Presentation to the APA Provincial Synod

Saints and the Liturgy

The honour and veneration of the Saints as our elder brothers and sisters in the communion which is the Family of God and the Temple of the Holy Ghost are a key and indispensable element in proper orthodox Christian worship. By honouring the Saints in liturgical prayer and devotional life, we emulate their examples, embody and recapitulate their virtues, and attempt to reproduce their lives of holiness in our own experience. No Christian communion which ignores or purposely evades the veneration due to the Saints can hope to inculcate the spirit of Christian virtue and the intensification of grace which Our Lord expects of His chosen race, His holy priesthood and royal nation. The liturgy is in fact a participation in the Communion of Saints, as the Book of Common Prayer so explicitly declares: 'therefore with angels and archangels and with all the company of heaven, we laud and magnify thy glorious name...' The Church is totus Christus, the whole Christ, both Head and Body, and in her the Saints participate with us in the one perfect and eternal Liturgy of the Lamb of God slain from the foundation of the world. All the saints and angels gather round the heavenly Throne and the heavenly Altar and worship God and the Lamb - the mystery of the worship of heaven, the action of the eternal heavenly liturgy, is made present and activated on earth in the Eucharist. We do on earth in the Mass what the saints and angels do forever in heaven.

Thus the Fathers of the Church describe the Mass as 'heaven on earth' and the Church as an 'earthly heaven.' The veil between heaven and earth is pulled back in the celebration of the Eucharist and we are caused by grace, united in the Risen and Ascended Lord, to be joined at the Altar with our own great-great grandfathers and great-great grandchildren in the mystical communion of Christ's Body, the Church triumphant, expectant and militant. All Christians living and dead are presented to the Father anew through Christ the High Priest in every Mass. Our Lord's eternal priesthood prevails once more under sensible signs on earth for all who have ever lived, past, present and future. All generations of God's people from the beginning of the human race to its consummation at the end of time are mystically and supernaturally present at the Altar, united to Christ, who pleads and exhibits the One Sacrifice for our sake.

Our veneration of the Communion of Saints, our hymns, prayers and devotions in honour of God's Friends above, reminds us of our own eschatological destiny in Christ and the victory we already share with the Saints in the crucified and risen Jesus, the Lord of all creation. 'Until His coming again:' the Mass is essentially an eschatological event in which we pass through death and judgement and enter once again, in time and space but beyond them, into the glory of the Risen Christ to live and reign with Him and to worship the Holy Trinity in Him, through Him and by Him. We don't need to believe in the 'Rapture,' because every Eucharist is a literal coming again, a true Advent of the Saviour to us here and now. The Second Coming occurs over and over again in the Mystery of the Altar. In the Eucharist we ascend with Christ, that where He is we might also ascend and reign with Him in glory. In the Mass 'our life is hid with Christ in God' and we are made continually to dwell in the heavens with Him. We never pray alone; we are not saved alone, but only as members of Christ. The liturgy of the Eucharist should express most profoundly our communion with the Church in heaven, in paradise, and on earth, with all who share the mystery of salvation with us. We are only brought to redemption and eternal life through the Church, whose most worthy members are those who have gone before us marked with the sign of faith and who now rest in the sleep of peace. In essence, the Eucharist is the Life of the Holy Trinity, as we go to the Father, through the Son, in the Holy Ghost, united to all those in this life and the life of the world to come who are, like us, made partakers of the divine nature. The Saints pray with us and for us in the liturgy of the Church. These ideas should certainly reinforce for us the need to recognise that the Communion of Saints links us not only in a vertical direction to the Church of eternity, but also horizontally to the other great Apostolic Catholic Churches of East and West.

75% of the world Christians directly invoke the prayers of the Saints in public worship. If we really are Catholics and we really believe in the catholicity of the Church and the Communion of Saints, then Anglicans will seek to convey in a liturgical manner our belief in the intercessory prayer and honour of those who have been glorified with Christ in His divinised life, as a foretaste of our own future glory. One essential characteristic and proof of Anglicanism's Catholicism should be its explicit reference to the Saints in the liturgy. A Church that does not reverence the Saints as exemplars of the Christian life and heavenly intercessors and relatives cannot be said to be Catholic. Anglicanism has historically held the Saints in the highest esteem, and has offered her liturgy in honour of their holy memory - and that hallmark of our patristic Catholicism, a biblical, sombre, restrained and dignified treatment of the Saints, has been an irreplaceable treasure shared in common with both Rome and Eastern Orthodoxy. We just need to bring that aspect of our history into more prominence over time... and the way forward is teaching, gradual implementation and then... full expression of the communion sanctorum.

Rome

What about Rome?

The Roman Church is the Patriarchate of Western Christendom; she holds the primary Apostolic See in the West and has served as the central primacy and focus of catholic unity throughout most of Christian history. She is the largest Apostolic body on earth and the most influential Christian communion in the world. The Bishop of Rome is historically the First Bishop of the Church, the Primate and chief representative of the Church Catholic. These are all positive and endearing characteristics, from which neither Orthodoxy nor Anglicanism has ever formally dissented: the Roman Church deserves our honour and respect, and all due devotion and obedience as guardedly allowed and mandated by the Undivided Church of the First Millennium. We accord to the Bishop of Rome that which the First Millennium Church accorded his office. Saint Ignatius of Antioch, Saint Irenaeus of Lyons and Saint Cyprian of Carthage proclaim that the Bishop of Rome 'presides in love and honour.' Anglicans honour the Roman See as primus inter pares, first amongst equals in the undivided and consentient Catholic episcopate. But there are serious problems with the Roman Communion, impediments and barriers which forestall the possibility of Anglicans entering into the Papal Fold. We believe Rome fails the strict litmus test of universality, antiquity and consent, the Canon of Saint Vincent of Lerins, in several key areas of Christian doctrine and practice.

The Anglican Tradition, believing as it does in the 'branch fact,' that the Catholic Church on earth is divided by human history and sin into separate jurisdictions which may or may not be in full communion with each other, and often are separated sacramentally from one another, although all the branches are fully and truly parts of the One Catholic Church because they are sacramentally, dogmatically and eschatologically one with Our Lord and the Communion of Saints, does not believe, as Rome does, that the totality and completeness of the whole Catholic Church on earth is contained in and comprehended by the See of Rome. We cannot say, as Rome does, that the Papal Communion is coterminous and coextensive with the One Holy Catholic and Apostolic Church.

The Church Catholic is not identified with or synonymous with the Roman Communion in an exclusive sense, and yet this is precisely what Rome claims for herself. According to Rome, those Churches in communion with the Pope are the Church, and uniquely the Church qua Church. We find that proposition an inadmissible and flatly anti-historical claim. The Papal Church also professes that the Bishop of Rome is infallible ex cathedra, from St Peter's Chair, and exercises a ministry of infallible teaching in faith and morals apart from the consensus of the Catholic episcopate. Rome also contends that the Bishop of Rome possesses universal and immediate jurisdiction over every Church and Christian on earth, disregarding the ancient sees and dioceses which have historically constituted Catholic communion. We maintain that papal infallibility ex consensu ecclesiae and papal universal jurisdiction are contrary to Scripture and Apostolic Tradition. We assert that the Pope is not above Tradition and the Ecumenical Councils, and cannot legislate doctrine in opposition to received universal Tradition or the consensus patricum and consensus ecclesiae.

Rome also requires belief in the Marian dogmas as necessary to salvation, de fide tenanda, they must be held as belonging to the essence of the Catholic Religion: she holds that one must believe in the dogmas of the Immaculate Conception of Our Lady (1854) and the corporeal Assumption of Our Lady (1950) in order for one to be saved. Rome equates the value of these novel doctrines, defined in the last two centuries, with the dogmatic and Creedal dogmas of the Trinity, Incarnation and Resurrection. Again, we believe such a salvific necessity for the Marian dogmas is unwarranted by Scripture and Primitive Tradition. Rome also continues to require a belief in fire-purgatory, in which souls make expiation for the punishment due for sins committed in this life, a retributive and penal punishment for sin even after the absolution of sins through the sacraments of the Church. She adds 14 Councils to those which are held by universal Catholic Christianity to be genuinely Ecumenical and General. There is a plethora of other theological difficulties which I could add to this litany, but these examples are the most serious and suffice to demonstrate that Anglicans believe the Roman Church had added innovative and novel articles of necessary belief to the Catholic Faith of the Creeds and Seven Ecumenical Councils of the first thousand years of the Christian history. We love and esteem the venerable Church of Rome, but we believe as a matter of faith and conscience that we are more Catholic than she. Genuine Catholicism is primitive, biblical and patristic orthodoxy, ancient in faith, universal in scope, consented-to in authority.

Rome calls Anglicanism to a New Oxford Movement

http://chiesa.espresso.repubblica.it/articolo/206069?eng=y

In his speech to the 2008 Lambeth Conference, Cardinal Walter Kasper mentions several of the key points frequently reiterated on this blog, as he describes the Vatican's desire to see the Anglican Communion preserve theological and moral orthodoxy and unity, which in turn could have in times past promoted the possibility of Rome's eventual recognition of Anglican Orders. The Cardinal issues a final warning to the Anglican Communion not to depart from the Catholic Tradition to which it has previously been committed. Note Cardinal Kasper's careful description of the Anglican episcopate in terms that invoke apostolic succession, apostolic tradition, the universal episcopate and fidelity to the Undivided Church. It is no secret that Cardinal Kapser has heretofore held a high and positive view of Anglicanism's historic catholicity and of the succession and sacramentality of Anglican Orders and the Anglican episcopal succession.

Hopes for the Canterbury Anglican Communion have surely fallen now. But what could we make of the Cardinal's remarks if applied to the Continuing Church? Could or would Rome now apply its once-hopeful appraisal to the Churches that truly preserve the Anglican Tradition?

...In this text, we can hear Archbishop Coggan and Paul VI pointing to what is the common ground, the common source and centre of our already existing but still incomplete unity: Jesus Christ, and the mission to bring Him to a world that is so desperately in need of Him. What we are talking about is not an ideology, not a private opinion which one may or may not share; it is our faithfulness to Jesus Christ, witnessed by the apostles, and to His Gospel, with which we are entrusted. From the very beginning we should, therefore, keep in mind what is at stake as we proceed to speak about faithfulness to the apostolic tradition and apostolic succession, when we speak about the threefold ministry, women’s ordination, and moral commandments. What we are talking about is nothing other than our faithfulness to Christ Himself, who is our unique and common master. And what else can our dialogue be but an expression of our intent and desire to be fully one in Him in order to be fully joint witnesses to His Gospel. What we are talking about is nothing other than our faithfulness to Christ Himself, who is our unique and common master. And what else can our dialogue be but an expression of our intent and desire to be fully one in Him in order to be fully joint witnesses to His Gospel...

...As I stated when addressing the Church of England’s House of Bishops in 2006, for us this decision to ordain women implies a turning away from the common position of all churches of the first millennium, that is, not only the Catholic Church but also the Oriental Orthodox and the Orthodox churches. We would see the Anglican Communion as moving a considerable distance closer to the side of the Protestant churches of the 16th century, and to a position they adopted only during the second half of the 20th century...

...I have already addressed the ecclesiological problem when bishops do not recognize other’s episcopal ordination within the one and same church, now I must be clear about the new situation which has been created in our ecumenical relations. While our dialogue has led to significant agreement on the understanding of ministry, the ordination of women to the episcopate effectively and definitively blocks a possible recognition of Anglican Orders by the Catholic Church...

...In light of this analysis of episcopal ministry as set forward in ARCIC and the koinonia ecclesiology found in The Windsor Report, it has been particularly disheartening to have witnessed the increasing tensions within the Anglican Communion. In several contexts, bishops are not in communion with other bishops; in some instances, Anglican provinces are no longer in full communion with each other. While the Windsor process continues, and the ecclesiology set forth in the Windsor Report has been welcomed in principle by the majority of Anglican provinces, it is difficult from our perspective to see how that has translated into the desired internal strengthening of the Anglican Communion and its instruments of unity. It also seems to us that the Anglican commitment to being ‘episcopally led and synodically governed’ has not always functioned in such a way as to maintain the apostolicity of the faith, and that synodical government misunderstood as a kind of parliamentary process has at times blocked the sort of episcopal leadership envisaged by Cyprian and articulated in ARCIC....

...In that vein, I would like to return to the Archbishop’s puzzling question what kind of Anglicanism I want. It occurs to me that at critical moments in the history of the Church of England and subsequently of the Anglican Communion, you have been able to retrieve the strength of the Church of the Fathers when that tradition was in jeopardy. The Caroline divines are an instance of that, and above all, I think of the Oxford Movement. Perhaps in our own day it would be possible too, to think of a new Oxford Movement, a retrieval of riches which lay within your own household. This would be a re-reception, a fresh recourse to the Apostolic Tradition in a new situation. It would not mean a renouncing of your deep attentiveness to human challenges and struggles, your desire for human dignity and justice, your concern with the active role of all women and men in the Church. Rather, it would bring these concerns and the questions that arise from them more directly within the framework shaped by the Gospel and ancient common tradition in which our dialogue is grounded.We hope and pray that as you seek to walk as faithful disciples of Jesus Christ, the Father of all mercies may bestow upon you the abundant riches of His grace, and guide you with the Holy Spirit’s abiding presence.

Theology and Tradition

Dear N.,

I thoroughly agree with your thoughts on the necessity of presenting in the first order the biblical case for any Catholic doctrine, and I usually lay the foundation and groundwork of the biblical sources for explaining any doctrine of the Faith, especially when engaging in dialogue with protestants or even non-Christians. The particular article you have in your possession was actually written originally for an Anglican lady of many year's Church life who is already familiar with the biblical passages often cited in the Perpetual Virginity controversy. So for her, instead of repeating and reiterating material with which she was already very familiar, I moved directly to the hermeneutic of Scripture based on the Apostolic Tradition and the conciliar consensus of the Church's fathers, doctors and saints. You might say in this instance I made an exception to a general rule with which I heartily concur.

One of the difficulties we can and often do have when presenting the biblical data for a particular dogma or doctrine of the Catholic Faith is that Holy Scripture is easily prooftexted and subjected to eisegesis, the reading into the text of a pre-conceived hermeneutic or interpretative grid. Evangelicals and other protestant Christians utilise Scripture in this fashion continually and subconsciously, often without even realising that they are in fact imposing their own 'tradition' and ecclesial reading of Scripture onto the interpretation of the text. For this reason, when writing on a theological subject, I not only usually submit the biblical pericopes and passages in question, but I immediately move to a consideration and rehearsal of the Church's authoritative interpretation of the passages as contained in Holy Tradition. For Anglicans, of course, we never divorce the text of the Bible from the living, worshipping and theologising community of the Church, for the Bible is the 'Church's Book.' The Bible is written Tradition. The sixteenth century Anglican slogan is 'the Bible and the Primitive Church' or another way of saying it is: 'the Church to teach; the Bible to prove.'

It is indeed always necessary to prove doctrine from Scripture, for only that which is contained therein or proved thereby is to be held as necessary for salvation. And so for Anglicanism and its prima scriptura (although not sola scriptura) position, appeal to Holy Writ is of the greatest and highest importance. What I have found through the years is that appealing to Scripture alone, or at least without reference to the consentient and unanimous teaching of the Fathers, the Tradition, opens one's presentation to a refutation itself based on Scripture which can be very difficult indeed to overcome. We are blessed in that we have not only the Word of God written, but also the Holy Ghost-guided way by which we can know our interpretation of the Word of God is authentic.

Two examples, one ancient and one modern, come to mind. The Arian heretics of the fourth century used explicit biblical passages in a sola scriptura approach to deny Our Lord's divinity and they were very good at it. Saint Athanasius remarks that he is quite frustrated by the cleverness, deviousness and acumen with which they used Scripture to make and defend their case. Like modern protestants, the Arians claimed to be following only the teaching and rule of Scripture in making their theological claims: you might even say they were biblical fundamentalists who considered their position to be an extremely 'conservative' one - they thought theirs was the original Christian understanding of the nature and work of Our Lord. Sophistical and intelligent as they were, they used the very same Scriptures to designate Christ a creature that the Orthodox and Catholics used to proclaim the Deity of Christ and the Trinity. The modern example of some GAFCON/CCP neo-evangelical puritans in the Anglican Communion fits the same pattern. They are essentially sola scriptura and biblical fundamentalists who protest that they hold to Scripture as to the unique and only source of revelation and authority for the Christian Faith. Yet, many of them reject the salvific necessity of the sacraments and priesthood and justify the purported ordination of women, a Christological heresy akin to Arianism, by using Scripture. They call themselves 'conservatives' and assert they are only holding to what the Bible teaches. In both examples, undoubtedly convinced and devout Christians have fallen into error because they have equally rejected the teaching and authority of Apostolic Tradition and the Rule of Faith found in the Creeds and Councils of the Undivided Church. The Bible itself demands the implementation of Tradition for the right interpretation of Scripture in such places as II Peter 1.20-21, II Thessalonians 2.15, I Timothy 3.15, and so I think we Catholics Anglicans are right on target!

All of this is simply to say that I totally agree with you and I always try to employ the 'dynamic duo' of Scripture and Tradition together when making a defence or offering an instruction on a point of Christian doctrine.

The Orthodox Church of Cyprus Reaffirms the Validity of Anglican Orders

From the official letter to the 2008 Lambeth Conference from of the Orthodox Archiepiscopate of Cyprus, represented by Metropolitan Chrysostomos of Kition:

'Unfortunately, after the Third Lambeth Conference, which was held in the year 1888, when a particular effort was made for the promotion of the relations between the Orthodox and the Anglican Church, no substantial progress has been made in this area though a most fervent desire for their union exists in both our Churches. The Orthodox Church of Cyprus, encouraged by the progress made at the time went ahead, as is known, in the year 1923 and recognised the validity of Anglican ordainments in the hope that this would be followed by more moves towards unity between our Churches.'

One has to love the archaic, if inaccurate, term, 'ordainments,' obviously meaning Anglican Orders.

The decision to which Metropolitan Chrysostomos refers is this:

The Archbishop of Cyprus wrote to the Patriarch of Constantinople in the name of his Synod on March 20, 1923, as follows: To His All-Holiness the Oecumenical Patriarch Mgr. Meletios we send brotherly greeting in Christ. Your Holiness – Responding readily to the suggestion made in your reverend Holiness' letter of August 8, 1922, that the autocephalous Church of Cyprus under our presidency should give its opinion as to the validity of Anglican Orders we have placed the matter before the Holy Synod in formal session. After full consideration thereof it has reached the following conclusion: It being understood that the Apostolic Succession in the Anglican Church by the Sacrament of Order was not broken at the Consecration of the first Archbishop of this Church, Matthew Parker, and the visible signs being present in Orders among the Anglicans by which the grace of the Holy Spirit is supplied, which enables the ordinand for the functions of his particular order, there is no obstacle to the recognition by the Orthodox Church of the validity of Anglican Ordinations in the same way that the validity of the ordinations of the Roman, Old Catholic, and Armenian Church are recognized by her. Since clerics coming from these Churches into the bosom of the Orthodox Church are received without reordination we express our judgment that this should also hold in the case of Anglicans – excluding intercommunio (sacramental union), by which one might receive the sacraments indiscriminately at the hands of an Anglican, even one holding the Orthodox dogma, until the dogmatic unity of the two Churches, Orthodox and Anglican, is attained.

Submitting this opinion of our Church to Your All-Holiness, we remain, Affectionately, the least of your brethren in Christ, Cyril of Cyprus Archbishopric of Cyprus. March 7/20, 1923

Anglican Province of America Provincial Synod

Please pray for the bishops, priests, deacons and laity who will participate in the tenth Provinical Synod of the Anglican Province of America to be held Thursday 24 July at the National Shrine of Our Lady of the Snows in Belleville, Illinois.

May Almighty God bless the work and mission of America's original Continuing Church!

Almighty and everlasting God, who by thy Holy Spirit didst preside in the Council of the blessed Apostles, and hast promised, through thy Son Jesus Christ, to be with thy Church to the end of the world; We beseech thee to be with the Council of thy Church about to assemble in thy Name and Presence. Save us from all error, ignorance, pride, and prejudice; and of thy great mercy vouchsafe, we beseech thee, so to direct, sanctify, and govern us in our work, by the mighty power of the Holy Ghost, that the comfortable Gospel of Christ may be truly preached, truly received, and truly followed, in all places, to the breaking down the kingdom of sin, Satan, and death; till at length the whole of thy dispersed sheep, being gathered into one fold, shall become partakers of everlasting life; through the merits and death of Jesus Christ our Saviour. Amen.

Anglican Wanderings

A simply splendid web log I discovered in the aftermath of the Church of England General Synod debacle - written by good and faithful Anglican Catholics who desire the preservation of the Catholic Movement within Anglicanism...


http://anglicanwanderings.blogspot.com/

Dr Francis J Hall from Logos Bible Software

http://www.logos.com/products/prepub/details/4330

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With the Logos edition of the Francis J. Hall Theology Collection, references to Church Fathers, medieval theologians, and Reformation scholars are linked, giving you instant access to other theological works relevant to your reading and research. Your digital library also allows you to perform powerful searches and word studies, and Scripture passages are linked to your Hebrew and Greek texts, along with your English translations! The Francis J. Hall Theology Collection is ideal for anyone interested in the relationship between theology and other academic disciplines in the late-nineteenth century, for anyone interested in Anglican studies, and for pastors, teachers, and students looking for a comprehensive and accessible summary of Christian thought.