More about Anglicanism

I'm carrying a comment from my friend, Jon, a Presbyterian, over to a new post...

"I thought the mention of Luther, Calvin, and Aquinas was insightful. It may be that Anglicanism, lacking a theological "founder," has more flexibility about doctrine and belief. I doubt there's a default theologian that all Anglicans read."


Thanks, Jon. Right: we don't quite have a default theologian, although Richard Hooker comes close. People often define Anglican theology by a "three-legged stool" metaphor -- one leg is scripture, one leg is tradition, one leg is reason -- that gets attributed to him (it's a metaphor that can be drawn from his writings, but not directly) but few have actually read him! I've read a couple essays.

You could say our default theologian is simply the Book of Common Prayer. Everyone reads that. And we tend to say often: "As we pray, so we believe," or "Praying Shapes Believing," as one of our prominent liturgical theologians, Leonel Mitchell, called one of his books.

"I do think it's not quite fair to claim all English authors as Anglican. Julian, for instance, is before the split."

Well, Julian was an English Catholic -- and, I would argue, more English than Roman. And Anglicans (Western ones, anyway) celebrate her all over the place. She has 2-3 canticles in one of our most-used liturgical supplements. We have a co-ed monastery called the "Order of St. Julian" up in Wisconsin. She's barely mentioned by RCs, perhaps because of her feminine imagery of Christ and her sensual mystical language. So, I'm going to continue to claim her as Anglican, or at least as one of the mothers of Anglicanism.

Here's one of those canticles, where God AND Jesus are seen as female:

A Song of True Motherhood

Julian of Norwich

God chose to be our mother in all things *

and so made the foundation of his work,

most humbly and most pure, in the Virgin’s womb.

God, the perfect wisdom of all, *

arrayed himself in this humble place.

Christ came in our poor flesh *

to share a mother’s care.

Our mothers bear us for pain and for death; *

our true mother, Jesus, bears us for joy and endless life.

Christ carried us within him in love and travail, *

until the full time of his passion.

And when all was completed and he had carried us so for joy, *

still all this could not satisfy the power of his wonderful love.

All that we owe is redeemed in truly loving God, *

for the love of Christ works in us;

Christ is the one whom we love.

"And in the 19th c. at least, as many people were attending nonconformist chapels on Sunday as were at Episcopal churches. I'm not sure how things stand today. ... I wonder what the Catholic/ Anglican / Mainline / Evangelical split is."

That's certainly true. The United Kingdom has never been monolithically Anglican. The Church of Scotland is Presbyterian, of course, and Catholicism and Methodism (I think) -- and now, Islam and evangelical Christian expressions -- are strong communities of faith in England. There has been a strong Jewish community in England, too. I don't know the exact demographics, but I do know that England is one of those Western European countries where worship attendance is way down.

And yet, Anglicanism is the national church. I met a priest from Manchester at my conference in Vancouver who said they're always having people show up to be married, have kids baptized, or bury their loved one at "our church." Whether you attend or not, the local church belongs to you. There is no membership, really. The parish belongs to the people of its community. I really like that.

"Was Blair's conversion a big deal?"

I don't know much about how this went over in England. It wasn't much talked about over here, at least in the circles I run in.

"How tight do you think the Episcopal connection is to England?"


The Episcopal connection to England is strong in terms of nostalgia, I'd say. Not much else. Many of us are Anglophiles. Parishes like to plan choir tours or sightseeing trips. We use old Anglican terms like vicar, nave, close, canon, lady chapel, vestry. And we pepper our liturgical calendar, still, with old English religious days like "Ember Days" (these come three at a time, four times a year, and are days for people in the ordination process); Rogation Day (the sixth Sunday of Easter, when the English used to process around their parish, blessing the earth and farms); Whitsunday (Pentecost). We use English-style vestments and choir robes. But we don't really pay attention to how the Church of England does things anymore. I mean, the Queen and Parliament pick their bishops! (See comments for a correction on this.) We just like "the pretties," I'd say.

The Lambeth Conference is somewhere in between. Lambeth is a gathering of Anglican bishops from all the provinces all over the world at Lambeth Palace, the home of the Archbishop of Canterbury or the "ABC" (cute, huh?). Anyway, it's not a legislative session, because the ABC has no real power over us. He's kind of like the Queen -- a symbol that we sometimes love and sometimes get very annoyed with. So, Lambeth is sort of like a retreat, a meeting, or "tea at the Palace" for two weeks in July, every 10 years or so. It's a powerful symbol. Gene Robinson, the only openly gay bishop in the Episcopal Church is not invited. Many other bishops are refusing to come because other Episcopal bishops are coming, and they believe we should be punished for allowing Robinson to be consecrated.

a blur of purple...

So, it's just "tea at Lambeth Palace" and yet, it means a lot to many folks, especially clergy, who are a little more interested in the national and international church, as a rule. So, sometimes, England is very important.