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Thread: Washington Post on Episcopal Church: "small but historically prominent" denomination
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stonespring
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# 15530
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Posted
In its coverage of the fatal hit and run accident involving Episcopal Bishop Heather Elizabeth Cook in the Diocese of Maryland, the Washington Post gave brief background information on the The Episcopal Church as "a small but historically prominent American Protestant denomination."
http://www.washingtonpost.com/local/diocese-knew-of-dui-when-it-made-woman-now-connected-with-cyclists-death-a-bishop/2014/12 /30/a68d04c6-905d-11e4-ba53-a477d66580ed_story.html
Ouch.
Numerically, in comparison with the Roman Catholic and Southern Baptist Churches, the huge number of non-denominational Christians and Christian congregations, etc., and given TEC's steadily declining membership, this is certainly true, but the way that phrase was worded and slipped into the article makes one realize that quite a few if not most Americans and even American Christians know very little about the Episcopal Church and even if they read about it, approaching the topic with no previous biases for or against it, would objectively describe it as such.
It is worth noting that there are thousands of denominations of Christianity in this country and that most do not have anywhere near a million members, so that maybe makes the "small" adjective a little less appropriate but in the context I describe above it still seems to fit.
Here are two blog posts:
http://cathylynngrossman.religionnews.com/2014/12/31/episcopal-church-protestant-religion/
http://www.getreligion.org/getreligion/2015/1/4/jeopardy-religion-name-a-small-but-historically-prominent-protestant-denomina tion-in-american-life
...about how this journalistic coverage of TEC differs from the weight that the denomination was assumed to carry among religion journalists as few as 10 years ago (note that the top billed writer of the current Washington Post article is the paper's chief religion writer).
Has the attention that the media has given up until recently to coverage of Mainline Protestant Denominations, especially the way that the mainstream media has up until recently portrayed Mainline Protestantism as "mainstream" Christianity, been unmerited given the decline of Mainline Protestantism over the decades? Is this article a sign of the news media putting things in better perspective?
Finally, concerning The Episcopal Church in particular, could one argue that, at least for the past 50 years or so, the only way that it has been a "major" denomination has been in its ownership of big and beautiful churches and other property/institutions, its philanthropism, and the overrepresentation of Episcopalians among the wealthy and politically (and academically) powerful (which is still true but less so as the children of many of these influential Episcopalians, while remaining influential themselves have increasingly not identified with The Episcopal Church or even with any religious group?).
I'll admit that I have been harsh on The Episcopal Church in asking these questions. The truth is I love the church (my marriage makes one of the two parishes I attend every week an Episcopal one), and I am very sad to see how in my part of the country (Upstate NY, Mid-Hudson Valley), there are beautiful Episcopal churches everywhere but they mostly have very small and elderly congregations.
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Belle Ringer
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# 13379
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Posted
quote:
Originally posted by stonespring:
Finally, concerning The Episcopal Church in particular, could one argue that, at least for the past 50 years or so, the only way that it has been a "major" denomination has been... the overrepresentation of Episcopalians among the wealthy and politically (and academically) powerful...
This one. I don't think most people care about a "foreign" to them church's buildings or activities or theology.
When the mayor, the bank president, and a high percentage of the corporate heads etc belong to the same church, I don't know if that church has clout in the sense of a clergy person's teaching or committee decision affecting the community in any way, but it appears to have clout just because so many clout people are there.
Over the years I've been surprised how much press the rather small denomination got compared with any other denominations it's size or larger except maybe RCC.
Posts: 5830 | From: Texas | Registered: Jan 2008
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Horseman Bree
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# 5290
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Posted
There was a time when large number of politically/economically were in attendance at Episcopal churches, whether for reasons of belief or because they wished to be associated with the "in" crowd.
FDR, for instance, was Episcopal, and attended an "Episcopal boarding school"
quote:
Roosevelt attended Groton School, an Episcopal boarding school in Massachusetts; 90% of the students were from families on the social register. He was strongly influenced by its headmaster, Endicott Peabody, who preached the duty of Christians to help the less fortunate and urged his students to enter public service
(Wikipedia)
This probably put him a bit out of step with many of the voters.
The fact that TEC has a "National" Cathedral in DC, which is often the place for formal national observances, might be telling as well.
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It's Not That Simple
Posts: 5372 | From: more herring choker than bluenose | Registered: Dec 2003
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Horseman Bree
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# 5290
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Posted
This is fun.
Re: TEC:
quote:
During the Gilded Age, highly prominent laity such as banker J. P. Morgan, industrialist Henry Ford, and art collector Isabella Stewart Gardner played a central role in shaping a distinctive upper class Episcopalian ethos, especially with regard to preserving the arts and history. These philanthropists propelled the Episcopal Church into a quasi-national position of importance while at the same time giving the church a central role in the cultural transformation of the country.[30] Another mark of influence is the fact that more than a quarter of all presidents of the United States have been Episcopalians (see religious affiliations of Presidents of the United States). It was during this period that the Book of Common Prayer was revised, first in 1892 and later in 1928.
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It's Not That Simple
Posts: 5372 | From: more herring choker than bluenose | Registered: Dec 2003
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stonespring
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# 15530
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Posted
St. John's Episcopal Church, being across from the White House, has also been the church of choice for many presidents who rarely attended church but wanted to make an impromptu appearance in one, including many who were not Episcopalians before becoming president and were not Episcopalian afterwards (George W. Bush, who is nominally Methodist after marrying Laura (although he was raised Episcopalian) and broadly Evangelical, is a good example).
[ 07. January 2015, 23:38: Message edited by: stonespring ]
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Net Spinster
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# 16058
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Posted
And Episcopalians/Anglicans make up 7.7% (41 members) of the new Congress in contrast to 2% of the general population according to the Pew Forum. Though not all of these might be TEC.
In contrast unaffiliated make up 20% of the general public and possibly 1.9% of Congress (1 member said unaffiliated and 9 didn't answer).
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spinner of webs
Posts: 1093 | From: San Francisco Bay area | Registered: Dec 2010
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stonespring
Shipmate
# 15530
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Posted
2% of the general population means at least 6 million, but TEC even combined with ACNA and other breakaway groups only have about 2 million members total. So are there a lot of self-identified Anglicans/Episcopalians in this country who aren't attending church and aren't even counted in church membership? (Lots of churches count many more members than actually attend, but different denominations have different rules for this.) I would think that unlike Roman Catholics, Episcopalians (especially ones who grew up in the denomination but do not attend church as adults) would be like other Mainline Protestants and be less likely to identify with a denominational label (while still perhaps identifying as Christian) unless they are actually affiliated with a particular congregation. An exception might be for immigrants from England, Australia, and other places where Anglican identity (as something distinct from Roman Catholicism and other Christian denominations) is stronger, but I do not think there are enough of them to cause this big of a discrepancy.
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Horseman Bree
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# 5290
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Posted
There is the point that Anglicanism at one time had a very large effect on significant parts of the US governments, particularly at the Federal level. How much effect it has actively now, and how much effect it may be thought to have (which are probably very different quantities!) is the question.
As a lobby group, Episcopalians could be quite effective, but they'd have to work at it to make much headway against the tidal power of the Christian Right, and both now have to contend with the dismissive attitude of the "nones", which is the rising group.
Unfortunately, the Christian Right is doing a pretty good job of reducing the willingness of ANYONE to listen to a religious viewpoint.
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It's Not That Simple
Posts: 5372 | From: more herring choker than bluenose | Registered: Dec 2003
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Net Spinster
Shipmate
# 16058
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Posted
I think there may have been some rounding up for the general population figures. In 2007 Pew did a very large survey of religious practices, affiliations, and beliefs.
1.0% of the population identified as TEC
0.3% identified as Anglican Church (Church of England)
and there were a smattering of others that fell into the Anglican/Episcopal affiliation
Some religions had more people on their books than identified as that religion (Mormons were a big one there) and some had far fewer people on the books than identified (Unitarian/Universalist as an example).
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spinner of webs
Posts: 1093 | From: San Francisco Bay area | Registered: Dec 2010
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