilemma today than that of also accepting this distinction between visible and invisible (it is presumed by the Articles of Religion and The Book of Common Prayer of the Anglican Way and so is already part of the faith of an Anglican).

How else can one make any sense of the complexity of the situation in the USA in terms of the massive variety of denominations, all claiming to be under Christ the Lord and based upon the revelation recorded in Holy Scripture? Of course, to accept it, does not mean that one uses it to justify the existence of thousands of denominations or to justify starting a new one when we feel that our interests are not being served! On the other hand, to accept it does mean that we shall see brothers and sister in Christ in groups and congregations other than our own, and we shall view them as future neighbors in the heavenly Jerusalem! And this will surely lead us to desire to dream of, to long for, to work for practical unity amongst the professing Christian people of the land, and especially so when they claim to belong to the same tradition (e.g., “Anglican”).

One major way in which the doctrine of the Church as invisible is wrongly used is to think and act as if, as a “born-again believer”, one has a kind of direct individualistic link as a human person to God the Father through Jesus Christ ( a kind of dial-up instant link). Note how the Confession states in (2) that ordinarily there is no salvation outside the belonging to and being a full member of the visible Church. In these days when individual autonomy is assumed as basic to living in the West, there is the real danger of linking this sense of autonomy to a doctrine of the Church as invisible and thereby getting the relation of the individual believer to Christ, to the members of Christ, to the local church and to God the Father, skewed! Salvation is as an individual person into the family of God so that one has brothers and sisters from the word go and on into eternity!

October 17, 2005 The Rev'd Dr. Peter Toon MA., D.Phil (Oxford)

Tribute to Caesar Yes – but Today?

A meditation to foster better reflection.

Over the weekend of October 15, 2005, the Gospel heard in many Episcopal parishes will be Matthew 22:15-22. In It are these words of Jesus: Render to Caesar the things that are Caesar’s and to God the things that are God’s. He said these words as he held a Roman coin in his hand, a coin on which was the image and inscription of the Emperor.

This profound pronouncement came from Jesus’ lips in response to a question: “Is it lawful to pay taxes to Caesar?” Whether or not the Jews as a subject people, whose land was occupied by the Roman forces, ought to/should pay taxes to the Roman imperial government was a hot theme in Jewish piety. The Herodian party which benefited most from the occupation insisted that it was good and right to pay taxes; the Pharisees sat on the fence but paid in the end; and the Zealots refused to pay and took the consequences.

Jesus called for a Roman coin and surprisingly his questioners quickly produced one. (The mere possession of which suggested that they accepted the principle of paying taxes to the imperial government!). Then Jesus asked whose likeness and inscription was on the denarius? And they answered, “Caesar’s” for all Roman coins of this period had such on them.

At this point Jesus made his pronouncement: “Give unto Caesar the things that are Caesar’s.” Pay your taxes, keep the laws of the land and submit to the government.
Yet this instruction must not stand alone as an absolute for man is God’s creature. So Jesus continued: “ Render to God the things that are God’s.” God’s image and likeness [Genesis 1:27] is stamped upon you, therefore offer to God your whole being and life for he is your Creator, Lord and Judge.

What we see here is that all obedience to human governments and authorities is not isolated and standing alone but is WITHIN the comprehensive submission and obedience to God as the LORD. Thus we are to obey the laws of the land and pay taxes, as part of our obedience of God, for “the powers that be are ordained of God.” Children are to obey parents, wives obey husbands, church members obey their elders, soldiers obey their officers – and so on – within the one submission and obedience to God. Thus we are only to refuse to submit to human authority when it is absolutely clear that the human authority is exceeding its God-ordained role (e.g., when the Caesar required worship of his image, then the Christians said no and became martyrs).

The situation in America is very different from that in Jerusalem in A.D. 30! And thus the temptations are different, and, further, not identical for people of different persuasions and mindsets.

Take, for example, a temptation facing people of a social conservative mindset. Some of them are perhaps in danger of giving too much devotion to “Caesar” (read the Republican Party and Government). That is, they possibly identify too closely the political ideals and programs of the “right” and of its “conservative ideology” with the will and purpose of God. So much so that they see it as a Christian duty not merely to vote responsibly and carefully but to vote only Republican, and they see it as a sin to vote any other way.

And this general commitment is usually linked to a particular (but debatable) reading of American history, of its founding and its constitution. Politics seems to have ceased to be the art of the possible and has become the means of the realization of the foretaste or first-fruits of the kingdom of God on American soil. This close identification of a this-worldly yet high-minded political aim and ideal with the actual kingdom of God and the perfect will of the LORD means that, in effect, too much is rendered to Caesar. And thus what is rendered to God, the Lord, whose image and likeness we bear, is less than it should be, for some devotion is taken away and is given to the “earthly kingdom.” (One well-known southern preacher often says of his evangelism: “We get them saved; we get them baptized; and then we get them signed up to work for the Republican Party.”)

It is part of our required obedience to God not to kill (and thus not to engage in abortion or euthanasia) but it is not necessarily part of our clear obedience of God to support or not support this or that legislation at the state and federal level. Prudential judgment is required all the time for politics is the art of the possible. It is one thing to be submitted to God’s law personally and as a family or congregation of Christ’s flock, and it is yet another thing to be clear as to the best way of helping and causing people in general to submit to this divine law via political, education and social means.

Whether our judgment leads us to vote one way or another, it is the act of voting responsibly that is required of us by God in obedience to the State as appointed by him. No earthly program, however noble, can ever equate with the perfect requirements of the kingdom of Christ. Likewise no political party is worthy of our total devotion and commitment. Why? Because Jesus Christ is Lord.

The Rev'd Dr. Peter Toon MA., D.Phil (Oxford)

Reform and be renewed from within? Or Depart to be Reformed & Renewed outside?

A meditation starter from Peter Toon

Pressing questions facing many concerned Episcopalians include: Is it possible or probable that there will be, by divine providence and through internal and external ecclesial pressures, a genuine reform and renewal within the Episcopal Church of the USA during 2006 – 7? Is internal renewal a possibility or a pipe-dream? Is a U-turn by the ECUSA worth working for?

To provide some food for thought as a preparation for answering these questions I offer the following.

The Pilgrim and Puritans of old England left the National Church of England in the seventeenth century in order to set up a reformed and renewed Church in New England. They saw no possibility of achieving their godly aims in the land of their birth but hoped to do so in the land of their adoption. They were schismatics but filled with holy drive and godly ideals. What they began now exists in a variety of forms!

In the countries of Europe that they left behind, there had been, a century or less before, a reform and renewal that had been primarily to establish national and provincial Churches. That is, individual countries, cantons, provinces and cities had thrown off the allegiance to the Bishop of Rome and Roman Catholic worship, doctrine and discipline and had adopted a form of Christian Religion that was generally called “Protestant” (based on the idea of a protest on behalf of the Scriptures and the worship, doctrine and discipline of the Early Church) or Reformed Catholicism. However, there were those in these who were not satisfied with the reforms and they sought to create congregations that were free of any relation to the State or the Monarch. People call them “radical reformers” or “Anabaptists.”

So we see what sociologists call the “church” type [i.e., the National Churches] and the “sect” type [i.e., the nonconformists of varied kinds] of the Christian Religion arising in old Europe in the sixteenth and seventeenth century.

Over in the USA, after Independence from Great Britain, there emerged many different forms of the Christian Religion as individual States in the East set themselves free from direct association with one particular form of the Church. The distinction between “church” and “sect”, useful for old Europe is not useful for the vibrant USA scene, and has been replaced by “denomination” in the USA, for there is no established Church and instead much emphasis on the separation of Church and State! In theory also all religious groups are equal.

So with the planting of a vast array of denominations in and across the USA in the 19th & 20th centuries, there is little or no perception that the Church of the One Jesus Christ is truly One Church (except as “invisible” with its members, the elect, known only unto God and joined together in his mind in Christ Jesus by the Holy Spirit). So to exit one denomination and create another, to exit one and join another, to try out a variety of denominations week by week, are all real possibilities in the USA and are available every week. This movement in and out and across is, however, easier for laity than clergy for obvious reasons – accreditation, pension plans, health insurance and the like.

Now to the Episcopal Church.

The Protestant Episcopal Church saw one small schism in the 19th century which led to the creation of the Reformed Episcopal Church, which is still around and growing slowly in the 21st century. Since World War II, as pressures from culture and society have mounted, there have been a growing number of secessions from the Episcopal Church – e.g., during the civil rights & Vietnam War period; in 1977 and since then with the advent of women’s ordination and the imposition of the new, liberal prayer book; in the late 1990s over the failure of the leadership of bishops; after 2003 with the acceptance of innovations in sexuality, and so on. These schisms of the last fifty years or so have led to many different expressions of Episcopalian or Anglicanism! And some of these jurisdictions and groups have themselves experienced schism.

It is reasonable to claim that the NORMAL American way of seeking to create the form of Christian religion that is seen as correct or preferred is to start from scratch. That is, to separate from others, to gather people together, to obtain property and to set up what is desired and sought for. And, in doing so to believe and to claim that one is led by heaven and is establishing the real and true form of the body of Christ, the church.

So, given the reality of the power of centrifugal forces within American religion aiding and abetting the making of schism normal and acceptable, and, further, given the fact that the old-line or main-line progressive liberal denominations of the USA (e.g. Congregationalist, Methodist, Presbyterian and Episcopalian) have never yet shown any capacity for real signs of internal reform and renewal (but have seen thousands of their members exit to create new churches), the odds against reform and renewal in the ECUSA are at best massive! Further, each week there are whole or parts of Episcopal congregations exiting in order to create new congregations, usually under the patronage of some far-away bishop. The stream is flowing and seems not to be drying up.

Only the extreme optimist would think that the ECUSA will reform itself. However, let us not forget that with God the Father all things are possible, said Jesus. Possible but not probable in this case, we may reverently add!

October 13, 2005

Do Episcopalians delight more in the Extras then in the Essentials? Is the modern Anglican Mind closed to most things Anglican?

A discussion starter from Peter Toon.

In order to make my points in this short essay, I shall deal with generalities and not supply footnotes to explain nuances, paradoxes and exceptions.

The point I wish to make is that in the USA both those who claim to be orthodox Episcopalians within the ECUSA, and those who claim to be orthodox Anglicans outside the ECUSA, share one common characteristic. It is this. That they appear to be more committed to what may be called additions to or extras of the Anglican Way than that which is the very essence of the Anglican Way. In short, they have closed their minds to what may be called the classic Anglican Mind.

Put another way, they go out of their way to distance themselves from that which historically may be called the key commitments and affirmations of the clergy and people who have been called Anglicans and Episcopalians.

Please note that I am referring not to the progressive liberal elite which runs the “National Church” and many dioceses of the ECUSA, although this group does clearly portray a total rejection of the classic Anglican Mind and received Episcopal Faith. I am referring to those who claim to be “orthodox” within and outside the ECUSA.

Whatever do I mean? Have I gone crazy? Maybe. I am living after all in the progressive state of Washington on the West Coast and I was born and bred in England!

I mean this. Many of those called “Continuing Anglicans” seem at first sight to be truly Anglicans when in reality they are not so. When you look closely you find that they have committed themselves to (a) a path that will end in union with the See of Rome – this is the expressed policy of the TAC & the ACA; (b) a form of Liturgy for the Eucharist that includes the most “Roman” parts of the classic Tridentine Liturgy of the Mass – see the Anglican or American Missals; and (c) a doctrinal commitment to the decrees of the Seventh Ecumenical Council, which require the veneration of icons.

Let us be clear. Historically, since the late 19th century not a few Anglo-Catholics have inserted into the Anglican BCP service parts of the Tridentine Mass and they have held to the doctrine of the Icons; but, very importantly, they have recognized these additions as extras and belonging not to the classic Anglican Mind as such but to that particular late development of it called the Anglo-Catholic Mind. And they have not made these things a test of fellowship with the Evangelical and Broad-Church Schools of Anglican churchmanship.

Today, in the USA we have the situation where not a few Continuing Anglicans are truly defined by their Additions and Extra for they have made these into essentials, and into a test of fellowship. They define the Anglican Way primarily in terms of what were once seen as the special emphases of a school of thought within Anglicanism, and what they are producing is no longer truly the Anglican Way, but the Canterbury route to Rome.

Let us recall that the essentials and standards of the Anglican Way are set forth in her Formularies (the classic BCP, Ordinal and Articles of Religion) which identify It as Reformed Catholicism, and these are based upon the basic 1,2,3,4 & 5 as taught by the standard divines of the Church of England in the seventeenth century. One Canon of Scripture, with its Two Testaments as God’s Word written, doctrinally summarized in Three Creeds [Apostles’, Nicene & Athanasian] and given form by Four Ecumenical Councils [from Nicea 325 to Chalcedon 451], and Five Centuries and development.

Of course, God was at work after the year 500 but this statement of the 1 to 5 is intended to indicate the basis and the essentials of the Anglican Way as Reformed Catholicism, with its Ministry and Liturgy based upon the developments and teaching of the Early Church.

If the Continuing Anglicans reveal a tendency to err in one direction, then the Charismatic/Evangelical Episcopalians inside and outside the ECUSA reveal a tendency in the other direction. They can be described as imitating what may be called generic evangelical [or charismatic/evangelical], American Protestantism. [See e.g., the general program for The Network Congress in Pittsburgh in November 0.] And they certainly give the impression that what they receive from this source is of greater importance than what they receive from within the classic stream of the Anglican Way. This is seen, for example, in how they talk of the Lordship of Christ and the Authority of Scripture (as if these were not most adequately proclaimed and explained in the classic Formularies!). They make it clear that they regard much of the inherited Anglican form of worship as “dead” and “out of touch” and the received expression of doctrine and discipline as being out-of-date and irrelevant.

They delight in using the most modern of Anglican liturgies (produced in the main by progressive liberals) and they adapt them so as to make them like the worship-style of the generic evangelical/charismatic found widely in the USA. Their quarrel with the present ECUSA is primarily focused on one thing – its sexual deviations and innovations – and they are little concerned with the apostasy in doctrine, worship and discipline that had occurred incrementally from the 1970s onwards. In fact, they give the impression of thinking that some of this apostasy is OK if in safe evangelical hands.

For them, to be Anglican is to use the structure/shape of a Liturgy supplied by modern liturgists and to insert into it their own choices, which are in fact the generalities of generic evangelical/charismatic Protestantism. If they can keep the homosexual agenda and lobby at bay, then they are happy. They have no plans or intentions to recover the classic Anglican Way for they enjoy too much what they have now. It is difficult to find the Anglican Mind in their midst!

Thus both the Continuers and the Stay-in-ers major on the extras to the Anglican Way and each group in its own way has lost much if not most of the Anglican Mind by this commitment to extras. Will either side recover it? At a deeper level is there any chance at all of recovering a unified, comprehensive Anglican Way, based on the historic Formularies and received Traditions, in the USA in this generation?

In your charity, do visit www.anglicanmarketplace.com in order to obtain CDs, books and booklets to extend this discussion starter. And do also visit www.episcopalian.org/pbs1928 to read more. Thank you.

October 13, 2005

The Rev'd Dr. Peter Toon MA., D.Phil (Oxford)

An Outline of the Faith (1979) compared with The Articles of Religion (1801): Part 5

5. The Holy Scriptures

One powerful cause of the creation of new liturgies from the 1960s onwards was the presence of new versions or translations of the Bible, The New English Bible and the New International Version, for example. As the decades have gone by, the number of versions has much increased and with this increase there is a greater commitment to the principle of dynamic equivalency in translation. This in turn has allowed for the entry into the translated texts that which are truly modern ideas and principles – e.g. of feminism. Nevertheless, whatever the version, the Bible is still read within the Liturgy, be the church progressive liberal or traditional conservative in its estimate of the Bible.

So it is wholly to be expected that in the Outline there is a section on “The Holy Scriptures.” We are told what are the Holy Scriptures (the books of the Old and New Testaments); what is the Old Testament (books written by the people of the Old Covenant as they were inspired by God); and what is the New Testament (books written by people of the New Covenant as they were inspired by God), In answer to the question why we call the Scriptures the “Word of God” it is stated: “ We call them the Word of God because God inspired their human authors and because God still speaks to us through the Bible.”

So it is taught that all the books of the Bible are inspired in the sense that their authors/editors were “inspired by the Holy Spirit.” And that they are the Word of God now because of this inspiration and because we find in experience that God still speaks to us through them.

It is not clear as to the extent of the inspiration. Was it of such a kind that what they wrote is truly and really God’s Word written? Or was it minimal and basic, guaranteeing at least that what they wrote is a generally true account of the religious experience and doctrine of people in the Old and New Covenants?

It is not clear also how God speaks to us through the Bible today. Are sentences therein taken as real statements by God to us today? Or is the way God speaks more indirect, a kind of conviction that arises after reflecting upon a passage or book?

And it is not clear what kind of authority the Bible has in the Church in terms of defining the Faith and establishing Morality, for example. We are told that “we understand the meaning of the Bible by the help of the Holy Spirit, who guides the Church in the true interpretation of the Scriptures.” Does this mean that the local Church (the ECUSA?) meeting in a national synod or General Convention can decide what is the true interpretation of Scripture in terms of Faith and Morals? Or does the local Church have to wait for the “mind” of the universal Church?

Turning to the Articles we enter a very different atmosphere and approach with regard to Holy Scripture. Article VI is given the title: “Of the Sufficiency of the Holy Scriptures for Salvation.” It is asserted that the Bible contains all things necessary for salvation; so that whatsoever is not read therein, nor may be proved thereby, is to be required of any man as an article of faith or be thought necessary for salvation. So, as Article XX makes very clear, the Church itself, with all its clergy and members, is clearly and necessarily under the authority of the Scriptures and may not impose anything that is contrary to the Word of God written. And even though the Church is in the divine providence “a witness and keeper” of Holy Scripture, it ought not to decree or require anything contrary to the clear teaching of the same.

In terms of interpretation, one part of Scripture is not to be explained and expounded so that it is contrary to another, for there is a basic harmony to the mind and will of God. And in interpretation, there is the basic dogma of the Church in terms of the Trinity and the Person of Christ, which is used as a kind of paradigm and means of understanding the content of the revelation in the Bible (see Articles I-V).

In summary, it may be said that the passionate concern of the Articles is to claim that the Scriptures are above the Church in authority for they are God’s Word, that the Scriptures are clear in their central message of salvation by faith in Jesus Christ, and that the Church, which is to preserve the Bible intact through space and time, is not to require anything that is clearly contrary to the Scriptures. In contrast, the Outline does not mention the matter of salvation and seems to suggest that the Church is actually above the Scriptures in her ability to state what they mean.

October 11, 2005

An Outline of the Faith (1979) compared with The Articles of Religion (1801): Part 4

4. What is a divine covenant?

If you ask those who favor the progressive liberal innovations of the Episcopal Church during the latter part of the twentieth century, what they regard as the most important part of the 1979 Prayer Book, at least some, perhaps many, will say, “the Baptismal Covenant.” When witnesses appeared before the Liturgical Commission at General Convention a few years ago asking for official permission for parishes to use services from the 1928 Book of Common Prayer, they perceived that the only service that could not ever be used from the 1928 BCP was the Baptismal Service! Why? Because the “Baptismal Covenant” of the 1979 Service is central to the practical theology of the modern Episcopal Church. It presents God and human beings on near equal terms and it commits them all to working for peace and justice.

Therefore, it is most interesting to note that in the Outline two sections are devoted to the theme of covenant, the third and seventh. The definition of covenant is as follows: “A covenant is a relationship initiated by God, to which a body of people responds in faith.”

Here we find the use of two words that do not normally appear in good translations of the Bible – “relationship” and “initiate”. Though an old English word, “relationship” only came into popular use from the 1960s especially to refer to sexual liaisons as well as short-term or temporary comings together of persons or groups of persons. Regrettably, due to changes in culture and morality, the word now is used both of marriage itself and of that personal, eternal union with God created by regeneration by the Spirit of God. The use of relationship encourages the suggestion that what God wishes to put in place with people is possibly only of temporary duration or belongs only to this world of space and time. (It contrasts with the word “relation” which points to a permanent and lasting union.)

The word “initiate” (much used these days as a noun of the sacrament of baptism!) suggests that God takes the lead, that it is his idea and it is what he wishes. However, when the Bible itself speaks of God and his covenant, strong verbs are used, verbs which suggest that God acted decisively to set in place his covenant (e.g., establish, make, create). In other words, the biblical covenant of grace from God is very much one-sided in that God wills it, creates it, and then he invites and causes people to enter into it, which is always and only on his conditions. The covenant is agreed and established (e.g., between The Father and the Son Incarnate) before any baptized believer actually enters into it. And he who enters can do so only in the way God has appointed. There is no contract as it were between a major partner and a junior one. The covenant of grace in its Old or New Testament form is a totally one-sided covenant. And it must be so, if it is to be for the full redemption of those who are called into it.

In the Outline the divine covenants are presented as if they are special contracts and thus, for example, the human side of the New Covenant is said to be “to believe in Christ and keep his commandments.” Yet, while it is true that God commands his people to do exactly this, these duties are not presented in the New Testament as conditions of a contract and they are certainly not the means of earning the gift of God which is eternal life.

Turning now to the Articles, we find a very different approach to man’s relation to God and God’s relation to man. Salvation from God, in terms of the justification of sinners, is presented with great clarity and power in XI to XVI. The eleventh begins: “We are accounted righteous before God only for the merit of our Lord and Saviour Jesus Christ by Faith and not for our own works and deservings.” Good works are presented as the fruits of Faith; but, they cannot in any way at all put away our sins or turn away God’s judgment from us for our sins. Nevertheless, good works that flow from Faith are pleasing and acceptable to God.

The Articles say nothing specifically as such about “covenants” although they presuppose the existence of the covenant of grace made with Abraham and the people of Israel, of the Mosaic administration of this covenant, and then of the new covenant brought into existence by Christ’s bloody sacrifice. However, and most importantly, in XVII “Of Predestination and Election” the background to the covenant of grace and redemption is made very clear. And that background is nothing less than the everlasting purposes of God and his decrees. (Of these matters the Outline has nothing to say.)

To summarize. For the Outline, God and humankind are partners, with God taking the initiative, but ready to allow human beings to have their say. For the Articles, the Persons of the Trinity are “Partners” in establishing the covenant of grace and into this human beings are graciously and generously called! And this distinction portrays an important theological difference between Rite II and the Services of the classic BCP.

October 11, 2005

An Outline of the Faith (1979) compared with The Articles of Religion (1801): Part 3

3. Who is Jesus?

Do the Outline and Articles have the same estimate, doctrine and evaluation of Jesus? Or are there differences? Obviously if the claim is that Jesus is really the Saviour of the whole world then who he really is counts, and counts tremendously.

In section six of the Outline, “Jesus is the only Son of God” in the sense that he “is the only perfect image of the Father and shows us the nature of God,” and that nature is love. “By God’s own act, his divine Son received our human nature from the Virgin Mary, his mother”. And “the divine Son became human, so that in him human beings might be adopted as children of God, and be made heirs of God’s kingdom.” By his obedience to God, Jesus “made the offering which we could not make; in him we are freed from the power of sin and reconciled to God.” And “by his resurrection, Jesus overcame death and opened for us the way of eternal life.”

In contrast, Article II (following Article I on the Holy Trinity) describes Jesus as he is presented in the decrees of the ecumenical councils of the Church. He is the Second Person of the Holy Trinity and as such, as the Incarnate Son & Logos (Word), he is One Person with two natures. That is, he possesses the identical, same deity as does the Father and also he possesses the same human nature as his earthly mother, the Virgin Mary. And as this One Person, this Christ who is very God and very Man, he truly suffered, was dead, was buried” in order to reconcile his Father to us, and to be a sacrifice not only for original guilt but also for the actual sins of men.” He then rose from the dead and in his body he ascended into heaven.

Whilst the Articles clearly commit the Church to the dogma of the Trinity set forth by the Ecumenical Councils of Nicea, Constantinople and Chalcedon (see Article I & V), it is not clear at all what doctrine of the Trinity the Outline assumes or commends. There is no section on God as Trinity but the last question in section eight on the Creeds asks, “What is the Trinity.” The answer is based upon the innovatory, opening Acclamation of the Eucharist and other Rite Two services. It reads: “The Trinity is one God: Father, Son and Holy Spirit.” Now this statement because of its form and its content can be read in a variety of ways, virtually all of which produce a doctrine that is different from the Catholic dogma of Articles I & II & V.

It may be read as stating that God as Trinity means that the One Person of God makes himself known in three essential Ways or Modes of Being – as Father, as Son and as Holy Spirit. This is Modalism or Sabellianism or Unitarianism. It may also be read as stating that God is a Threesome, in the sense that he is the unity of Three beings of equal or similar nature. This is Tritheism. Or it may be read – but this requires a great act of imagination and charity – as a careless summary of the patristic doctrine. This is: God is a Trinity in Unity and a Unity in Trinity, and that the Three Persons of the Trinity are one God, in that they all share and possess the one identical Godhead and are thus of identical substance/essence/being as and with each other.

Nowhere in the Outline is Jesus as Son of God said to be homoousios with the Father and the Holy Spirit, that is of the one, same identical divine nature. Further, although in section nine on the Holy Spirit, the Spirit is called “the Third Person of the Trinity”, this is immediately defined as “God at work in the world and in the Church”, whereas the primary reference in Trinitarian discourse is normally to his position within the Trinity, as proceeding from the Father through the Son (see Article V).

If the Nicene Creed is removed from the Rite II texts, then it may be reasonably claimed that they do not possess, clearly teach or affirm week by week the biblical and catholic doctrines of the Trinity and the Person of Jesus Christ. Regrettably the translation of this Creed within the same Rite II texts is faulty at various points (e.g. in stating that Jesus was conceived “by the power of the Holy Spirit” when the original is that he was conceived by the Holy Spirit, the Third Person himself!) and so the orthodoxy of the Rite II texts is further in question with the use of this Creed. Only on Trinity Sunday with the special Preface and Collect is there any real sense of the presence of Catholic dogma and teaching.

In contrast, the Catholic doctrine of the Trinity permeates the text of the Book of Common Prayer (1662/1928) and the Ordinal.

October 11, 2005

An Outline of the Faith (1979) compared with The Articles of Religion (1801): Part 2

2. Human being as a sinner

If both the Articles and Outline are correct in their estimate of human nature then human beings have improved dramatically in terms of their moral and spiritual being in the last two centuries!

The Outline begins with a heading, “Human Nature’”, which contains a description of human beings as part of God’s creation and made in his image (which is defined as being free to make choices and live in harmony with both creation and God). Then it explains that human beings have not used their freedom aright for they have made wrong choices and thereby rebelled against God.

So who can help them? God can! And his first way of helping the human race was by his revealing of himself in nature and history, particularly Israel’s history. In this history (dealt with in section 2, “God the Father”) God revealed himself as “the Father almighty creator of heaven and earth.” The universe is good and is “the work of a single loving God who creates, sustains and directs it.” Further, within the created order all people are worthy of respect and honor and all as made in God’s image can respond to the love of God.

What about sin? It is presented as the wrong use of freedom and of making bad choices. There is no permanent “bondage of the will” here to sin and thus “all can respond to the love of God” anywhere at any time. In fact, in the fifth section, ‘Sin and Redemption,” sin is defined as “the seeking of our own will instead of the will of God, thus distorting our relationship with God, with other people and with all creation.” Further, it is claimed that “sin has power over us because we lose out liberty when our relationship with God is distorted

In the Outline, the type of doctrine found in the Rite 2 Services of the 1979 book is summarized. It is a theology which rightly emphasizes that God is the Creator of the universe and what he made was good. At the same time it is a theology which fails to identify clearly the biblical basis of the revealed name of “the Father” (which is not, as suggested in section 2, because he is Creator of all persons, but rather because he is the Father of the only-begotten Son, the eternal Word). Then, it presents a doctrine of human sinfulness which omits any reference to sin as a permanent disease or bias of the soul. That is there is actual sin but not “original sin.”


If we turn to the Articles then we find that they begin not with human nature but with the primary Christian doctrine, God the Holy Trinity, the One God who is the Father, the Son and the Holy Ghost, the Creator of the visible and invisible worlds. Then they speak of the Incarnation of the Son, so that he becomes One Person, with a divine and a human nature, and as such he lives, dies as a sacrifice for sin and is raised from the dead.

We may regret that the Articles do not provide any statements of man made in the image of God. In the sixteenth century this doctrine was assumed by Catholics and Protestants as a given, as was also the doctrine that this image is now deface and corrupted in all of us. But the Articles do deal fully with human sin which they describe in that tradition of biblical theology that is usually called Augustinian. And here the difference between the 1979 doctrine and the Reformed Catholic is great. Article IX is entitled “Of Original or Birth-Sin” and Article X “Of Free Will.” Here each of us is declared to have from birth a human nature that is not perfect for it already is spiritually deformed and has a bias towards evil. This human nature will only be fully sanctified and redeemed with the resurrection of the body at the last Day. In this life God provides regeneration, new birth by the Holy Spirit from above, which introduces into the soul a new principle, a new nature, which by grace mortifies the old nature and enables the born-again believer to live in the freedom of Christ. Without the divine act of regeneration, each person remains in bondage to sin for the human will is not free to choose to do that true good which is acceptable to God, the Holy One.

In the Articles, the doctrine of the sinfulness of man is stated in order to present the doctrine of God’s salvation provided through the saving work of Jesus Christ as the Mediator (see especially Articles XI to XV on the doctrine of Justification by Faith through Grace). At the center of the Book of Common Prayer (1662/1928) service of Holy Communion is the presentation of Salvation from the Father through the Son by the Holy Spirit, in which salvation man is justified by faith and is sent forth to produce good works in faithfulness to the glory of God. In contrast, the Rite II services lack the depth and clarity of the Reformed Catholic presentation of justification by faith.

October 11, 2005

An Outline of the Faith (1979) compared with The Articles of Religion (1801): Part 1

1. Origins of each

Each major Church or denomination normally has a Confession of Faith wherein what it officially believes, teaches and confesses is presented. Of these the most used in recent times is The Catechism of the Catholic Church, which is a major book in terms of its size. Further, it can only be describes as being traditional in its teaching and attractive in its format.

The Catechism printed in the ECUSA Prayer Book of 1979 (pp.844ff.) and known as “An Outline of the Faith” was created in an exceptionally novel way. The committee given the task of producing it were told to follow the principle of “the rule of praying is the rule of believing” [ lex orandi lex credendi], which was then a popular slogan, and to examine carefully the Texts in the 1979 Prayer Book, which address God as “You” and are usually called “the Rite Two” texts, in order to find in them what is the Faith of the Episcopal Church. Texts taken over with editing from the 1928 edition of the Book of Common Prayer and placed in the 1979 Book, and which address God as “Thou,” were not to be used.

The ECUSA wished to have a truly modern confession of Faith based on the creative work of their liturgists. Earlier it had rejected the draft of a Catechism on traditional Anglican lines produced by an official committee, chaired by Bishop Stanley Atkins of Eau Claire.

Thus “An Outline of the Faith” is unique as an Anglican Confession of Faith for it is not that Faith which is believed, taught and confessed on the basis of the content of the Bible and the interpretation of the Bible in the Church. Rather, it is based on the presumption that modern American liturgists, who create new forms of liturgy in a hurry and in the atmosphere of the 1960s, place within these Services the truth of the Christian Faith (even when it is different from the official teaching of the past in both the American Episcopal Church and the Anglican Communion). This approach to creating a Confession of Faith presupposes a strong doctrine of authority of the General Convention and autonomy by the ECUSA in approving first the Liturgy and then the Confession, and a weak doctrine of relations with the other Provinces of the Anglican Family of Churches and with Anglican and Catholic tradition.

In the various editions (e.g., 1662, 1928) of the classic Book of Common Prayer [BCP], there is printed along with the BCP itself, the Ordinal (Ordination Services) and the Articles of Religion. These Three have always been the Formularies and Standards of the Anglican Way. Also within the BCP itself there is a short Catechism, based on the Creed, the Lord’s Prayer and the Ten Commandments, and associated with Confirmation.

The Articles of Religion were first officially approved in 1571 in the Church of England, after the BCP had been in use for twenty years or so. However, they were first written at the time when the BCP itself was also being created. They were certainly not based on the principle of “the law of praying is the law of believing” but on that of confessing and stating what the Christian Faith, based on the Bible, is all about, and how a National Church is to confess that Faith.

When the Articles were adopted by the Protestant Episcopal Church [PECUSA] in 1801 they were edited so that their content was not related to a monarchy but to a new republic. However, their teaching on the content of the Faith and what is essential and what is secondary in a National Church or Province remained fully in place. These Articles remained as the Confession of Faith of the PECUSA and then ECUSA until 1979 when they were relegated to the status of a historical document without any doctrinal authority at all.

Since the longish 1979 Catechism is deliberately unlike the short original Catechism of the BCP, and since it effectively serves the same place now as the Articles of Religion once did in terms of being a Formulary of the Episcopal Church, our contrast will be -- in subsequent short essays -- between the 1979 Catechism and the 1571 (England) and 1801 (USA) Articles. We shall discover that they present two very different accounts of the Christian Religion and Christian Church. (And we need to hold in mind that the ECUSA has actually continued its progressive journey since 1979 and that its next “Outline” due by 2010 will probably be much more radical than that of 1979!) A final comment -- If we were to contrast the longish 1979 Catechism with the shortish & 1928BCP Catechism we would come to the same results, but with less detail of major points.

The Revd Dr Peter Toon October 10, 2005