Thanks for your reply. I’ll just say one thing in response, as we are unlikely to find absolute common ground on this: if it were merely a matter of accepting the Creeds, or what I would consider true essentials, I might already be Catholic. But you know better than I that that is not what is required. My copy of the Catechism is over 750 pages long – that is violence to the intellect. I’m afraid there are too many irreconcilable points to which I cannot, in good conscience, give public assent.

In fact, I’ve begun to come to a greater peace about this since I last wrote. I’ve also started to feel a rather rebellious spirit coming to the surface – one that wants to refuse to worship with any congregation that closes communion to me, Catholic or otherwise. Yes, I recognize the arrogance and irony in this response, but I can’t help but see, in a closed communion, nothing but another version of 1 Cor. 3:1-7. Add to this the apparent fact that I have been better “catechized” than many long-term Catholics with whom I sit through RCIA every week, and you can see why I might be chafing a little over all this. Anyway, thank you again, and if you have any recommendations for a way forward, as far as reading, etc., I welcome them.

Real Peace and Love,
Charles

Peace,
Apodeictic.

I agree with you that the analogy isn’t perfect. No analogy is. I was simply trying to illustrate the fact that love and institutional union are not mutually exclusive. Marriage illustrates that quite well, in my opinion. In fact, the more perfect the love, the more deeply the persons want to make it institutional, i.e. tie the knot, make it ‘forever.’

My marriage analogy breaks down when we get to the subject of authority, and the implications of apostolic succession. For example, if a person wants to be an Arian, then he cannot be a Catholic. The Arian could complain about this, but he does not have the authority to determine for the Church what is orthodox and what is heresy. A Catholic priest or bishop cannot knowingly permit an Arian to come to the table, because such a person does not share the faith of the Church. The communion table isn’t pretend union; it is real union. So it is right for the priest or bishop not to allow the Arian to come to the table. It is right for the priest or bishop to say, “If you want to be in full communion with the Church, then you need to renounce Arianism and accept the Creed.” There is such a thing as the Catholic faith only because the Church does not compromise with everyone who wishes to dissent from her doctrine. If the Church started compromising with dissenters, there would soon be no Catholic faith. My point is that preserving the distinction between orthodoxy and heresy is a necessary condition for the perpetuation of the faith. It is not a malicious or mean-spirited thing at all. Requiring that those who wish to be in full communion with the Church affirm their belief in the Church’s faith only makes sense, from my point of view. The Church has to be faithful to the deposit of faith that has been handed down to her; so in that respect she has to seek to please God rather than merely pleasing men.

In the peace of Christ,

- Bryan

I appreciate your respectful response. I am a big fan of Alister McGrath and have books by him (I am working through his textbook “Reformation Thought” currently), so I am familiar with the history of the Anglican Church well past King Henry VIII, including the inter-Protestant civil war in the mid-1600s, the brief reign of the Puritans/Calvinists and abolishment of dioceses/bishops before everyone got tired of their legalism (no plum pudding on Christmas even) and reinstituted the former church structures. Just mentioning this to recognize your point that King Henry VIII didn’t mold the Anglicans’ doctrine and practices.

Peace in Christ,

Devin, thanks for your comments.
Yes, obviously Thomas More and John Fisher didn’t think that the reformed Church of England was the ancient catholic church in England reformed according to the word of God and therefore (understandably) sided with Rome. In their view what I would call the “reformed” Church was in fact “schismatic”. So understandably they took the stand they did. “Heretics” is not actually a word I would want to use to describe either More or Fisher. Both were following their consciences seeking to be faithful to God. I hope one day to see them in the joy of heaven where the divisions which mar us now will now longer be present in the church triumphant. But, yes, I believe they were wrong to side with Rome. But understandably and — perhaps more importantly — forgivably wrong.

Like most Roman Catholic apologists you seem to stop at Henry VIII and this is something that Anglicans do not do. From an Anglican point of view the actions of Henry VIII do not the English Reformation or the Church of England make. He got the ball rolling but a lot else happened after Henry’s reign. I guess from a Roman point of view the definitive event is “schism” and that happened at a particular point in time as the Church in England broke from Rome during Henry’s reign. Case more or less closed from a Roman point of view. But from a protestant point of view, however, the lens to view this trhough is “reform” and this is something that came about gradually, and something that God can bring about despite a sinful king’s questionable motives. I will quite readily accept that many of Henry’s motives were questionable at best, possibly even wicked. But that didn’t stop the work of godly men such as Cranmer, Latimer and Ridley getting on with the work of reforming the church, particularly under the reign of Edward VI.

One more point: Anglicans do not consider the British monarch to be the “Supreme Head” of the curch. From our point of view the church has ONE head, both in heaven and on earth, namely Jesus Christ our Lord. No-one can replace him as head, not even on earth. In England (and only in England; this is NOT the case for Anglican churches in other parts of the world which are not established), the Queen is the “Supreme Governor” of the church. That is not the same as saying that she is the “head”, let alone the “supreme head”. This is another aspect of reform coming gradually. At first Henry was considered “Supreme Head” but under Elizabeth the view became that the monarch was “Supreme Governor”, lest their be any doubt that Jesus Christ (and he alone) is the one true head of the Church. The idea behind that of “Supreme Governor” is that in a professedly Christian kingdom the monarch has a duty under God not just to uphold the civil laws but also to defend and maintain the true faith. But neither she nor the church cannot ordain anything contrary to Scripture.

Finally I agree with N.T. Wright that the Anglican communion is a “slow moving train wreck”. No doubt the same could be said about many of the other parts of the visible church.

Blessings,
Apodeictic