'Do not go about to appropriate the mansions to our sect': words from Jeremy Taylor for the Week of Prayer for Christian Unity

Words from Jeremy Taylor - in Holy Dying - for this Week of Prayer for Christian Unity:

Let the sick man mingle the recital of his creed [i.e. the Apostles' Creed] together with his devotions, and in that let him account his faith; not in curiosity and factions, in the confessions of parties and interests: for some over-forward zeals are so earnest to profess their little and uncertain articles, and glory so to die in a particular and divided communion, that in the profession of their faith they lose or discompose their charity. Let it be enough that we secure our interest of heaven, though we do not go about to appropriate the mansions to our sect; for every good man hopes to be saved, as he is a Christian, and not as he is a Lutheran, or of another division. However, those articles upon which he can build the exercise of any virtue in his sickness, or upon the stock of which he can improve his present condition, are such as consist in the greatness and goodness, the veracity and mercy of God through Jesus Christ; nothing of which can be concerned in the fond disputations which faction and interest hath too long maintained in Christendom.

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Why I support the ordination of women: a High Church reflection

A number of commenters on this blog have asked about my occasional expressions of support for the ordination of women to all three orders. With some hesitation, I have decided to post a summary of my own views on this matter. The hesitation is because I have sought on this blog to focus on issues and themes which can unify those who identify with or have respect (grudging or otherwise!) for what we might term 'classical' Anglicanism (the Anglicanism of the Formularies and - yes - of the Old High Church tradition). Some oppose the ordination of women (and I have friends and colleagues who do so, Anglo-Catholic, High Church, and Reformed Evangelical). Some of us support it (again, friends and colleagues covering a wide range of theological traditions). Below, I have organised my thinking around 5 points (needless to say, no reference to Dort is implied). 1. The Declaration for Subscription required of clergy in the Church of Ireland states: (6) I promise to submit ...

How the Old High tradition continued

Charles Gore's 1914 letter to the clergy of his diocese, ' The Basis of Anglican Fellowship ', can be regarded as a classical expression of the Prayer Book Catholic tradition. A key part of the letter - entitled 'Romanizing in the Church of England' - addressed the "Catholic movement", questioning beliefs and practices within it which tended to "a position which makes it very difficult for its extremer representatives to give an intelligible reason why they are not Roman Catholics". Gore provides the outlines of an alternative account and experience of catholicity within Anglicanism, defined by three characteristics. What is particularly interesting about these characteristics is their continuity with the older High Church tradition. Indeed, the central characteristic as set out by Gore was integral to High Church claims over centuries: To accept the Anglican position as valid, in any sense, is to appeal behind the Pope and the authority of t...

1928 practices and the 1979 book: unthinking conservatism or popular piety?

Those responsible for Earth & Altar - a new blog emanating from a group within TEC - are to be congratulated for an excellent contribution to wider Anglican discussion and debate. The commitment to "an expansively conceived credal orthodoxy as fully compatible with LGBTQ inclusion, gender equality, and racial justice" is an important part of a wider retrieval of creedal orthodoxy within what we might call the post-liberal generation. It is in this spirit that I want to respond to a recent post on the site by Andrew McGowan , Dean of the Berkeley Divinity School at Yale and Professor of Anglican Studies at Yale Divinity School. Against the background of another round of "ill-defined" liturgical revision in TEC, he understandably urges that a fuller reception of the 1979 BCP should occur before further reforms. In doing so, however, he takes aim at what he describes as "clinging to the ritual structures of 1928" while using the text of 1979. We ...

laudable Practice

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