Bishop Duncan Speaks at Mere Anglicanism: The Elizabethan Settlement is Collapsing

Many thanks to +Matt Kennedy for posting his copious notes from the address given by Bishop Bob Duncan at the Mere Anglicanism conference.  This is a significant address and one worth trotting over to Stand Firm and reading in its entirety.  There is no question, as one commentor on Stand Firm said, that +Duncan "gets it."

Bishop Duncan's words always connect with me, but one part of his address particularly hit home as distilling where we are right now, in the context of where Anglicanism stands relative to the historic Elizabethan Settlement:

"And what has happened is that that consensus has disintegrated. The substance of the settlement, not the idea itself, has disintegrated. A new consensus has to emerge and we are a long way from that.

The systems that characterized the Elizabethan settlement, there were three:

1. Anglicanism was agreed to be under the Word. Are we there now? No. We use these words sometimes but they no longer have the same meaning. The settlement was that the church was to be under the Word.

2. The second thing that was true is that the Settlement: was under the prayerbook. We don’t have that anymore. There is nothing in terms of our prayer that is common. There is nothing that might lead us to believe that what we pray is really what we believe. We no longer pray the same things so we no longer believe the same things. The book has collapsed. The book was our magisterium. We did not have a Roman Magisterium. We had a book. It was our articulation of doctrine. It was the theological construct in which we prayed. But just like the word that we believed judged us rather that us it, the book has collapsed.

Third: the Settlement exchanged an international leader for a local leader (pope to king). All this took place under British systems. Theses systems were remarkable. Even after the collapse of the Empire everyone was still under the systems. Who calls the primates together? Who gives the mandate to the ACC and who appoints the General Secretary? The consensus that had existed that was the settlement and the settlement worked in a system.

The system has worked, the settlement has worked for 400 years, but the agreement that authority rests in the bible, in the prayerbook and the English church system…all of that is collapsing."

This hit very much home to me.  I was raised Methodist and came to the Episcopal Church through my wife and her family.  One of the things that I grew to most like and appreciate about the Episcopal Church was the comforting "same-ness" of the beautiful liturgy, yes, even in the 1979 versions.  As I learned about Anglicanism I grew to love even more the older versions of the prayer book, particularly the 1789 version (of which I have an original copy once carried by a Civil War soldier through the battles of 1864-65 in Virginia).  As I learned to love the Episcopal liturgy, I realized that one thing that had been bothering me as a Methodist is that the Order of Worship was constantly changed, seemingly on whim or fancy as the Minister may like from week to week.  Corinne says she cannot tell the beginning from the middle from the end of a Methodist service.  I also realized that receiving the Eucharist weekly was important to me, as opposed to monthly or even quarterly in the Methodist Church.

What changed all that?  I still love the liturgies, but my ability to fully participate in them has been very badly damaged.  As +Duncan says, "There is nothing in terms of our prayer that is common. There is nothing that might lead us to believe that what we pray is really what we believe. We no longer pray the same things so we no longer believe the same things."  I have found myself feeling very discomfited by reciting things and making responses, not to mention listening to clergy, when what is being said from the BCP is wholly inconsistent with the statements being made and positions being taken by national and diocesan leadership all over the country.  We ask our new ordinands and baptism candidates to agree to abide with the "Doctrine, Discipline and Worship" of the church, but leadership and Bishops apparently do not consider themselves similarly bound.

The clearest example of this problem is in the recitation of the Nicene Creed.  I cannot make myself say "We" believe in doing so, because that is not an honest statement, and I am not in the habit of making dishonest statements when avowing my faith in God.  "We" clearly do NOT believe in all that is recited in the Nicene Creed - all one has to do is read some of the speeches, articles and interviews by the Archbishop of Canterbury, the Presiding Bishop and many of our Bishops and clergy over the last few years to find an ersatz theology that has little to do with the historic faith handed down by the saints.  "I" do believe all that is in the Nicene Creed and the only way I can make an honest statement is to use the personal pronoun "I" which has gotten me a few strange looks.

The simple truth is that +Duncan is right.  Schism has already happened.  We are really down to the point where the remaining questions are who ends up in which camp and who gets the property?  Any notions of real "Anglican unity" are little more than nostalgic memories from the youth of our older members.  If the Anglican world could simply accept this notion, much as someone with an addiction must first accept that he/she has a problem before getting help, then perhaps we could all move forward and get on with our real mission to love and serve the Lord.

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