E=mc2: More spiritual energetics

The faithful, as soon as they wake up and are risen, before beginning work, shall pray to God, and then go to their work. But if there is any instruction in the Word, they shall give this preference and go there to hear the Word of God
for the strengthening of their souls. They shall be zealous to go to the church, where the Spirit flourishes.

St Hippolytus Traditio Apostolica Cap xxxv

I am most interested by the last sentence that St Hippolytus writes here as it issues an enormous challenge to each Parish Church of each and every denomination.

I wrote earlier about the need for the Church to be a place of energising for the people of God - after all, it should be hard work being a Christian. Those of us who hold down full time jobs work at the spiritual coal faces as well, bringing our Christianity into the places where we are. We shouldn't suppress that. Saying that, neither should we force it down people's throats. Let us be content to live our lives as to make people curious about our faith and, further, to want to share it. Then, because we are terribly thirsty, tired and hungry we come to the Church. Remember that lovely old hymn by Horatius Bonar:

I heard the voice of Jesus say, “Come unto Me and rest;
Lay down, thou weary one, lay down Thy head upon My breast.”
I came to Jesus as I was, weary and worn and sad;
I found in Him a resting place, and He has made me glad.

I heard the voice of Jesus say, “Behold, I freely give
The living water; thirsty one, stoop down, and drink, and live.”
I came to Jesus, and I drank of that life giving stream;
My thirst was quenched, my soul revived, and now I live in Him.

I heard the voice of Jesus say, “I am this dark world’s Light;
Look unto Me, thy morn shall rise, and all thy day be bright.”
I looked to Jesus, and I found in Him my Star, my Sun;
And in that light of life I’ll walk, till traveling days are done.

The hymn speaks of the refreshment that we receive in the person of Christ, and of course, Christ is present at Mass for the express intent of nourishing us with His very self as far as we allow Him. However, St Hippolytus points us to an unpalatable truth. He implies strongly that the Church is "where the Spirit flourishes."

This then provides us with a criterion for examining our Parishes very carefully. "Is the Spirit flourishing in your Church?" If the answer is no, then it does cast some doubt as to whether one's Parish is part of the Church.

What are the signs of the Spirit flourishing?

St Paul's letter to the Galatians does tell us about the fruit of the spirit being

Ὁ δὲ καρπὸς τοῦ πνεύματός ἐστιν ἀγάπη, χαρά, εἰρήνη, μακροθυμία, χρηστότης, ἀγαθωσύνη, πίστις, πραΰτης, ἐγκράτεια: κατὰ τῶν τοιούτων οὐκ ἔστιν νόμος.

Galatians v.22

But the fruit of the Spirit is (Unconditional) Love, Joy, Peace (in the Jewish sense this can mean prosperity, health and welfare), Patience (literally the opposite of being quick tempered), Goodness (or Usefulness), Goodness (in the senses of personal integrity and, towards others, beneficence), Faith, Meekness (or forbearance) and Self Control (i.e. continence and temperance): against these things there is no law.

(My Translation)

These things need to be seen in each Parish, and if they aren't then one must ask the question, "what can be done?" But we should not be too perturbed: notice that the translation says that there is only one fruit of the Spirit - the word καρπὸς is singular indicating that this one fruit of the Spirit is transcendental, unifying the list of wonderful virtues. One can take heart then that if just one aspect is found in one's parish, then something is growing. Of course, the goal must be to ensure that all of these aspects are active in our parishes.

Such cultivation can only come about if the Sacraments are distributed and received with due reverence, realising that they are the vehicles by which the grace of God abounds in us. If the Spirit of God was present at the Creation (however it happened, pace O Scientists) then it is clear that this Spirit seeks to put into order rather than to allow chaos to reign. This order has to be considered at the level of the person, of the parish, of the diocese and at the jurisdiction. The fragmentation of the church is an impediment to the order that the Spirit seeks at the level of the jurisdiction, and perhaps it is no wonder that we struggle as Christians. There has been no golden age of the Church, unlike the great golden age of Judaism, or the height of the Roman Empire. Either that is God's plan to keep us humble, or it is because we refuse to seek full order.

That order will come, at the hands of the Prelates in building Christian Unity, but ultimately at the hands of God.

We have a lot to do. If we wish to have the energy to serve God truly, then we must seek to ensure that our Parishes allow access to the wells of living water. How will your Parish work towards this?

Elmore 2009

Well, I left Fr Prior Simon, Dom Bruce, Dom Francis and Dom Kenneth earlier this morning, and I am deeply thankful for their kindness, hospitality and unique Elmoreness.

One gets a true sense of community worshipping with them, and the Veil seems to get thinner every time I go.

But for how much longer?

The average age of these four gentlemen religious is 67. The Abbey is large and the monks rattle around in it whenever it is shaken. Dom Kenneth is a testament to the Benedictine direction of perseverence, as he just keeps on going. But he is finding it hard going, and there seem to be so few people who are willing to help them out. It is certainly no surprise that they are looking for other arrangements. The community of four will survive, but it seems likely that Elmore as an Abbey will go the way of Nashdom and Pershore.

I took the time to review my calling, and to my honest regret, it isn't to be a monk at Elmore - at least yet. I still have work to do at the College (I don't regret that) and so my involvement is limited.

The point is that retreating to Elmore may be a nice way to have a break from work, or to review one's relationship with God, but this is a by-product service that is being provided by the Community. They will welcome all and sundry through the doors because they want to and they are called to do so, but their primary objective is to carry out the Opus Dei - the prayer work of God. Nor should we feel guilty about visiting them provided that we are sympathetic to their ways and seek to aid them by praying well in the offices.

If Elmore is to continue as an Abbey then there must be a very swift influx of young men (i.e. under 45s) willing to take up the full scapula and dedicate their lives to prayer and service. I appreciate that these days this is a rare calling indeed, but I do live in hope. Please remember these very special gentlemen in your prayers - they have some hard decisions to make.

E=mc2: ecclesiastically speaking

Yesterday, of course, was the Feast of Our Lord's Transfiguration on Mout Tabor. I didn't go out to Mass.

The first reason was that I am recovering from the flu (which may or may not have been of the Swine variety) which was sufficiently potent to keep me indoors and away from folk of a more fragile constitution.

The second reason that a Mass for the Feast wasn't actually being offered by the parish, probably moving the celebration to the Sunday.

Why do we have this practice of moving the celebration of important feasts to the nearest Sunday, and forget others completely?

This does seem a modern phenomenon: even I, in my comparative youth, remember the Feasts of Corpus Christi, of the Transfiguration and of St Peter and St Paul's being celebrated with midweek Masses. These days a celebration will only occur if the feast falls on a day when a Mass is being held.

Why? Is it solely because "people don't go to midweek Masses any more", the reason being that they are too tired from working? Is it because the priest is frightened by having too tiny a congregation?

To the numbers obsessed clergy, we can easily warn with the Prophet Zechariah against "despising the day of small things". They are not priests for numbers, they are priests for the glory of God and the service of His Church whether that expression of Church be a Cathedral, or a housing estate in Brixton.

There is an issue as to why people do not come to church on weekdays - because they are too tired from working. Of course we are! Work is hard and we try to do a good job and earn our wage. However this does speak of a sad indictment of how the Church is performing in society.

Consider: one of the reasons for Mass is spiritual nourishment, a re-energising effect on the soul. If our Masses are not giving that energy to the congregation, then there must be something wrong with the way we are doing our Mass. Seeing that Christ Himself speaks of the living water that wells up within each of us for our continuing refreshment, one wonders whether the practices of the Church have rather sought to stem the flow of this water so that coming to Church is more of a chore than a joy.

I've spoken before about the inherent Apathy, Complacency and Apostasy that are infecting our society - "don't care, can't care, won't care". The spiritual problem is that of accidie and seems to have overrun the C of E with it's desitre to distract people with innovation which undermine its own teaching such as the ludicrous service of Wedding-cum-Baptism - how is the Church supposed to speak out against the erosion of the family through fornication now that it liturgically supports it, Dr Williams?

The Church needs to seek ways of energising its congregants. Lack of Energy is a sign of the lack of the Holy Spirit acting in the Church life and in her members, and ultimately leads to a vicious cycle of disenchantment and disbelief.

At the risk of seeming a bit gimmicky and silly, Einstein's (overcited) equation E=mc² could still stand if E stands for the energy derived from Mass, m stands for the quality of the Mass done and c the effort that one puts in to living a prayerful Christian life. I suppose that one could interpret that equation in other ways!

Defining or Dogmatising Anglican Identity

This seems to be a very well-asked question in the debates between Catholic jurisdictions and Sees. What is the Anglican Identity? Does it even exist? Should it even exist? Defining an identity is a terribly tricky – indeed it’s probably impossible. Definitions and Dogmata are intrinsically very different things and really inhabit different spheres of philosophical thought.

Definitions really belong to the mathematical sphere more than anywhere else. When a mathematician defines an object/set/operation/process/quality it has a very specific meaning upon which all can agree upon assumption of given axioms. Mathematically, some work has to go in to showing that two definitions of an object logically agree. Further, sometimes it is necessary for the definition to be checked as to make logical sense, yielding the mathematical notion of being well-defined.


The number two is defined to be the number which we get when we add one to one, i.e. the number of apples on the table when having one apple on the table, we proceed to put another apple on the table. Similarly, three and four and the rest just follow from the process of adding one. As a result, 2+2=4 is a logical deduction, a fundamental theorem that arises from the facts that 1+1=2, 1+2=3 and 1+3=4 – the definitions of 2, 3 and 4.

It’s all precise under the assumption that we follow the same rules of adding. Changing the rules of adding produces different theories of number, for example modular (or clock arithmetic) in which 12+1=1, or 23+1=0. Sounds daft, but we use such a strange arithmetic in real life. Think about it.

Mathematics is built on axioms and axioms are static assumptions. You don’t disagree with axioms. Change an axiom, then you change the theory; preserve the axiom and preserve the theory.

Dogmata just do not work like that. They come like individual suitcases that require to be unpacked.

“I believe in One God” is a wonderful suitcase containing ever more nested suitcases: “believe”, “God”, “One” and “One God”, and even “I”. It is in opening these suitcases that we find the richness of theology and philosophy. Does that make the Church a collection of baggage handlers?

No. In entering the Church, we are given one particular suitcase to open. It contains our way of identifying ourselves with the coherent structure of Christian belief in engaging with our earthly lives, helping us to make sense of who we are and how we are here and a way of communicating with the many wonderful and varied folk around us. This suitcase is the Truth, and it is in its ability to hand out this suitcase and pack and unpack it that the Church possesses the fullness of Truth.

So now it looks as if I have strayed from the point, but I haven’t.

Anglican identity is not something that can be defined to a precise degree. Even the theoretically narrower term of “Anglo-Catholic” takes in a broad sweep of conflicting views ranging from the Ultramontane to the Protestant. So what causes people to identify themselves with Anglicanism?

An individual’s identity, again, cannot be defined but can be experienced by interaction. We know who our family and friends are without knowing them in full, without being able to define their identity in terms of axiomatics and specific qualia. We also get some idea of our own identity through interacting with them.


If we say that we are Anglican then we are clearly stating that we share an aspect of our own identity with others, namely that of being Anglican. So what is it that we share?

Well, we could say “Anglican” means pertaining to and having continuity with the Church which lies within England. To be Anglican suggests that we have to hold in our own identity some continuity with what the English Church is. If we claim to be Anglican yet disassociate ourselves from every aspect of the English Church, then our Anglican identity is not shared with very many others and casts a large question over whether we are really Anglican at all.

Notice that I have failed to give a definition of “Anglican” but merely point to where it is. What on Earth do I mean by “the Church with lies within England”, especially since there are Anglicans all over the world? England became a unified state in 927 and there was really only one expression of Church until the Reformation. Prior to 927, England was separate kingdoms and before the Synod of Whitby in the 8th Century there was a dichotomy between Irish Christianity and Roman Christianity, the former largely succumbing to the latter which was carried principally by the Angles and the Saxons from Rome. Again, here we have problems because historical data is open to interpretation: History is written by the winners!

The Church of England claims to be Anglican stating that it has continuity with the historic Anglican Church. In what sense? How can this continuity occur? Listening to the people around me, I hear that one is Anglican


1) by continuing in the Apostolic Succession with Anglican Bishops.

2) by the continued use of Scripture, Tradition and Right Reason in continuity with the great Anglican Divines – Hooker, Andrewes et al;

3) by agreeing with the principles laid down at the Reformation;

4) by worshipping in the same places, in the same buildings as antiquity;

5) by being in communion with the Archbishop of Canterbury;

6) by being a Christian subject of Queen Elizabeth II and her successors

7) by adhering to traditional Anglican liturgies;


Have I left any out?


There are those who would define Anglicanism as being in Communion with the Archbishop of Canterbury, in much the same way as some define Roman Catholicism as being in Communion with the Pope. Personally I find this definition as being somewhat insubstantial. The histories of the roles of Pope and Archbishop of Canterbury are very different. Either the Archbishop of Canterbury is a substitute for the Pope, which most Anglicans would object to, or he is a Primus inter Pares.


If he is the first among equals, then saying that Communion with him is definitive of Anglicanism is either a property which is peculiar to the Archbishop of Canterbury in which case he has a quality which other bishops do not possess which raises a question as to who his pares truly are, or it must be a property shared by every bishop ordained by the Church of England – this would delight St Iranaeus! If a Bishop ordained Anglican ceases to be in Communion with the Archbishop of Canterbury, then the fact that his “bishopness” doesn’t sacramentally change suggests that to be in communion with any Bishop in the Anglican Succession must be fully Anglican.

Of course, I’m not entirely convinced that “not being in Communion” is well-defined in certain cases.
Are we Anglican because we use the Anglican Liturgies? Well, surely a liturgy becomes Anglican only if used by Anglicans. We may have lex orandi lex credendi, but does this mean that Anglicans who use the Missal are not Anglican if Anglicanism is defined by the liturgical use of the BCP? What about vice versa?
There is a decommissioned church building not far from me that was built in the 19th Century, was Anglican and was taken over by the Roman Catholics. I think this rather puts a darkener on the idea that it’s where you worship that makes you Anglican.




As for being sovereign subjects of Her Majesty the Queen (God bless her), many republican and papal and anti-papal minded folk would take issue with that. It certainly cannot be a necessary condition. As for its sufficiency – given that there are Priests who describe themselves as Anglicans yet reject (or redefine) Apostolicity and Catholicity of the Church (indeed who do not believe in God in an orthodox sense), no.


The other ideas are more substantial. I can accept adherents of the prayer book as being Anglican because they seek continuity with the Anglicanism that emerged with the Prayer-Book which Cranmer did largely put together from extant material. Also to be in communion with a Bishop from an Anglican Succession who holds to the Traditional Faith as received by the Church, this also has merit, though what if that Bishop were to secede to Roman Catholicism? For me, that’s not a problem. It is for other Anglicans.


These are just thoughts, and I refuse to say that they are in any way conclusive or terribly coherent. As I said, pinning down Anglican Identity is practically impossible. The only way that we can find out about our identities is to interact with others and see what we share and how we differ in our communication. It is in the interaction that Anglicanism exists, but by far the most important identity that we need to cultivate is our Christianity. That can only come about by interacting and responding with the One who made us, redeemed us and continues to walk alongside us. That is an identity for which it is worth losing whatever we presently consider to be our identities to be.

New blog

... to me at least. I introduce Fr Hunwicke an English Anglo-Catholic of the Papalist tradition of Frs Patten and Fynes-Clinton. His blog can be found here.

Pondering Polemics

There are times when I am glad not to be a gifted theologian. As soon as someone finds themselves thus branded, they also find themselves branded with a label and if this label is not popular, then the Polemicists come out and try to force that theologian into their way of thinking.

Being identified with the Papalist camp, I have my share of people trying to convince me that Rome is heretical and that I should not despise my Anglican identity, while others tell me that I am being chauvinist or homophobic or Mariolatrous or just plain nasty.

I perceive that the same Polemicists have descended upon the Continuum Blog in no small number. Unfortunately for me, they are Papal Polemicists and their bent seems to be to try and convince, nay forcibly convince, the learned members there that they are wrong. It seems that the Synod of Whitby is meeting again with even more snipery!

I disagree with the folk on the Continuum, but I have every respect and interest in what they are doing in presenting just how coherent Anglicanism really is. I don't regard the 39 Articles as defining Anglicanism, as far I understand them at the moment, though I do look through them to try and make sense of them in the same way as Blessed Father Newman did. I am still learning - it's not easy when you're doing this as an amateur. However, I do not see it as my job to tell people that they are wrong. I see it as my job to bear witness to the Truth as has been revealed to me by Our God through Holy Mother Church. Unless I've got the law courts completely wrong, witnesses don't get out of the witness box, grab the defendant by the throat and force their testimony down it.

To support what I'm saying here, I'd like to make an extended quote from the Sixth Discourse of Dorotheus of Gaza:

There are times when we not only condemn but also despise people; for it is one thing to condemn and quite another to despise. Contempt adds to condemnation the desire to set someone at nought - as if the neighbour were a bad smell which has got to be rid of as something disgusting, and this is worse than rash judgment and exceedingly destructive.

Those who want to be saved scrutinise not the shortcomings (as below) of their neighbour but always their own and they set about eliminating them. Such as the man who saw his brother doing wrong and groaned, "woe is me: him today - me tomorrow!" You see his caution? You see the preparedness of his mind? How he swiftly foresaw how to avoid judging his brother.? When he said "me tomorrow" he aroused his fear of sinning, and by this he increased his caution about avoiding those sins which he was likely to commit, and so he escaped judging his neighbour: and he did not stop at this, but put himself below his brother, saying, "He has repented for his sin but I do not always repent. I am never first to ask for forgiveness and I am never completely converted." Do you see the Divine Light in his soul? Not only was he able to escape making judgment but he humbled himself as well. And we miserable fellows judge rashly, we hate indiscriminately and set people at nought whether we see something, or hear something, or even only suspect something. And what is worse, we do not stop at harming ourselves, but we go and gossip and say, "Here, listen to what has just happened!" We harm our neighbour and put sin into his heart also.

How can we put up with this behaviour unless it is because we have no true love? If we have have true love, with sympathy and patient labour, we will not go about scrutinising our neighbour's shortcomings. As it is said, "Love covers up a multitude of sins." If we have true love, that very love should screen anything of this kind, as did the saints when they saw the shortcomings of others. Were they blind? Not at all. But they simply would not let their eyes dwell on sins. Who hated sin more than the Saints? But they did not hate the sinners or condemn them, nor turn away from them, but they suffered with them, admonished them, comforted them, gave them remedies as sickly members, and did all they could to heal them.

Let us acquire tenderness towards our neighbour so that we may guard ourselves from speaking evil of our neighbour, and from judging and despising them. Let us help one another, for we are indeed members of one another.

When I hear that phrase "One True Church" I worry about the context in which it is being used. If that word "True" is not supported by some commitment to love, then I wonder whether it really is true. Human beings are not entirely rational and there are things of the soul which defy the rational thought of others and the self to make coherent sense of. I am still trying to understand how to be an Anglican Papalist. By that I don't mean a Romaniser, but rather how to bring the integrity of Anglicanism - and boy does it have integrity - into union with the Holy See. The Holy See is the One True Church. I firmly believe that, but I also believe that the Orthodox Church of the East is the One True Church and that the Anglican Church is the One True Church, because, as Dorotheus reminds us, each Christian is a member of every other Christian.

If we are going to debate the nature of what it means to be Church, then we need to do so in recognition of this basic, yet transcendent property of the Church. For an Anglican Papalist to despise his Anglican heritage is to cease to be an Anglican, and to become a Romaniser. Fr Hope Patten in rebuilding the Shrine at Walsingham sought to reclaim some of the Anglican Heritage thrown out at the reformation. He was not out to Romanise. Indeed, this archetypal Anglican Papalist despised Latin and used the Book of Common Prayer with a Roman twist. Other Anglican Papalists make use of the Anglican Missal, and Anglican Breviary which seek to reclaim the liturgical richness of the pre-Reformation without jettisoning the BCP.

As I say, the BCP is an Anglican product, but does not, in my mind, define what Anglicanism is, though I do not despise its use, nor those who use it. Indeed, I rather pine for the days when I used to sing Choral Evensong in the Church Choir, before being kicked out for having the wrong voice.

To the disgust of many a Prayer-book Catholic, I proudly wear my biretta at Morning Prayer. The horns make it very easy for me to doff at the Holy Name. The thing is, until they got back into the practice of wearing mitres, Anglican Bishops wore mortar-boards. I daresay many a prayer-book Catholic has nothing against a mortar-board. However, a mortar-board is just a modified biretta which has been joined to the zucchetto, hence the distinctive shape. How much of Anglicanism is the same, I wonder?

We Anglicans need to come together under the Kingship of Christ. We need to recognise our need in one another so that we can present ourselves whole and humble to each other so that we can embrace each other. Having heard Metropolitan Jonah's speech at the inauguration of ACNA, if he is right then there are lots of welcoming arms outstretched for us. We need to be humble enough to allow ourselves to be embrace and even dare to embrace others. In doing so, our embrace of Christ will be tighter and more passionate.

Sorry! Couldn't resist!

Ships that pass

Homosexuality was raised again in a homily I heard this morning. The priest criticised the Church for its attitude to homosexuals citing the story of Jairus' Daughter and the woman with a haemorrhage as examples of the acceptance of Christ for all people. However, he said nothing to indicate which particular attitude of the Church to Homosexuality was detestable to him.

If I've got this right, the Church says nothing detestable about homosexuality, the doctrine is: being a homosexual is not a sin, fornication is a sin. Homosexuals are acceptable to God, those who reject Him as King refuse to accept Him and thus render themselves unacceptable. I agree that the issue is not black and white, but there is a clarity to which some folk blind themselves.

The priest also went on to say that Christianity is not a set of rules. How right he was - it's one single Rule, the Rule of Christ. We therefore have duties of obedience to His teaching. Christ condemned sin strongly - we ought to hate it so much that we would rather rip off parts of our own bodies rather than fall into it. Christ also gave us the Way to live despite our sin - follow Him His way. If that is not a rule, I don't know what is.

Of course, the issue is ripping the Church to pieces. I find myself reading the account of the shipwreck in Act xxvii.

And when the south wind blew softly, supposing that they had obtained their purpose, loosing thence, they sailed close by Crete. But not long after there arose against it a tempestuous wind, called Euroclydon.

And when the ship was caught, and could not bear up into the wind, we let her drive. And running under a certain island which is called Clauda, we had much work to come by the boat: Which when they had taken up, they used helps, undergirding the ship; and, fearing lest they should fall into the quicksands, strake sail, and so were driven. 18 And we being exceedingly tossed with a tempest, the next day they lightened the ship;

And the third day we cast out with our own hands the tackling of the ship. And when neither sun nor stars in many days appeared, and no small tempest lay on us, all hope that we should be saved was then taken away.

But after long abstinence Paul stood forth in the midst of them, and said, Sirs, ye should have hearkened unto me, and not have loosed from Crete, and to have gained this harm and loss. And now I exhort you to be of good cheer: for there shall be no loss of any man's life among you, but of the ship. For there stood by me this night the angel of God, whose I am, and whom I serve, Saying, Fear not, Paul; thou must be brought before Caesar: and, lo, God hath given thee all them that sail with thee. Wherefore, sirs, be of good cheer: for I believe God, that it shall be even as it was told me. Howbeit we must be cast upon a certain island.

But when the fourteenth night was come, as we were driven up and down in Adria, about midnight the shipmen deemed that they drew near to some country; And sounded, and found it twenty fathoms: and when they had gone a little further, they sounded again, and found it fifteen fathoms. Then fearing lest we should have fallen upon rocks, they cast four anchors out of the stern, and wished for the day. And as the shipmen were about to flee out of the ship, when they had let down the boat into the sea, under colour as though they would have cast anchors out of the foreship, Paul said to the centurion and to the soldiers, Except these abide in the ship, ye cannot be saved. Then the soldiers cut off the ropes of the boat, and let her fall off.

And while the day was coming on, Paul besought them all to take meat, saying, This day is the fourteenth day that ye have tarried and continued fasting, having taken nothing. Wherefore I pray you to take some meat: for this is for your health: for there shall not an hair fall from the head of any of you. And when he had thus spoken, he took bread, and gave thanks to God in presence of them all: and when he had broken it, he began to eat. Then were they all of good cheer, and they also took some meat. And we were in all in the ship two hundred threescore and sixteen souls. And when they had eaten enough, they lightened the ship, and cast out the wheat into the sea. And when it was day, they knew not the land: but they discovered a certain creek with a shore, into the which they were minded, if it were possible, to thrust in the ship.

And when they had taken up the anchors, they committed themselves unto the sea, and loosed the rudder bands, and hoisted up the mainsail to the wind, and made toward shore. And falling into a place where two seas met, they ran the ship aground; and the forepart stuck fast, and remained unmoveable, but the hinder part was broken with the violence of the waves. And the soldiers' counsel was to kill the prisoners, lest any of them should swim out, and escape. But the centurion, willing to save Paul, kept them from their purpose; and commanded that they which could swim should cast themselves first into the sea, and get to land: And the rest, some on boards, and some on broken pieces of the ship. And so it came to pass, that they escaped all safe to land.

It's quite fascinating if we see the ship as the Ship of the Church. How, during the storm, the sailors tried to hold her together with ropes, binding the hull, casting out all that was not nailed down, including the tackle and so on. Why did this crisis occur? Because those in control of the ship decided to sail a dangerous course at the worst possible time for their own convenience.

We see the sailors try to flee the ship, letting down the lifeboats ready to cast away from the storm-tossed vessel, yet they heed the voice of St Paul telling them to stay together otherwise they won't be saved. Interestingly, St Paul doesn't make it clear whether all had to stay on board in order for everyone to be saved. If someone had left the ship, would that have doomed everyone? The text doesn't answer that, but it does in my eyes draw attention to the many splittings that are occurring within Anglicanism and the slow disintegration of the Roman Catholic Church in the light of modern storms. It raises the question of the house divided against itself falling. The Church should stand all together or not at all.

I firmly believe that the Church needs to stay together in order to be the vehicle of salvation. Look what happens to the ship. The prow is wedged fast and unmoveable, the stern is ripped to pieces. One could draw parallels with the wise man building the house on rock and the foolish upon the sand, and it does seem to suggest that those who stick to the core traditional and orthodox doctrines of Christianity and remain unmoveable, whereas those who do not find themselves going through the greater ordeal of fragmentation and disintegration.

There is still much to be positive about. The Eucharist is present by which all are nourished. All make it to shore safely floating on bits of the ship. God's promise is that the gates of Hell shall not prevail against the Church. I take that as a positive sign, that the Church does have a future as the vessel that carries all aboard to Salvation through the wounds of Christ. I just hope and pray that God sends us a decent shipwright very soon.

Christ in casuals?

That they may also ascend: Marcus Cornish’s new bronze statue for Our Lady Immaculate and St Philip Neri RC Church in Uckfield, East Sussex, shows Jesus in billowing contemporary clothing, defying gravity, looking down at and reaching out to all who enter the church.

What do you think?

Storm in a chocolate bar wrapper.

Homily preached at Eltham College on 5th June 2009 based on the fourth chapter of St Paul’s letter to the Ephesians verses 17 to 32.

It’s break time.

Of course, after a double period of P.E.
with your Games Master making you run
from here to the Lake District
and back
in lead-lined wellies,
your stomach feels as empty
as a Big Brother Contestant’s head
and is just as noisy.

Fortunately,
you have prepared for this eventuality:
in your bag is a King-size Twix.


So you find yourself
a spot in the quad with some friends,
take out your Twix from your bag,
open it up…


And woosh, it’s gone!

Snatched out of your hand
by an 11 year-old interloper!

Before he disappears
around the corner at Mach 7,
you can see him stuffing
your break-time snack into his mouth.


How are you feeling now?

[PAUSE]

Angry?

Furious?

Indignant?

Hungry?

What awful thoughts of retribution
are crossing your mind?

Catch the boy, rip off his arm
and beat him to a pulp with the wet end!

Ritually behead him with your shatterproof ruler!

Do something else even nastier with the ruler!

Ah!

But bear in mind,
you’ve got to use that ruler later in maths today.

Certainly these are inventive thoughts,
but what are you going to do really?

[PAUSE]

There doesn’t seem much you can do.

Your Twix has gone forever.

That boy has vanished
into the group playing Manhunt on the field.

All you are left with
is the rumbling of your stomach,
and the rumbling of your seething fury
at what has just ruined your break.


But why are you angry?

Well, duh!

Because someone has stolen your Twix.

Yes, but why does that make you angry?

Perhaps you are angry
because you are hungry after P.E.

You had legitimately purchased something to eat,
and now it has been stolen from you.

You feel cheated, outraged and still hungry.


The conclusion is that
somehow
you want to retrieve what is rightfully yours
which you can’t seeing that
it is now little more than a load of goo
inside another boy’s stomach.

You want exact some sort of judgement
on the perpetrator of this most diabolical of crimes.


But what judgement do you want to exact?

Revenge,
violence,
hatred,
some form of ridicule?

We know that violence in revenge
achieves very little of any worth.

We know that hatred just builds up
more hatred until violence seems inevitable.

Ridicule creates more ill-feeling
and resentment.

Honestly,
how confident are you that,
in this situation at your most angry,
you can administer justice
fairly, proportionately
and appropriately?

[PAUSE]

We could try turning the situation around.

What motive does the boy have
for stealing your Twix in the first place?

It could be for a laugh.

Granted, you don’t find it at all funny.

In fact,
it does say something very tragic
about a person who believes
that stealing from others should be funny.

Surely he is less someone to get angry with
and more someone to be pitied.


It could be that he’s hungry,
just like you,
but hasn’t had the wherewithal
to buy his own Twix.

It could be
that he has other issues in his life
which lead him to commit acts
which are socially unacceptable
– and Twix stealing is certainly
unacceptable.

Again, would that not mean
that he is in need of help,
not vengeance?

Or else,
he’s just too lazy or mean
to get his own Twix from the refectory?

Why should that bother you?

After all, laziness and meanness
bring about their own punishments in life,
and you aren’t lazy or mean, are you?

[PAUSE]

St Paul says: "In your anger do not sin":

Do not let the sun go down
while you are still angry,
do not give the devil a foothold.”

That’s the trouble with anger.

If it isn’t expressed rationally,
but rather purely emotionally,
it rampages like a fire
and causes damage.



When we are angry,
we need to step back,
out of the situation
so we can see the bigger picture.

That takes an awful lot of self-discipline,
but it’s worth learning.

It seems that it is often easier
for young folk like yourselves
to learn this than many adults.


If you’re unemployed,
then it’s easy to be angry at seeing
“foreigners” coming in and “stealing” jobs.

If we give in to the emotion,
then we end up
seeing valuable contributors to our society
as evil.

It is emotions like these
that the far-right use to stir us
into acts of bigotry and racism.


It is possible to be angry justifiably,
whether you are the victim
of a happy-slap chocolate-snatch,
or whether you are angry
at the way the Ghurkhas have been treated.


However,
we mustn’t confuse our passion
for fairness,
justice and liberty
with an uncontrollable emotion.

Like Joanna Lumley,
we can use the energy from our anger
to find rational,
peaceful and effective protests
in order to get our point across.

What we have to get rid of
very quickly
are the feelings
which threaten to consume us
and lead us down paths
of negativity and destruction,
impairing our judgement
and sense of fair play.

[PAUSE]

Twixes come in twos
– hence the name Twix.

You could offer in future
to give one away
to the very boy who has caused you
all this anger.

“Hmmph,”
you say,
“give me one good reason
why I should share with him.”

Can you give one good reason why you shouldn’t?

A week and a bit too early!

There is only One God in Perfect Trinity and Perfect Unity, but there seem to be several lesser holy trinities which point to the true Holy Trinity. St Paul's Faith, Hope and Love spring to mind as does St John's Spirit, water and blood. One could say that SS Peter, James and John also form a holy trinity, but that could be stretching the point: they form a triad rather than a trinity. Faith, Hope and Love seem to form a trinity because they seem to have separate identities but the same essence. The way St John speaks of Spirit, water and blood as separate entities yet sharing a unifying testimony, is a lesser trinity than that of Faith, Hope and Love, since their unity of essence is less obvious.

In my mind, there is another holy trinity. The Venerable Bede mentions in a sermon of his that the Peace "which the world cannot give" can only come about through Love. It seems to me that God provides us with a conceptual mirror of His existence in the relationships between Truth, Peace and Love, since all three are the same thing but have a separation and uniqueness of themselves.

God tells us that Love is the source of all things. It is because of Love that God creates all that is. Truth bears witness to the fact that Love exists and is real and, when it comes into contact with what has been created, Truth bears witness to the reality of Creation and the act of its creation in love. The Creature finds Peace only when it has the assurance of Truth of its creation in Love.

So we find ourselves as restless beings in various forms of agony: a cold numbness of complacency, a feverish endeavour to control things and people, a furious pushing away of that which challenges our perceptions and seeks to unseat us from our confidence that what we hold is true, a sickly obsession to finding an anodyne in what is created, and a nausea of believing that others possess the truth, love and peace that we deserve.

A search for the Truth brings Peace through Love. A desire for Peace can only be found in True Love, and Love can only ever lead us to Peace through the revelation of what is True.

Ἀγαπητοί, νῦν τέκνα θεοῦ ἐσμεν, καὶ οὔπω ἐφανερώθη τί ἐσόμεθα. οἴδαμεν ὅτι ἐὰν φανερωθῇ ὅμοιοι αὐτῷ ἐσόμεθα, ὅτι ὀψόμεθα αὐτὸν καθώς ἐστιν.

Beloved, now are we the sons of God, and it doth not yet appear what we shall be: but we know that, when he shall appear, we shall be like him; for we shall see him as he is.

I John iii.2

Because we were created in love, we ourselves bear in ourselves the Truth of our reality. We do seem to get confused by this, in that we can confuse our truth as an existence separate from other people, or to convince ourselves that the truth can only ever be reached by certain reductionist techniques. Our truth is totally subordinate to the Truth precisely because our truth is the Truth. The Truth of our reality can only be the Truth that God is. We seem more to be obsessed with the tiny diamonds of Truth that permeate our understanding, hoarding them, protecting them, polishing them and examining them rather than realising that these tiny fragments are merely the intersections of the Truth with our empirical reality.

The Church really does possess this Truth, because the Truth is God Himself, yet she only possesses Him in the sense that He desires the embrace of His Bride and yields to that embrace. Yet, at each instant in time, all we will be able to perceive of the Truth are the fragments we have so far collected, and the fragments that we are finding now. Our possession can never be an ownership, merely an experience of Divine Love.

Yet if the Lord Christ tells us that He is the Truth, if St John tells us that God is Love, and the Saviour also describes the Holy Ghost as a comforter, a bringer of Peace, then the trinity of Love, Truth and Peace offer us an active way of living out our belief in God as lovers, peacekeepers and proper scientists.

Trust or Trussed II: The Letter to the Gullations?

If you think about it, one of the lessons that life gives you is that people can't be trusted. However, life does not often teach you who can be trusted until it's too late and thus when you have been deceived. It is when you have been deceived and hurt by one whom you have trusted that you find yourself

1. hating them for deceiving you;


2. trusting less in people around you;


3. berating yourself for being so stupid.

This raises the issue of gullibility and over-credulity in people. Can it be that actually all Christians are gullible because they spend their time being controlled by the priests and pastors. They are being told what to think by a Magisterium or by pastors under a specific interpretation of the Bible. Even in this day and age, I still meet people who say effectively: "I believe in God because the Bible tells me He exists and I believe what the Bible tells me, because God wrote it." As arguments go, this is pretty weak. At some point, the Christian must be prepared to examine his faith in exterior to the Scripture.


Moderns reject the Real Presence as a piece of supreme gullibility. The body and blood of Christ cannot be physically perceived, so the believer in the Real Presence is being required to believe in something that is not physically verifiable. This, according to some, is a sign of gullibility, that others are seeking to control others through their belief.


If this is true, then to what end? It seems a strange sort of power to control what people believe if it cannot subsequently exploit that belief to some achievable end. If one just rejoices in what one can make others believe, then surely this rejoicing is deeply limited and become unfulfilling unless it moves into some form of exploitation. That is not to say that it cannot happen. I just doubt whether such a practice would last very long.


If gullibility necessarily leads to exploitation, then under what accusation can Christian belief be seen as gullibility? The ends seem obvious; according to the teachings of Christ, Christians are required to turn the other cheek, go the extra mile, forgive one's enemies - the perfect mules for the world all for the pie-in-the-sky promise of eternal life.

What fools we must be - the fools for Christ as St Paul would have it. So St Paul's statement must be the way that Christians address the question "are you not being foolish allowing yourselves to be treated in this way, and all for some vague promise that you can't even provide evidence that it exists in the first place?" This provides the unbeliever with "evidence" that Christianity builds in a failsafe to prevent the believer from realising that he is being taken in.

So are Christians merely victims of a two-millennia long fraud?


Well, I am convinced the veracity of the Scriptural evidence of the life, death and resurrection of the Lord Jesus Christ. I find the testimony of St John in his first letter very compelling.

Ὃ ἦν ἀπ' ἀρχῆς, ὃ ἀκηκόαμεν, ὃ ἑωράκαμεν τοῖς ὀφθαλμοῖς ἡμῶν, ὃ ἐθεασάμεθα καὶ αἱ χεῖρες ἡμῶν ἐψηλάφησαν, περὶ τοῦ λόγου τῆς ζωῆς

That which was from the beginning, which we have heard, which we have seen with our eyes, which we have looked upon, and our hands have handled, of the Word of life,

Again, I just don't see the point in lying about such a thing as this, especially when the core doctrine of Christianity is to help people live life well.

One could refer to the Jehovah's Witnesses and their policy on blood transfusions, but then the comeback is "well, isn't this exactly the same as the Catholic stance on contraception and abortion?"

Well, I can understand the doctrine on contraception and abortion. Both contraception and abortion stem from views of the body that are inherently damaging. Yes, there are complicated factors, but again, at the heart of these issues is the question: "are we considering the welfare of all lives involved here?" As a Catholic, I believe in the well-being of the unborn as much as in the well-being of the mother. I also question whether it really is better to let lust rampage through society with the widespread use of prophylactics than to teach people to cultivate a deeper love than to scratch animal itches.

I am not convinced that the Jehovah's Witness prohibition of blood transfusion stems from a similar interest in the well-being of others. It seems more to me like an arbitrary proof of faith than a way of deciding how to live well.

It seems then, that the whole difference between cultic gullibility and religious observance lies in whether or not the practice stems from a coherent philosophy of well-being. The Mass may seem arcane and meaningless to an outsider, but its purpose is to bring people together in a state of respect, love and generosity together with the God in whose existence we believe. Yes, the Mass done properly has much intricate ritual which can confuse and annoy those who do not understand what is going on, but each ritual again stems from a desire to be well in the presence of God and this is verifiable with study. If we believe in a God who desires not only to be present with us but to make his presence objective, then this is surely reasonable. The ritual killing of one's children as practised by the followers of Moloch is not.

Of course, the question of gullibility now boils down to a value judgement. If gullibility involves being drawn into believing something "false" and, as a result of that belief, making a "foolish" action then one needs to qualify "false" and "foolish". One also needs to understand what "well-being" is. All good questions, but they do raise doubt upon the militant atheist stance that religion is the opiate of the gullible.

As a Christian, I should look to everyone's happiness - a happiness that God created each one of us to have. Of course I fail, often miserably but I do not believe that I am being conned by some maleficent conspiracy. Judging by how long the Church has existed and the number of grievous errors she has made (the Crusades and the persecution of the Jews), the fact that she still exists with the same message convinces me that the Way is the way.

What you don't really want to hear!

I used part of a previously published sermon that I did not actually preach to form the heart of this homily.

Homily preached at Eltham College on Friday 1st May 2009 based on St John v.1-16

Why is it that Christians are unpopular?

For one thing, they go on and on about
trying to lead good lives
and pointing out
everybody’s sins!

When was the last time you sinned?

[PAUSE]

That’s seems rather a rude question
to be asked first thing
on a Friday morning.

How did it make you feel?

Uncomfortable?

Nervous?

Did you find it a laughable question?

Let’s face it.

You don’t want to be told that you’re a sinner.

Nobody does.

The question of sin is not exactly
an issue which makes
Christianity popular.

The idea of sin seems
outdated these days,
just an irrelevance.

What do you think of when you hear the word?

Something rude?

Is saying the word “bum” in chapel a sin?

Is eating too much a sin?

Can a cream bun really be sinful to eat?

Is sin what an MP does
when he runs off with his secretary?

Or is sin just a Christian’s way
of telling everyone to obey
an arbitrary and pointless set of rules
in order to spoil everybody’s fun?

If that’s the image of sin
that we Christians send out,
then we are ourselves failing
to understand what God wants for us,
and that’s a sin too.

[PAUSE]

Whether we are Christian or not,
there is a sense of
right and wrong in all of us
– within limits!


We would agree that deliberately
wiring someone to
the Van der Graaf generator in the physics lab
is clearly a case of murder
and is something
morally and ethically wrong.


Yet, is it murder
to allow a terminally ill patient to die
by turning off their life support machine?

Further than that,
is failing to hold the door open
for someone a sin?

[PAUSE]

Robert forgets to hold the door open for Nancy
and it hits her,
taking the skin off her elbow.

This puts her in a bad mood
so she shouts at her secretary Jean for being,
in her words,
“bone idle”.

Jean takes Nancy’s criticisms seriously
and tries to compensate
by working harder.



She spends more and more time at the office
trying to sort out what to do,
so much so that she forgets
about the needs of her twins
Bradley and Britney.

They crave attention from their mother
and, without her guidance,
start to wander away
from the straight and narrow.

Britney,
in order to numb the pain
of being ignored by her mother,
and finding her life meaningless,
gets hooked on heroine.
Later, she is invited to an eighteenth birthday party
where she meets Taylor.

They get pally.

She introduces Taylor to heroine.

He gets hooked, loses his job
and gets kicked out of his home.

One day, he leaves his filthy squat
lined with dirty newspapers
and even filthier hypodermic needles,
in a frantic search for money
to stop the pain in his stomach.

On his way he meets Kyle.

Kyle refuses to give him any money,
so Taylor stabs him dead with his rusty penknife.

He takes from Kyle a grand total of £3.87.

Not enough.Of course, Taylor is caught
and convicted of Kyle’s murder.

Who is responsible for Kyle’s death?

Taylor? Britney? Jean? Nancy? Robert?

Do you honestly have an answer for that?

[PAUSE]

It’s being said that
it is the greed of bankers
which is to blame for the Credit Crunch.

Do you really agree with that?

But then how did the greed get there in the first place?

[PAUSE]

It could be said that sin is nothing more
than finding different ways of being selfish.

This is a vast subject
and cannot be dealt with
in a couple of sentences.

But even a little selfishness,
as we have seen,
contributes to the suffering of other people.

[PAUSE]

So it seems that sin is serious.

Worse still, we are all guilty of being selfish.

Yes, you knew it didn’t you?

Christians always tell you that you’re a sinner,
but that doesn’t mean that you’re evil.

Actually,
quite the reverse,
it means you are no better,
nor worse than anyone else.

To realise that we all
contribute to the sufferings of others
is a brave thought,
and to seek to stop that suffering
is an even braver thought.

How?


Well it’s all contained in the phrase
“Love your neighbour as yourself”.

To love our neighbours
means that in addition to enjoying our lives,
we need to include
the interests and needs of others
and build them into our enjoyment of life.

To love ourselves means that
we have to see ourselves as we really are,
warts’n’all
and to be happy with who we really are.

[PAUSE]

Yes, we do need to recognise that
sin is a serious business,
that we do fall short in what we do,
but that is not the end of the story.



However far downhill
you think this world is heading
with corporate greed,
teenage pregnancy,
famine and poverty in the third world,
or even vile acts of genocide,
it really doesn’t have to be this way.

We can start
by following the example
of St Francis of Assisi
and look for the image of God
in every single person around us
and treating them
with compassion and interest.

Christianity is all about realising
that we need the direction of God
to prevent sin from destroying us,
and to trust Him to show us how
to limit the effects of Evil.


God has no desire to see us destroyed by sin,
and that’s why He sent Jesus Christ
to die and rise again.

What God offers all of us
is the opportunity to transform the World
into something brilliant,
free from sin and suffering.

After all, that is the message of Easter.

Isn’t it?

Easter 2009

It's all doom and gloom at the moment, isn't it?

The Pope speaks about the terrible loss of life in Italy through the Earthquake.
The Archbishop of Canterbury speaks of the need to use the recession as a lesson in anti-materialism. The first item of News in Blighty is about the Labour Party Spin Doctor attempting to slur the Conservative Party leaders.

So what's different from this age from the time of the Resurrection?

It seems mainly to be the technology we use, and the breadth of our ability to communicate our ideas. We are certainly no more enlightened than those who have gone before us. Our political and economic situations don't hold up much hope for the future; the crumbling fabric of our society in a culture of "grab what you can" certainly doesn't fill us up with hope; and the militant atheists seek to drum up more support with their happy and uplifting slogan of "dust thou art and unto dust shalt thou return" - it's such a comforting thought that will win many a person over(!)

And into this hot-pot of Pharisaism and Sadducaism, political unrest, hedonism, barbarity and sadness, one little man does something amazing - He rises from the dead. Not ostentatiously, no big bang that shakes Jerusalem and Rome to their very foundations, no rout of the foreign power, He just appears to those who love Him to show them that their faith is not misplaced.

And suddenly, we realise that life is worth living, even though depressions do assail us and that there is something more. Sure, we have nothing to show for it, nothing that will prove that our hope is well-placed, we just have that hope, and our faith and our love that will confound the philosophers and scientists and the cynics of this day and age, just as it always had confounded them in ages past. The problem is that Truth is bigger than the Human Mind and always will be. Only the Church possesses the fulness of Truth and even then I'm not convinced that she possesses it fully in any one particular instant of Time, but cumulatively the truth discovered in each age piling up upon that discovered previously.

But there is work to be done, for I do not believe that the Church is living out her hope as well she might, for many of her congregations are getting choked by the cares of this world. So what is it that we have to do? Pray! Yes, then what?

Who's Authority?

How about I state the obvious?

Anglicanism is in a wee bit of a pickle!

Recent events among my friends in the Continuum highlight one thing: that the divisions are getting worse and are having a detrimental effect on Christians of all stripes.

A priestly friend has followed his bishop into an Anglican jurisdiction which some hold to have a question mark over aspects of their belief. I trust my friend and his bishop to be acting according to their consciences and their belief in God for the good of their congregations and for the faithful promulgation of the faith. I also know nothing about the jurisdiction into which they have moved, so I remain rather disinterested (not uninterested) in their situation. They have my prayers.

It does strike me as terribly odd that such a move was necessary in the first place. It is nothing less than a scandal that Anglicanism is deteriorating into divisions and factions according to subtle nuances. It seems that no-one seems to want to do anything together these days.

To be honest, I am the last person to be preaching about not joining in with others, seeing that I refuse to play a full part in my own parish on account of the nature of the ἀτάκτως. But then I refuse to be so disorderly. Am I right to go with my own conscience in this matter, or should I submit myself to the authority whom God has set over me?

This isn't just at the heart of Anglicanism, it's present in Roman Catholicism where goodness knows how many thousands are ignoring our Pope's teaching on contraception, or the orthodox monks who are not exactly averse to giving each other a punch up the bracket! This division is a spirit in society itself. Look at how in this country there is no respect for any form of authority. Eggs are thrown at deputy Prime Ministers, Lords are covered in custard, priests are heckled in their pulpits, teachers verbally abused and ignored by students.

Of course, it all stems from the fact that our leaders have let us down in the past. Popes have been corrupt, Kings despotic, priests failing to practise what they preach, governments failing to listen to the people. It seems then that there is no possible way that the Truth of God's existence can have been authoritatively passed from generation to generation.

The Roman Catholic Church says that she is One True Church that possesses the fullness of Truth, so do the Eastern Orthodox Patriarchates, but they are not united. Anglicans have always claimed to be part of the One True Church, yet do not agree on the source of authority, and the Protestants who rely solely on their Bibles (allegedly) cannot agree on the correct interpretation. It's a shambles!

So how can Anglicanism ever be united if some want to do just what the world wants it to do, others stick to the BCP and various interpretations of that and still others wish to be reunited with the Pope? What is Unity in these circumstances?

So what marks should there be for unity? I doubt that I can ever produce a definitive list that is even remotely philosophically or theologically sensible., but I try in the hope that my feeble mutterings may inspire greater minds to make it clear (assuming that they read this!):

1) That Holy Scripture, Orthodox Catholic Tradition and Right Reason are at the heart of the Christian Faith and are authoritative;

2) That at least the first Seven Oecumencial Councils are authoritative;

3) That the Seven Sacraments are ordered according to Catholic and Orthodox Tradition, that their efficacy is recognised and their importance promoted.

4) That there is recognition of others' adherence to other formularies which do not contradict any of (1) or (2).

5) That all conversation between those of different jurisdictions is conducted with the sole view of standing together in the Presence of Christ and seeking nothing that would scandalise the other, but rather that a mutual exploration of the Truth may be achieved.

6) That all attempts must be made for communio in sacris and that all dialogue to this end should never cease.

For me, these represent a start and a hope that there would be some common ground for building a Church that will give society what it needs.

Society has lost its sense of the sacramental. If we cannot venerate Our Lord in Sacramental form in Church, then how would we teach others to venerate Him in their secular lives? If we cannot live together without trying to tear ourselves apart, how can we show the Body of Christ as a united entity?

One of the reasons I stay Anglican is because I have a trust and respect for my Anglican Prayer-book critics. I cannot hold to the Prayer Book as being definitive of Anglicanism, but they do and admittedly that Prayer-Book has been part of Anglicanism for four-and-a-half centuries. That I believe that Anglican Catholicism stems from the pre-Reformation Church in England is a sticking point that affects the relationships between Anglican Papalists and the Prayer-Book Catholics.

It would be a help for unity if either side here did recognise the various intentions behind the other. The Anglican Papalists do seek corporate Unity with Rome and accept the primacy of the Holy Father (though sometimes, I rather cheekily think that we APs do Rome better than Rome does ;-) ) that we are trying to hold two jurisdictions together, rather than allow them to drift further apart. We seek the impossible and logically contradictory - the reconciliation of the Anglican Identity with the Catechism of the Catholic Church, nor should we pretend at this stage to know how it should be done.

But then, we APs must stay Anglican for the sake of our Prayer-Book Catholic brethren - after all they have sprung from the same cleft in the Church that we have. Theirs is an integrity that comes from objective criticism and it is in part that they struggle to find the nature of the Anglican Identity, which eludes them as much as Unity eludes us. That Rome needs to hear them is clear, since Rome has not heard the Anglican voice for four-and-a-half centuries, and has not benefited from the scholarship and the Anglican reserve which it needed to hear and has only just begun to hear. But then APs and PBCs must stick together for the sheer sake of a coherent Anglicanism.

It is only in the light of this unity that the Liberals might repent and return. We should not cut these misguided iconoclasts off absolutely either.

Marah, Meribah and Massah

I've not written for a long time, and I do want to keep up this blog because I find that it at least allows me to set down my thoughts in total so that people can point at the flaws in my thinking. Very useful, especially when I have people who do disagree with me about what the nature of Anglican Catholicism is.

Alas, (Fr.) Marco Vervoorst has given up his blog, largely methinks due to commitment to his growing family and the fact that Third Blog from the Right has run its course. Considering that it started as Traditional Anglo-Papist, shows what a journey he has been through. Perhaps now is the time for him to have a little rest now that he has found some doctrinal stability.

My recent meanderings through the Old Testament have been following the meanderings of the Israelites as they grumble their way across the wilderness for the promised land which the majority never see due to their sheer disobedience to God.

So far for me, the three Ms have occurred in the course of their wanderings: Marah, Meribah and Massah, i.e. bitterness, and (as the Venite puts it) provocation and temptation. The waters of Marah are bitter until Moses throws in a tree that makes the water sweet, whilst Meribah and Massah have the Israelites crying out accusing God and Moses of seeking only to destroy them and showing a complete lack of faith in God. I've always found it rather fun that this occurs in the Wilderness of Sin!

It's very easy to draw parallels with the plight of the Christians in this century and the Israelites way back when. Christianity is no longer the force that it once was in the West, largely because the standards of the Christian Faith have been eroded by Liberalism, materialism and a militant atheism which is largely hedonistic in its expression.

In all walks of Christianity, there are those who move the goalposts just to make life easy for themselves. One only has to look at the outcry about the Holy Father's latest comments about contraception to see that the populace, rather than listen to the message of continence and self-control, are more concerned with the restraint which one needs to show in one's life. We cannot have life all our own way if we are to live together.

So these are the Christians who stay in Egypt and try to build a life for themselves there, and I pray to God that they be saved. Then there are Christians who, acknowledging the Sacrament of the Eucharist as an effective sign of God's nourishment and Salvation, who pass over the waters of the Sea of Reeds into the wilderness.

And here it is that we find ourselves. There is a lot of bitterness in our hearts. Certainly I see it so much in the lives of the many friends that I now have on the Anglican Diaspora Forum, and on the Continuum blog. The trouble is that we know that something is terribly wrong.

It seems to me that the typical Continuer has an enormous strength of character. They have been able to leave the Parishes, Churches and Congregations of their formative years because they have seen something horribly wrong in the way that their same church has been moving. They know what is right and have the Traditions of the Church ingrained in their blood. But that same strength of character is in danger of pushing them away from those who really do care about them, if they carry with them the bitterness that comes from that separation. Who wouldn't carry that bitterness?

The typical Continuer is also American and, from my English perspective, have a larger than life way of committing themselves to a social code. All the Americans that I have met take their religion terribly seriously. They cling to what is right and refuse to concede an inch, because they fear that it was concession that brought them to the wilderness. They feel charged with being disloyal by their erstwhile jurisdictions. One only has to look at Archbishop Coggan referring to the Continuers as disloyal and Archbishop Carey describing opponents of women's "ordination" as heretics. These words sting.

Yet, I don't think I've seen the word "heretic" bandied about so much as in Continuing Circles. Of course, it's true: anyone who departs from the Traditional teaching of the Church is a heretic - that is what the word means.

What the Continuing Church needs is that tree which sweetens all bitterness. If that isn't the tree of life that comes from communio in sacris then I don't really know what it is.

From my point of view, in my peripheral state in the Church of England, the danger for me and those like me is that of Meribah and Massah, the terrible despair that comes from disbelieving that God can and will sustain them in the wilderness. I suspect that my parish have given up on me completely now. I'm not called to do much, but, since quoting II Thessalonians iii.6 at them, I haven't won many friends!

The antidote for this despair is to hope that something will happen which will lift the gloom that surrounds the orthodox Anglican. There is refreshment available and we do have to turn to God together and be reassured that He has said that He would not abandon us.

Continuers and the relics in the Church of England do have to see that Rome is not the enemy, but Rome needs to recognise herself that she has many Egyptians within her hierarchy, and they do need to be recognised.

If Anglicans began to trust each other a little more, then perhaps our Unity may show sufficient light on the world, and on Rome too, to see what needs doing. Why don't we become the example of Unity to all Christians?

How much have you been Lent?

Homily preached at Eltham College on 27th February 2009 based on St Matthew iv.1-11

Do you really know who you are?

How would you go about
explaining who you are
to someone who has never met you?

Well chances are,
shortly after you have told them
your name and your age,
you’ll start talking about
your interests and hobbies:

how you enjoy going to parties
and dancing to Lady Gaga,
or sitting at home
reading The Brothers Karamazov;
how you can wield an epee with remarkable skill
or fill in a Sudoku in four minutes flat.

Are you really you because of what you do?

Let’s just say you are not allowed
to explain who you are by your interests
and what you do.

Who are you now?

Well, now perhaps
you’ll try to say something about who you are
by where you live,
where you go to school.

You might start talking about
what you and your family own,
what make of Apple Notebook you own,
what size shoes you take,
the fact that you love kebabs
or a frappuccino
with extra cinnamon.

Are you really you because of what you own?

So now let’s restrict the options further.

You cannot explain who you are
with what you have.

Who are you now?

David’s son,
brother of Phil,
Eric’s friend,
Mia’s boyfriend?
Is that who you are?

That’s sounds like different people.

What about what you remember?

The time you first lost a tooth,
your first words,
your Bar-mitzvah,
that embarrassing incident
with the spoon,
bouncy castle
and tub of mayonnaise?

That’s all in the past, that’s not you.

Let’s say
you are not allowed to explain who you are
using what you own,
what you have done, do,
or what you hope to do,
who your family and friends are,
what you look like
or hope to look like,
or using any memories whatsoever.



Let’s say that you have to say who you are
without using your physical being
or even your thoughts.

Who are you now?

Are you even you
any more without these things?

If you believe that you still exist
even when these things are all gone,
then congratulations,
you cannot be a materialist.

You have just had a glimpse into the wilderness.

In the wilderness,
there’s nothing to define who you are
apart from you yourself.

You come face to face with the person that you are.

It’s like looking in the mirror,
only without the benefit
of hairspray, Clearasil and deodorant.



Is that something that you’d find pleasant,
stuck in the middle of nowhere
with just yourself for company,
warts and all?

And yet some people choose to do just that!

Spend time in a self-inflicted wilderness
trying to discover who on earth they are.

There are people who try to find out
something about who they are
by leaving things behind
which merely distract them from the truth.

In this day and age it’s difficult
to find a modern wilderness,
though Slough and Gravesend
certainly seem to fit the bill.

Indeed for folk who have families
and commitments it is difficult
to just drop everything to find out who we are.

For this purpose,
the three Abrahamic Faiths –
Islam, Judaism and Christianity -
stress the importance of fasting.
In the Christian faith,
the Lord Jesus Himself
chooses to spend time alone in the wilderness
to find out more about Himself.

Later He tells His disciples that
fasting is a necessity in order
to demonstrate to ourselves
that we are not defined
by our needs even for food.

Fasting in former days meant
spending dawn to dusk without eating.

These days,
a fast for a Christian can mean
to give up something we enjoy
to show that what we enjoy
isn’t the centre of our world,
that there is more to us
beyond what we do, say, think
or even fail to do say or think.


However, fasting is easier said than done.



It’s uncomfortable,
and boring,
and you get withdrawal symptoms.

The twinge of hunger
when a chocolate cake is brought into the room,

that feeling of not knowing what to do
since you’ve stopped watching Skins,

the waking in the middle of the night sweating
because you’ve gone without your fix
of swallowing a tube of Smarties in one go.

If it takes the forty days and nights of Lent
giving up console games
or Facebook
for you to realise this about yourself
and also about other people,
then isn’t it worth it?

Of course,
like the Lord Christ,
you will be tempted to give up,
seek out something
to make it more convenient to you
or to make the withdrawal symptoms go away.

Fasting does take strength of character,
and it is precisely that character
that we try to seek in the wilderness
that Lent provides for us.

You see, you exist.

You exist with a dignity,
a humanity and a personality
that can never be taken away from you.

Though you’re not exactly prepared to admit it,
you are actually worth knowing,
each single one of you.

You cannot be defined by things,
or words,
or actions or even ideas.

You are you
and you have every reason to be proud
of being who you are
– no exceptions.

What will it take for you to give up
before you find out more about how wonderful you really are?

Another by the Babylonian waters.

I am privileged to have among my acquaintances Fr Anthony Chadwick from the TAC who pops in on the Anglican Diaspora forum when he can. In response to comments made about my previous post, he has published the following reflection which I find rather reassuring. The fact that he thinks that I am young means he is my friend for life, especially since I was asked by one of the boys what it was like arguing personally with Martin Luther!

Thank you Fr Chadwick.

By the waters of Babylon

I've recently set Psalm 136 to music for a couple of friends. It's a psalm that speaks to me very much at them moment, and I've been reflecting on the exile of the Jews from Jerusalem into Babylon.


Certainly the proper Anglo-Catholics in the CofE do feel that they are in some form of exile, especially from the repercussions of the last couple of Synods. The Continuum Churches too are refugees from the iconoclasm and exist (in many cases) in a fragile and delicate state in pockets in England and with a little more stability in the US. Since the schism in the '70s, the Continuers have, in the eyes of the Anglican Communion, been tarred with Archbishop Coggan's unwillingness to accept them as proper Anglicans.


The fact of the matter is that Anglo-Catholics have been and are being systematically pushed out of the Established Church in Britain. Until the twentieth Century the different wings of the Church were in a delicate stability. The rise of the Liberal theology and the fact that it has been allowed to promote the removal of Tradition has prevented Anglo-Catholics from being able to help guide Anglicanism and from playing its part in effective ministry from within the historic Church of England and thus in English society.


So now with another split looming as the Established Church seeks to announce its final renunciation of being part of the Apostolic Church in putting a mitre on a female head, the Anglo-Catholics go further into exile: some will go to the Continuum, some will go to Rome and some will disappear into the woodwork.


It's interesting to note that in Ezra and Nehemiah, the Jews are allowed to rebuild Jerusalem, and lead a life with some semblance of normal Jewish life despite continuing to be in subjugation to another authority. Life goes on, all appears well, but there is an undercurrent, a deep knowledge that things are not really okay and that there is still something that needs to be put right.


The same is true for the Anglican Diaspora. Life goes on, the sacraments are administered, the gospel is preached, the Offices are prayed but still there is something not right in the homes that Anglicans have made for themselves. The acrimony between some Anglican jurisdictions is merely a symptom of this unease.

It was somewhat of a cheer for me to hear the Archbishop of Westminster's remarks:

Let me be frank. Your struggles with issues on Communion which deeply affect the unity of the Anglican Communion, affect us all. Divisions within any Church or Ecclesial Community impoverish the communion of the whole Church.

We Roman Catholics cannot be indifferent to what is happening to our friends in the Anglican Communion and, in particular, in the Church of England. All I can say – and I would not want to be misinterpreted - is that it is only in a fuller and deeper unity that the truth and the demands of the Gospel are to be discerned. In this sense, unity is a prerequisite to truth and you should not settle for less – even if it takes time.

He also says, prior to the above statement but more importantly in my reckoning:

And although Catholics believe that the Church of Christ subsists in the Catholic Church, that very wording implies that the Roman Catholic Church is not totally self-sufficient, and that in the riches and gifts of other Christian churches are elements that would contribute to its fullness.

This certainly points to the only way forward - Unity not diversity. Again "how" is the problem. With apparent differences in worldview, doctrine and motives, the Church Catholic - comprising of Romans, Traditional Anglicans (i.e. those who truly embrace the qualifying adjective), and Orthodox folk - seems unlikely to come together in the near future. There are, however, signs that there is movement within the Continuum between the ACC, APCK and UECNA which may provide the largest body in the Continuum. Also, if anything comes from the TAC's work with Rome, then that too will be a marvellous thing.

Using an analogy that I have used before and, I am sure, others have used before me, the Catholic Churches should be singing a beautiful piece of polyphony. The
words have been written by God for us to sing, and each church sings in its own octave to produce the harmonies of human interaction with God. However, it is clear that some people think that we ought to be singing in unison, and that one part is more accurate than the others. This is not true, nor is it true to say that we know all the words to the hymn-sheet that God has given us; we can only keep singing the words in front of us which will occur, as often happens in polyphony, in different times to other folk. Only in the light of Eternity will those words be revealed as complete.

If we date the English Reformation from 1534, then we will reach its 490th anniversary in 2024. Considering that 490 is a significant number, it will provide us with a date by which we can hope for the end of the exile of the traditional Anglicans from each other.

And what of the Anglican Communion of which I am a member, albeit in a state of impairment? The Continuum rails against her, and justifiably so since she is trying to excise the four Credal marks of the church by interpreting those marks differently from their original meaning, or consigning them to History as things irrelevant. Yes, there has to be a distance between the Continuum and the Communion, but there still needs to be dialogue between them. In the eyes of the Continuum, I am a heretic because I remain in order to be in communion with my Monastic Community of which my involvement is happily deepening. In the eyes of the Communion, the Continuum is an irrelevance because it isn't properly Anglican. Both sides need the space to walk apart, but to recognise the need for each other as well as the need for the Catholic Churches around them.

I pray for an end to the bitterness among Traditional Anglicans - a bitterness which gnaws at my own soul, if I am honest - and also for the opening of the eyes of the Communion to the damage that it is causing herself and the Churches around it by pushing out from her midst into Exile those who cannot accept the modern follies which she pursues.