Readers may recall from our General Synod in May that legal advice was to be sought from the Communion as to the compatibility between the Covenant and the ACC Constitution:
"4. Requests the Standing Committee of the Anglican Communion to obtain an opinion from the Legal Advisor to the Anglican Consultative Council and from the Chancellors and Legal Advisors Committee of this church regarding the appropriateness of the provisions of Clause 4.2.8 of the proposed Covenant in relation to decisions regarding membership of the Anglican Consultative Council;"
According to the ACI and a recent posting there regarding continuing questions, seemingly without adequate answers, about the legal status of the Standing Committee of the Communion, this is where we are at:
"we note that our original paper dealt in large part with the possible incompatibility of the new Articles with the Anglican Covenant now being considered by the member churches. Canon Rees does not even mention the Covenant in his interview, notwithstanding the fact that he has just rendered legal advice to the standing committee in response to a question raised by the province of Aotearoa, New Zealand and Polynesia suggesting that the Covenant and ACC constitution are not compatible. This advice has not been made public even as the Covenant is being considered for adoption by the member churches. How can they make an informed decision on adoption when this issue has been addressed by the legal advisor but not all the churches have been informed of the answer?" [my italics]
So, where is that advice and when will we, the hoi polloi of ACANZP find out?
Now, to the north-west of Down Under, Michael Poon joins with ACI in asking questions of Canon Rees. And offers this tantalising comment (noticed on Stand Firm):
"The controversy on the new ACC Constitution may well derail the already difficult processes in the adoption of the Anglican Communion Covenant. Churches in the southern continents may well be tempted to look for more radical alternatives for a more permanent solution to recent Anglican disputes." [my italics]
The thing about Anglicans is that, in the end, we do not like sectarianism in our midst. We crave 'communion'. And we prefer it to be on satisfactory terms!
Sharpen up, team ACO!!
Monday, August 16, 2010
Saturday, August 14, 2010
The gospel is truth
From an unexpected quarter comes some help in reflecting on the question, 'What is the gospel?'
A couple of days ago the biggest and most popular ski-field in my province of Canterbury, Mt Hutt, was hit by 200km/h winds and not only had to stop skiing but also close down its access road, resulting in 900 or so people spending an unexpected sleepover in the ski-field cafe! Now the inquest begins, with the question, Given the weather forecast, should the ski-field have opened at all that day?
"It was a big call to close the skifield on a weather forecast as they often proved wrong, [Mt Hutt Ski Area manager Dave Wilson] said.
"We've seen them predict 120kmh winds and it gets to 70, and when you're sitting there in the morning and saying they're predicting that but it's calm now, we could be closing a lot more if we took it as absolute gospel," he said.
MetService chief forecaster Peter Kreft said a severe-gale forecast was the strongest wind level and indicated mean wind speeds of at least 90kmh."
Absolute gospel!
Here gospel is a synonym for 'truth', but it is used in a context of making an important decision with grave consequences (possible financial loss, skier frustration, risk to life). The speaker would not have talked about 'absolute gospel' if asked whether it was true that 2+2=4 or that a cup of coffee in the skifield cafe costs $4.
What is the gospel? The development of the English language has preserved an important part of the answer: the gospel is something true with grave consequences. A significant, non-trivial truth! Even in a post-modern world, 'gospel' naturally draws to its side the word 'absolute.'
More soon ...
A couple of days ago the biggest and most popular ski-field in my province of Canterbury, Mt Hutt, was hit by 200km/h winds and not only had to stop skiing but also close down its access road, resulting in 900 or so people spending an unexpected sleepover in the ski-field cafe! Now the inquest begins, with the question, Given the weather forecast, should the ski-field have opened at all that day?
"It was a big call to close the skifield on a weather forecast as they often proved wrong, [Mt Hutt Ski Area manager Dave Wilson] said.
"We've seen them predict 120kmh winds and it gets to 70, and when you're sitting there in the morning and saying they're predicting that but it's calm now, we could be closing a lot more if we took it as absolute gospel," he said.
MetService chief forecaster Peter Kreft said a severe-gale forecast was the strongest wind level and indicated mean wind speeds of at least 90kmh."
Absolute gospel!
Here gospel is a synonym for 'truth', but it is used in a context of making an important decision with grave consequences (possible financial loss, skier frustration, risk to life). The speaker would not have talked about 'absolute gospel' if asked whether it was true that 2+2=4 or that a cup of coffee in the skifield cafe costs $4.
What is the gospel? The development of the English language has preserved an important part of the answer: the gospel is something true with grave consequences. A significant, non-trivial truth! Even in a post-modern world, 'gospel' naturally draws to its side the word 'absolute.'
More soon ...
Friday, August 13, 2010
Chicanery
I use 'chicanery' here in the motor-racing sense of trying to get from A to B by making some deft steering manouvres. This is what Right Reverend Dr Glenn Davies appears to have attempted in presenting the Sydney case for the legality of its synodical decision to authorise diaconal and lay presidency. Smart racing drivers do not drive into obstacles but around them so it is interesting to read that +Glenn offered no arguments in favour of lay presidency. But his attempts to justify diaconal presidency involve chicane driving around the words 'administration' and 'assist'. But to no avail. The Australian Anglican church has waved the red flag.
You can read about it briefly here at Thinking Anglicans (and then links to news media reports), read the Tribunal's report here, or read all the Tribunal's reports here.
You can read about it briefly here at Thinking Anglicans (and then links to news media reports), read the Tribunal's report here, or read all the Tribunal's reports here.
What the gospel is not!
Trying to answer the question 'what is the gospel?', it may be useful to first set down what the gospel is not. But before that, a brief acknowledgement that what the gospel is involves some diversity of expression (as we will see in future posts). Then, a possibly helpful analogy to get us going.
Take the concept of 'health'. Some diversity of expression of 'health' is reasonable. Here in Aotearoa New Zealand, for instance, we have found it useful to understand 'health' for Maori and 'health' for Pakeha (European-background Kiwis) in different ways with consequences for different approaches to diagnosis and treatment. To give a one example, the communal aspect of Maori culture means that the presence of whanau (extended family) with a patient in hospital, to the extent of several people sleeping near the patient each night, can be vital to recovery. But these differences should not obscure the fact that a cancer growing inside a Maori body is the same as a cancer growing inside a Pakeha body, and if radiotherapy will treat the cancer in one, it will treat it in the other. So some difference of expression of 'health' between Maori and Pakeha is reasonable, but what is not reasonable is to say that one with cancer is 'healthy' and one without cancer is 'healthy'. What 'health' is not is that health means one thing to one person and another thing to another.
So, to what the gospel is not. Briefly, and without citation and argument. I hope things are fairly obvious here!
The gospel is not:
(1) One thing for one people group, or one era in history, and another for a different group or era.
(2) A message for some (those disposed to live by it) but not for others (those disinterested in it). Another way of putting this: the gospel is not the charter or constitution of a hobby group or club called 'church'.
(3) A human proposal up for debate because, like all human proposals it has flaws, needs revising for the needs of the day, etc.
Take the concept of 'health'. Some diversity of expression of 'health' is reasonable. Here in Aotearoa New Zealand, for instance, we have found it useful to understand 'health' for Maori and 'health' for Pakeha (European-background Kiwis) in different ways with consequences for different approaches to diagnosis and treatment. To give a one example, the communal aspect of Maori culture means that the presence of whanau (extended family) with a patient in hospital, to the extent of several people sleeping near the patient each night, can be vital to recovery. But these differences should not obscure the fact that a cancer growing inside a Maori body is the same as a cancer growing inside a Pakeha body, and if radiotherapy will treat the cancer in one, it will treat it in the other. So some difference of expression of 'health' between Maori and Pakeha is reasonable, but what is not reasonable is to say that one with cancer is 'healthy' and one without cancer is 'healthy'. What 'health' is not is that health means one thing to one person and another thing to another.
So, to what the gospel is not. Briefly, and without citation and argument. I hope things are fairly obvious here!
The gospel is not:
(1) One thing for one people group, or one era in history, and another for a different group or era.
(2) A message for some (those disposed to live by it) but not for others (those disinterested in it). Another way of putting this: the gospel is not the charter or constitution of a hobby group or club called 'church'.
(3) A human proposal up for debate because, like all human proposals it has flaws, needs revising for the needs of the day, etc.
Thursday, August 12, 2010
What is the gospel?
Who needs a Stalin or Pol Pot to destroy Christianity when apparently it can do so of its own accord?
"And now congregation, put your hands together and give thanks, for I come bearing Good News. My country, Britain, is now the most irreligious country on earth. This island has shed superstition faster and more completely than anywhere else. Some 63 percent of us are non-believers, according to a 2006 Guardian/ICM poll, while 82 percent say religion is a cause of harmful division. Now, let us stand and sing our new national hymn: Jerusalem was dismantled here/ in England's green and pleasant land.
How did it happen? For centuries, religion was insulated from criticism in Britain. First its opponents were burned, then jailed, then shunned. But once there was a free marketplace of ideas, once people could finally hear both the religious arguments and the rationalist criticisms of them, the religious lost the British people. Their case was too weak, their opposition to divorce and abortion and gay people too cruel, their evidence for their claims non-existent. Once they had to rely on persuasion rather than intimidation, the story of British Christianity came to an end."
Johann Hari's diatribe continues in similar vein here, under the heading "The slow, whining death of British Christianity."
There is, of course, great nonsense at work in the citation above. To say, without qualification, "For centuries, religion was insulated from criticism in Britain. First its opponents were burned, then jailed, then shunned," is to overlook the centuries when opponents of Christianity were converted to Christianity, as well as to overlook the centuries when the British people widely embraced Christianity (but had trouble, for about one century, coping with internal dissent and difference without resorting to bonfires). Then there is nonsense at work in these sentences:
"Their case was too weak, their opposition to divorce and abortion and gay people too cruel, their evidence for their claims non-existent. Once they had to rely on persuasion rather than intimidation, the story of British Christianity came to an end."
I suggest it is far from clear that "opposition to divorce and abortion and gay people" has contributed much to the "story of British Christianity" coming to "an end." Nor is it accurate to pit "persuasion" against "intimidation" as the only dynamics at work in the public face of Christianity in British society over the last few centuries. When the intimidation of the 16th and 17th centuries ended, the story of British Christianity did not come to an end. For starters, it had some vigorous new life in it - Methodism, evangelical revival, the Oxford Movement, the Alpha Course - the last mentioned reminding us that the story is far from over!
Having got that off my chest, I acknowledge that mixed in with the nonsense is a telling point. That point is the ebbing away of belief in the existence of God among British (and Western) people. Almost certainly contributing, since the Enlightenment, has been a perception that we have a "weak case" and "non-existent evidence."
Also contributing, I suggest, has been the confusion we have sown in people's minds by being divided churches. I wonder how many people have wondered, "If Methodists think Anglicans are wrong who think Roman Catholics are wrong who think Pentecostals are wrong ... perhaps they are all wrong!" But those divisions have also reflected our uncertainty in Western Christianity about what the gospel is. The gospel is the power of God for salvation, but has God's power been inhibited in the world by uncertain notes being struck in the proclamation of the gospel? If Christianity is weak then chances are that we have failed to proclaim the gospel with the vitality, urgency, and persuasiveness that in previous times has made Christianity strong.
What is the gospel?
That is the great question Western Christianity needs to focus on in the 21st century. An extremely modest contribution by me will be a few posts over the next period which engage with the question.
Back to Hari. He concludes his diatribe with these words:
"As their dusty Churches crumble because nobody wants to go there, the few remaining Christians in Britain will only become more angry and uncomprehending. Let them. We can't stop [sic, I think he means "let"] this hysterical toy-tossing stop us from turning our country into a secular democracy where everyone has the same rights, and nobody is granted special rights just because they claim their ideas come from an invisible supernatural being. Now, if you'll excuse me, I have a Holy Lamb of God to carve into kebabs - it's our new national dish. Amen, and hallelujah."
Since we are talking about British Christianity and secular democracy in Britain, it is astounding that he should imply here that Christianity as privileged by legislation is the last barrier to the imminent triumphant establishment of secular democracy in every corner and layer of British society. Reference to "kebabs" might have alerted him to the presence of another strong religious force resistant to that triumph which he will have to deal with! I cannot see Islam "crumbling" anytime soon in Britain.
"And now congregation, put your hands together and give thanks, for I come bearing Good News. My country, Britain, is now the most irreligious country on earth. This island has shed superstition faster and more completely than anywhere else. Some 63 percent of us are non-believers, according to a 2006 Guardian/ICM poll, while 82 percent say religion is a cause of harmful division. Now, let us stand and sing our new national hymn: Jerusalem was dismantled here/ in England's green and pleasant land.
How did it happen? For centuries, religion was insulated from criticism in Britain. First its opponents were burned, then jailed, then shunned. But once there was a free marketplace of ideas, once people could finally hear both the religious arguments and the rationalist criticisms of them, the religious lost the British people. Their case was too weak, their opposition to divorce and abortion and gay people too cruel, their evidence for their claims non-existent. Once they had to rely on persuasion rather than intimidation, the story of British Christianity came to an end."
Johann Hari's diatribe continues in similar vein here, under the heading "The slow, whining death of British Christianity."
There is, of course, great nonsense at work in the citation above. To say, without qualification, "For centuries, religion was insulated from criticism in Britain. First its opponents were burned, then jailed, then shunned," is to overlook the centuries when opponents of Christianity were converted to Christianity, as well as to overlook the centuries when the British people widely embraced Christianity (but had trouble, for about one century, coping with internal dissent and difference without resorting to bonfires). Then there is nonsense at work in these sentences:
"Their case was too weak, their opposition to divorce and abortion and gay people too cruel, their evidence for their claims non-existent. Once they had to rely on persuasion rather than intimidation, the story of British Christianity came to an end."
I suggest it is far from clear that "opposition to divorce and abortion and gay people" has contributed much to the "story of British Christianity" coming to "an end." Nor is it accurate to pit "persuasion" against "intimidation" as the only dynamics at work in the public face of Christianity in British society over the last few centuries. When the intimidation of the 16th and 17th centuries ended, the story of British Christianity did not come to an end. For starters, it had some vigorous new life in it - Methodism, evangelical revival, the Oxford Movement, the Alpha Course - the last mentioned reminding us that the story is far from over!
Having got that off my chest, I acknowledge that mixed in with the nonsense is a telling point. That point is the ebbing away of belief in the existence of God among British (and Western) people. Almost certainly contributing, since the Enlightenment, has been a perception that we have a "weak case" and "non-existent evidence."
Also contributing, I suggest, has been the confusion we have sown in people's minds by being divided churches. I wonder how many people have wondered, "If Methodists think Anglicans are wrong who think Roman Catholics are wrong who think Pentecostals are wrong ... perhaps they are all wrong!" But those divisions have also reflected our uncertainty in Western Christianity about what the gospel is. The gospel is the power of God for salvation, but has God's power been inhibited in the world by uncertain notes being struck in the proclamation of the gospel? If Christianity is weak then chances are that we have failed to proclaim the gospel with the vitality, urgency, and persuasiveness that in previous times has made Christianity strong.
What is the gospel?
That is the great question Western Christianity needs to focus on in the 21st century. An extremely modest contribution by me will be a few posts over the next period which engage with the question.
Back to Hari. He concludes his diatribe with these words:
"As their dusty Churches crumble because nobody wants to go there, the few remaining Christians in Britain will only become more angry and uncomprehending. Let them. We can't stop [sic, I think he means "let"] this hysterical toy-tossing stop us from turning our country into a secular democracy where everyone has the same rights, and nobody is granted special rights just because they claim their ideas come from an invisible supernatural being. Now, if you'll excuse me, I have a Holy Lamb of God to carve into kebabs - it's our new national dish. Amen, and hallelujah."
Since we are talking about British Christianity and secular democracy in Britain, it is astounding that he should imply here that Christianity as privileged by legislation is the last barrier to the imminent triumphant establishment of secular democracy in every corner and layer of British society. Reference to "kebabs" might have alerted him to the presence of another strong religious force resistant to that triumph which he will have to deal with! I cannot see Islam "crumbling" anytime soon in Britain.
Wednesday, August 11, 2010
Ad Lucem: the Future of St John's College, Auckland
All education is an exercise in seeking light - knowledge, insight, enlightenment - and theological education and ministry training is no different an exercise. The future of education is always a moving from the relative darkness of the present to the light of the future. In certain ways our church's oldest and best endowed residential theological college, St John's College, is in a shadowy place, having been deemed by our General Synod to be inadequately functioning in governance and management. But its future is 'ad lucem' with new governance and management structures being put in place. Today I believe is the day when the new Commissioner of our residential theological college, Gail Thompson, begins her duties. [Later: a profile is published here in Anglican Taonga]. Were she to talk to me, what would I say to her? Here are five things.
(1) The single most important decision any college of education can make is the appointment of a principal. Gail Thompson knows this already as she has a strong and distinguished background in secondary school principalship (including, most recently, running schools which have fallen on hard times). But I would underline the importance of General Synod's decision in May to bring to an end the dysfunctionality of trying to run our college with three principals and I would press upon her, should it not already be clear, that the single priority of her time between now and General Synod in 2012 is to model with excellence a single principalship of the College. We need our church to be united in agreeing to move from a Commissioner leading the College to appointing a single principal to lead the College beyond 2012.
(2) Notwithstanding any messages our church may have given the College over preceding years about what it wants from the College, what the College most needs to achieve is outstanding graduates who have been well-educated for Anglican ministry and mission. Useful though it has been for St John's College in certain individuals' lives to be a dormitory so they can pursue studies or training in other professions, the one thing which distinguishes St John's College from the multitude of educational institutions which dot our landscape is the opportunity it provides for an outstanding and well-supported education for Anglican ministry and mission. There should not be one residential scholarship at St John's College which is not focused on gaining education and training for ministry and mission.
(3) In relation to (2) the question needs to be asked with vigour and frankness, What will it take for St John's College to be recognised throughout our church as the premium college for ministry and mission education? Or, put in a different way, What will it take for bishops in our church to be beating on the Commissioner's door demanding that the College take their prospective students, only to be told that there is a waiting list for places? The building blocks are already being put in place for a positive answer to these questions, but more needs to be done. Hence (4) and (5).
(4) There is an urgent need for a communications strategy for St John's College. Ad lucem, remember! Too many Anglicans outside of Auckland (perhaps inside as well!) are in the dark about what is happening at the College and, worse, think they know what is happening at the College. Except what they think is happening, and cheerfully tell others is happening is, actually, what was happening two, five or ten years ago. But to be fair to them, when there is no regular newsletter from the College to its alumni, when there is no particular effort made to promote the College or to disseminate news about the College (had you heard about the Commissioner's appointment before reading it here?), then how would anyone know accurately what is happening at the College? Good things are happening at the College, great things are around the corner ... but our church needs to know this.
(5) Stay focused on offering an excellent theological education (via B. Theol. studies available right now at SJC) and an outstanding ministry and mission training programme (via the Anglican Studies programme available right now at SJC). But ask what it will take to draw a long line of applicants to want to enrol for these opportunities (in line with (3) above). Explore how staffing might be developed which excites and inspires future student enrolments: there have been significant retirements in recent years so the College has potential to appoint staff in areas of biblical studies, Christian thought and history, and aspects of ministry training. Speaking of the last of those, some think preaching in our church is pretty dire. What if the College were to appoint a 'Director of Preaching' of such calibre and stature that we in the dioceses without fail sent our budding preachers to learn from this person? And, while I am at it, I suggest thinking creatively about possible appointments. Perhaps (because of the way various things are structured about B. Theol. education), there is no great room for appointing a teaching member of staff in (say, because lack thereof is often lamented) systematic theology, but why not appoint a researching member of staff. One day the Archbishop of Canterbury will retire. A change of scene as Research Professor of Theology at St John's College might do him, and us, good. I can guarantee some keen doctoral students lining him up for supervision!!
So, one final point, communicate well with the St John's College Trust Board. They finance the College to a certain budgeted point each year. But that point can be broken. It has often been said that the Board will fund worthwhile, well-justified theological education and ministry training at the College. Now may be the time to explore the openness of the Board to funding a new vision for St. John's.
(1) The single most important decision any college of education can make is the appointment of a principal. Gail Thompson knows this already as she has a strong and distinguished background in secondary school principalship (including, most recently, running schools which have fallen on hard times). But I would underline the importance of General Synod's decision in May to bring to an end the dysfunctionality of trying to run our college with three principals and I would press upon her, should it not already be clear, that the single priority of her time between now and General Synod in 2012 is to model with excellence a single principalship of the College. We need our church to be united in agreeing to move from a Commissioner leading the College to appointing a single principal to lead the College beyond 2012.
(2) Notwithstanding any messages our church may have given the College over preceding years about what it wants from the College, what the College most needs to achieve is outstanding graduates who have been well-educated for Anglican ministry and mission. Useful though it has been for St John's College in certain individuals' lives to be a dormitory so they can pursue studies or training in other professions, the one thing which distinguishes St John's College from the multitude of educational institutions which dot our landscape is the opportunity it provides for an outstanding and well-supported education for Anglican ministry and mission. There should not be one residential scholarship at St John's College which is not focused on gaining education and training for ministry and mission.
(3) In relation to (2) the question needs to be asked with vigour and frankness, What will it take for St John's College to be recognised throughout our church as the premium college for ministry and mission education? Or, put in a different way, What will it take for bishops in our church to be beating on the Commissioner's door demanding that the College take their prospective students, only to be told that there is a waiting list for places? The building blocks are already being put in place for a positive answer to these questions, but more needs to be done. Hence (4) and (5).
(4) There is an urgent need for a communications strategy for St John's College. Ad lucem, remember! Too many Anglicans outside of Auckland (perhaps inside as well!) are in the dark about what is happening at the College and, worse, think they know what is happening at the College. Except what they think is happening, and cheerfully tell others is happening is, actually, what was happening two, five or ten years ago. But to be fair to them, when there is no regular newsletter from the College to its alumni, when there is no particular effort made to promote the College or to disseminate news about the College (had you heard about the Commissioner's appointment before reading it here?), then how would anyone know accurately what is happening at the College? Good things are happening at the College, great things are around the corner ... but our church needs to know this.
(5) Stay focused on offering an excellent theological education (via B. Theol. studies available right now at SJC) and an outstanding ministry and mission training programme (via the Anglican Studies programme available right now at SJC). But ask what it will take to draw a long line of applicants to want to enrol for these opportunities (in line with (3) above). Explore how staffing might be developed which excites and inspires future student enrolments: there have been significant retirements in recent years so the College has potential to appoint staff in areas of biblical studies, Christian thought and history, and aspects of ministry training. Speaking of the last of those, some think preaching in our church is pretty dire. What if the College were to appoint a 'Director of Preaching' of such calibre and stature that we in the dioceses without fail sent our budding preachers to learn from this person? And, while I am at it, I suggest thinking creatively about possible appointments. Perhaps (because of the way various things are structured about B. Theol. education), there is no great room for appointing a teaching member of staff in (say, because lack thereof is often lamented) systematic theology, but why not appoint a researching member of staff. One day the Archbishop of Canterbury will retire. A change of scene as Research Professor of Theology at St John's College might do him, and us, good. I can guarantee some keen doctoral students lining him up for supervision!!
So, one final point, communicate well with the St John's College Trust Board. They finance the College to a certain budgeted point each year. But that point can be broken. It has often been said that the Board will fund worthwhile, well-justified theological education and ministry training at the College. Now may be the time to explore the openness of the Board to funding a new vision for St. John's.
Monday, August 9, 2010
Do we want to be in the church we wish it could be?
Not much going on in my mind right now. But John Richardson has been doing some thinking about his troubled Church of England and the two 'parties' within it most affected by the consequences of imminent legislation. An excerpt from the whole which is here:
"The Catholic movement did not get where it did by waiting for the Church to enact legislation to provide what it wanted. Yet today it has four dedicated bishops and a dozen or so sympathizers, hundreds of clergy, a multitude of buildings and a host of people. Why, then, is it so much on the back foot?
Now for the Evangelicals. Our problem is simply this: many of us don’t really want to be Church of England, and it shows. As a result, we’ve never organized ourselves to be an effective force within the institution. Instead, we’ve laughed at bishops and ploughed our own individual parish furrows. We’ve never had a vision for the Church of England, because we’ve never really had heart for it. Indeed, for some of us, the prospect of ‘ejection’ is greeted not with gloom but elation, confirming as it does all our prejudices."
A vision for one's church? Now there is a thought! We have a lot of emphasis (in my experience) on vision for one's own local church. Want to grow your church, o vicar? First of all, get a vision, speak it out and make it happen ... but that is always about the parish, scarcely about the diocese, let alone the whole shebang. John Richardson's challenge is to 'think big.'
It is not as though far away Down Under we have no need of that big encompassing vision ...
"The Catholic movement did not get where it did by waiting for the Church to enact legislation to provide what it wanted. Yet today it has four dedicated bishops and a dozen or so sympathizers, hundreds of clergy, a multitude of buildings and a host of people. Why, then, is it so much on the back foot?
Now for the Evangelicals. Our problem is simply this: many of us don’t really want to be Church of England, and it shows. As a result, we’ve never organized ourselves to be an effective force within the institution. Instead, we’ve laughed at bishops and ploughed our own individual parish furrows. We’ve never had a vision for the Church of England, because we’ve never really had heart for it. Indeed, for some of us, the prospect of ‘ejection’ is greeted not with gloom but elation, confirming as it does all our prejudices."
A vision for one's church? Now there is a thought! We have a lot of emphasis (in my experience) on vision for one's own local church. Want to grow your church, o vicar? First of all, get a vision, speak it out and make it happen ... but that is always about the parish, scarcely about the diocese, let alone the whole shebang. John Richardson's challenge is to 'think big.'
It is not as though far away Down Under we have no need of that big encompassing vision ...
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