Difference between High Church and Anglo-Catholic and can Anglo-Catholics identify as Protestants?

Whenever there is talk on Anglo-Catholicism Vs Evangelicalism, you often hear or read that one emphasises the Catholic nature of the Anglican church and the other emphasises the Protestant nature, but can (or are) Anglo-Catholics still considered Protestants? Do AC's see themselves as Protestant and would evangelicals accept them as Protestant?

Also, what are the differences between Anglo-Catholic and high church? I understand AC is about theology whereas HC refers to liturgical practice, but what would you say makes them distinct from one another? What would AC or HC folk do that the other would not?

 

High Church Anglicans or Anglocatholics still regard themselves a 'protesting' against erronius Romish practices and doctrines.

The original 'Protestants' protested against the abuse of authority and corruption in the Roman Catholic church. ... Luther is said to have nailed a list of arguments against these abuses, which became known as the 95 theses.

Anglicans do not trace their historical origins and spiritual heritage to Luther though. Our 'protests' go back further than him to Wycliffe and the Lollards and even before that to St Augustine of Canterbury and before that to Celtic Christianity. I doubt many of Luther's 95 'objections' though, (some of the 95 have since been dealt with by RCs in the counter reformation and later), would be defended or overturned by most High Church Anglocatholics, (apart from those who wish to return to the Roman Catholic church, which makes then basically Roman Catholic in their practice and theolgical reasoning, rather than Anglocatholic anyway).
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I wanted to start from this.

High church is your traditional Anglican theology that goes back centuries. In terms of etymology, 'high church' simply means taking the 'church' stuff 'highly'. You take the ceremonies as meaningful, the liturgy as transcendent, the sacraments and ordinances as effectual (rather than symbolic), the vestments as important. In other words if we contrast 'church' to 'christianity', the Church being a physical manifestation and practice of Christianity, then high church means taking seriously the outward and external manifestations of Christianity.

Now in the Anglican tradition, the high church is the traditional perspective. In the 1662 Ordinal it is required that all non-episcopal ordinations are considered invalid, so holy orders and episcopal succession are taken seriously. The BCP, Catechism, and the Articles teach high doctrines about the sacraments: that the ceremony of baptism causes a literal regeneration in the person, and in the ceremony of the Eucharist you receive the actual spiritual body and blood of Jesus. The other holy ordinances are treated likewise; Absolution is shown as declarative, giving to the ministers the ability so that through them God might absolve the penitent; Confirmation is taught highly. The absolute necessity of liturgical piety is taught all throughout. I could go on.

Now, for Anglo-Catholicism. If you know Roman Catholic history, you'll know that in the 19th century the RCs were very impressive in combating modernism and liberalism; for a variety of reasons this proved very seductive to the Anglicans who shared the same anxieties against modernism. Some converted outright, and that's where you get Newman and Manning; but many remained within the Anglican pale but re-formulated Anglicanism to look more like Romanism. For the first time you had people trying to insist on the "7 Sacraments" or that the Eucharist was a physical body of Jesus, that you had to wear specific extra vestments for it to be 'real', that you had to have X number of candles on the altar for it to be 'real'. Etc.

In short it was a new and different way of manifesting the external 'church' elements of 'christianity'. Those Anglicans who were previously passionate about the 'church' stuff (in the traditional high church format) over time became converted into "Anglo-Catholics". By the 1950s, if you were 'high church' it meant almost universally that you were 'Anglo-Catholic'.

Now what happened since then, was the absolute devastation following Vatican II, where the awesome mirage of the Roman Church was cracked, and with all subsequent Popes was forever shattered into pieces. Today's Anglo-Catholics find themselves in extreme anxiety. They were bred up to believe to look to the Roman church as the leader and gold standard of what 'church' looks like, but now their idol doesn't look quite so good. So what you have now, is them asking, Okay, is there still a way to do 'church' stuff without looking to Rome for inspiration? And they're re-discovering again the classical traditional Anglican high churchmanship.

Both of these are hang-ups and inventions from the 19th century. Today these categories mean less and less, although a few still try to use them identifiers despite them no longer being accurate or relevant.

I covered the first one above. The latter was the same phenomenon of looking outside Anglicanism, but in the opposite direction. In the 19th century you had extremely compelling Revivalist protestant groups, such as Methodists and Baptists, who grew, doubled, and tripled every year, were converting whole nations. To those Anglicans not so interested in 'church' (who became seduced by Romanism), these became seduced essentially by Methodism. So just like with the Anglo-Catholic party, this 'Evangelical' party began to re-interpret the Anglican tradition through Methodist eyes: downplay the sacraments, downplay the church hierarchy and vestments, downplay the liturgy; but maximize on revivalism (etc).

But just as with Anglo-Catholicism, the Evangelical party is on a quick retreat today; firstly, it's no longer socially cool to do revivals and 'crusades'. The culture became secular and hostile. You need something deeper and more powerful than just some emotional manipulation and fake enthusiasm, to convert the culture we are in. Also, they know they're incompatible with the Anglican tradition which was high church, as I showed above.

So what you have today is a kind of fusion of Anglo-Catholicism and Evangelicalism into a new traditionalist Anglicanism for the 21st century. The Evangelicals are wearing vestments and love the liturgy again, and the Anglo-Catholics are re-embracing the power of the Gospel, and re-learning how to be high church without looking to the Roman tradition.

Hope that helps!

 

Hello! Anglo-Catholic here. We consider ourselves Protestant in the sense that we are not in union with Rome, but that is about it.

So you will find two different "understandings" or to use a Greek Term - "phronema"s of Anglicanism. Some will (like most people here in this particular forum) think Anglicanism began at the Reformation, and restored the true Church and Faith from the evils of Roman Tyranny, and changed numerous articles of faith and is total discontinuity with the Church from about 700AD-1500AD. They will typically say that Anglo-Catholics are merely "re-formulating" Anglicanism by their claims and practices, but in reality - that is a false view of the Church. The other view, which I subscribe to, is that there is legitimate Continuity with the Church. The English Catholic Church went through a very mild reform regarding Nominalist Transubstantiation, Indulgences, Masses for the sole benefit of releasing souls from the fires of Purgatory, buying and selling the Mass, buying and selling of relics, and other superstitions. So the Anglo-Catholic wouldn't look at 1500-1600 as "Anglicanism" entire, but as one side of the multi-faceted shape of English Catholicism. Anglo-Catholics would not lift up Cranmer any higher than Anselm or Aelfric. In a sense, we do not glorify the Reformation, we just see it as one of many Reformations of the English Church, and it accomplished it's task (good went out with the bad), and over time things were restored slowly with proper theological distinctions being made. So the short of it is this, Anglo-Catholicism is an entirely different "phronema" than the Protestants withing the English Church, who hold a Restorationist view of the Church. I hope that helps!

 

Could you please source your claims here that Anglo-Catholics taught the Liturgy was invalid based on numbers of ministers present, or candles on the altar, or vestments worn? I've never seen such a claim before, and I'd love to examine it if you have any backing to the claim you offered.

 

It's not so much that numbers of candles or the vestments made things invalid, as much as they made things defective or incomplete. At the height of Anglo-Catholic vs. Evangelical Wars (circa 1860 to 1920), the ACs insisted to the point of bitter acrimony, even bloodshed, and even suffering imprisonment, that there had to be six candles on the altar when the traditional number was 2, one on each end. The ACs while accepting the 2 candles as 'valid' nevertheless disparaged them as 'Protestant' and defective in an unspecified way. It was a matter of first importance to make sure there were six candles, to establish the 'Catholicity' of the divine service (which was increasingly called the mass).

The same goes for vestments: while the traditional Anglican vestments were 'valid', it was considered a higher Catholicity to wear chasubles; for most ACs a gothic chasuble sufficed, but for some it was necessary to put on a fiddleback Tridentine chasuble for 'maximum Catholicity'. You can see what they meant by 'Catholicity' there.

I can provide some books if you want; it's been some years since I studied the movement and will have to pull up the references from the books of that era, which are available for free online.

 

Please do, I am aware that they thought the ceremony was not complete, and for that -I am in agreement with them. There was a huge breach of ceremony in the Church and while it was necessary to do so for educating on what the Mass actually is in the native language, it is natural to desire a return to a fuller Catholic ceremonial. I am not saying you must have 6 candles on the altar (as the Sarum use often had two side candles, an nothing on the altar), but having 6 isn't "popish" or whatever the detractors of the day were saying against them. Is it a crime to desire the fullness of Divine Worship as the Church has given it? That is a very real question many Anglo-Catholics faced, and I commend them for standing for what they believed in the face of all adversity. As for the Chasuble, I think that or the Cope should be worn as the Eucharistic Vestment. This is not Un-Anglican, it is commended in the 1549 Prayer Book, as well as the use of the word Mass. Anglicanism is much more broad than just using the 1662 Prayer Book.

 

Yes who would have thought that candles could cause such problems.


From the
REPORT OF THE ROYAL COMMISSION ON ECCLESIASTICAL DISCIPLINE.

Presented to both Houses of Parliament by Command of His Majesty
1906.

(14) TENEBRÆ.

The service known in the Roman Church as “Tenebræ” has also been introduced in some churches. Tenebræ is the name given to a special form of Mattins and Lauds used on the Wednesday, Thursday, and Friday in Holy Week, since the eighth or ninth century. A number of lighted candles were extinguished one by one at the end of each Psalm, recalling the darkness of Calvary. A single candle remained alight which, after the Benedictus, was hidden behind the altar, and again brought out at the close of the service, to signify that Christ the Light of the World was hidden in the grave and afterwards rose again.

Accounts of three Tenebræ Services are given in the evidence. One of these, at St. Cuthbert's, Pilbeach Gardens, appears to have contained most of the ceremonies above described. Bishop Creighton is said to have sanctioned this particular service, thought he objected to the name. The present Bishop of London has refused to sanction the service of Tenebræ.



(16) PASCHAL CANDLE.

In five churches, as to which evidence was given, a candle of great size, called the Paschal Candle, is introduced and lit at Easter. The significance of the observance is thus described by a writer of the Roman Church:

“The Paschal Candle, blest in the next place by the deacon, if a figure of the Body Cof Jesus Christ--not lighted at first to represent Him dead; and the five blest grains of incense fixed in it denote the aromatic spices that embalmed His Sacred Wounds. When the deacon lights it, it is a representation of the Resurrection; and the lighting of the lamps and other candles afterwards teaches the faithful that the resurrection of the Head will be followed by that of the members.”

The use of the Paschal Candle has been declared illegal by the Court of Arches. Bishop Creighton refused to sanction the benediction of a Paschal Candle.

The first certain mention of the Paschal Candle is found about the year 500 A.D.; and from that date onwards it appears to have been gradually introduced throughout the various Churches of the West.

---------------------------------------

Unfortunately for Bishop Creighton, in true British style, the Court of Arches decision was successfully appealed to the Privy Council. This in effect meant a secular court could rule on issues that on face value would seem to be church only matters.

 

One thing I have noticed about high churchmen and Anglo Catholics is that AngloCatholics place a much greater emphasis on private confession. I really see no need in private confession unless you just think you are not forgiven for some reason and want the private reassurance.

 

I am going to throw a spanner in the works. I think defining Anglo-Catholic is difficult! At least, it seems to have become difficult. I say this because as an Anglo-Catholic, and I believe orthodox Christian, I believe it is contrary to God's Divine Will that women can receive Holy Orders. I had, hitherto, considered this to be the view of all Anglo-Catholics. However, there are parishes here in the Church of England that decribe themselves as Anglo-Catholic, use all the ceremonial and ritual you would associate with Anglo-Catholicism, but have women clergy.

I know the Evangelicals in the Church of England are also opposed to the ordination of women and, like the Anglo-Catholics, when the General Synod went against God and legislated for women to be ordained, they sought alternative episcopal oversight. They have relatively recently been given their own bishop rather than being served by the various bishops for Anglo-Catholics. I have to wonder if there are parishes in the Church of England who label themselves Evangelical who have women clergy. That would then, I feel, render defining Evangelicals more problematic.

I am aware of the other differences between Anglo-Catholics and Evangelicals mentioned in other posts on this thread. I had thought we shared a common view on Holy Orders and women. I do know, as I have mentioned, of those who define themselves as Anglo-Catholics but accept women's ordination. Are there Evangelicals who have broken ranks and gone down this path, too?

 

I am a high churchman and would never receive the sacraments from a woman priest. They are not real priests. I don't know much about the CoE inEngland though.

 

You describe your religion as 'ACNA'. I am correct in thinking what you said is not the common view of the entire ACNA?

 

Most of ACNA does not acknowledge women's ministry as valid ministry. A few elements of Women's Ordination were imported from the Episcopal Church during that cataclysmic time in 2008, so they're there, but even those who were for WO during the episcopal church days aren't that way now. It is increasingly a marginalized position. Of course there are several jurisdictions within ACNA that never had women priests in the first place, such as the CANA jurisdiction (now Diocese of the Living Word).

 

In my diocese of the South we don't ordain women .

 

I think your 'spanner' was more of a 'clog'. Ecclesiastical sabotage?
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Presumably you don't mind that we received the body of Christ on earth from the BVM though.
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Ohhh, just because she was ordained by God to deliver the Christ child doesn't mean... uh....... hmmmm.......
Tiffy, you troublemaker, you!

 

It's hard for me to see that 'continuity' view when the church in England was under the headship of Rome, and called itself "Roman Catholic," right up until Henry VIII took actions that clearly began a transformational change in the English church's leadership, allegiance, and doctrinal stance.

 

In my experience, most Anglo-Catholics are uncomfortable being labeled 'protestant.'

 

I think a lot of people make the mistake of missing the point of the Roman adjective applied to the noun Catholic, as it clearly came to distinguish it from the Byzantine or Orthodox Catholic Church. The thirty nine articles refer to Rome as one of the ancient sees in Article 19 and to the Bishop of Rome in Article 37. Article 22 refers to the Romish Doctrine of Purgatory - which perhaps leaves open the question that there may be other Doctrines of Purgatory.

Henry VIII took actions to minimise the interference of the Church in what he regarded as matters of state in England. Henry's actions clearly did result in a transformational change, however it was clearly not Henry's intent of purpose to create a new Church, so much as to ensure a free and independent of foreign intervention prosperous England. Part of that of course was concerned with the Tudor obsession with succession the cause of which might be understood if you consider the devastating cost of the Wars of the Roses, which had been brought to a conclusion by Henry's own father Henry, at the Battle of Bosworth Field, which was only forty or so years before.

Henry's Letter to the Pope Leo accompanying his Assertio Septem Sacramentorum reads:

Most Holy Father :
As we Catholic sovereigns should uphold religion, when we saw Luther’s heresy running wild, for the sake of Germany, and still more for love of the Holy Apostolic See, we tried to weed out this heresy. “Seeing its widespread havoc, We called on all to help us to eradicate it, particularly the Emperor and the Electoral Princes. Lest, however, this be not enough to Show our mind on Luther’s wicked books, We shall defend and guard the Holy Roman Church not only by force of arms, but also by our wits. And therefore we dedicate to Your Holiness our first fruits, confident that an abundant harvest will be gathered, should Your Holiness approve our work.

From Our Royal Palace at Greenwich,
May 21st, 1521
Your Holiness’ most devoted and humble son,
Henry, by the grace of God King of England and France, and Lord of Ireland.​

I don't think the English Church called itself Roman Catholic, and certainly not in the denominational sense you seem to suggest. For the people of the day, there was the matter of being Catholic, which had the sense in which we use the word in the Creeds, which simply was to be Christian.