So who are the Anglicans?

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Just a small thought as Muriel Porter launches another attack upon Sydney Anglicanism…

Muriel Porter in her latest book “Sydney Anglicans and the Threat to World Anglicanism (Ashgate Contemporary Ecclesiology)” (quote from Mark Thompson’s blog):

To my mind the Articles are a quaintly-worded, seriously limited summary of Anglican understandings of faith and doctrine, scarcely relevant to modern Australian life.

Compare to the Constitution of the Anglican Church of Australia [pdf]:

CHAPTER II. – RULING PRINCIPLES
4. This Church, being derived from the Church of England, retains and approves the doctrine and principles of the Church of England embodied in the Book of Common Prayer together with the Form and Manner of Making Ordaining and Consecrating of Bishops, Priests and Deacons and in the Articles of Religion sometimes called the Thirty-nine Articles

…and it is hereby further declared, that the above-named Book of Common Prayer, together with the Thirty-nine Articles, be regarded as the authorised standard of worship and doctrine in this Church, and no alteration in or permitted variations from the services or Articles therein contained shall contravene any principle of doctrine or worship laid down in such standard.

Which leads to the inevitable question, “who is offically, constitutionally, more Anglican? Those that uphold the 39 Articles or those that reject them?”

Just saying…

(awesome 39 Articles wordle by Seven whole days)

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This Post Has 4 Comments

  1. Andrew Reid

    According to Mark’s article, Dr Porter’s book isn’t very positive about the consitutional arrangements in Australia either.
    “Porter is willing to suggest that instead of the constitution as it exists, it may have been ‘wiser to create a national church that did not include Sydney’ (48).”
    So, it doesn’t seem Dr Porter would call herself constitutionally more Anglican, but rather more in line with Anglican traditions.

  2. David Ould

    hi Andrew, quite possibly. But then she’s hardly in a place to claim that Sydney ought not to be in the Australian Church. To be consistent, she should remove herself wink
    At the moment she appears a little like a tennis player complaining that the local bowls club that she signed up for doesn’t play the game the way she likes it.

  3. Addy

    Wow I must confess you make some very trenchant pintos.

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