The Purity of the Church of England

And the future might be better than the past, if we're honest about the past.

I’ve just spent a long weekend – and sometimes it felt very long – at General Synod. Normally, the July Synod is held in York and can be rather jolly, but the extension of lockdown meant it moved to Church House in London, and then doomed to Zoom. It was exhausting.

Why bother?

That’s a question I’m occasionally asked, although more often I get comments of appreciation that I’m doing it so that they don’t have to.

We are all called to different ministries in different ways, and we all tend to be in awe of the gifts and abilities of others. I’m astonished by the care of clergy who, for example, regularly visit elderly members of the parish to give them communion and pray with them. Other people are able to work with small, chaotic children and teach them the simple truths of the Christian faith. But that’s what it means to be a different body with different parts, as the Church is often described in the Bible.

But what happens when the body is diseased or has a cancer?

That is how some independent or non-conformist Evangelicals feel about the Church of England. They point to statements by certain bishops on certain topics and the lack of statements by other bishops on other topics. This is a sign, they argue, that the Church of England is a lost cause. I had one such email to that effect recently from a listener to the Cooper and Cary Have Words podcast.

Get Out. Save Yourself.

This correspondent also asked why I wouldn’t leave the Church of England over complementarianism given there are now women bishops. That one’s easy. The Church of England continues to honour the ministry of complementarians by the Five Guiding Principles. We took note of this process on the last day of the last Synod, despite a number of snarky speeches to the contrary. Clearly this essential provision is being stressed-tested regularly throughout the Church of England, but while it remains in place, I’m in.

But to answer the question more generally, let’s take one step further back. When would it have been uncontroversial for a conservative evangelical to join the Church of England?

The Quest for a Better Time

In the 1990s? This was a time when some senior clergy were casting doubt on the physical resurrection (see The Gospel According To A Sitcom Writer)? There were pretty worrying statements back then.

How about going back to the beginning in 1530s when we broke from Rome? England remained functionally Catholic for decades. Cranmer’s Prayer Book of 1552 may have been a magnificent achievement of Protestant Anglican liturgical theology, but there was very little appetite for it in the parishes, and an armed rebellion.

What about during the Elizabethan settlement in 1559/60? But that drove enough Evangelicals to go Dutch, and eventually board the Mayflower. The story of the implacably schismatic Brownites is brilliantly told by Steve Tomkins in Journey to the Mayflower.

Was it better when we, as a nation, ended up going to war over religion, as we did in 1642? I have strong Calvinist sympathies and I’m no fan of Archbishop Laud and his agenda, but his trial and beheading in 1645 by a Calvinist Parliament seems vengeful, vindictive and, frankly, unchristian.

Should we throw back to the founding of the Church of England in 597? Or The Synod of Whitby? Or the Norman Conquest? Soon after 1066, there were a few good reforms in the Church of England when some Norman bishops were unimpressed by the elevation of dubious bones of pseudo-saints. These bones were burned, but in time, only replaced with more bones of other saints.

So when was this time when it was okay to be a member of the Church of England? When was the doctrine was pure ehough? When were all the bishops making all the right noises, rather than living lives of the 0.1% and occasionally taking part in battles?

At the Heart of It

What is the common theme here? People. The Church of England is no different from any other church in being made up of petty, hypocritical, tribal, idolatrous, vengeful, vindictive, unchristian image bearers of a kind and gracious God who will build his church, despite our best attempts to get in the way.

Even when we try to do the right thing, it can easily go wrong. Try to be missional for the sake of unbelievers and you are in danger of becoming liberal and at the mercy of the spirit of the age, who is on good terms with the Prince of the Air. Try to be doctrinally pure, and you may well up in a state of cult-like isolation. The nation is not only littered with empty Church of England churches, but non-Conformist chapels that have been turned into flats and shops.

If you don’t believe that there should be bishops or infant baptism, then other denominations are available. But as for me and my household? Can I say the words of Common Worship without crossing my fingers? Yes. Does my denomination recognise complementarian ministry? Yes. Well, right now, that’s good enough for me.

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At the Synod, there was a debate about the vision and the strategy of the Church that some found painful and ill-conceived, and said so on social media. Some louder more influential voices were very robust, and hyperbolic, which is okay. But if I’d been called to speak, I would have said the following.

James Cary 246 Bath and Wells

Can you imagine how it felt to be one of the eleven disciples at the end of Matthew’s gospel? In Chapter 28v17 it says:

And when they saw him they worshipped him, but some doubted.

That sounds about right. We doubt. We worry.

And Jesus came and said to them, “All authority in heaven and on earth has been given to me. Go therefore and make disciples of all nations, baptising them in the name of the Father and of the Son and of the Holy Spirit, teaching them to observe all that I have commanded you.”

What on earth were these bedraggled, doubting, frightened fisherman and debt collectors to make of that? What would their response have been? “Sorry Jesus, but that won’t work here. We need to see more detail. Submit a report and Peter and Andrew will take it to the Scrutiny committee while it’s all being costed.” Perhaps Matthew is being kind in not recording their responses to Jesus’ mission statement – the mission statement.

But how did that mission go? Read Acts. Read church history. Read secular history. Read Dominion by Tom Holland. Christ has built and is building and will build his kingdom through his church through the ages even though we mostly get in the way. Which is why Jesus finishes with these words, “Behold, I am with you always, to the end of the age.”

And that’s why I can get behind this vision and strategy. Because it’s Christ-centred. But also, the original mission statement in Matthew 28 didn’t make a lot of sense at the time either because we doubt, and continue to underestimate how God works through his church, and his people. But that’s why I can vote to take note of this report.

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A Book for Church Book Groups You Actually Want To Read

Do you want to read The Gospel According To a Sitcom Writer with some folk at your church, or a small group? Your group might actually read this one, rather than bluffing their way through the later sessions. I’ve produced some starter videos and discussion questions for The Big Church Read where you can also get discount off multiple copies. That’s all over here.

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Anything But Sanctification

Cooper and Cary have words about how we try to avoid sanctification and do Christian things in order to avoid it or achieve it - like Evangelism. I ask Barry whether has, on reflection, thrown away a career in comedy and acting, to waste his life aiding and abetting evangelism. He hasn’t. But there’s lots of food for thought here on Episode #112 which dropped on Thursday. Or subscribe on Apple Podcasts here or Spotify here. Links to other podcast apps here. Or search for ‘Cooper and Cary’ in your podcast app.