Ecclesiastico-Nationalist Narcissism

Themes: On Church

Anglican Mainstream » Blog Archive » What’s up Down Under?

The Anglican Church Synod here in Sydney recently passed a resolution stating that it could see no Biblical or legal impediment to Deacons or lay people celebrating the Lord’s Supper in Anglican Churches. If you’re not an Anglican you might well be thinking, ‘Big Deal’.
And I’d agree. Anglicans are weird aren’t they?
Sydney Anglicans are the weirdest of all. They love being Anglican, but have a wonderfully idiosyncratic understanding of what that means. Honestly, I wish that Sydney Anglicanism wasn’t idiosyncratic – I wish that all Anglicans were like Sydney Anglicans. I think they are a little picture of what Anglicanism could have been if the English Church had managed to complete its Reformation.
This article is a really interesting orientation to the ‘Lay Presidency’ debate from the perspective of an American Episcopalian (the name for Anglicans when they are behind enemy lines). It’s a nice little reading of the history of Australia and of Australian Anglicanism.
I love finding out other people think about my country and my church. I like to call it, ‘Ecclesiastico-Nationalist Narcissism’.
[ooo-yeah!]

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I Love Anglicanism (a bit)!

Themes: On Church

I’m not always very positive about living in Sydney or about the Anglican Church but in a surprising turn of events I found myself feeling a tiny bit rosy about them both this evening.

It was probably the Mongolian Lamb served on a sizzling hotplate from the Sussex St Food Court that did it. I really love Asian food. I love China town.
Who knew what truly bizarre things you could put into pastries…
Curried Prawn Danish anyone?

This past week I’ve been hanging out in the Public Gallery of the Anglican Synod most afternoons. It’s the only chance I’ve had to see my wife (she’s working there). To actually talk to her I would need to move a motion (no, that’s not really true, my love).
Although, when I come to think of it there is no shortage of helpful Motions – even full blown Gestures – I could come up with for a chamber of Anglicans…

The strange thing is that I am never more attracted to Anglicanism than when I traipse along to Synod. (Before you bother typing it into Google: a) No, it is not symptomatic of serious mental disturbance; b) Yes, I checked).
Synod is tough and sometimes boring, but they do a good job of making sure there are glimpses of the beautiful, powerful gospel ministry that is going on in, and through, faithful people in Churches.
But more than that, what I find stirring as a born-and-bred congregationalist, is a sense of genuine commitment that extends beyond the local Christian assembly. I love watching Anglicans wrestling with each other over theology or practical ministry or parish administration (or just wrestling… mud, jelly, whatever).
I love the debates. Not because I have an unhealthy interest in conflict but because it is a demonstration of involvement in each others’ lives.
It means giving up freedom, having to labor over and over an idea, being rejected or shouted down.
But it means thoughts are tested, support is offered, and ideally, relationships are prioritized over concepts.
The Anglican Church has never been more than an imperfectly reformed Church, and I’m proud of the men and women who left it in the past, at great personal cost, for the sake of their consciences and the gospel. Anglophone evangelicalism owes so much of its strength and character to them (as does so much of what is valuable in the Western liberal tradition).
But there is a sacrifice involved in staying, in committing yourself to others, to bearing each others burdens – this is a difficult beauty of Anglicanism.
Richard Chin, the National Director of AFES, is fond of saying that fellowship is a self-sacrificing conformity to a shared vision -  that’s why fellowship is such a distinctly Christian concept.
We don’t go in for conformity much these days, or self-sacrifice, and so our Christian fellowship can be impoverished. 
Maybe a little old-timey Anglicanism wouldn’t hurt.

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Ma Siss's Place

Themes: On Church

From a Dorchester chop shop, a place to pray – The Boston Globe

This series of articles by Michael Paulson won a host of awards this year in the US, including the Templeton award for Religion Reporting.
“The series, called “Ma Siss’s Place,” was judged a “memorable example of narrative journalism. As with the best journalism, the reader develops a nuanced appreciation for the gritty lives and struggles with faith endured by the congregants.” (from the RNA website)

File under ‘lessons for Church Planters’.

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Breaking up

Themes: On Church

Diocese found breaking up hard to do, but still a relief

- an interesting insight into what would be involved in breaking up the Anglican Communion.

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To put up and shut up?

Themes: On Church

Some friends and I recently worked through Natural Theology, a book that binds together two essays, one by Emil Brunner, and the other by Karl Barth, on the topic of God’s revelation in Scripture and the world.
Barth really wades into Brunner in the second essay and it got us into a discussion about theological polemic and when and how it is appropriate to disagree in theology.
We live in a time and culture when we often feel that our identity and value is secured through distinguishing ourselves from those around us. In light of this, there is significant temptation to mistake matters on which to disagree for matters over which to break fellowship, and to mask the unnecessary breaking of fellowship with a cloak of conscience. Indeed, some have claimed that Martin Luther’s magnificent statement of conscience, ‘Here I stand, I can do no other’, is the birth-cry of modern Western individualism.
It’s important to be aware of the push to define ourselves by what we are against, but undiscriminating unity is no fit alternative. In fact, the push for unity can be just as prone to hijack by the temptation to find security for ourselves in combining strength with others. It is too often motivated by a weak view of the work of the Holy Spirit in incorporating us into the true Church of Jesus.

Perhaps the problem is how we carry on this discussion: in cafes or armchairs, as a non-Conformist in an Anglican college, as people who would not be unduly troubled by changing denomination or having no denomination, and without fear of sanction for our views.
I’m not saying that we should always just put up or shut up, but perhaps the real test for whether a matter of Church practice or teaching is worth fighting or leaving over, is when fighting or leaving is going to cost. Maybe cost it all. And you do the sums, and it still seems worth it.

Hold fast your integrity, and rather let all go than let that go. A man had better let liberty, estate, relations, and life go, than let his integrity go. Yea, let ordinances themselves go, when they cannot be held with the hand of integrity: ‘God forbid that I should justify you till I die I will not remove my integrity from me. My righteousness I hold fast, and I will not let it go: my heart shall not reproach me so long as I live’ (Job 27:5-6). Look, as the drowning man holds fast that which is cast forth to save him, as the soldier holds fast his sword and buckler on which his life depends, so, says Job, ‘I will hold fast my integrity; my heart shall not reproach me. I had rather all the world should reproach me, and my heart justify me, than that my heart should reproach me, and all the world justify me.’ That man will make a sad exchange that shall exchange his integrity for any worldly concern. Integrity maintained in the soul will be a feast of fat things in the worst of days; but let a man lose his integrity, and it is not in the power of all the world to make a feast of fat things in that soul. (Thomas Brooks, ‘A Pastor’s Legacies’, in Sermons from the Great Ejection, Banner of Truth).

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