The General Synod of the Church of England took place this past week in London. I mentioned it earlier this week, referencing particularly the debate that was to occur regarding the Church of England's relationship with the Anglican Church in North America, since that was the most interesting item on the agenda for me. Below is the video recording of Lorna Ashworth presenting her Private Member's Motion. You can also watch the debate that followed (part 1, part 2).

Also of interest was the address by the Archbishop of Canterbury, Rowan Williams. He addressed the idea of human freedom and emphasized the need to listen and learn from each other.

If you refer to my earlier post, I provided a variety of links with more reading on Synod. Those sites now have their post-Synod thoughts online, offering a variety of viewpoints on what transpired. Also, you can find the official press release from the ACNA online here.

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Somewhat to even my surprise, I have taken quite a bit of interest in the General Synod of the Church of England this year. In the last few weeks I heard that there is to be a discussion surrounding the Anglican Church in North America (ACNA) and whether or not the Church of England should enter into communion with that body. A number of students and staff here at RTS attend or are on staff with churches joined with the ACNA, and so I have had the opportunity to become more familiar with it over the past few years. I have been reading different things around the internet to try and get some perspective on the issue, but there is a lot of material to work through.

The woman who initially raised what is called a "private member's motion," Lorna Ashworth, published a document highlighting a number of what she calls injustices done by the Episcopal Church in the US against various bishops and clergy, including the deposition of men like J.I. Packer. She writes, "It is my desire to give Synod an opportunity to hear about the unfair treatment of people who have continued to maintain the Anglican faith in doctrine, practice and worship, and to express their continuing fellowship with them as loyal Anglicans." Expressed at the beginning of the motion is her desire to see the Church of England to enter into communion with the ACNA, the proposal of which will be discussed by the Synod on this coming Wednesday.

What makes this interesting is that, technically speaking, the ACNA is a schismatic body. Ashworth states that a number of bishops and clergy had been deposed from the Anglican Communion, but many others have voluntarily withdrawn and together formed the new organization. What would be the implications of the Church of England were to enter into communion with the ACNA? What does such a move convey?

It is no secret that the Anglican Communion worldwide is in trouble; it has been in such a state for quite some time now, as the GAFCON conference in 2008 brought to the forefront in a very visible way. Many conservative bodies around the world (such as the ACNA) demonstrated their difficulties with the pervasive liberalism in the Anglican Communion and its departure from general biblical teaching. So if the Church of England were to enter into communion with one of these conservative bodies, is that an indication of perhaps a new direction in the Anglican Communion? I know it is very premature to be talking about something like that, but it must be on a few people's minds, right? Then again, I may be totally off the mark.

For more information, be sure to visit the General Synod Blog. You can also check out Thinking Anglicans, who are regularly posting other documents and links to discussions on the matter, as well as the Church Mouse Blog. Additionally, many clergy and bishops can be found on Twitter via the lists compiled on the Twurch of England account, and they are using the hashtag #synod to keep track of what's going this week.

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In my spare time—well, actually when I should doing schoolwork—I have been reading some on the history of Anglicanism. Having known very little about the tradition, I wanted to get a better picture of its roots. It was only recently that I learned of the great influence some of the continental Reformers had on Anglicanism during its most formative time, like Peter Martyr Vermigli and Martin Bucer, who both spent many years there, and John Calvin, whose influence spread through his writings.

The most notable Reformer in the English tradition is Thomas Cranmer. Church history classes I have taken in the past have touched on his life and work, but my knowledge of him was rather limited. One of the books I have been reading is Stephen Neill's 1958 study, simply called Anglicanism. Early on, discussing Cranmer's influence in the English Reformation, he writes the following:

It is to be noted that Cranmer, like the other Reformers, had fallen in love with the Bible. But his love took a particular form. He believed that the Bible was the living word of God to every man, and that it comes with the greatest power when unaccompanied by any human gloss, comment, or exposition. He was convinced that, if his fellow countrymen could be induced to read the word of God, or, if illiterate, to hear it read, it would in course of time make its way into their hearts and consciences.

Neill writes that the composition of the Book of Common Prayer was, without measure, the most significant contribution Cranmer made to the Church in the Reformation era. Whereas the genius of men like Calvin lay in their theological contributions, for Cranmer it was formulating a liturgy saturated with Scripture. Neill continues:

It was only in the next reign [of Edward VI] that Cranmer was able to provide his Church with a lectionary; when he was able to do so, he made the Church of England in a day the greatest Bible-reading Church in the world. In no other Church anywhere is the Bible read in public worship so regularly, with such order, and at such length, as in the Anglican fellowship of Churches. In making such provision, Cranmer was laying heavy demands on his Englishmen, and reposing great confidence in them. But in that too he was the typical Anglican—Anglicanism is a form of the Christian faith that demands and expects a great deal from ordinary people.

In those churches which still use the Book of Common Prayer, Cranmer's influence lives on. It is quite something to worship with an Anglican congregation and see how Scripture saturates the liturgy, and to know that this was the work of Cranmer himself. I find it quite significant that Neill sees the Anglican tradition defined by its worship, as opposed to a tradition like my own, which is characterized much more by its theology.

And so Neill writes, "We have no English Luther or Calvin...[instead] we have as our chief reformer the man who had a greater genius for liturgical worship than any other of whom we have record in the whole history of the Church."

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I grew up (and largely remain in, as this is characteristic of large swathes of evangelicalism) a tradition that placed a high value on a person's ability to pray on the spot. A sign of spiritual maturity was that you could say something unique and profound every time you prayed, even if the prayers often became tediously verbose.

Honestly, I still feel a tinge of guilt when I am fumbling for words as I pray. So the other day when I picked up N. T. Wright's recent book, Simply Christian, I felt a great deal of comfort in reading these words.

There's nothing wrong with having a form of words composed by somebody else. Indeed, there's probably something wrong with not using such a form. Some Christians, some of the time, can sustain a life of prayer entirely out of their own internal resources, just as there are hardy mountaineers (I've met one) who can walk the Scottish highlands in their bare feet. Most of us need boots; not because we don't want to do the walking ourselves, but because we do...

There is nothing wrong, nothing sub-Christian...about using words, set forms, prayers, and sequences of prayers written by other people in other centuries. Indeed, the idea that I must always find my own words, that I must generate my own devotion from scratch every morning, that unless I think of new words I must be spiritually lazy or deficient—that has the all-to-familiar sign of human pride, of 'doing it my way': of, yes, works-righteousness. Good liturgy—other people's prayers, whether for corporate or individual use—can be, should be, a sign and means of grace, an occasion of humility (accepting that someone else has said, better than I can, what I deeply want to express) and gratitude. How many times have I been grateful, faced with nightfalls both metaphorical and literal, for the old Anglican prayer which runs,

Lighten our darkness, we beseech thee, O Lord;
and by thy great mercy
defend us from all perils and dangers of this night;
for the love of thy only Son,
our Savior Jesus Christ. Amen.

Using formed prayers is relatively new to me, and at times I feel awkward trying to pray the words. The more I do it, though, the more I am learning to understand what Wright is saying here. More significantly, I'm learning to cherish the resultant intimate connection with the body of Christ that transcends space and time, and to mine the treasures of wisdom and devotion which they left us.

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We attended a local Anglican church today. The church we usually attend does not typically observe the liturgical calender, with the exception of the major holidays, so it kind of slipped my mind that today was All Saints' Day (although last night being Halloween should have tipped me off). We heard the beautiful words of this collect from the Book of Common Prayer:

Almighty God, who hast knit together thine elect in one communion and fellowship in the mystical body of Your Son, Christ our Lord: Give us grace so to follow Your blessed saints in all virtuous and godly living, that we may come to those ineffable joys that thou hast prepared for those who unfeignedly love thee; through the same Jesus Christ our Lord, who with thee and the Holy Spirit liveth and reigneth, one God, in glory everlasting. Amen.

And, of course, the words of Hebrews 12:1-2 are fitting for this day as well.

Therefore, since we are surrounded by so great a cloud of witnesses, let us also lay aside every weight, and sin which clings so closely, and let us run with endurance the race that is set before us, looking to Jesus, the founder and perfecter of our faith, who for the joy that was set before him endured the cross, despising the shame, and is seated at the right hand of the throne of God.

We can't forget that although the saints have come to that "ineffable joy" the collect speaks of—indeed, how could the being in the presence of God be described in any other way—that joy is not yet complete. Only when Christ returns in glory will that joy be fully complete, where we will enjoy, in the deepest sense of the word, the glory of His consummated Kingdom and the new creation. Indeed, that is the goal of this race which we run.

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