Being a long way from home inevitably makes you reflect on domestic matters with a different perspective. Sitting in a Central Asian capital city, having been in conference with a vast range of world religions, the scandal of Christian division is all the more acute.
Waiting for my next appointment I was catching up with emails and read Bishop Graham Kings’ article on the Fulcrum website at http://fulcrum-anglican.org.uk/page.cfm?ID=437. The questions he poses are astute, but I doubt if he will get any response.
The Fellowship of Confessing Anglicans will be established on Saturday (as I understand it from a distance). This is a self-indulgent distraction from the real stuff of Christian mission in a fractured world that cries out for reconciliation. FCA is not needed, is a distraction and offers the world yet another example of Christian fracturing.
After the irregular ordinations in the Diocese of Southwark several years ago I asked a couple of those involved to show me where they find the biblical sanction for lying, misrepresentation and subterfuge. I have never had a reply. Despite protestations of innocence, the scheming behind FCA does not give us confidence that dodgy behaviour will receive the same biblical or ethical scrutiny as is applied to questions of sexual behaviour.
I don’t know who FCA is really for. I am not aware of evangelicals really wanting it and will be interested to see who joins the party. Graham Kings suggests that the take-up for this weekend has not been great – if so, that should not come as any surprise. Most evangelicals – it seems to me – just want to get on with the ministry and mission to which they are called as Anglicans and are fed up with schemes for fragmentation.
The intriguing conundrum that I cannot resolve is how Forward in Faith and Reform can unite despite such serious contradictions in their cultures, priorities and practices. It seems they can only do so with a massive dose of pretence that the world is not as it is: that there is no gay sub-culture in FiF’s constituency and lay presidency does not happen.
I hope Graham Kings’ questions will be answered and that his warnings will be heeded. Maybe, when I get back from Kazakhstan to the familiarity of England my perspective will change. But, sitting here and thinking about the world, some of these internal Anglican shenanigans do look like trumped up, self-indulgent and self-important side-shows.
July 3, 2009 at 7:27 am
Bishop Nick, you are spot on. The key question for the Mouse is just as you put it – what is the FCA for? If it is just there to oppose the ordination of homosexuals, it is a terrible way to make the point.
July 3, 2009 at 9:39 am
Thanks, Nick, as someone who has trouble even keeping up with the acronyms at the moment you’ve nailed the issues as far as I’m concerned.
Church history tell us that people who split in order to maintain or gain privilege usually get exactly what they deserve.
The ecclesial contortions the C of E has put itself through to include those who are unable to accept the ordination of women is (despite its flaws) an attempt to live out our calling to bring reconciliation into the world. FCA isn’t.
The challenge for me is to try and maintain an attitude of reconciliation towards a group which seems to exist largely to throw down the gauntlet.
July 3, 2009 at 12:31 pm
“Most evangelicals – it seems to me – just want to get on with the ministry and mission to which they are called as Anglicans and are fed up with schemes for fragmentation.”
+1 for me.
Good sense here, thanks.
July 3, 2009 at 5:19 pm
An excellent insightful blog.
Pity your good sense is not shared by many more.
July 3, 2009 at 7:07 pm
Absolutely right, Nick, and tanks for putting it so well.
July 3, 2009 at 7:17 pm
Nick, I am all for taking the long view – and the broad (or global) one as well. I can’t speak too directly about the UK scene (which is not just England but Wales, Ireland and Scotland too – where the Scottish Episcopal Church almost died out under the ex-Christian Holloway) but I note that Charles Raven has replied point by point to Graham Kings in SPREAD:
http://www.anglicanspread.org/?p=214
and he does make a few points about senior leadership and how conservative evangelicals are almost entirely absent at that level – evidence of a closed shop, perhaps?
As for the longer and broader view, you ptobably know that the creation of ACNA was bitterly and repeatedly denounced and resisted, and not just by the revisionists – people like Ephraim Radner and Philip Turner wrote long erudite pieces counseling the orthodox to stay, while Schori, Robinson, Ingham etc kept forcing the radical pace in a church now imploding. In the end people saw there was no point using up all their energy and money in an apostate organization, in the vain hope that TEC would obey the Anglican Communion.
I’m sure the C of E is different from TEC, but Raven does refer to the C of E’s capitulation on ‘civil partnerships’ (aka samesex marriage for clergy) as evidence of Trojan horses. In the end, FCA probably means an international realignment in Anglicanism, away from its colonialist center in Canterbury. That’s the broad significance of what’s happening, i suggest, and Michael Nazir-ali and others can see this.
July 3, 2009 at 10:06 pm
Interesting.
Now, maybe you could share how you think about the TEC bishops who consecrated Gene Robinson and are currently attempting to drive those who protest agaínst them out of their churches? What do you think about those bishops who promote a homosexual lifestyle as a valid choice for anglican clergy? What do you think of the Church of Canada who are pushing for same-sex blessings? Are these also causing the “scandal of Christian division”?
I would also like to suggest that if you are accusing people of lying, maybe you should be more concrete in your allegations and allow them a proper right of reply. Otherwise it’s just gossip!
July 4, 2009 at 6:27 am
Yup. I was expecting to hear more about this at the New Wine leaders conference in May, but apart from a couple of comments and the FCA launch leaflets in a pile on a table, it was strangely quiet.
There’s been concern among some New Wine folk I know that the movement was getting too political, and perhaps they’ve heard that. In their latest circular, the FCA launch is commended, but it’s recognised that people will have concerns about it. That seems a bit softer than what we were hearing a couple of years ago.
July 4, 2009 at 10:02 pm
RE “The intriguing conundrum that I cannot resolve is how Forward in Faith and Reform can unite despite such serious contradictions in their cultures, priorities and practices. It seems they can only do so with a massive dose of pretence that the world is not as it is: that there is no gay sub-culture in FiF’s constituency and lay presidency does not happen.”
It’s pretty easily resolved — and has been explained time and time again for the past several years. The people in FIF and Reform believe that one another actually believe the Gospel, even if they do 1) have a gay sub-culture, or 2) believe in lay presidency.
They don’t believe, however, that the crazed foaming at the mouth, Buddhist bishop nominating, same sex union promoting, progressives believe the same gospel.
Now. I grant that you don’t believe those things above. You’re probably willing to believe that the crazed progressives believe the same gospel as you do. But they don’t.
And so the “interesting conundrum” is not at all irresolvable. Reform believes that FIF is seriously mistaken about some important points. FIF believes that Reform is seriously mistaken about some important points. But both believe that the other actually have some foundational viewpoints in common like the essentials of the Gospel. And they don’t believe that about the crazed progressives.
There. It’s explained now. I’m sure you never need to “wonder” again about the “conundrum.”
July 4, 2009 at 10:31 pm
I was with you at a ‘regular ordination’ last Sunday in Southwark cathedral when my brother Tim was made deacon.
I became a priest myself because I wanted to celebrate the resurrection of my Saviour and the presence of God’s Kingdom at the heart of the community.
I also believe I joined the Catholic church of Christ, not a ‘colonial centre’ as some of your other posters seem to suggest.
My concern is that I know exactly who FCA is for.
July 5, 2009 at 8:44 am
Well, it looks like I’m not a solitary ‘vox clamantis in deserto’ here. Is that Sarah from Titusonenine supra? Let me amplify her point: to judge from their own pronouncements and writings, what Schori, Ingham, Robinson, Spong etc believe about the Holy Trinity and the Niceno-Constantinopolitan Creed is so far removed from what I believe that I have trouble recognizing them as orthodox Christians, let alone God-appointed leaders in the Church of God. (Judgmental? Well, as Bre’r Rabbit said, ‘Please don’t throw me into that briar patch!’)
Do clergy in the Church of England promote simliar “strange and erroneous opinions” (to cite the BCP)? Not usually as openly extreme, but there are a few who push the envelope in the ‘Modern Churchpeople’s Union’ and ‘Inclusive Church’.
Do bishops of the C of E know of clergy in same sex relations? Of course they do; at least 50 clergy, including some cathedral canons, are in ‘civil partnerships’. Some bishops have even attended the ceremonies. Does Nick know why? Is there not ’subterfuge and lying’ going on at this level? Or is that old West End farce from the 70s, ‘No Sex Please, We’re British’ still running in the C of E?
July 5, 2009 at 12:27 pm
Spot on, Nick. FCA seems a colossal irrelevance to, and a desperately sad distraction from, the Gospel in England. It’s simply not needed.
To Mark B, if I might just say that it is a regular complaint of Conservative Evangelicals that they don’t get the bishops and other senior clergy appointments. But many CE’s simply don’t do the work in the structural life of the diocese that might demonstrate their suitability for such appointments. Furthermore, while the hierarchy of the Church of England is not averse to the appointment of CE’s to senior posts, a friend in the Crown Nominations Commission was telling me recently that the problem often comes not from the central appointed and elected members, but from the diocesan appointed members of the CNC who are reluctant to have someone who is perceived (and often acts) as extreme.
And to Sarah, my I add that your far too charitable about the significance of the differences that exist between FiF & Reform. Reform’s entire agenda with respect to homosexuality is that support for it is part of a ‘different gospel’. Anyone who supports it – including a large minority of FiF clergy – is a false teacher. For FiF, lay presidency is utterly anaethema, something that makes the Church the Church, as opposed to a sect. Practising lay presidency is a betrayal not of some secondary issue but of the very nature of the Church.
July 5, 2009 at 5:57 pm
Simon, you seem to confirm my impression that senior appointments in England are decided on a ‘closed shop’ basis, in which a governing clique determines who is suitable to admit to their number – I think the name for this is ‘nomenklatura’. All very English and smug, I’m sure, and esigned to exclude conservative evangelicals. From my contacts in England and travels I also know that nearly all of the largest parish churches in England (by attendance) are conservative evangelical or evangelical charismatic (All Souls, Christ Church Fulwood, Holy Trinity Brompton, All Saints Crowborough, Jesmond Parish Church etc etc), so these leaders obviously know how to build churches through preaching and teaching. What does ‘doing the work in the structural life of the diocese’ mean – sitting on pointless committees and writing reports that will never be read?
The system works to maintain the liberal catholic ascendancy in the hierarchy in the Church of England. Far fewer people attend ‘Affirming Catholic’ parishes, but far more AC clerics become deans, canons and suffragan bishops – all effectively appointed positions.
As for FCA being ‘a colossal irrelevance’, I will follow Gamaliel on this one. Simon, I believe you write for ‘Fulcrum’ and openly dissent (as do most people on that website) from the Church of England’s teaching on homosexuality. That’s your privilege. But I don’t know understand how you can call that ‘the evangelical center’. It sounds like classical liberalism to me.
July 6, 2009 at 3:36 pm
But are those churches growing through conversion or transference? And how many people within them are spending most of their time on evangelism with the unchurched? I know some do, and all power to them, but I’m also sure – having been there myself – that many more are there because they like the facilities a large church offers. There’s nothing wrong with it but it’s the same old ‘indrag’ methodology whose limits have been clearly seen over the last 50 years. And God’s mission takes place and has always taken place on the fringes, and within the culture of the unchurched.
Since GAFCON/ACA etc seem to exist largely for the purpose of organising large meetings at which only those who agree with them are welcome, ISTM you’re in quite a large glass house from which to throw stones at people for taking part in pointless meetings.
You can’t have it both ways, if the con evos’ answer is to make everyone a con evo (which it appears it is from the worked example of Sydney), and if con evos stand back from involvement in their Dioceses, you can’t expect the majority of those who do become involved in the Diocese to decide that what’s really needed is a Bishop who has no interest in anyone other than a very narrow group who set themselves apart.
AFAIK sorting the sheep from the goats is God’s problem, not ours. What is the fruit of FCA in mission terms?
July 6, 2009 at 6:40 pm
“But are those churches growing through conversion or transference?”
A fair question – to which you must grant that conservative evangelicals at least do profess to believe in evangelism and to teach faith sharing, witnessing etc. Where do you think ‘Christianity Explored’, ‘Alpha’ and a plethora of programs down the years have come from? From the reviled ‘con evos’ and evangelical charismatics (‘Alpha’). Whether they’re ’successful’ in such a hostile-to-Christian-faith climate as modern Britain is another question (but remember that Gospel ’success’ means primarily obedience and fidelity to the faith once delivered).
If liberals and liberal catholics are busy evangelizing the unchurched (insofar as they understand the evangel), I suppose I would be glad to hear of it. But AFAIK, they still seem to be clinging to a disappearing Christendom model of British society.
I doubt GAFCon is interested in ‘large meetings’ for their own sake – the real purpose is to establish structures of fellowship and support for orthodox Anglicans in North America and elsewhere who have been failed so terribly by the existing institutions, esp. the ACC. The meeting is very far from pointless – which is why GAFCon, ACNA and now FCA have been so bitterly opposed and denounced. After years of talk and frustration, while the revisionists advanced their agenda (despite Lambeth 110.1, Windsor, Dromantine, Dar es-Salaam etc) and the liberal evangelicals counseled ‘Just hang on another 10 years and all will well!’, they have finally begun to act. You ask (very prematurely!), ‘What is the fruit of FCA in mission terms?’ Let it get started first, Pam!
July 6, 2009 at 8:44 pm
The British Empire dissolved itself from the 1950’s onwards…shouldn’t the Anglican communion do the same? Time for the Archbishop of Canterbury himself to give the “colonials” as Mark B. put it, their freedom, so that they can live out their Victorian empire-era holier than thou
gospel to their hearts content while little old England carries on in the way it usually has, slowly evolving and seeking subtle balance and compromise, understanding that humankind and the universe are very complex things, and just as it is ok to now wear mixed-fibre clothing and to eat pork, for women to speak in church without being considered a harlot etc, it is perhaps also time on move on in other areas.
I for one would rejoice if the “colonies” were given their freedom. Let all of us find our own path. Schisms are sad, but it’s not as bad as witnessing this unseemly argument within a Christian church, instigated by those who seem to want to selectively raise certain issues while ignoring others. I have yet to read any statements from Anglican Mainstream or the Bishop of Sydney on the dreadful scourge of obesity in the west for example (One of the ten commandments, anyone?)
As for the comment about conservative evangelical churches like All Souls, Holy Trinity Brompton etc proving more popular, they are large churches with a big seating capacity, have city centre locations and developed the “alpha course” and “christianity explored” courses respectively, so I’m not surprised they have large congregations. Nevertheless, if you add all the congregations in smaller churches in the suburbs and countryside I am quite confident the majority of CofE congregants are not conservative evangelical.
July 6, 2009 at 11:24 pm
Mark, you really shouldn’t speak about what you don’t know. There are non-evangelical churches growing in the UK, but the reasons are not clear – in the same way that some evangelical churches might well be growing for complex reasons that have more to do with sociology than theology. Conservative evangelicals are not ‘reviled’ any more than other Christians are ‘reviled’ by them. But I do know that I have not heard Conservative evangelicals preached against from pulpits, but I have heard the rest of the church (including ‘open’ evangelicals) freely criticised from conservative pulpits – with evangelical clergy’s credentials brought openly into question. I have also then heard such heard criticism denied by those who issue it. I do not think this is honourable or ‘biblical’.
July 7, 2009 at 4:27 am
Nick, thanks. I wondered when you were going to rejoin this thread with an insight. A couple of practical points.
1. Is not the problem with much of this debate that we tackle FIRST a theological understanding and only SECOND a pastoral one? Most evangelicals (and yes, I am one, but reforming) start with the bible and then go on to the people. Increasingly we have to do this the other way round. This is why people like Rowan Williams are so valuable to the church because he is first and foremost a pastor and does his theology through pastoral lenses. I don’t necessarily agree with all he concludes, but then I have not walked his path. And don’t want to, either!
Second point, perhaps a bit naive for some of those above. The great gift to the world church that the Anglican communion has given is its ability to straddle worlds, both geographical and theological, and to live with necessary compromise. It is SO EASY to try and box things up into categories and labels. As soon as we do we give ourselves an excuse to criticize each other. So we live with paradox (which evangelicals like me really struggle with), in prayer, in openness towards God, with an awareness that the Bible points forwards to something but is in many ways a staging point not an end point (I can hear my brethren shifting in their seats at the moment…). This means two things – I will personally stick up for my own understanding of the bible, of the gospel and of Jesus’ love and life, BUT will always be aware that I could be misguided and therefore have to have an open heart to other understandings.
July 7, 2009 at 6:57 am
Nick, I cannot speak for the pulpits of your diocese. What I do know is your old colleagues Colin Slee and Giles Frazer (now at the heart of the establishment at St Paul’s Cathedral, I believe) routinely denounce conservative evangelicals (and conservative catholics) in their many broadcast and press writings. In fact, that seems to be their principal theme, along with pushing ‘Inclusive Church’. The ‘Fulcrum’ website posters make similar attacks, and some folk from ‘down under’ now say they are no longer following that site because of the tone.
Why churches grow and decline is an interesting question, but I wouldn’t oppose ’sociology’ to ‘theology’. My point, however, is that the C of E seems to operate a closed shop or nomenklatura in its senior appointments – and I think the evidence bears this out. Wallace Benn is the only conservative evangelical bishop you have, and I’m sure there are no CE suffragans or deans in England.
But you do have some cathedral canons in ‘civil partnerships’. Strange, no?
July 7, 2009 at 7:21 am
Mark, you clearly (but wrongly) see through a ‘Soviet’ lens what you clearly do not understand. Before I waste a lot of words explaining how it works, can you let me know what you understand the system of appointments of bishops in the C of E to be? And when will you stop citing Slee and Fraser as being typical of the C of E (including its liberal wings)?
July 7, 2009 at 7:23 am
Huw, your points are strong ones. Look closely at the particular response by Jesus to the particular (types of) people in the Gospels and I think you’ll see your point supported. Opposition to Jesus came precisely because he was (a) violating the purity laws and (b) allowing God to break his own ‘commandments’. Shouldn’t that at least tell us something?
July 7, 2009 at 8:30 am
Crumbs – I have just looked at your blog after noticing you are following me on Twitter and am quite overwhelmed.
If only folks could just focus on the stuff that Jesus focused on – maybe then more folks that don’t know Him might come to know Him!
ps. love the word ’shenanigans’ – describes it very well
)
July 7, 2009 at 10:22 am
I’m undecided now, but even when I was opposed to homosexuality, I didn’t see why there should be a division between Christians. I don’t know much about church organisation or anything like that, but to me it just seems unnecessary. As has been said, it is not about what we believe but in whom we believe.
July 7, 2009 at 1:48 pm
Mark B,
1. Be careful. Nick knows all about things Russian: he’s pretty much guarateed to know more than you!
2. The C of E process involves far more people elected to committees that are involved in the appointment of bishops than those who are ex-officio members. And the majority of appointments to other senior posts (Archdeacons & Cathedral Canons) are done by open competition.
3. What’s the alternative you suggest? I know: how about ELECTING bishops? Let’s think of some provinces that do that…USA, Scotland, Wales, Ireland(I think), New Zealand, Canada, Australia…all liberal. The C of E system may look strange to many, but it delivers a church where all voices are heard.
4. Liberal catholic ascendancy?..speak to the liberal catholics I know and they’re worried that the Church of England is heading in a more conservative direction.
5. In order to be able to lead in a diocese, I would suggest that knowing how one works would be a pretty central qualification. The problem with many CE’s (one many of them would admit) is that they haven’t got a lot of experience in leading communities that are diverse. Many therefore don’t want the hassle of having to work with other traditions, when they find the Gospel ministry they exercise more effective when the church is homogenous. Anyone who works in diocesan life must be able to work and live with difference. Otherwise you become a party creature and less effective in your ministry to the whole church.
6. I am that Simon Butler and I hold those views. But I don’t for a minute claim to speak for the evangelical centre but only for myself (would that others in the church had the confidence to do the same, I say!). What I do do though is happily engage with difference in order to commend my views to others by persuasion rather than coercion. As I believe you are American, I think you will understand the value of free speech…
Grace and peace.
Simon
July 7, 2009 at 8:56 pm
Simon, I’m well aware that part of the purpose of GCHQ in the Cold War was listening to Soviet chatter. That was the point of my semi-serious reference.
Is there an ideal way of electing bishops, other than the Matthian method? Probably not. But since I follow Lightfoot’s understanding of the episcopacy (that it is essentially a senior presbyterate, because presbuteroi and episkopoi are really synonymous, rather than another “order” of ministry – as ARCIC claimed), it’s more the institution rather than the means of election that calls for reform. A fixed term, like the Reformed moderatorship, is probably the best way of achieving this. (That great Anglo-Irish Anglican Edmund Burke is one of my heroes.) The idea that one person should act as gatekeeper for thousands until his (or her) retirement is a terrible one. So is the creation of a quasi-political class of clergy. (For the record, I don’t like African episcopal autocrats either.)
Yes, I do believe in free speech, and it grieves me that it is disappearing in England (as it largely has in Canada) under the gay rights bandwagon, as the police increasingly harrass citizens – including the Bishop of Chester and street evangelists – for expressing very moderate and traditional Christian views about the sinfulness of homosexual acts. This is how far you have come in post-Christian Britain.
July 7, 2009 at 9:06 pm
Jane, I hope ‘overwhelmed’ is a good rather than a bad thing. If bad, I apologise!
July 7, 2009 at 10:51 pm
See the report of a FiF vicar who attended the FCA launch on Monday (at http://stmarystgilesstonystratford.blogspot.com/2009/07/today-at-westminster.html).
It seems that “The intriguing conundrum that I cannot resolve is how Forward in Faith and Reform can unite despite such serious contradictions in their cultures, priorities and practices” was proving equally difficult for at least one FiF supporter at the event.
July 9, 2009 at 9:38 am
Mark B, you say:
“If liberals and liberal catholics are busy evangelizing the unchurched (insofar as they understand the evangel), I suppose I would be glad to hear of it. But AFAIK, they still seem to be clinging to a disappearing Christendom model of British society.”
Most of the work with unchurched and dechurched people is going on at the margins of the institutional church, as it always has done, as it did when Jesus was around. I presume you have heard of emerging church, fresh expressions, CMS missional communities etc?
That isn’t to say we don’t need an institutional church as well, but I really do wonder if, on the day of judgement, God is really going to more concerned about what precise rules and regulations we followed and the purity of our doctrinal beliefs, rather than how we fulfilled his mission to make disciples. There’s a ‘jam tomorrow’ aspect to all this stuff which is frankly not good enough – ‘first we’ll sort out everyone’s beliefs and structure the church to our liking, then we’ll be ready to go out and look in the highways and under the hedges for the people God would invite to his feast.’
In fact I really can’t find much in the Bible to support the idea that we make everyone in our own image first and *then* agree to be in fellowship with them. Jesus visited Zaccheus and as a result Zaccheus repented. We are told very firmly to inspect our own eyes before getting too bothered about other people’s. And we’re also told we don’t know who will be at the God’s banquet but we should prepare to be surprised.
So I can understand the ‘con’ bit of ‘con evo’, it’s the ‘evo’ bit I have trouble with. In what way do you see FCA relating tot he beatitudes – under which category should God bless them?
July 9, 2009 at 9:41 am
The link in A Parishioner’s post doesn’t work for me, but you can find the blog by scrolling down here
http://stmarystgilesstonystratford.blogspot.com/
Interesting.
July 9, 2009 at 12:52 pm
Pam, fellowship is a dynamic thing. I have excellent fellowship in prayer and evangelism with a Baptist, a couple of Pentecostalists and an independent evangelical in ministry to high school students. We can work together because we share core convictions about the Lord Jesus Christ, the Gospel, and the kind of sexual morality that befits members of the Kingdon of God. Do we fall short? Definitely. But the answer to sin is repentance, not redefinition.
That oldline institutional Protestantism (esp. C of E and Methodists) is shrinking to an alarming extent in the UK can’t be denied. The Scottish Episcopal Church, once led by the now-atheist Holloway is almost nonexistent now. At the same time, new churches have appeared, incl. African Pentecostalist ones, while the number of Muslims in the UK has soared. This is the reality of the religious landscape there, and it goes a long way to explain the current politics and what Michael Nazir-Ali has been saying. Have you read his analysis? ‘The Ugley Vicar’ John Richardson is also a very perceptive commentator on these issues.
Some of your other comments seem to me non sequiturs (quae non sequor) or straw men whom I will leave to scare the crows.
Grace and peace.
July 9, 2009 at 2:59 pm
I’m not clear what the problem is with African Pentecostalists from what you’ve written – could you elaborate?
I’m interested that you think that asking in where ACA fits into the beatitudes is a straw man, I guess that means you’re not going to answer. Can you say what Biblical principles you think ARE being fulfilled by ACA in the way it’s operating and in the way it’s talking about people it sees as ‘outside’ its own charmed circle – because I can’t think of any.
July 9, 2009 at 3:06 pm
Mark, I am glad you have good fellowship with like-minded people (men?). And you are right about ‘repentance not redefinition’. But, it depends on where you site the definition in the first place. That is where the debate is, I think.
I assume you take the UgleyVicar stuff as truth. But he represents a particular (and very jaundiced) position whihc many of us evangelicals would want to question. Your uncritical acceptance of what you read – from sites that support your own prejudices (meant neutrally rather than in a negative or loaded sense) – is as ill-advised as someone else’s uncritical acceptance of what Giles Fraser writes.
July 10, 2009 at 11:30 am
Nick – women and men, I love them all in the Lord!
John Richardson is not my guru but he’s actually a very well informed guy, having been brought up an Anglo-Catholic, worked as a university chaplain, written a book or two, and studied for a time in Australia, where he discovered the theological education standards far higher than you get in some of your college courses in England (esp. in biblical languages and knowledge of historical theology – and having done research in Cambridge & knowing some of these Aussies, I have to agree with him). He’s pretty clued up on Islam as well.
You may consider him ‘jaundiced’, (‘john-dissed’! ha! ha! – sorry, I should be punished for every pun I shed from my punnish head) but then, brother, you’re claiming your eyesight is sound. We must remember some dominical ophthalmic advice here. What you should do is have a similar intellectual confidence and engage him thought for thought rather than hold him at disdainful armslength. Please be careful that the word ‘evangelical’ which you claim for yourself doesn’t become a wax nose – for Richardson’s own bishop John Gladwin also called himself an ‘evangelical’ but has refused publicly to engage on the question of his support for ‘Changing Attitude’.