Divided We Stand

I would like to recommend Divided We Stand:  A History of the Continuing Anglican Movement, by Douglas Bess, to all those interested in Continuing Anglicanism.  Having done some ad hoc research into the history of Continuing Anglicanism myself over the years, which has included in-depth conversations with several of the key participants in such landmark events as the St. Louis Congress, the Denver Consecrations, and the Dallas Synod, I can say with some confidence that Bess has done an decent job of making a reasonably accurate record of the Movement's key events.  Moreover, let me also say that this record is of crucial importance for anyone who wishes to understand the state of Continuing Anglicanism today.

My recent rereading of Divided We Stand left me with the firm impression that the Continuing Anglican Movement is fundamentally divided between two, discrete visions of Anglicanism.  First, there are those that hold an exclusively catholic-minded vision of Anglicanism, most of whom, but are not all, are distinguished by their distinctively Tridentine outlook regarding doctrine and practise.  Secondly, there are those that adhere to a comprehensive, but conservative and traditional, vision of Anglicanism centered on the traditional editions of the Book of Common Prayer, the traditional Ordinal, and the Thirty-Nine Articles of Religion, but that are otherwise tolerant of quite a bit of theological and liturgical latitude.  Today, in the United States, the predominant "catholic" jurisdictions are the Anglican Catholic Church (ACC) and the Anglican Province of Christ the King (APCK), while the larger "comprehensive" jurisdictions are the Anglican Church in America (ACA) and the Anglican Province in America (APA).

Having stated that Divide We Stand, as its title suggests, leads the reader to a dichotomous view of the Continuing Anglican Movement, I must give Bess credit for not painting this division in overly stark terms.  Indeed, as Bess correctly points out, the catholic jurisdictions, such as the ACC and APCK do, in fact, have parishes that do not use the Missals, and steer clear of Tridentine teaching and piety.  On the other hand, Bess notes that the comprehensive jurisdictions are hardly the exclusive province of low-church parishes, but instead contain many fully Anglo-Catholic parishes.  Thus, on the surface of things, the distinction between the two competing visions of Continuing Anglicanism probably should be viewed as involving differing centers of gravity regarding views of acceptable churchmanship, and Bess does not dispel this possibility in his text.

Thus, I would not fault a reader of Divided We Stand for coming away with the impression that the difference between the catholic jurisdictions and the comprehensive jurisdictions is one of emphasis rather than substance--at least not enough substantive difference to justify the divisions amongst them.  But, this conclusion would be, in my opinion, incorrect.  In the first place, as Bess's narrative demonstrates,  and experience has shown, that the catholic and comprehensive camps have generally been suspicious of, and adversarial toward, each other throughout the history of the Continuing Movement.  Indeed, the conflict between the two visions of Continuing Anglicanism and the resulting political machinations that have occurred within the Movement even before the St. Louis Congress, is the very drama that drives the main plot line of Divided We Stand.  Thus, I cannot help but conclude that something more fundamental must keeping the division between the competing visions of Continuing Anglicanism alive.  And, what that something is, I believe, is, in a word, Calvinism.

Indeed, in the comprehensive vision of Continuing Anglicanism, Calvinists have been recognized as having a legitimate place at the Anglican table since the Glorious Revolution.  Thus, for the comprehensives, Evangelical Churchmanship, often denominated as "low churchmanship" in contemporary parlance, which is perhaps most seminally expressed in W. H. Griffith Thomas or D.B. Knox's expositions of the Thirty-Nine Articles of Religion, deserves its share in the Continuing Anglican Movement.  In contrast, for the ardently catholic-minded Anglicans, the Evangelical Party has always been a bridge too far.  Indeed, for the catholic-minded Anglican, Missal Anglo-Catholics, Prayerbook Catholics, philOrthodox, Old High Churchman, and perhaps even Conservative Central Churchman can be tolerated under one big tent, but the "low" churchmanship of the Evangelicals  cannot.

Thus, in my view, the real reason that the predominantly Anglo-Catholic jurisdictions such as the ACC and APCK will not seriously entertain union with a conservative, comprehensive jurisdictions like the APA or the ACA, is that comprehensive formulations of Anglicanism are simply too tolerant of Calvinism or Reformed principles.  Indeed, the existence of Evangelical expositions of the Thirty-Nine Articles of Religion is one of the reasons that catholic jurisdictions have shied away from giving the Articles any sort of constitutional, as opposed to merely historical, status.  Moreover, it is also my opinion that, despite the prevalence of Tridentinism in the catholic jurisdictions, they do have a valid point.  Whereas the differences in the exposition of the Thirty-Nine Articles evinced by decidedly non-Tridentine works of such catholic-minded men as W. Beveridge, E.H. Browne, or E. J. Bicknell can theologically co-exist along side the Tridentine-friendly expositions of A. P. Forbes and Newman (Tract XC), on the ground that each merely express differing theological opinions about secondary aspects of the same underlying faith, once the Evangelical point of view is introduced, fundamentally inconsistent understandings of the very faith itself are being asked to cohere, which is logically intolerable.  Indeed, atonement is either limited or it is not; grace is either irresistible or its is not; some men are unconditionally predestined to eternal damnation (the doctrine of reprobation) or they are not.

In sum, while much of Divide We Stand, gives me hope that a greater consolidation of the jurisdictions presently comprising Continuing Anglicanism is possible in the near future, the overall import of the book leads me to believe that, for the foreseeable future, the irreducible minimum number of Continuing Anglican jurisdictions is two.  And, my own experiences in the Continuum, lead me to believe that it is likely the true, minimum number of jurisdictions is three:  Anglo-Catholic, High Church, and Evangelical.  Once the old, institutional structures of Anglican unity have been breached, as they have been since St. Louis, then the unity of inconsistent theological and liturgical parties in a single jurisdiction will not hold.