Anglican Evangelicals and Ecclesiology: "Leave us alone!"

 

At some point it dawned upon me that the ecclesiology of our Anglican Evangelical brethren was actually quite simple. It can be expressed in just three words: "leave us alone!".

Though they have plenty of things to say about why they believe in the Episcopal (actually Erastian) structure of their denomination, and how it ought to work, and how they labour towards that end, and why they were not independents, etc., etc., by observation you come to the simple conclusion: they are actually independents in practice. They just want the rest of the Church of England to leave them be. If they can leave them be, then they'll agree to leave the rest of the Church of England be too. (I note that in recent years this is more and more becoming the official ecclesiology of Anglican evangelicals, openly: it's now being called "structural differentiation". This is much more sophisticated than saying "leave us alone". This might be attractive to you if looking sophisticated before others is something that you think the Bible says is important).

The gospel is so far from being essential or important to these Anglicans' theology of the church, that it's actually entirely optional. It doesn't matter who denies it or how they deny it; these evangelicals are finally quite happy to ignore them, as long as they're adhering to the rule "leave us alone". This has been Anglican evangelical policy for multiple generations now. Oh yes, they'll write blog posts about them and say at their own conferences and teach in their own parishes that they personally disagree, but that's not what I mean. I mean that there will be no church discipline, and no ultimate consequences. Only when there are ultimate consequences can someone be said to believe what they're saying, and thus I say: they don't really believe in their own official ecclesiology. For someone who does believe in their own professed ecclesiology, things go like this:

• Step one: you notice, and become convinced, that someone within the church hierarchy clearly and openly contradicts essential doctrines of the faith.
• Step two: you use all available mechanisms to apply the church's discipline to this situation, to restore the offender back to the truth and so that God's name isn't dishonoured before outsiders and other genuine believers aren't harmed.
  
• Step three: either the offender is disciplined, or, when it becomes clear that the church's official doctrines do not actually apply and that these precious truths are counted as not being of the essence of the church's life, then since you yourself do personally believe them, you sadly depart in order to find a church that does believe them so that the truth is maintained (and not just in some semi-Gnostic, hidden realm of your private definition).
  

What actually happens with our Anglican brethren is that they either replace step two with tut-tutting in unofficial channels (their blogs, newsletters or in-house unofficial conferences), or at step three they show that they themselves also hold these beliefs not as cherished, essential truths, but as optional too. They just accept that these are in fact not the official doctrines of the church after all....and that they can live with that.

Of course, I know that there are and have been honourable exceptions to this: there is a growing band of ex-Anglicans who did believe what they professed to believe (which happily was not just "leave us alone!"), and ultimately acted accordingly, struggled, overcame, and paid the necessary price. Well done, friends. You have gone outside the camp, and shared in the shame of the One who went there first.

The Archbishop of Canterbury does not believe what God says about marriage, fornication or sodomy. But here's the lame get-out clause being offered to all those who hold to "leave us alone!" ecclesiology: "Lambeth Palace said the Archbishop’s views are his own, and are not the official stance of the Church of England." Well, that's OK, then. If all you want is to be left alone, that is, it's OK. But if you actually believe that either the "Church of England" ought to be something other than a synagogue of Satan (and not just in some quasi-Platonic realm of forms, but in this creation too), or that if not then you shouldn't be part of it, then that's not OK. Steps 2 and 3 above are available. We'll be rooting and praying for you to do the right thing.