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Source: (consider it)
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Thread: Lay knowledge of the CofE?
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SvitlanaV2
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Posted
Let's hope this is the right forum for my rather unusual thread....
As a non-Anglican I've been told that my understanding of the CofE is inaccurate, but also that it's quite hard for anyone to get a handle on this institution. This being the case, can anyone tell me to what extent ordinary laypeople in Anglican pews are expected to understand the structures and culture of the CofE? Does such knowledge help them to belong, or is it mostly irrelevant? Is it only necessary to understand one's own congregation, or is a wider awareness important in a denomination with so many different traditions?
The books and articles I've read about the CofE are perhaps not the most useful ones. Please recommend any that you think would be helpful.
Thanks.
(NB: I'm currently between churches, but trying to consider what to do in the long term.)
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Adam.
Like as the
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From an outsider's POV, it often seemed to me your typical CofE-er in the pew is very parochial, in the positive and negative senses of that word. So, their understanding of the CofE is really their understanding of their parish.
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Knopwood
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Posted
quote:
Originally posted by SvitlanaV2:
As a non-Anglican I've been told that my understanding of the CofE is inaccurate, but also that it's quite hard for anyone to get a handle on this institution. This being the case, can anyone tell me to what extent ordinary laypeople in Anglican pews are expected to understand the structures and culture of the CofE?
Heck, it's opaque to me as a non-English Anglican!
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Morlader
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Expected by whom?
Every diocese, every deanery, every parish is different from its neighbours. Heck, often congregations meeting in the same building with same clergy are quite different. (I remember one Pentecost - "they were all together in one place" Acts 2:1:1, so one service instead of three - when an '8 o'clock' man said to an '11 o'clock' neighbour "I didn't know you went to church".)
And then there's the whole question of establishment and its repercussions.
Nah! Any "explanation" of the CofE is bound to be biased and partial.
[ 16. November 2013, 08:56: Message edited by: Morlader ]
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.. to utmost west.
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L'organist
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1. Many people who are CofE wouldn't necessarily see themselves as "Anglican".
2. Since the main "rules" are the 39 Articles then you'd be best placed questioning the over 50s.
3. The main thing to realise is that one of the joys of the Church of England is that, by-and-large, no one is really interested in the finer points of what you believe, with the exception of the more evangelical wing.
Yes, there will be issues that people care about passionately and that cause dissent, unpleasantness, rage, angst and general ill-feeling, but they are issues, not belief.
4. As to how the CofE works - the answer is that most in the pew would reel off something along the lines of: Archbishop of Canterbury, other bishops, dioceses, rural deaneries, parish. They might mention synod; they might put the Queen at the head of the list.
5. Depending on how involved they are in their own church they may know how their parish runs - MAY.
Me? Well, as an organist I report to the Priest-in-Charge, he delegates most stuff to the Churchwardens; Chris (the most musical of the two) takes the view that you "don't own a guard-dog and bark yourself" so I'm left to get on with the job I'm trained to do. The only other person who gets involved is the Treasurer (finance director) who issues cheques for occasional services and settles invoices for instrument tuning and music.
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Rara temporum felicitate ubi sentire quae velis et quae sentias dicere licet
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S. Bacchus
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I would second what Hart said about the average Anglican in the pews being parochial in his or her attachments. Outwith their own parish, many devout Anglican will have laundry lists of favourite churches and clerics, whom they believe to 'do things correctly' (whatever they mean by that, and it will vary enormously from individual to individual).
That's not to say that there's no feeling of connection to the bishop or the diocese. There is, of course. It's perhaps most commonly expressed in a feeling for the cathedral as the 'mother church'. I would say, though, that there is probably a greater connection to the person of the bishop. Despite what you might here on the Ship, most bishops are popular with the laity in their dioceses. I attribute this partly to the fact that bishops tend to be skilled at 'putting on the face to meet the faces that they meet', as it were.
Interest in Synod tends to grow in a direct relationship to frustration with it. If people aren't angry with Synod, they ignore it.
A big difference between the CofE and the Roman Catholic Church is the attitude toward what goes on around the person of the most senior bishop. I can't think of any Anglican, expect for those actually employed in Church House, who knows the name of a single member of the Archbishop's staff. In contrast, a certain type of Roman Catholic always seems to be very keen to keep up with who's done what in the Vatican and will say things like 'well, when Msgr. XX was the Pope's Private Secretary, things were like this' or 'Msgr. Marini has much better liturgical taste than Msgr. Marini'. Nobody in the Church of England, whether lay or ordained, seems to pay the slightest attention to what the Archbishop of Canterbury is doing liturgically or even administratively, unless it actually affects them directly. I'm enough of an Anglican to think that attitude may be rather healthy.
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'It's not that simple. I won't have it to be that simple'.
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Anglo Catholic Relict
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Posted
quote:
Originally posted by SvitlanaV2:
Let's hope this is the right forum for my rather unusual thread....
As a non-Anglican I've been told that my understanding of the CofE is inaccurate, but also that it's quite hard for anyone to get a handle on this institution. This being the case, can anyone tell me to what extent ordinary laypeople in Anglican pews are expected to understand the structures and culture of the CofE? Does such knowledge help them to belong, or is it mostly irrelevant? Is it only necessary to understand one's own congregation, or is a wider awareness important in a denomination with so many different traditions?
The books and articles I've read about the CofE are perhaps not the most useful ones. Please recommend any that you think would be helpful.
Thanks.
(NB: I'm currently between churches, but trying to consider what to do in the long term.)
I think most people do not concern themselves with the structures, and the culture is acquired by osmosis.
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South Coast Kevin
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Posted
quote:
Originally posted by S. Bacchus:
A big difference between the CofE and the Roman Catholic Church is the attitude toward what goes on around the person of the most senior bishop. I can't think of any Anglican, expect for those actually employed in Church House, who knows the name of a single member of the Archbishop's staff. In contrast, a certain type of Roman Catholic always seems to be very keen to keep up with who's done what in the Vatican and will say things like 'well, when Msgr. XX was the Pope's Private Secretary, things were like this' or 'Msgr. Marini has much better liturgical taste than Msgr. Marini'. Nobody in the Church of England, whether lay or ordained, seems to pay the slightest attention to what the Archbishop of Canterbury is doing liturgically or even administratively, unless it actually affects them directly. I'm enough of an Anglican to think that attitude may be rather healthy.
Something like this, for example?
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Chorister
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I probably know more than most lay people in my church because I have spent many years reading the Church Times. (And how many people actually do that?) Thinking my way back to the years BCT, so to speak, I think what mostly concerned me was that the church was there week by week, putting on services and being a reassuring presence in the community. Apart from the odd visit to the Cathedral for a special event, the wider workings of the church didn't really concern me. I hazard a guess that it is the same for most people.
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Retired, sitting back and watching others for a change.
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SvitlanaV2
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Posted
quote:
Originally posted by L'organist:
Many people who are CofE wouldn't necessarily see themselves as "Anglican".
I understand that Anglicanism exists around the world, whereas the CofE is a specifically English church. But what does it mean to be CofE and not Anglican?
[ 16. November 2013, 23:24: Message edited by: SvitlanaV2 ]
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bib
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It has always made me smile when I fill in a hospital admission form for a patient when they answer CofE to the religious affiliation question. In Australia that literally means 'doesn't go to church or hasn't been for over half a century'. The church attenders answer Anglican if thay are of the Anglican persuasion.
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"My Lord, my Life, my Way, my End, accept the praise I bring"
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american piskie
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Posted
quote:
Originally posted by SvitlanaV2:
But what does it mean to be CofE and not Anglican?
Well here are two understandings of being C of E
(i) being a member of the ongoing christian community in Little Wittering;
(ii) being a member of one of two provinces of the western church which somehow got detached in the confusions of the 16 and 17 C.
Neither of these is "Anglican" except in the obsolete definitional sense of "in communion with the see of Canterbury".
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SvitlanaV2
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Posted
I'm getting the impression that (apart from archbishops and ecclesiastical PR folk?) the concept of a 'CofE identity' primarily exists in the minds of people who are in many respects outside the CofE. It doesn't have much meaning for ordinary lay worshippers. Is that correct?
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Basilica
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Posted
quote:
Originally posted by SvitlanaV2:
I'm getting the impression that (apart from archbishops and ecclesiastical PR folk?) the concept of a 'CofE identity' primarily exists in the minds of people who are in many respects outside the CofE. It doesn't have much meaning for ordinary lay worshippers. Is that correct?
I think there's a lot to that. I recently held a group discussion in a parish I was working in. I asked about 20 people "who here decided to become Anglican?" Only four people raised their hands.
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S. Bacchus
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Posted
quote:
Originally posted by american piskie:
Neither of these is "Anglican" except in the obsolete definitional sense of "in communion with the see of Canterbury".
If that definition is obsolete, then it seems to me that there is no workable definition of what it means to be Anglican.
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Cara
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I too (as a cradle English Catholic who became Episcopalian in the US, and therefore don't have detailed knowledge about the main branch of Christianity in my native country) am puzzled by the idea that you could consider yourself a member of the Church of England but not an Anglican???
Unless, as has been mentioned, we're talking only about nominal C of E people who put that down as their religion because it's their cultural heritage, but who don't practice...Ok, they might say "C of E" when pressed to say something.
But to be a practising member of the C of E and yet not consider oneself Anglican??
But then maybe there are Episcopalians in the States who, though they are de facto members of the Anglican Communion, don't think much about being Anglican. That's more understandable there; but for a member of the Church of England not to consider him/herself Anglican seems strange to me...
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Pondering.
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Bostonman
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Posted
quote:
Originally posted by Cara:
But then maybe there are Episcopalians in the States who, though they are de facto members of the Anglican Communion, don't think much about being Anglican. That's more understandable there; but for a member of the Church of England not to consider him/herself Anglican seems strange to me...
All living Episcopalians have always called themselves Episcopalians. "Anglican" in the United States is primarily used by those attacking the Episcopal Church. That might explain it.
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Albertus
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CofE but not Anglican? No more odd than (although not exactly analogous to) identifying with Britain but not the Commonwealth, England rather than Britain, Yorkshire rather than England. At a push, provided you are aware of these wider contexts, you might admit to them as a secondary identity, but they don't shape how you think of yourself. There's also I think still something of a sense among some people that this is the default (Ok, not quite the right word, but something like that) Church where they were born, and probably those people would have been CoS if born in Scotland, RC if Belgian, and so on.
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Corvo
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The vicar of the Anglo-Catholic parish in which I grew up taught us not to use the word 'Anglican' because it made the CofE sound like a denomination - as opposed to simply being 'the Church' (in/of England).
[ 17. November 2013, 13:57: Message edited by: Corvo ]
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SvitlanaV2
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# 16967
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Posted
quote:
Originally posted by Basilica:
I recently held a group discussion in a parish I was working in. I asked about 20 people "who here decided to become Anglican?" Only four people raised their hands.
Maybe they just thought you were asking if anyone had entered the CofE as adults rather than having been raised in it.
Regarding people who are CofE but not Anglican, I understand there are some evangelicals who don't like denominational labels but prefer to identify solely as Christians. In an evangelical CofE context maybe this would this would indicate an unwillingness to be called an Anglican?
A few years ago I used to read about clergy who wanted to 'empower the laity'. Do church leaders in the CofE ever talk about this, or was it more of a fad in other denominations? I find it hard to see how the apparent reality of lay indifference (and ignorance) towards the wider church culture and its structures can help with that goal.
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Arethosemyfeet
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Posted
quote:
Originally posted by Albertus:
CofE but not Anglican? No more odd than (although not exactly analogous to) identifying with Britain but not the Commonwealth, England rather than Britain, Yorkshire rather than England. At a push, provided you are aware of these wider contexts, you might admit to them as a secondary identity, but they don't shape how you think of yourself. There's also I think still something of a sense among some people that this is the default (Ok, not quite the right word, but something like that) Church where they were born, and probably those people would have been CoS if born in Scotland, RC if Belgian, and so on.
And indeed a lot of folk will move from the CofE in England to the CofS in Scotland without batting an eyelid or realising there is a difference.
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Metapelagius
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Posted
quote:
Originally posted by Arethosemyfeet:
quote:
Originally posted by Albertus:
CofE but not Anglican? No more odd than (although not exactly analogous to) identifying with Britain but not the Commonwealth, England rather than Britain, Yorkshire rather than England. At a push, provided you are aware of these wider contexts, you might admit to them as a secondary identity, but they don't shape how you think of yourself. There's also I think still something of a sense among some people that this is the default (Ok, not quite the right word, but something like that) Church where they were born, and probably those people would have been CoS if born in Scotland, RC if Belgian, and so on.
And indeed a lot of folk will move from the CofE in England to the CofS in Scotland without batting an eyelid or realising there is a difference.
quote:
posted by Chorister
quote:
When the bishop turns up at your church ...
![[Killing me]](graemlins/killingme.gif)
Are you serious?
- L'Organist in the purgatory discussion "Bishops - sign of unity?"
Not much difference there then... ![[Two face]](graemlins/scot_twoface.gif)
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Adam.
Like as the
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Posted
quote:
Originally posted by Arethosemyfeet:
And indeed a lot of folk will move from the CofE in England to the CofS in Scotland without batting an eyelid or realising there is a difference.
Including the Queen, yes?
[Edit: I mean, I'm sure she realizes there's a difference, but her eyelids remain indefatigably unbatted I'm sure.]
[ 17. November 2013, 16:54: Message edited by: Hart ]
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Ave Crux, Spes Unica!
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Arethosemyfeet
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# 17047
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Posted
quote:
Originally posted by Hart:
quote:
Originally posted by Arethosemyfeet:
And indeed a lot of folk will move from the CofE in England to the CofS in Scotland without batting an eyelid or realising there is a difference.
Including the Queen, yes?
I think the Queen is able to distinguish between being Supreme Governor of one and a member of the other.
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american piskie
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Posted
I said "obsolete" because nowadays there are all sorts of churches in communion with the see of Canterbury which are clearly not Anglican---some Old Catholics, some Lutherans, some Hispanic protestant episcopalians, etc. Otherwise, in my opinion, there is no other sensible definition from the point of view of a member of the C of E. Does one in ten thousand know or care about Intruments of Communion?
I am puzzled too by the puzzlement that members of the C of E should prefer not to know too much about the "denominational" workings of the Church (instance of the rule that those prone to seasickness should keep away from the engine room), and should on the whole exhibit no more than polite acquiescence if asked to self-identify as "Anglican".
I live in England and therefore am a member of the C of E. In GOC I thought of Seabury and his Aberdeen ordination and threw my lot in with the Protestant Episcopalians. If I returned to Scotland I rather think I would have my name entered on the communion roll of the parish church (but often find myself 8 o'clocking with the episcopalian remnant.)
I know that the Vatican tried to persuade the Anglican Communion to act as a Church, but it ain't. No one becomes "an anglican", do they?
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Gamaliel
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I think you're right on the evangelical thing, SvitlanaV2 - to many (if not most) evangelical Anglicans their evangelical identity trumps their Anglican one ...
Although that's not always the case. You can still meet 'Prayer Book evangelicals' where the Anglican identity forms a big part of how they view themselves.
But it'd be an Anglican identity that other Anglicans mightn't recognise or at least tackle in the same way ...
Which is why the whole thing is very slippery.
That's part of its charm, of course, although it can be infuriating at times.
I think I've been one of those who has accused you of 'inaccuracy' in some of your assumptions about the CofE - ![[Hot and Hormonal]](icon_redface.gif) - but I suspect there are as many answers to your questions as there are Anglicans.
FWIW in terms of your church-hunting, if you were to consider attending an Anglican parish regularly, then your experience will inevitably be shaped by the churchmanship there and what goes on there on the ground. Two parishes away or even a few hundred yards down the road the experience could be very different.
Far be it from me to offer advice, but if I were to do so, it would be to go with the flow for a while and simply observe what goes on.
You'll find some things that resonate with your Methodist experience and other things that don't. Some things will seem familiar, others very different. But the degree to which that happens depends on the parish concerned.
The parish where my wife grew up was always described as 'More Methodist than the Methodists' (despite having a very Calvinistic strand at its core - it was one of those churches which signed up always to have Calvinistic ministers in the Charles Simeon mould).
In the end, a lot of the congregation ended up with the Methodists up the road as they had a nice, new, warm and more easily maintained building ...
Many of the others ended up in the lively, non-denominational charismatic fellowship on the other side of town ...
Your best bet, I think, would be to hang around with one or other of your nearest parishes and then post a list of questions/observations here. Once the Shippies have failed to answer those or given 26 contradictory answers to your 3 or 4 questions, you'll have understood something more about the CofE ...
![[Big Grin]](biggrin.gif)
What non-conformist alternatives are there where you are? URC? Baptist?
I've always thought of the Methodists as something of a half-way house between the CofE and the more full-on non-conformists like the Baptists ... but that might just be me ...
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Basilica
Shipmate
# 16965
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Posted
quote:
Originally posted by SvitlanaV2:
quote:
Originally posted by Basilica:
I recently held a group discussion in a parish I was working in. I asked about 20 people "who here decided to become Anglican?" Only four people raised their hands.
Maybe they just thought you were asking if anyone had entered the CofE as adults rather than having been raised in it.
To a large extent I was. But it was notable that quite a few had never really asked themselves "why am I Anglican?" or "why am I Church of England?" (That was part of the reason I was asked to give the talk.)
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seasick
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As this seems to be about the CofE in general, rather than its worship in particular, I think it would be better off in Purgatory. Hang on to your Prayer Books.
seasick, Eccles host
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We believe there is, and always was, in every Christian Church, ... an outward priesthood, ordained by Jesus Christ, and an outward sacrifice offered therein. - John Wesley
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Albertus
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Posted
quote:
Originally posted by Gamaliel:
I've always thought of the Methodists as something of a half-way house between the CofE and the more full-on non-conformists like the Baptists ... but that might just be me ...
Potentially, at least, a preaching order of the CofE according to Donald Soper.
A little more surprisingly, a very definitely RC friend of mine, on being told that I had started attending a Methodist church, said 'Oh, Methodists- they have the Mass'. I am not sure whether or not the rather high Methodists with whom I used to worship would have agreed with him, though.
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Gamaliel
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Posted
He'd be right that many Methodists retain a 'higher' view of the Eucharist than is common across non-conformity - at least in its British manifestation.
I've never attended a 'high' Methodist service but I'm told that they exist. The Methodists I've known have tended to be suspicious of their 'high-church' end.
I've also heard it said that most Methodist ministers who become Anglican - and some do - tend to gravitate to the higher end of the spectrum. I've met a female CofE priest who used to be a Methodist minister who cross over at what she took to be considerable personal cost. She told me it was because her view of the Eucharist meant that she could no longer remain where she was ...
It was on the tip of my tongue to ask her, but I refrained, why she thought the CofE had a more coherent or cohesive Eucharistic theology ...
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Let us with a gladsome mind
Praise the Lord for He is kind.
http://philthebard.blogspot.com
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Pulsator Organorum Ineptus
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I would have thought most people in England would consider "C of E" and "Anglican" to be interchangeable terms - in rather the same way that we tend to forget (or certainly did in the past) there is a difference between "English" and "British".
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Aravis
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I officially converted from Baptist to Anglican at the age of 20. I'm now 47 and have been a lay reader in the Anglican for 10 years.
Recently, my father-in-law was grumbling about the vestments their new vicar wore, saying it was all far too high church. I said, gently, that I didn't really see why it was a major issue (bearing in mind that they have an ageing congregation and problems maintaining the building). His automatic response was, "Oh, you wouldn't understand because you were brought up Baptist." ![[Paranoid]](graemlins/paranoid.gif)
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Pomona
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I certainly know plenty of evangelicals who attend an Anglican church, but for whom evangelicalism how they identify - they'd easily go from an evangelical Anglican church to a Vineyard church, for example.
However, for MOTR CoE attenders, I would imagine that for them attending a CoE church (usually their parish church in this case unless they go to a church specifically for their children's work provision) is default churchgoing behaviour for English people. It may not actually be accurate, but there's a cultural influence of the CoE that doesn't exist for TEC and other Anglican churches outside the UK. For a lot of people in England, church = CoE even if they wouldn't identify as Anglicans.
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Consider the work of God: Who is able to straighten what he has bent? [Ecclesiastes 7:13]
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CL
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Posted
quote:
Originally posted by S. Bacchus:
quote:
Originally posted by american piskie:
Neither of these is "Anglican" except in the obsolete definitional sense of "in communion with the see of Canterbury".
If that definition is obsolete, then it seems to me that there is no workable definition of what it means to be Anglican.
I'm reminded of Bill Buckley's remark that no one from the pope to Mao Tse Tung could be entirely sure that they weren't an Episcopalian.
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SvitlanaV2
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Posted
quote:
Originally posted by american piskie:
I am puzzled too by the puzzlement that members of the C of E should prefer not to know too much about the "denominational" workings of the Church (instance of the rule that those prone to seasickness should keep away from the engine room), and should on the whole exhibit no more than polite acquiescence if asked to self-identify as "Anglican".
I'm puzzled simply because the ways of the CofE are unfamiliar to me! I grew up with the Methodists, who have a stronger sense of group identity, even though some of them are a bit higher or lower than others. I don't have any CofE folk in my extended family.
Gamaliel
I've been attending a CofE church quite often for a while now, but it hasn't made me any less 'inaccurate', has it?? To be fair, I just go there to worship - I don't try to fit in. But in the long term I ought to be in a place where I can fit in and contribute.
The Methodist church I used to attend had good relations with a local CofE congregation, and the folk there are friendly. I've worshipped with them on quite a few occasions over the years, either alone or with other Methodists at ecumenical services. This church describes itself as 'liberal catholic'. The vicar, a woman, is very welcoming. And as the secretary to the local Churches Together network I know quite a bit about various local churches. But my original question wasn't about how to find a friendly church. It was about the extent to which ordinary laypeople in CofE pews understand the wider church culture and structures. There have been some very interesting answers to that question, for which I'm grateful.
[ 17. November 2013, 21:27: Message edited by: SvitlanaV2 ]
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SvitlanaV2
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Posted
Sorry to double post, but I wanted to add a smiley, and to say that the commments so far have all provided food for thought. Many thanks.
![[Smile]](smile.gif)
[ 17. November 2013, 21:46: Message edited by: SvitlanaV2 ]
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Curiosity killed ...
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Svitlana, you're asking for generalisations about a church that has room for Holy Trinity Brompton and St Mary's Bourne Street, All Souls' Langham Place and All Saints' Margaret Street deliberately naming pairs of churches that are within sight of each other.
The CofE is a broad church, it chooses to take the middle way and allow a wide range of expressions of churchmanship. Common Worship is written to allow those expressions.
Different churches and congregations will have different understandings of whether they are Anglican, whether they are evangelical, how involved they are with the wider church. Those churches that say the Nicene Creed weekly say they are part of the "holy catholic and apostolic church" - no mention of Anglicanism at all.
And in my experience, many of the congregation won't have much understanding of what the CofE is and how it works at all.
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Mugs - Keep the Ship afloat
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Enoch
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Svitlana, I tend to think of myself as CofE rather than Anglican. To me, if you are English, the CofE is the church for you unless you're either convinced by someone else's claims or were brought up something else, just as Orthodoxy is Christianity for Greeks, Russians etc, and the Roman Catholic Church is Christianity for Italians, French etc.
It matters also to me that the CofE (and also the CinW) are the lineal descendants of the first missionaries that arrived in these lands.
Very occasionally - every two or three years when somebody asks this sort of question - I wonder what I'd be if I lived in Scotland, but I don't. There's quite a lot of familiar things I'd miss if I was CofS, but although I prefer having bishops, I'm not sure that I'm really a Piskie.
Incidentally, American Piskie, what does GOC stand for? When I looked it up, it said General Optical Council, but that doesn't seem to fit the context.
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Brexit wrexit - Sir Graham Watson
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seasick
...over the edge
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quote:
Originally posted by Gamaliel:
He'd be right that many Methodists retain a 'higher' view of the Eucharist than is common across non-conformity - at least in its British manifestation.
I've never attended a 'high' Methodist service but I'm told that they exist. The Methodists I've known have tended to be suspicious of their 'high-church' end.
I've also heard it said that most Methodist ministers who become Anglican - and some do - tend to gravitate to the higher end of the spectrum. I've met a female CofE priest who used to be a Methodist minister who cross over at what she took to be considerable personal cost. She told me it was because her view of the Eucharist meant that she could no longer remain where she was ...
It was on the tip of my tongue to ask her, but I refrained, why she thought the CofE had a more coherent or cohesive Eucharistic theology ...
How are you defining "high"? I'm sensible and middle-of-the-road, of course.
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We believe there is, and always was, in every Christian Church, ... an outward priesthood, ordained by Jesus Christ, and an outward sacrifice offered therein. - John Wesley
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Ethne Alba
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Until such time as someone brings out a decent book on the subject of what the Church of England actually is......there is always the Church of England website. It's actually very helpful and very informative
Start right at the beginning and steadily go through. ...but be warned, you can easily loose a few days in that website
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Baptist Trainfan
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quote:
Originally posted by Ethne Alba:
Until such time as someone brings out a decent book on the subject of what the Church of England actually is......
Is this any use, perhaps?
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Forthview
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Many years ago I was in Portsmouth which has both an RC and a CofE cathedral. I went into the tourist office to ask where the Anglican cathedral was.The young girl working there had no idea where the 'Anglican' cathedral was.She was hardly aware of the RC cathedral but the word 'Anglican' was unknown to her,though she was able to tell me where THE cathedral was.
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american piskie
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quote:
Originally posted by Enoch:
Incidentally, American Piskie, what does GOC stand for? When I looked it up, it said General Optical Council, but that doesn't seem to fit the context.
Sorry, God's Own Country.
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North East Quine
Curious beastie
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Originally posted by Arethosemyfeet:
quote:
And indeed a lot of folk will move from the CofE in England to the CofS in Scotland without batting an eyelid or realising there is a difference.
My impression, based admittedly on a small sample, is that, rather than realise there is a difference, they simply assume we are doing it wrong. ![[Roll Eyes]](rolleyes.gif)
[ 18. November 2013, 07:43: Message edited by: North East Quine ]
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Cara
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quote:
Originally posted by american piskie:
No one becomes "an anglican", do they?
???? I am confused, American piskie.
In joining the Episcopalian Church in the US, which is part of the Anglican Communion, didn't I choose to become
a) an Episcopalian, and therefore and simultaneously
b) an Anglican?
I like the analogy someone made above about whether you see yourself as English or British. I "feel" English but I know that means I am also British.
So, I guess an American Episcopalian feels Episcopalian, while knowing that means s/he is also in a larger sense Anglican.
I, as an English person in the US, joined the Episcopalian church very conscious that it was part of the Anglican Communion and feeling that in a way I was coming home; also knowing this meant that when I am back in England I will go to "my church," which in the US is called Episcopalian and in the UK, Church of England.
But they aren't both equally "Anglican," for surely a member of the C of E is much more likely than a US Episcopalian to consider her/himself "Anglican" ? Because "Anglican" as a word is so connected etymologically and historically with "England"....?
If I felt I was becoming an Anglican by joining the Episcopal church, surely a convert from Catholicism in England who joins the C of E is even more intentionally "becoming an Anglican" ??
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Pondering.
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Albertus
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quote:
Originally posted by seasick:
quote:
Originally posted by Gamaliel:
He'd be right that many Methodists retain a 'higher' view of the Eucharist than is common across non-conformity - at least in its British manifestation.
I've never attended a 'high' Methodist service but I'm told that they exist. The Methodists I've known have tended to be suspicious of their 'high-church' end....
How are you defining "high"? I'm sensible and middle-of-the-road, of course.
Well, I used the term originally, so let me say what I meant. The church in question was Hinde St/ West London Mission: at least one, usually two Communion services every Sunday, relatively liturgical, pulpit fall and Minister's stole in seasonal colours. Would you say that that was 'high' by Methodist standards?
[ 18. November 2013, 08:11: Message edited by: Albertus ]
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pererin
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quote:
Originally posted by Enoch:
Svitlana, I tend to think of myself as CofE rather than Anglican. To me, if you are English, the CofE is the church for you unless you're either convinced by someone else's claims or were brought up something else, just as Orthodoxy is Christianity for Greeks, Russians etc, and the Roman Catholic Church is Christianity for Italians, French etc.
It matters also to me that the CofE (and also the CinW) are the lineal descendants of the first missionaries that arrived in these lands.
Very occasionally - every two or three years when somebody asks this sort of question - I wonder what I'd be if I lived in Scotland, but I don't. There's quite a lot of familiar things I'd miss if I was CofS, but although I prefer having bishops, I'm not sure that I'm really a Piskie.
This is a question I've thought about too. I regard the Roman Church's claims and innovations as so problematic that I would be an Old Catholic in Germany or Holland, or a Reformed Episcopalian in Spain or Portugal. France and Italy are more problematic, as even the Evangelical Lutheran churches are small and tiny respectively. If only the Gallican Church had maintained its break with Rome.
But would I care enough about bishops and not being *that* Calvinist if I were a Scot? I imagine the answer's no, as the ancient practice of the Alexandrian Church of non-episcopal consecration of bishops is an adequate counter-example to later tradition. And I do tend to regard the territorial monoepiscopacy, with each diocese having its own administration, as both an inefficiency and an obstacle to Christian unity.
But it's the so-called Calvinism that's more of a problem: every time I read an instance of that wing's demands from the 17th Century, I give thanks for those wonderful high-church bishops and for the Stuart monarchy. To misquote someone whose attribution I have forgotten, they seemed to want to grant the Bishop of Rome a monopoly on anything beautiful.
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"They go to and fro in the evening, they grin like a dog, and run about through the city." (Psalm 59.6)
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L'organist
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Posted
posted by american piskie quote:
Originally posted by Enoch:
Incidentally, American Piskie, what does GOC stand for? When I looked it up, it said General Optical Council, but that doesn't seem to fit the context.
Sorry, God's Own Country.
And we all know that that is WALES
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Rara temporum felicitate ubi sentire quae velis et quae sentias dicere licet
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Gamaliel
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@SvitlanaV2 - sure, please don't misunderstand me, I'm not out to dismiss any impression you may have when you knock around in Anglican circles. It'll be as valid as anyone else's, of course and you'll see things as a comparative 'outsider'/new-comer that the regulars wouldn't ...
I've been pondering your comments about the greater level of self-identity among Methodists. I think this is right and is probably a feature of the way the circuit-system and so on works - as well as the way Methodist churches are organised on the ground.
We have a large Methodist church here and from people say it manages to stay together despite being riddled with factions. It's said to be one of the most factional churches in the area ... but I wouldn't be able to comment as I don't know it that well.
Methodist churches I've encountered in the past haven't struck me as being particularly factional at all.
Anyway ...
I echo Curiosity Killed's point. If you're trying to assess the average Anglican's sense of how things work within the CofE in a structural sense, an ethos sense and whatever else then it's going to take you an awfully long time.
Once you've done it, come back and tell the rest of us. We'd like to know the answer ...
![[Biased]](wink.gif)
Meanwhile, your friendly 'liberal catholic' parish with its female priest sounds good to me. I'd certainly check that one out if I lived where you are.
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Let us with a gladsome mind
Praise the Lord for He is kind.
http://philthebard.blogspot.com
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