INDEPENDENT CATHOLICISM AND THE ECUMENICAL IMPERATIVE

Is the Anglican Church a Catholic Church or an Evangelical Protestant denomination? The answer to that question is easy to find. One needs to look no farther than the historic Book of Common Prayer. Every Anglican professes belief in articles of the Christian faith as contained in the Apostles Creed, either directly or vicariously through their sponsors, at their baptism; and every member of the Church reaffirms this belief at their Confirmation. In the Apostles Creed faith is professed not in the Anglican Church, but in the holy Catholic Church. Every time Anglicans recite the Nicene Creed at the Eucharist, or the Apostles Creed at Morning and Evening Prayer, they continue to confess their belief in the holy Catholic Church. 

Anglicans are Catholic Christians. No Creed or prayer in the Book of Common Prayer even refers to the Anglican or Episcopal Church, or any Church other than the Catholic Church. In the Eucharistic Liturgy we confess our belief in the “one holy Catholic and Apostolic Church.” We pray for the “universal” or Catholic Church in the Prayer for the Whole State of Christ Church. On page 37 of the 1928 Book of Common Prayer there is a beautiful Collect that says, “O Gracious Father, we humbly beseech thee for thy Holy Catholic Church...” In the Bidding Prayer the Minister says, “Good Christian people, I bid your prayers for Christ’s holy Catholic Church...and more especially for that branch of the same planted by God in this land, whereof we are members...” The words “more especially for that branch of the same...whereof we are members” is as close that the Prayer Book ever comes to praying specifically for the Anglican branch of the Catholic Church rather than for the Catholic Church as a whole. In The Order for the Visitation of the Sick the Minister prays, “let thy Holy Spirit lead us in holiness and righteousness, all our days: that, when we shall have served thee in our generation, we may be gathered unto our fathers, having the testimony of a good conscience; in communion of the Catholic Church...” (1928 BCP, pp. 316-317). The Book of Common Prayer knows of no Church but the Catholic Church and no Faith but the Catholic Faith, and the Anglican Church is merely a branch of the Catholic Church.

It is true that the Anglican Church is a classical protestant Church. But what did the term “protestant” originally mean? It was first used in 1526 at the Diet of Speyer to protest the ruling of the Diet that such reforms as worship in the language of the people and the publication of the Holy Scriptures in the vernacular must cease. It did not mean to protest against the Catholic Faith, but rather against corruption in the Church.

The saintly Lancelot Andrewes illustrated this when, as Bishop of Chichester (1605-1609), he met with Tobie Mathews, son of the Archbishop of York, who was in the process of embracing Roman Catholicism. During their meeting Bishop Andrewes referred to the Church of England as the “English Protestant Catholic Church.” He told Mathews that he “held the English Protestant Catholic Church and the Roman Catholic Church, to be one and the same Church of Christ,” except that “my Church” is “the better swept, and more cleanly kept, and more substantially repaired.” Andrewes also used the word “protestant” in his Responsio to Cardinal Bellermine, but qualified the usage on the grounds of “temporary convenience.” Temporary, because the protest would no longer be necessary once Rome too reformed herself by allowing worship in the language of the people, the vernacular Bible to be freely read, and the Gospel of Christ to be freely proclaimed.

Unfortunately, over the centuries the definition of “protestant” has changed in most peoples minds to denote those who protest against not merely medieval errors and corruptions in the Church, but against the Catholic Faith itself. For many people today the word Protestant is taken to be the opposite of Catholic. As Anglicans we are classical protestants, but not Protestants according to the contemporary use of the term, and that is why Anglicans do not commonly describe themselves as protestants today.    

I came to know the Lord Jesus Christ in the Episcopal Church, and I love classical Anglicanism. With thousands of others, I left the Episcopal Church in the late 1970s after the Minneapolis General Convention in 1976, and the great St. Louis Church Congress in 1977. I am fifty-four years old and have been in the ministry all of my adult life. Since 1997, I have been involved in ecumenism. First, I worked under Bishop Donald Davies of Ft. Worth and Bishop Patrick Murphy of Houston to bring orthodox Anglicans together, with the hope of corporate reunion with the wider Catholic Church. In the early years of the 21st century I was appointed Ecumenical Officer of the Anglican Province of Christ the King, a post that I held until 2007. As Ecumenical Officer I continued to work for orthodox Anglican unity and for corporate reunion among Catholic Christians. With the formation of the Federation of Anglican Churches in the America’s (FACA), I gave up my ministry of Ecumenical Officer and focused my energies on being the rector of Holy Cross Anglican Church in Omaha, Nebraska. In 2009, we became a founding parish of the Anglican Church in North America. 

Since 2009, I have been cautiously optimistic about the Anglican Church in North America, and the New Reformation in the Anglican Communion which began with the GAFCON conference in Jerusalem in 2008. I have prayed and worked to advance the New Reformation and the realignment in the Anglican Communion, and have followed the progress of ecumenical dialogue with the Orthodox Church in America, the Roman Catholic Church, the Polish National Catholic Church, and the Missouri Synod of the Lutheran Church with great interest. My hope has always been that the New Reformation in the Anglican Communion would restore the Faith and Order of the undivided Church and fulfill the Anglican vocation of being a bridge Church and a healing balm in a divided Christendom, and would be a vehicle for the corporate reunion of Catholic Christendom. 

Since mid-2012 though, I have lost much of my “cautious optimism” about the Anglican Church in North America, and the restoration of the Anglican Communion to Catholic orthodoxy. The reports that I have received of the 2012 Assembly of the Anglican Church in North America by godly and learned priests who were in attendance, bear this out. There are clearly two Churches in the Anglican Church in North America: 1) orthodox Anglicans, and 2) 2002 Episcopalians - Episcopalians who simply drew the line with the election of Gene Robinson to the episcopate in 2003. 

Despite assurances to the contrary, there is no indication that women's ordination is on the way out in the Anglican Church in North America. In fact, every report that I received said that there were far more women in collars in evidence at the 2012 Assembly than there were at the 2009 Assembly. In addition, we are hearing rhetoric that is reminiscent of the Episcopal Church, such as that we are in a "period of reception" regarding the "ordination" of women; and that there are two "integrates" in the Church and that this was the understanding from the beginning. The continued compromises being suggested by those who really know the Faith and the feebleness of the opposition to Women’s “Ordination” all but guarantee that  it is here to stay in the Anglican Church in North America. 

We have been told that the Primates Council of GAFCON has called for a formal study of Women's “Ordination,” and that since 70+% of the Anglican Communion is "orthodox" the study will undoubtedly result in the end of Women's "Ordination." I now believe that this is just wishful thinking. According to Anglican journalist George Conger, only seven of the thirty-eight provinces of the Anglican Communion do not ordain women, and of the seven all but Nigeria and Southeast Asia are small provinces. In addition there are two provinces: Congo and the Southern Cone, that "ordain" women to the diaconate (which, frankly, is just as contrary to Scripture, Tradition and Catholic Order), but not to the presbyterate. Only seven of the thirty-eight provinces do not ordain women. Thirty-one do. This is all very shocking. We have never been told this. I know that I have not been told this before.

While I am stunned by all of this, I am also thankful to George Conger for exposing it. We need to know the truth, even if it is very painful. There is not one single example of a province of the Anglican Communion that has ended Women’s “Ordination” after beginning the practice. Not one. Of the thirty-eight provinces of the Anglican Communion only seven do not ordain women: Central Africa, Melanesia, Myanmar, Nigeria, Papua New Guinea, South East Asia and Tanzania. It is utterly unrealistic that any study will lead to the end of Women’s “Ordination.” If it has been all but impossible to eliminate it in North America, just imagine the task of eliminating it in thirty more provinces scattered all around the globe!

A look at the direction that GAFCON is heading bears this out. The first president of the Primates Council came from Nigeria, a province that does not ordain women. His successor came from the Southern Cone, a province that “ordains” women to the diaconate. The third and current president comes from Kenya, a church that “ordains” women to the diaconate and the presbyterate. 

In April 2012, the Fellowship of Confessing Anglicans (GAFCON) held its first conference for Anglican leaders in London. Over 200 bishops, clergy and lay leaders attended from thirty countries and 25 provinces of the Anglican Communion. Anglican Mainstream reported that “GAFCON recognized... the conflict in the Anglican Communion since 1998.” Since 1998? Women’s ordination began in the United States and Canada in the 1970s, and was adopted by the Church of England in 1992. Not only does GAFCON not see that the abandonment of Catholic Order has precipitated a crisis, but “Conference participants formed networks that will pursue ongoing work in areas vital to the movement.” These networks “vital to the movement” include forums for episcopal leaders (bishops), pastors, evangelists, theological educators, cross-cultural workers, aid and development workers, lawyers, and “women in ministry — a forum for women in ministry to share challenges, resources and prayer.” When the women in ministry forum was held at the 2012 ACNA Assembly for priestesses and female deacons, which caused so much alarm among so many of us, Archbishop Duncan was merely carrying out the mandate of the London GAFCON Conference.

If all but seven provinces of the Anglican Communion “ordain” women, and GAFCON sees a “women in ministry” forum as “vital to the movement,” then how can it be said that 70+% of the Anglican Communion is "orthodox"? It seems that the one and only litmus test for Anglican “orthodoxy” today is homosexual behavior. It appears that if you are opposed to homosexual behavior you are "orthodox" even if you "ordain" priestesses, have a Zwinglian sacramental theology, etc.

Our ecumenical partners see this more clearly than we do. In 2010, I had a wedding to conduct that would have more guests than we could seat in our church, so I contacted a nearby Roman Catholic priest and asked him if we could borrow his church for our Service. He told me that it was against archdiocesan policy to loan the use of churches to other denominations. When I assured him that we were Catholic Christians, he responded bluntly that we were simply an anti-gay Episcopal church. Stunned, I responded that our position on homosexual behavior was no different than that of his Church. He replied that while the Roman Catholic Church was opposed to sin, of which homosexual behavior was just one, our whole reason for being was our opposition to gays, and that had Gene Robinson not been elected bishop we would all be Episcopalians today. I was shocked by how others see us. Fortunately, after telling him that I left the Episcopal Church in the late 1970s, long before homosexuality was an issue and that Holy Cross parish was thoroughly orthodox and was not a post-2003 split from the Episcopal Church, he agreed to take my request to the Archbishop, although he didn’t hold out much hope. Happily, Archbishop Lucas graciously agreed to our request, and we were granted full use of the church on Friday evening and all day Saturday. As far as I know, I am the only Anglican priest to have ever conducted an Anglican Service in a parish of the Archdiocese of Omaha, and I am truly grateful for the kindness shown us.

Thankfully, there are hundreds of faithful Anglican congregations like Holy Cross parish scattered across North America, and undoubtedly thousands more all around the world. We have kept the Faith, are growing in holiness, are advancing the Great Commission and growing in numbers. However, while our Lord has undoubtedly preserved Anglicanism, it does not seem that He is preserving the Anglican Communion. Only seven of the thirty-eight provinces of the Anglican Communion can make any claim to Catholic Order, and the Church of England will in all likelihood lose the last semblance of its Catholicity later this year.

Many traditionalists took heart when the July 2012 General Synod did not pass the draft legislation authorizing women bishops, but that is to seriously misunderstand what really happened. The vote was no victory for traditionalists, and there seems no hope for the remaining traditionalists in the Church of England. The draft legislation was voted down because of Clause 5(1)c which was designed to provide some protection for traditionalists. However, before the General Synod even met, traditionalists had said that this Clause was only cosmetic and offered no real “protection” for those who could not accept women bishops. By voting down the draft legislation the General Synod sent it back to the House of bishops for them to remove even this inadequate protection at their September meeting. The General Synod will then vote on the draft legislation in November of this year. The July 9, 2012 issue of England’s, Anglican Journal reported, “‘It’s a victory for the Church of England, which has issued a resounding “No” to discrimination,’ said Christina Rees, a member of the General Synod and the Archbishop’s Council. ‘Had this measure been approved it would have had the effect of discriminating against people who believe men and women are equal.’” This talk of discrimination is, of course, nonsense. Orthodox Christians believe that men and women are equal in the sight and love of God, but are not interchangeable. We believe in complimentarianism. 

The sad truth is that an overwhelming 42 of the 44 dioceses of the Church of England have voted in favor of women bishops. At the General Synod, Archbishop Rowan Williams of Canterbury said, “Like the majority of members of the Synod and majority of members of the Church of England, I’m very firmly of the view that we need to proceed as speedily as we can because I, like most of you, long to see women bishops in the Church of England.”

The July 13, 2012, issue of the CatholicHerald.co.uk reports, “Anglo-Catholics should no longer expect the C of E to make special arrangements for them; it's not going to happen.” Even if the already acknowledged to be “inadequate” protections of Clause 5(1)c were to pass, the article reports, “It has been little noticed, however, that this time, members of the 30-strong parliamentary committee of MPs and peers known as the ‘ecclesiastical committee’, which would have to agree that the synodical legislation is ‘expedient’ before it proceeds on its weary way, are saying firmly that any ‘special arrangements’ for dissident parishes would not be accepted by them.” The article concludes by saying, “Anglo-Catholics need to understand clearly that there is no place for them in the Church of England; they are not wanted... they will have simply to accept that they are members of a Church with women priests and women bishops and get used to it. But if they do, they had better stop calling themselves ‘Anglo-Catholics’: they will have forfeited the right.”

The July 2, 2012, issue of the Christian Post reports that more women than men were “ordained” in the Church of England in 2010. The article says, “It would seem that positions within churches are being filled predominantly by women and that in years to come, if current trends continue, women will comprise the majority of spiritual leaders in England.”  David Martin, Emeritus Professor of Sociology at the London School of Economics, told The Sunday Times, “It’s obvious that over time the priesthood will become increasingly a female profession. As far as the church has a future it will include a predominant ministry of women...” In 2000, the proportion of men to women attending Church of England parishes was 45% to 55%, but by the end of the decade attendance of men had declined so much that the proportion of men to women was 37% to 63%. The Church of England and the See of Canterbury is lost.

So what is the solution? It is not for the Anglican Church in North America to break up into its constituent parts and reorganize as separate jurisdictions, or for orthodox Anglicans to separate and form a second ACNA province. Independent Catholicism does not work and cannot work because it is based on a non-Catholic ecclesiology. We cannot form Catholic “jurisdictions” like evangelical protestants form denominations. 

In 1691, six nonjuring Anglican bishops, including the Archbishop of Canterbury William Sancroft, and around four hundred other clergy were deprived and deposed for refusing to swear an oath to William of Orange after King James II had been driven from England They then formed a separate Anglican jurisdiction. Despite being led by experienced bishops, with an Archbishop of Canterbury at their head, the history of the nonjurors was one of numerical decline until they became only a footnote in church history. In 1717, they split over liturgical matters (Usages), speeding their decline, and their history spanned a mere 114 years, from 1691 until 1805 when their last bishop died. 

In the 20th century, the great St. Louis Church Congress brought together around 2,000 orthodox Anglicans, but that proved to be the high water mark of the Continuing Church Movement. The post-St. Louis Church saw schism after schism, and the three heirs of the St. Louis Church Congress, the Anglican Catholic Church, Anglican Province of Christ the King and the United Episcopal Church, when taken together, are smaller in numbers with fewer resources than the movement had in the 1980s, and are aging and declining. The largest of these three bodies, the Anglican Catholic Church (Original Province), has less than 4,000 members, while the APCK cannot have more than 2,000 members today, and the UECNA a few hundred. Unlike the nonjurors though, it is unlikely that the Anglican Continuum will ever see the death of its last bishop. The continuum seems to have the opposite problem, continual division and the creation of ever more bishops. Continuing Anglicanism reads like a bowl of alphabet soup: ACA, ACC, ACCC, ACNA, AM, APA, APCK, CANA, DHC, EMC, HCC-AR, OAC, UECNA, just to name a few. Independent Catholicism cannot  work because Catholicism is more than liturgy, ceremony, sacraments and apostolic ministry; there must be Catholic ecclesiology. If the schisms in the Body of Christ are a scandal, what of the tiny splinters?   

The branches of the Catholic Church have always been anchored in ancient Sees: Rome, Constantinople, Antioch, Alexandria, Jerusalem, and Canterbury. But as we have seen, Canterbury will very likely lose what remains of its Catholic inheritance this year as it embraces women bishops. Once that happens, Canterbury will no longer have any claim to being an historic Catholic See. 

As Anglicans, we can either fully embrace Catholic ecclesiology or continue to succumb to the temptation of denominationalism. As quoted in my last blog post, Women’s Ordination and the Ecumenical Imperative, Dom Anselm Hughes, one-time Prior of Nashdom Abbey, reminded Anglicans in 1961, where our primary loyalty must be. He said, “The first and most urgent matter to deal with is that of loyalty. Now in the Creed which in its Apostolic version is accepted by all members of the Church, either directly or vicariously, at their baptism; in the Creed which in its Nicene form they recite at every Sunday and feast-day Mass; they pledge their faith in the One Holy Catholic Apostolic Church. This is their first and largest loyalty, and those of whom we have been speaking as the Catholics within the Church of England consist of those to whom this allegiance comes always and instinctively first, and for whom all other loyalties, to the Church of England or the Anglican Communion, are made to rank as subservient to this over-riding, all-embracing, loyalty to the One Holy Church” (The Rivers of the Flood, p. 146).

In 1923, Bishop Frank Weston of Zanzibar told the great Anglo-Catholic Congress in England, “We now stand for the Catholic Faith common to East and West. We are not concerned with the shibboleths of low Church, high Church, broad Church, liberal modernist, or even the new ‘non-party’ party. We stand or fall with Christ’s Church, catholic and apostolic. And we wait patiently till the Holy Father and the Orthodox Patriarchs recognize us as of their own stock.” 

The day that Bishop Frank Weston and our spiritual forbearers longed for has come. The Eastern Orthodox, Rome, and the Polish National Catholics, all now recognize orthodox Anglicans as their own stock, bone of their bone and flesh of their flesh. Rome and Eastern Orthodoxy are demonstrating far more interest in our Anglican patrimony than is being shown by Canterbury and even by many in the Anglican Church in North America. The Anglican Use liturgies authorized by Rome since the establishment of the Anglican Ordinariates (not to be confused with the old Anglican Use rites of the Pastoral Provision) are clearly taken from the traditional Book of Common Prayer and are far more in the spirit of the Anglican liturgical tradition than anything issued of late by the Church of England or found in the 1979 Book of Common Prayer, or the trial rites of the Anglican Church in North America.

Likewise, both the Patriarchate of Antioch “where they were first called Christians”; and the Russian Orthodox Church, by far the largest of the Eastern Orthodox Churches, have authorized the use of the Anglican liturgy, are welcoming Anglican parishes and clergy, and are actively pursuing Western Rite work. According to Fr. Anthony Bondi, Metropolitan Hillarion’s Pastoral Vicar, the new Western Rite Vicariate of the Russian Orthodox Church already has forty-three priests in the United States, and the Vicariate is growing rapidly.

The Russian Orthodox Church and the Roman Catholic Church have authorized the use of the Anglican Rite in Great Britain as well, and have begun working with Anglicans there. Russian Orthodox Western Rite work is being carried out in the United States, the United Kingdom, Canada and Australia. Western Rite dioceses will be established when the numbers warrant. Likewise, the Vatican has established Anglican Ordinariates in England, the United States, and Australia, with more to come as needed. The Polish National Catholic Church is also ready to reach out to Anglicans in England and North America, just as they have to Scandinavian Lutherans in Norway, and to others in Europe, including former Anglican parishes in Italy.

Until 1978, the Polish National Catholic Church was in full communion with the Episcopal Church USA and the Anglican Communion, but severed that communion because of the introduction of the “ordination” of women among Anglicans. The PNCC are our estranged brothers and sisters, and they want to heal the breach in the family. The December 2011, issue of Forward in Faith’s New Directions magazine published an article by Norwegian PNCC Bishop Roald Flemstad titled, “Looking for a New Home?” In the article Bishop Flemstad invites Anglicans to embrace Catholic unity through the PNCC led Union of Scranton. 

The Polish National Catholic Church is unique among Western Churches in that it is not only recognized as a valid and legitimate national Catholic Church by Rome, but it has limited intercommunion with the Roman Catholic Church as well. Dialogue with the United States Conference of Catholic Bishops, with the approval of the Holy See, led in 1996 to a "limited inter-communion". What this means is that the Roman Catholic Church recognizes the validity of the sacraments of the PNCC, making applicable to its members the provisions of canon 844 §§2–3 of the Code of Canon Law. This canon allows Roman Catholics who are unable to approach a Roman Catholic minister to receive, under certain conditions, the sacraments of Reconciliation, Eucharist and Anointing of the Sick from "non-Catholic ministers in whose Churches these sacraments are valid", and declares it licit for Roman Catholic priests to administer the same three sacraments to members of Churches which the Holy See judges to be in the same condition in regard to the sacraments as the Eastern Churches, if they ask for the sacraments of their own accord and are properly disposed. Remaining obstacles to full  Communion are different understandings regarding the place of the papal ministry in the Church, and the PNCC reception of some former Roman Catholic clergy, most of whom subsequently married. 

I have been told by an Anglican bishop with close ties to the PNCC that although the PNCC has long recognized Anglican Orders as valid, Anglican clergy would be required to undergo conditional ordination in order to avoid endangering the intercommunion now enjoyed with Rome. Union with the Polish National Catholic Church would bring Anglicans into limited intercommunion with the Holy See, while the implications of Ut Unum Sint are worked out. 

When announcing the upcoming Second Vatican Council in 1959, Pope John XXIII spoke to non-Roman Catholic Christians saying, “We will not try to find out who was right , we will only say: Let us be reconciled.” If only Anglicans, Eastern Orthodox, Old Catholics, and Roman Catholics could have such open hearts toward one another. Love covers a multitude of sins and hurts.

In November 2003, Eastern Orthodox Patriarch of Antioch, Ignatius IV wrote, “Our divisions make Christ unrecognizable. We have an urgent need for prophetic initiatives in order to bring ecumenism out of the twists and turns in which I fear it is getting stuck. We have an urgent need for prophets and saints to help our Churches to be converted by mutual forgiveness.”

Brother Roger of Taize wrote, “When communion among Christians is a life and not a theory, it radiates hope... How then, could Christians still remain divided? Reconciliation among Christians is urgent today; it cannot continually be put off until later, until the end of time. Over the years, the ecumenical vocation has fostered an invaluable exchange of views. This dialogue continues the first fruits of reconciliation. But when the ecumenical vocation is not made concrete through a communion, it leads no where.” 

The Anglican Communion is very likely lost to the Catholic Church, yet God has preserved classical Anglicanism in hundreds of congregations in North America and thousands throughout the world. Classical Anglicanism combines Evangelical Truth and Catholic Order. Anglicans have wonderful gifts to bring to the wider Church and to the New Evangelization, gifts that God has given to us to share and to enrich others. God may have indeed closed a door - the door to continued separation, but He has opened a greater door - the door to Catholic unity.

Some Anglicans will still believe that reunion with Rome and the East is possible even with women’s ordination, but it is not. Many other conservative Anglicans, so used to making compromises in matters of Faith and Order, will continue to believe that Rome or Eastern Orthodoxy will eventually enter into communion with Anglicanism if we can only “split the difference” with the proponents of Women’s “Ordination” and restrict the “ordination” of women to the diaconate alone. But this is only wishful thinking. It will never happen. Having served for years as an Anglican Ecumenical Officer I am still amazed at the way that many Anglican leaders can delude themselves by thinking that other Catholic Christians are willing to compromise in matters of Catholic Faith and Order as they themselves have. It will not happen, and the sooner we face this reality the better. 

Speaking of the Anglo-Russian Theological Conference in Moscow in 1956, Archbishop of Canterbury Michael Ramsey expressed the Orthodox position: The Orthodox said in effect, “The Tradition is a concrete fact. There it is, in its totality. Do you Anglicans accept it or do you reject it?... the Orthodox appeal to the one indivisible organism of Tradition, to tamper with any part of which is to spoil the whole, in the sort of way that a single splodge on a picture can mar its beauty” (Sobornost, series 3, no. 23, 1958, pp. 562-563). Rome has the same view regarding Faith and Order. Thankfully, Holy Cross parish and hundreds more like her can say, “Yes, we accept the Tradition. We will guard the deposit. We will earnestly contend for the Faith which was once delivered unto the saints. If we are shown to be in error, we will embrace the truth.”

At the 1989 Conference of Anglican Cathedral Deans, the Most Reverend Robert Runcie, 102nd Archbishop of Canterbury said, “our vocation as Anglicans was to put ourselves out of business.” Anglicans have always seen their Church as a branch of the Catholic Church, waiting “patiently until the Holy Father and the Orthodox Patriarchs recognize us as their own stock.” And they have!  The Anglican patrimony, liturgy and spirituality is now recognized, valued and encouraged in both Eastern and Western Christendom. There is no more need to wait, and it is becoming increasingly difficult to justify continued separation, especially after learning the true condition of the ACNA, the Church of England, and at least 31 of the 38 provinces of the Anglican Communion.  

Anglicans can be united with the wider Church, and be united without being absorbed.  Perhaps this is why God has preserved classical Anglicanism, but not the Anglican Communion. We will be able to continue our vocation of being a bridge Church and a healing balm in a divided Christendom, but we will have demonstrated how unity can come without ceasing to be who we are. My prayer is that our bishops will boldly take the step of faith necessary, and lead us quickly to greater unity. Other orthodox Anglicans throughout the world will follow our example. As Patriarch Ignatius IV of Antioch said, “We have an urgent need for prophets and saints to help our Churches to be converted by mutual forgiveness”; and as Brother Roger of Taize said, “when the ecumenical vocation is not made concrete through a communion, it leads no where.” 

Fr. Victor E. Novak is a priest of the Diocese of Mid-America, and the rector of Holy Cross Anglican Church in Omaha, Nebraska. The website of Holy Cross parish can be found at: www.holycrossomaha.net and the parish media site at: www.holycrossmedia.com  Fr. Novak can be reached by e-mail at: venovak@hughes.net and by phone at (402) 573-6558. 

WOMEN'S ORDINATION AND THE ECUMENICAL IMPERATIVE

In Advent 2010, Bishop Jack Iker of the Anglican Diocese Fort Worth offered “A Reflection on our Anglican Identity.” In it, he said, “I invite us all to look beyond the surface level of our Anglican Identity, with its temptation to denominationalism, and go back to our heritage as Catholic Christians...

“This means that we are not members of a sectarian, Protestant denomination, but of the Catholic Church. Remember, the Church of England, which came to be known as Anglican, existed before the Reformation and traces its roots back to the Patristic age of the early Christian Church. This same Church, which predated the arrival of Augustine and his missionaries from Rome in the sixth century, is continuous with the Church of England that emerged from the sixteenth century Reformation. Reformed, yes, but not a new denomination, the Church of England still maintained the sacraments, creeds, and holy orders of the undivided Church of the early centuries, before the Great Schism of West and East in 1054.

“Knowing this, Archbishop of Canterbury Geoffrey Fisher famously said, ‘We have no doctrine of our own. We only possess the Catholic doctrine of the Catholic Church enshrined in the Catholic Creeds, and these creeds, we hold without addition or diminution. We stand firm on that rock.’ And to that we might add that Anglicanism has no Scriptures of its own, no sacraments of its own, no holy orders of its own - just those of the Catholic Church that we have received. Fisher was right, as Anglicans we have no faith of our own.

“Like the Roman Catholic Church and the Eastern Orthodox Church, orthodox Anglicans uphold the historic faith and order of the undivided Church. We are nothing more or less than Catholic Christians, seeking to be faithful to the teaching of the early Church Fathers and the Great Ecumenical Councils of the first centuries of Christian witness. With St. Vincent of Lerins, we affirm that the Catholic faith is that which has been believed ‘everywhere, always and by all.’ Wherever you find departures from this given faith and received order, you will find sectarianism, heresy and error.”

Unfortunately, many Anglicans are losing sight of these facts as presented by Bishop Iker. The reports that I have received of the recent Assembly of the Anglican Church in North America by godly and learned priests who were in attendance, bear this out. There are clearly two Churches in the Anglican Church in North America: 1) orthodox Anglicans, and 2) 2002 Episcopalians - Episcopalians who simply drew the line with the election of Gene Robinson to the episcopate in 2003. 

Despite assurances to the contrary, it does not seem that women’s ordination is on the way out. In fact, every report that I received said that there were far more women in collars in evidence at the 2012 Assembly than there were at the 2009 Assembly. In addition, we are hearing rhetoric that is reminiscent of the Episcopal Church, such as that we are in a “period of reception” regarding the “ordination” of women; and that there are two “integrities” in the Church and that this was the understanding from the beginning.

Even worse is the continued compromises being suggested by those who really know the faith. Many otherwise orthodox Anglicans, while still arguing against the ordination of women to the episcopate and presbyterate, are willing to compromise and allow the “ordination” of women to the diaconate. This is despite the fact that the Scriptural qualifications for all three Orders are essentially the same and are clearly male, and that the unanimous witness of Catholic Christendom throughout the ages is that all three Orders are male in character. Once orthodox Anglicans are willing to ignore the clear teaching of Scripture and the witness of Apostolic Tradition regarding the diaconate, what justification is there for not doing  the same with the presbyterate and episcopate? Without the authoritative witness of Scripture and Tradition, any doctrine of Holy Orders is reduced to personal opinion and preference. 

In support of such a compromise, we are sometimes hearing that both Eastern Orthodoxy and Roman Catholicism agree that women may be validly ordained to the diaconate, even if those Churches for reasons of discipline chose not to do so. We are also hearing from some quarters that women who have been “ordained” to the presbyterate are valid priests who can validly consecrate the Eucharist, but that they should not have been ordained and should not serve because it is a violation of Biblical headship and Catholic Order. There are even stories being told of women illicitly ordained to the presbyterate in the Roman Catholic Church in Europe and China who, while recognized as valid priests by Rome, were forbidden to exercise their ministerial priesthood by Church authorities because their ordinations were a violation of Catholic Order and Canon Law.

I knew these views were incorrect and the stories apocryphal when I heard them, but I decided to get authoritative statements from the Roman Catholic and Eastern Orthodox Churches so there could be no doubt in anyone’s mind. I contacted Monsignor Jeffrey Steenson, Ordinary of the Anglican Ordinariate here in North America; Fr. Peter Stravinskas, superior of the Priestly Society of Blessed John Henry Cardinal Newman whose publishing House, Newman House Press, published the Anglican Use Book of Divine Worship;  and the Russian Orthodox Church, because the Moscow Patriarchate is by far the largest Eastern Orthodox jurisdiction in the world. 

The following is my June 28, 2012 e-mail to Monsignor Steenson:

Good morning Monsignor Steenson,

My name is Fr. Victor Novak and I am the rector of Holy Cross Anglican Church in Omaha, Nebraska. We are a parish of the Anglican Church in North America. During the first decade of the new millennium I had served as the Ecumenical Officer for the Anglican Province of Christ the King and was very involved in the discussions that led to the issuing of Anglicanorum Coetibus. I will be attending the Forward in Faith North America Assembly in two weeks and I have a couple of questions for you.

First, we are beginning to hear voices among professed Anglo-Catholics that say women who are ordained priests are indeed priests, they are merely forbidden to exercise that ministry by Rome because it is contrary to Catholic Order. We are being told that some Roman Catholic women have been ordained in Europe by presumably dissident bishops, and in China out of perceived necessity, and that they have been recognized as valid priests but disciplined in Europe, and forbidden to exercise their priesthood in China. My understanding has always been that women cannot be validly ordained. Could you clarify this issue for me and shed any light on the truth or fiction of the stories about these alleged ordinations in Europe and China?

Second, we are hearing that although Rome does not ordain women to the diaconate at this time it is only a matter of discipline, and that women may be ordained to the diaconate and that the Roman Catholic Church does not dispute the validity of such ordinations. Again, my understanding has always been that women may not be validly ordained to the diaconate, and that the ancient Order of deaconess was a lay vocation much like the consecrated life and not the same as the diaconate. Could you clarify this for me? Thank you for your help.

I will be looking forward to hearing from you.

Wishing you every grace and blessing,

Fr. V. E. Novak+

Rev. Victor E. Novak

Rector

HOLY CROSS ANGLICAN CHURCH

Here is Monsignor Steensons response:

Dear Fr. Victor,

I am happy to answer your questions, because they are amongst the easiest I get these days!

1.  It is not a matter of these women being irregularly ordained; they are invalidly ordained.  This is a firm and settled teaching of the Magisterium of the Catholic Church that women cannot be ordained deacons or priests.  Perhaps the most accessible reference is Paragraph 1577 of the Catechism of the Catholic Church.

2.  You are correct on the question of women as deacons as well.  It is not permitted, nor is it under consideration.  The most definitive word on these matters is probably John Paul II's 1994 encyclical, Ordinatio Sacerdotalis. Note section four, where JPII says it is not a matter of discipline but a matter of the faith.

Good luck on your meeting.  I have many old friends in ACNA, and will keep you all in my prayers.

Msgr. Jeffrey Steenson

Personal Ordinariate of the Chair of St. Peter

www.usordinariate.org / (713) 609-9292

While serving as an Ecumenical Officer during the discussions that ultimately led to the issuing of Anglicanorum Coetibus, I worked very closely with Fr. Peter Stravinskas, Ph.D, S.T.D.. He lived in Omaha at the time and we visited each others churches, dined together, and regularly communicated by e-mail and telephone. The priestly society which he heads has been very active in supporting the Anglican Use in the Roman Catholic Church, and he has great respect for our Anglican patrimony.

In response to my inquiry to him of June 28th, Fr. Stravinskas replied: “Paul VI in inter insignores and John Paul II in Ordinatio Sacerdotalis have made it abundantly clear that ‘The Church has no authority to ordain women.’ Period. Any stories to the contrary are exercises in wishful thinking.

“On the diaconate for women, we face a different issue. Clearly, in the early Church there were deaconesses, but their ‘ordination’ was no different from that of lectors and acolytes - a blessing to engage in a particular ministry not involved in sacramental power.”

In response to my e-mail to the Russian Orthodox Church, Fr. Anthony Bondi, Pastoral Vicar for Metropolitan Hilarion, called me on Friday, June 29th, and followed up our telephone conversation with the following e-mail:

Dear Father Victor,

It was a pleasure speaking with you.

This was passed on to me by the webmaster. His Grace is in Des Moines IA doing ordinations this weekend. So permit me to respond to you until he does so.

I also respond because there are a few priests who are attending the Forward in Faith Assembly who have asked me to attend and address their group.

Finally, I convey to you that I was once an Episcopal priest. I stayed to take care of my parish spiritually, until I simply could not take the level of apostasy anymore and left.

The teaching and practice of the Orthodox Catholic Church is that woman have never been, are not now, nor will ever be priests.  Some scholars have pointed out on an old mosaic the word “presbytera” and concluded that there were female priests. The fact is that to this day the WIFE of a Presbyter in the Greek Church is called “Presvytera” as a sign of respect. So shoddy scholarship does not measure up to the 2000 year old Tradition of the Church.

As to the Diaconate: There is a big difference between “Deaconess” and  “Female Deacons.”   We do not have any “Female Deacons” who have a liturgical role equal to the male deacon.  In the early Church there were deaconesses who assisted with the naked baptisms of women as they were immersed.  Today if a woman wished to be baptized it would be done in a public place with the wife of the priest or deacon assisting and with clothing on.

Now in all fairness, I must relay that there are a few Orthodox deaconesses in convents in Greece who bring communion to their fellow nuns who are in the infirmary as males are not permitted in those parts of the buildings.

The bottom line here, Father, is that the Anglican Church says that it is a “branch” of the Catholic Church (a self serving theory that both we and the Romans reject) but she continues to depart daily from the Tradition and Faith of the undivided Church. And even when she does try to keep that faith, she fragments into smaller and smaller pieces with more and more bishops.

Father Victor, you seem like a sensible man, why don’t you and the rest of the like minded men come as a group into the Western Rite of the Russian Church?

I will send you the Orthodox BCP as promised.

Fraternally in Christ,

Fr Anthony

Pastoral Vicar to the Metropolitan for Western Rite

Finally, I wanted to get the official position of the Polish National Catholic Church on the ordination of women to the presbyterate and the diaconate. In 2008, the Polish National Catholic Church issued an official profession of faith called the Declaration of Scranton. The Declaration of Scranton is based on the 19th century Declaration of Utrecht, but includes contemporary issues such as the ordination of women and the blessing of same sex-unions. In 2009, the PNCC issued an official Commentary on the Declaration of Scranton. The Commentary was approved by the PNCC Church Doctrine Commission on September 8, 2009, accepted by the PNCC Clergy Conference on October 21, 2009, and adopted by the PNCC General Synod in October 2010. Regarding the ordination of women this official document says: “The Polish National Catholic Church rejects the ordination of women to the three-fold office of diaconate, presbyterate and episcopate in concord with the practice of the Undivided Church, the teaching on Apostolic Succession and ministry, and the living Tradition of the Church.”

There is a complete Catholic consensus among the Eastern Orthodox, Roman Catholic, and Polish National Catholic Churches that the sacrament of Holy Orders is male in character and that women may not be validly ordained to the episcopate, presbyterate or the diaconate. Until the 1970s this was also the position of the Anglican Communion. 

The 1920 Lambeth Conference of the Anglican Communion declared, “The Order of Deaconess is for women the one and only order of ministry which has the stamp of apostolic approval, and is for women the only order of ministry which we can recommend that our branch of the Catholic Church should recognize and use” (Resolution 48). In order to make clear the distinction between the revived perpetual diaconate and the Order of Deaconess, the 1920 Lambeth Conference also stated, “The deaconess order is modeled on the diakonia ‘of the primitive rather than of the modern diaconate of men’” (Resolution 49).

The Order of Deaconess was restored in the Church of England in 1861, and by canon in the Episcopal Church in 1889. The Order of Deaconess also exists in the Anglican Church in North America. Deaconesses render valuable service to the Church and are identified by their blue habits. The Handbook for the Order of Deaconess says, “The Order of Deaconesses is an ancient and Apostolic vocation for lay women in Christ’s Church. It is a Scripturally based, theological appropriate venue for women who feel called to ministerial service.” For more information on the Order of Deaconess I invite you to visit the website of the Anglican Deaconess Association: www.anglican-deaconess.org  

In his presentation, A Reflection on our Anglican Identity, Bishop Iker said, “I invite us all to look beyond the surface level of our Anglican Identity, with its temptation to denominationalism, and go back to our heritage as Catholic Christians... This means that we are not members of a sectarian, Protestant denomination, but of the Catholic Church.” Unfortunately, it seems that we may be succumbing to the temptation of denominationalism and cafeteria-style Catholicism. In order to hold the ACNA together many otherwise orthodox Anglicans are willing to live with “two integrities” regarding the presbyterate at least for the foreseeable future, and to compromise with the advocates of women’s ordination by abandoning the universal Catholic teaching on the diaconate. Yet Bishop Iker reminds us that, “Anglicanism has...no holy orders of its own - just those of the Catholic Church which we have received... Wherever you find departures from this given faith and received order, you will find sectarianism, heresy and error.” It is alarming that advocates of women’s ordination in the Anglican Church in North America can be considered “conservatives” and “orthodox” today. The truth is that they would have been considered liberal-modernists in 1976, and remain so today. They are considered conservative and orthodox only because the center has moved so far to the left over the past forty years. 

As Anglicans, we are standing at the crossroads. Never have the ecumenical opportunities been greater. We have the opportunity today to fulfill our vocation of being a bridge Church and working to reunite the broken Body of Christ. The other branches of the Catholic Church are beckoning to us, and the Missouri Synod of the Lutheran Church is drawing closer to us as the Catholic Revival in that denomination continues to advance. We may indeed be on the verge of a New Springtime for the Church, and a family reunion that will see the Body of Christ breathing again with both lungs: Eastern and Western. But all of this will be lost if we succumb to the temptation of denominationalism, for as Bishop Iker has said, “Wherever you find departures from this given faith and received order, you will find sectarianism, heresy and error.” There will be absolutely no hope of Catholic reunion if we continue to allow the ordination of women to the presbyterate or the diaconate. None. Claims to the contrary are merely wishful thinking.

In 1961, Dom Anselm Hughes, one-time Prior of Nashdom Abbey, published a book called, The Rivers of the Flood. His book has had a great influence on my life and ministry. In it Dom Anselm Hughes reminds Anglicans of where our loyalty should be. He writes, “The first and most urgent matter to deal with is that of loyalty. Now in the Creed which in its Apostolic version is accepted by all members of the Church, either directly or vicariously, at their baptism; in the Creed which in its Nicene form they recite at every Sunday and feast-day Mass; they pledge their faith in the One Holy Catholic Apostolic Church. This is their first and largest loyalty, and those of whom we have been speaking as the Catholics within the Church of England consist of those to whom this allegiance comes always and instinctively first, and for whom all other loyalties, to the Church of England or the Anglican Communion, are made to rank as subservient to this over-riding, all-embracing, loyalty to the One Holy Church” (p. 146).

The bishops of the Anglican Communion, gathered in 1867 at the Lambeth Conference said, “We do here solemnly record our conviction that unity will be most effectively promoted by maintaining the faith in its purity and integrity, as taught by Holy Scripture, held by the primitive Church, summed up in the Creeds, and affirmed by the undisputed General Councils.” It would be hard to find a more succinct definition of the Orthodox Christian Faith; and there can be no compromise in matters of the Orthodox Faith.

Fr. Victor E. Novak is a priest of the Diocese of Mid-America and the rector of Holy Cross Anglican Church in Omaha, Nebraska. His parish websites are: www.holycrossomaha.net and www.holycrossmedia.com . He can be reached at: venovak@hughes.net or at (402) 573-6558.

PNCC-ACNA DIALOGUE PRESS RELEASE

PNCC-ACNA Dialogue Press Release

Meeting One

The inaugural meeting of the Polish National Catholic Church (PNCC) and the Anglican Church in North America (ACNA) met on June 19-20, 2012 in Scranton, Pennsylvania. This historic meeting was hosted by the PNCC at the National Church Center located on Pittston Avenue.

In attendance for this inaugural meeting were the Primates of both Churches, the Most Reverend Anthony A. Mikovsky, Prime Bishop of the Polish National Catholic Church and the Most Reverend Robert Wm. Duncan, D.D., Archbishop and Primate of the Anglican Church in North America.

The Dialogue members in attendance were the Right Reverend Paul Sobiechowski as Co-Chairman, Right Reverend John E. Mack, Very Reverend Augustin Sicard, Reverend Jaroslaw Rafalko, Reverend Stanley Bilinski, and the Reverend John P. Kowalczyk, Jr. as Secretary for the PNCC. ACNA was represented by the Right Reverend Richard W. Lipka as Co-Chairman, Right Reverend Ray R. Sutton, Abbot Luis A. Gonzalez, OSB, and the Right Reverend Keith L. Ackerman, SSC, DD. Also in attendance was the Ecumenical Officer of the PNCC the Reverend Robert M. Nemkovich, Jr.

The two Churches met on Tuesday starting at 12:00 Noon and concluded with Vespers celebrated by the Primates of the two Churches. The dialogue continued on Wednesday morning with Holy Mass celebrated by the Right Reverend Paul Sobiechowski. This was followed by a presentation by Bishop Sutton on the 39 Articles of Religion and a presentation by Reverend Bilinski on the 11 Great Principles of the Polish National Catholic Church.

The PNCC-ACNA Dialogue will continue on January 29-30, 2013 in Bartonville, IL at Saint Benedict’s Abbey and will be hosted by the Anglican Church in North America.

A NEW SPRINGTIME

I often speak of a coming new Springtime for the Church, and we are seeing it at Holy Cross parish. While summer is often a slow time for churches, there has been no slowdown at Holy Cross. About the only thing that we have discontinued for the summer is our Christian education program (Sunday School). However, Christian education classes for children, youth and adults will resume in September.

Yesterday (June 17th) was the Second Sunday after Trinity and we had forty-six in attendance at the Eucharist with no "drop in" visitors. Actually, we were missing some of our regulars. We have grown from a small church with an average Sunday attendance of under twenty-five to a medium size church. In fact, our attendance on Sunday equaled the median Sunday attendance for congregations of the Anglican Church in North America. Not bad for summer!

Last Wednesday we had eleven at our 12:10 PM Eucharist, with one of our regular attenders out of State. Participation in the Mid-week Eucharist has grown steadily from two or three to half a dozen, and now to more than ten. Only one couple that attends on Wednesdays is retired. Why do parishioners make such an effort, and sacrifice their lunch hour to come to church? Because they have learned from experience that receiving the Sacrament of Holy Communion twice a week can change their lives! We are now planning to increase our weekday Liturgies by adding an early morning Eucharist. After that, I hope to add an early evening celebration, with the goal of eventually having a daily Eucharist. There is nothing that I would rather see than people receiving the Blessed Sacrament throughout the week, and even daily!

We have very active Women's and Men's groups at Holy Cross parish. Last Saturday the Sisters of Holy Cross held their annual fund-raising Rummage Sale. Between a furniture donation that they had auctioned off and the Rummage sale they raised around $1,700.00. The Women's Group plans to send $500.00 to the Board of Foreign Missions in support of the new indigenous Reformed Episcopal Church in Croatia and Serbia, and to buy a new flat screen TV for the parish hall so we can better enjoy our dinner and a movie nights. In August the Sisters of Holy Cross will sponsor our annual Summer Parish Picnic, and will provide scholarships for our fall Hayrack Ride, Bonfire and Potluck. The Men's Group assisted the Women's Group with their Rummage Sale and will be helping out at the picnic as well.

Every month we support the Open Door Mission with food donations. The needs are great. The Open Door Mission is just one of several homeless shelters in the Omaha area, but they serve 1,800 meals every day! Our goal has been to provide them with 100 pounds of food every month, but we have been far surpassing that goal. On Saturday of last week we delivered 236 pounds of food, and that was just for the first half of the month of June!

In Advent and Lent we used Mite Boxes to raise funds for the Anglican Relief and Development Fund. The ARDF raises money to help those most in need, whether it be clean water wells in third world villages or disaster relief in Japan during their recent nuclear crisis.

We have a new ministry at Holy Cross parish called the Holy Cross Love Squad. The Love Squad visits nursing homes, hospitals, Alzheimer's units and other institutions, providing music, companionship and more to the residents. This is a ministry to lonely, hurting and often forgotten people. Jack, our Love Squad Leader is a real dynamo, and Fr. Craig Smith who assists me at Holy Cross serves as chaplain to the group providing spiritual counsel to those who want to talk with a clergyman. Once a month our Love Squad leader picks up a bread donation from a local gourmet sandwich shop and delivers it to the Francis and Siena Houses, two other area homeless shelters.

Thanks to Jesse, our Outreach Director, we have a new media site up on the Internet. The new media site works in conjunction with our parish website, but it has a regional, national and global reach.  Holy Cross Media offers video, audio and podcasts that are designed to help people learn about classical Anglican history, theology, liturgics and spirituality. I hope that you will visit Holy Cross Media, use it, tell your friends about it, and check back often. You can find Holy Cross Media at: www.holycrossmedia.com

Holy Cross Anglican Church is a real parish community rather than just a place to worship. We have fellowship and refreshments in our parish hall every Sunday after Services and a potluck luncheon on the last Sunday of every month. Fellowship is so popular that when my wife and I leave for home in mid-afternoon there is always a group of men still there, drinking coffee and talking not about sports but about theology and church history!

During Lent we began providing Nursery Care for children under the age of four during our 10:00 AM Eucharist, and it has become very popular. We are a youthful congregation with a number of young families with small children. The Nursery cares for the children through the sermon, after which they join the adults for the rest of the Service. I even enjoy hearing a little fussing from the little ones in the pews. It is a sign of a healthy and growing church!

Morning Prayer is at 9:30 AM followed by the Holy Communion at 10:00 AM. We have a proper balance of Word and Sacrament in every Sunday Liturgy. We preach real sermons where we explain the Scripture lessons and teach the Faith. Now that we are in Trinity Season I have begun a sermon series on the Catechism of the Book of Common Prayer. The first of the series was presented last Sunday, but don't worry if you missed it. The series is being filmed and each week's lesson will soon be up  on Holy Cross Media.

In addition to all of these ministries I have two priests to assist me, three lay readers and chalice bearers, an acolyte, and a Pro-Life Coordinator. We also have an excellent Prayer Chain which has been a real blessing to those in need. Whenever an emergency situation arises the Prayer Chain springs into action, and within a very short time the parish is praying by name and need for the situation.

Less than half of the people at Holy Cross parish come to us from Anglican or Episcopal backgrounds. Our people come from many Christian traditions and none. We have people that come from as diverse of backgrounds as the Assemblies of God and Roman Catholicism, the LDS and Eastern Orthodoxy. 

The Work has prospered here. I am a full time rector and we support our diocese every month. We have already added about 50% more space to our leased facility and have outgrown that. We have a Building Committee and are wanting to build or buy our own church building. Buying would be more cost effective in the present economy, so we are actively looking at church buildings that are for sale. However, we have an immediate need for space, and more space adjoining us to the West is about to come open. Our Senior Warden and I plan to look at it tomorrow.

Don't let anyone tell you that you have to conform to the world and reinvent Anglicanism to grow. Holy Cross is a growing, active and thriving parish, and we are on fire for the Lord. You won't find anything new here. No trendy worship, watered down theology, or compromised morality. We are a classical Anglican parish using the Liturgy of the 1928 Book of Common Prayer and the 1940 Hymnal.

Our worship is accompanied by a church organ, we use pews and kneelers, celebrate facing the altar, and partake of the sacrament kneeling. We abstain from meat on Fridays, fast during Lent, support the church with our tithes and offerings, and our mission is to proclaim the Gospel of Jesus Christ to those who do not know Him, and the fullness of the Apostolic Faith to those who do.

Rome has learned the same lesson. They have freed up their traditional Roman Liturgy, and reformed the Novus Order to make it more in line with tradition and to improve its beauty and reverence. Don't sell the Faith short and don't shortchange the people. Preach the truth in love, teach the Word, use the historic Book of Common Prayer, sing the great hymns of the Church, lift the hearts of the people to the Throne of Grace through reverent and inspiring worship, and the church will grow. Rather than repackaging the Faith as some sort of Anglicanism Lite, just give them that Old Time Religion. As the song says, it was good enough for Paul and Silas, and it's good enough for us. That Old Time Religion still changes lives!

THE FILIOQUE CLAUSE IN THE NICENE CREED

Metropolitan Jonah, primate of the Orthodox Church in America, spoke at last week's provincial Assembly of the Anglican Church in North America. In his address he reminded Anglicans of the necessity of removing the Filioque clause from the Nicene Creed if there is to be reunion with the Eastern Churches. The Nicene Creed, or more properly the Nicene-Constantinopolitan Creed was written by the Council of Nicea in 325 and the Council of Constantinople in 381, two of the undisputed seven Ecumenical Councils of the undivided Church. What is the Filioque clause? Filioque is Latin for "and the Son." The Nicene Creed as found in the Book of Common Prayer says that Holy Ghost "proceedeth from the Father and the Son." In the Liturgy booklet used at the Assembly last week the words "and the Son" were in brackets, indicating that they really didn't belong in the text. 

Some Anglicans are confused about this, and a few are indignant. But Metropolitan Jonah and the Eastern Orthodox are right about the Filioque clause, and the Anglican Communion has been in agreement with them for decades about this matter. It has only been the internal turmoil in the Anglican Communion over the last three and a half decades that have caused a delay in its removal. The Filioque clause was not in the Nicene Creed as originally written, does not belong in the Nicene Creed, and the sooner that it is officially removed the better it will be for our Church and for the cause of Christian unity.

The Oxford Dictionary of the Christian Church says, "It [the Filioque clause] is no part of the original Creed, but is first met with as an interpolation (acc. to the usual texts) at the Third Council of Toledo (589)." The Third Council of Toledo was a Spanish synod called to combat a revival of the Arian heresy in Spain. The Oxford Dictionary of the Christian Church continues, "In 796 its use was defended by Paulinus of Aquileia at the Synod of Friuli and from c. 800, when the Creed began to be generally chanted in the Mass throughout the Frankish Empire, the words became widely familiar. Its introduction by Frankish Monks in 807 into their monastery at Jerusalem on the Mount of Olives aroused strong but easily understandable opposition from the Eastern monks of St. Sabas, and when the matter was referred to [Pope] Leo III he tried to suppress the addition to the formula while approving the doctrine. He caused the Creed in its original form to be engraved on two silver tables deposited at the tomb of St. Peter. The 'Filioque', however, continued to be sung and soon after 1000 had been adopted also at Rome."

The change in the Creed as formally adopted by the Ecumenical Councils of Nicea and Constantinople was the ultimate cause of the Great Schism or division between Eastern and Western Christendom in 1054. At the time of the Reformation, when the Anglican Church was finally able to regain her self-governing status that had been lost to Rome as a result of the Norman invasion of 1066, the Church of England had been reciting the Filioque clause in the Creed for centuries. We received this interpolation by inheritance from Rome, and continue to include it in our Prayer Books.

More than a century ago the Anglican Communion and the Eastern Orthodox Churches began to dialogue with one another. Soon a great interest in regaining the unity that was lost in 1066, led to serious reunion conferences. Repeatedly over the past century, in the days of its orthodoxy, the Anglican Communion has agreed that the Filioque clause was not part of the original Creed, was uncanonically interpolated into the Creed centuries after it was written, is the cause of division among Christians, and must be removed. 

For instance, The Moscow Agreed Statement of 1976 says, "The Anglican members therefore agree that:

(a) because the original form of the Creed referred to the origin of the Holy Spirit from the Father,

(b) because the Filioque clause was introduced into this Creed without the authority of an Ecumenical Council and without due regard for Catholic consent, and

(c) because this Creed constitutes the public confession of the faith of the people of God in the Eucharist,

the Filioque clause should not be included in this Creed."

The last Anglican-Orthodox agreed statement was in 1984. With the ordination of women by the Church of England in 1994, all serious reunion dialogue ended. The Dublin Agreed Statement of 1984 says, "Further discussions on the Filioque led to the reaffirmation by both Anglican and Orthodox of the agreement reached in Moscow in 1976 that this phrase should not be included in the Nicene-Constantinopolitan Creed. Certain Anglican Churches have already acted upon this recommendation, whilst others are still considering it.

"From the theological point of view the Orthodox stated that the doctrine of the Filioque is unacceptable, although as expressed by Augustine, it is capable of an Orthodox interpretation. According to the Orthodox understanding the Son cannot be considered a cause or co-cause of the existence of the Holy Spirit. In spite of this we find certain Fathers, for example St. Maximus the Confessor (7th century), as explained by Anastasius the Librarian (9th century), the opinion that the Filioque, as used in early Latin theology, can be understood in an Orthodox way. According to this interpretation a distinction should be made between two senses of procession, one by which the Father causes the existence of the Spirit and the other by which the Spirit shines forth from the Father and the Son. This second sense of procession must be clearly differentiated from the later Western use of the Filioque which observed no distinction but rather confused 'cause of existence' with  'communication of essence'.  Some Orthodox theologians, while affirming that the doctrine of the Filioque is unacceptable for the Orthodox Church, at the same time, having in mind the position of Professor Bolotov (1854-1900) and his followers, regard the Filioque as a 'theologoumenon' in the West." 

St. Augustine and other early Western Church Fathers may have used the Filioque in their theological writings, but they did not recite it in the Creed. As The Dublin Agreed Statement of 1984 says, "the Filioque, as used in early Latin theology, can be understood in an Orthodox way."  The problem is that the Filioque clause was added to the Creed uncanonically, and that after the Great Schism the Western use of the Filioque changed theologically in a way that could no longer be considered orthodox, although some Orthodox theologians are willing to regard the Filioque as a Western theologoumenon (theological opinion). It is sometimes argued that the Athanasian Creed contains the Filioque clause so it must have been used anciently, and it does in the West just as it is included in the Nicene Creed, but the Eastern Orthodox Churches also make use of the Athanasian Creed in the Liturgy of the Hours where it is found without the Filioque clause.

The goal of the English Reformation was to restore the Faith of the undivided Church. In 1562, Anglican Bishop John Jewel wrote, "We have returned to the Apostles and the old Catholic Fathers. We have planted no new religion, but only preserved the old that was undoubtedly founded and used by the Apostles of Christ and other holy Fathers of the Primitive Church" (Apologia Ecclesiae Anglicanae).

Metropolitan Jonah has given us an opportunity to complete the reunion talks that were ended after the introduction of the purported "ordination" of women years ago. The Anglican Church in North America must do three things: 1) abolish the ordination of women to the diaconate and presbyterate, 2) remove the Filioque clause from the Creed, and 3) reaffirm the Faith of the undivided Church. After decades of study and dialogue, the Anglican Communion agreed to remove the Filioque clause in The Moscow Agreed Statement of 1976, and reaffirmed that agreement in The Dublin Agreed Statement of 1984. There is really nothing more to discuss. We have rightly agreed to remove an interpolation from the Creed, and it is time that we fulfill our promise.

Let us move swiftly in completing the New Reformation and the renewal of the Anglican Church so that we may fulfill our mission to be a bridge Church, healing the Great Schism between East and West. What a blessing it will be to live in a new era of the undivided Church and to feel the renewed strength of the Body of Christ breathing again with both lungs, Eastern and Western. That will be a New Springtime for the Church, a grace-filled restoration of Christendom, a new hope for the world, and the flowering of the new evangelization. May God speed the day, and may we do our part. Amen and Amen!

NEW ANGLICAN MEDIA MINISTRY LAUNCHED

On Trinity Sunday Holy Cross Anglican Church went live with its newest outreach: Holy Cross Media. This new ministry has been in the works for more than a year now. Jesse Nigro, the new editor and publisher of The North American Anglican Journal and a parishioner at Holy Cross parish, is the director of this outreach. Our mission is to proclaim the Gospel of Jesus Christ to those who do not know Him, and the fullness of the Apostolic Faith to those who do.

Through Holy Cross Media we hope to extend our outreach to people all across the country and around the world. This new website will give people everywhere access to video, audio and print media that will deepen their knowledge and understanding of the Gospel, Church history, and of classical Anglican theology, worship and spirituality.

At Holy Cross Media you will find a video introduction to the historic Anglican liturgy, and a growing number of sermons, podcasts, lectures, discussions and articles, as well as access to my blog, and links to the Holy Cross parish website and Face Book page, the website of The North American Anglican Journal, and more. The content of Holy Cross Media will be constantly changing, so I hope that you will check back often.

I would like to thank Jesse and his wife Ashley for all of their hard work in getting this new outreach launched. I would also like to thank the owners and staff of Big Picture Productions who donated so generously of their time, talent, equipment and resources to produce the video of the Anglican liturgy and to put the media site together.

We would like to partner with other orthodox Anglican congregations in proclaiming the Gospel of Jesus Christ and advancing the new reformation and renewal of Anglicanism and the ongoing realignment in the Anglican Communion by inviting Anglican churches and ministries in America and abroad to link their websites to Holy Cross Media and to utilize this ministry to assist them in their work. 

Readers of my blog and users of Holy Cross Media can assist Holy Cross Anglican Church in its mission by supporting our work with your prayers and offerings. You can donate to Holy Cross Anglican Church safely and securely through Paypal. Just go to Holy Cross Media and click the donate icon. Together, we can change lives!

You can access Holy Cross Media at: www.holycrossmedia.com

  

WHAT WE BELIEVE

Our mission at Holy Cross Anglican Church is to proclaim the Gospel of Jesus Christ and teach classical Anglican faith and practice. You won’t find anything new here, just “the faith which was once delivered unto the saints” (Jude 3 ). 

The Gospel was brought to the British Isles by St. Joseph of Arimathea, the disciple who buried Christ after the crucifixion. Gildas the Wise (AD 425-512), an early British historian wrote, “Christ, the True Sun, afforded His light, the knowledge of his precepts to our island in the last year, as we know, of Tiberius Caesar.” The last year of Tiberius Caesar was AD 37, just a few years after the resurrection and ascension of Christ! The Church has existed in Britain from that time until today without a break in its continuity, and has since spread all around the world.

In the 16th century the bishops of the Anglican Church launched a Reformation to cleanse the Church from medieval doctrinal and moral corruptions and to restore the faith and practice of the early Church. In 1562, Anglican Bishop John Jewel wrote, “We have returned to the Apostles and the old Catholic Fathers. We have planted no new religion, but only preserved the old that was undoubtedly founded and used by the Apostles of Christ and other holy Fathers of the Primitive Church.” And Archbishop John Bramhall (1594-1663) of Armagh in Ireland wrote, “I make not the least doubt in the world, but that the Church of England before the Reformation and the Church of England after the Reformation are as much the same Church as a garden before it is weeded and after it is weeded is the same garden; or a vine before it is pruned and after it is pruned and freed from luxuriant branches is one and the same vine.”

The canon of Convocation which imposed subscription to the Thirty-nine Articles of Religion upon the clergy in the reign of Elizabeth I, directed preachers “to be careful that they never teach ought in a sermon, to be religiously taught and held by the people, except what is agreeable to the doctrine of the Old and New Testaments, and what the Catholic fathers and ancient bishops have collected out of the same doctrine.” Dr. E. B. Pusey, the great 19th century Anglican theologian wrote, “The Church of England has, from the Reformation held implicitly, in purpose of heart, all which the ancient Church ever held” (The Rule of Faith, p. 42).

Classical Anglicanism combines Evangelical Truth and Catholic Order.  Anglicanism, when it is true to itself, is Evangelical Catholicism. As Evangelicals we are Biblical Christians who proclaim the centrality of the cross, emphasize the necessity of personal conversion, and are committed to evangelism and activism. As Catholics we are Churchmen, committed to the historic visible Church which is the Body of which Christ is the Head, possess the Catholic ministry of male bishops, presbyters  (priests) and deacons in Apostolic Succession, emphasize the three Creeds as faithful summaries of orthodox Christian doctrine, believe in the sacraments as objective means of grace with the Holy Eucharist as the center and summit of our spirituality, and proclaim the universal call to holiness.

Orthodox Anglicanism is both thoroughly Evangelical and fully Catholic. Holy Cross parish is committed to the classical Anglican formularies: the historic Book of Common Prayer and its Ordinal and Catechism, the Thirty-nine Articles of Religion, and the two Books of Homilies, interpreted according to the Canon of St. Vincent of Lerins; and to embracing the fullness of our Anglican inheritance: the Church Fathers, Doctors, Reformers, Caroline Divines, and Tractarians. 

After the cultural and social revolution of the 1960s and 1970s the Universal Church is in need of a New Reformation, a restoration of  Apostolic faith and practice, and a revival of Evangelical witness and mission in an increasingly secular world. Holy Cross parish is committed to proclaiming the Gospel, teaching classical Anglicanism, and to advancing the New Reformation and realignment in the Anglican Communion. 

Because the Anglican Church is both thoroughly Evangelical and fully Catholic, Anglicanism has a special vocation to serve as a healing balm in a divided Christendom and as  a bridge Church to bring Christians back together again in one Body. This is authentic ecumenism, not a false ecumenism based on doctrinal indifference and political compromise. 

The bishops of the world-wide Anglican Communion, gathered in 1867 at the Lambeth Conference said, “We do here solemnly record our conviction that unity will be be most effectively promoted by maintaining the faith in its purity and integrity, as taught by Holy Scripture, held by the primitive Church, summed up in the Creeds, and affirmed by the undisputed General Councils.” It would be hard to find a more succinct definition of the orthodox Christian faith. It is this faith that we hold, confess and teach.

I hope that you will accept my personal invitation to worship with us at Holy Cross Anglican Church. We have members throughout Eastern Nebraska, in Western Iowa, and even South Dakota. Why are people willing to drive so far to go to church? Because they have found a church worth the drive. We celebrate the Holy Communion every Sunday at 10:00 AM, with fellowship and refreshments after worship and a potluck luncheon on the last Sunday of the month. We are a faithful and friendly church, and we have a place for you!