From ACNA to Episcopalian

What did you find? I was only aware of a Facebook page for the Canadian Mission.

 

The only problem with that is that we aren’t heretics.

 

Gay marriage, women bishops, a middle way on abortion for the most part, trans affirming. I am having a hard time not calling the whole denomination heretical

 

None of those things are heresies, nor are they obligatory. Individual Episcopalians and their parishes have a very wide latitude when it comes to practice at the local level. My own parish is quite traditional and conservative, as is my diocese.

 

Would you leave the TEC if the presiding Bishop (or your Bishop) denied the Trinity and/or said that Christ wasn't the only means of salvation? What would it take for you to join ACNA?

 

TEC literally ran out the last Bishop who would not allow gay marriage. Your diocese has to allow gay marriage. It has women or can have women bishops. It is not traditional or conservative. I am not sure how you can say that none of those things are not heresies. What does it take for you to claim something to be heretical?

 

Promotion of sodomy is a heresy, a denial of natural order. Promotion of gender ideology (transgenderism) is a heresy, a denial of natural order.

Yes that argument gets made sometimes. And it's the only argument that can be made, by the orthodox Episcopalians like you that are still in TEC.

But. You have to ask yourself: what is the moral majority of those whom you are in communion with? Pedophiles and heretics, to the left of you, to the right of you, all around. Priests, bishops, canons, archdeacons; the whole hierarchy. You can stay pristine, this is not a condemnation of you personally. It's just an estimate about the moral majority of those who inhabit the Episcopal Church at this moment in time.

You can say, but what about the orthodox bishops mentioned in the article. The issue for you is, that article was written in 2017, back when there were still 5 orthodox bishops left in TEC. A lot has changed since then, notably, sodomy became canonically legitimized from the TEC national office, and none of the orthodox bishops challenged it. Therefore, that was the end of them. (And some of them have also simply retired by now).

However, one of them did push back: Bishop Love. He outright repudiated the new doctrine, and forbade gay marriages in his diocese. Well in 2020 he was tried in a TEC ecclesiastical court, and found guilty. Today he is in ACNA, joyfully planting churches and peaceably overseeing the faithful as a suffragan bishop under Bishop Julian Dobbs.

The last faithful and orthodox bishop has been pushed out. As of 2021, there are no orthodox dioceses left in all of the Episcopal Church.

 

The only defined dogmas (Art. 1-5) are the unity and trinity of God, and the unity of Christ’s person in two natures (with the title Theotokos for the Mother of God as an approved safeguard of the latter dogma). Everything else - the Church’s ritual, structure, government, discipline, etc. - is subject to the Church and can be altered by it (Art. 20). The Church is not infallible. It can make decisions in these areas that are shortsighted, wrong, even downright stupid (Art. 19). Individual hierarchs are certainly capable of great personal sin and even public heresy. Such instances do not invalidate the mission of the Church as a whole, nor are they transferable to faithful clergy and laity (Art. 26). Unless and until the Episcopal Church officially declares itself to be a unitarian organization and bans the Nicene Creed and equivalent formulations from its liturgy and teaching (Art. 8), or adopts some other sacred text in place of the Bible (Art. 6), it remains the legitimate Anglican body in the United States. For as long as I desire to be and remain a faithful Anglican, the Episcopal Church, warts and all, is where I belong.

 

Fair enough. We just have to disagree. I can't remain in a church that allows and teaches such dogma

 

We do not teach any dogma other than Art. 1-5 referred to above. The matters to which you object are of discipline and morals, not dogma. Such things may be the subject of legitimate disagreement, but they are not heresy - whether understood theologically or juridically - as there is no defined dogma on those matters which they contradict. That is the point I was making.

Also, schism is not less severe than heresy. We can agree to disagree, but we can’t both be right.

 

Such things are not subject to legitimate disagreement. They are wrong and should be only treated as such. They are heretical. You are playing the no true scotsman fallacy here and there is no reason to deny it. You choose to be in communion with people who openly teach anti Biblical doctrines.

I know we both can't be right but in this once case I know I am right and I know you are wrong in choosing which churches to be in communion with. Fortunately for me I can't be accused of schism since I never was in the TEC.

 

What would an Anglican Invictus in the 1500s use to convenience a Roman Catholic Invictus to join the Reformation? Why would the Roman Catholic Invictus be wrong in telling the Anglican Invictus that "Unless and until the Roman Catholic Church officially declares itself to be a unitarian organization and bans the Nicene Creed and equivalent formulations from its liturgy and teaching, or adopts some other sacred text in place of the Bible, it remains the legitimate Christian body in Europe, then I will stay a Roman Catholic."

As far as I know, the Roman Catholics haven't (1) declared themselves Unitarian, (2) banned the Nicene Creed, (3) adopted another sacred text than the Bible, (6) and was the sole legitimate Christian body of Europe during that time (and still consider themselves to be).
Furthermore, if you would have left the Roman Catholic Church because its teachings (although they can't be considered heretical in your formulation) are contrary to scripture, how could it be wrong for us to leave a denomination that has embraced teachings contrary to scripture (teachings that if listened to and acted upon would be damnable)? Or do you consider Roman Catholics to be heretics?


Basically, I find it hard to see you joining the Reformation if you had lived back then with the arguments you are presenting for staying within the Episcopal Church.

 

Frankly, that sounds an awful lot like the argument the RCC makes against Anglicans and everyone else. They say they're the original, canonical jurisdiction worldwide, and the rest of us are breakaways.

(edit) : Funny, I didn't see Carolinian's post prior to writing this, but we're on the same wavelength!

 

Obviously the arguments are different. No one is claiming that the Episcopal Church has worldwide jurisdiction. Christianity in the American colonies originally consisted of Anglicans and various dissenting sects. All Anglicans in the colonies were under the Bishop of London. The Church of England, in turn, was not some separate hierarchy that was setup to rival the Roman one; it was the old Roman one (or at least its direct descendant). When the colonies became independent, Seabury was ordained by Scottish Non-jurors, and the other bishops were ordained by English bishops, and thus Anglicanism was preserved in America. There were various minor breakaways here and there, but no one disputed that the Protestant Episcopal Church was the representative of Anglicanism in America.

 

But the RCC does claim to have worldwide jurisdiction. And you just said the the Church of England was the old Roman Church. So when the Church of England distanced itself from the RCC and set up separate episcopacy and established parishes and bishops in places where the RCC had (or has) parishes and bishops, Anglicanism is the breakaway that (by your definition) must be invalid. That's the RC argument in a nutshell, and it's the same type of argument you are making against non-TEC Anglicans in North America; the biggest difference is, the RCs make the argument against all other denominations worldwide, while you're being more geographically selective.

 

The Church of England was the old Roman Church in England. They never “broke away”, i.e., established a separate or parallel hierarchy. They simply asserted royal supremacy. It’s the establishment of a parallel hierarchy that is the critical difference. The Scandinavian Church did the same thing. The Lutherans didn’t break away from the established Church in Sweden; the established Church simply adopted the Augsburg Confession while the hierarchy remained intact. So there are some Lutherans who have maintained apostolic succession just as the Anglicans have. Obviously you want to defend the ACNA and that’s fine and understandable, but it sure looks like the cost-benefit ratio is rather high if the argumentative strategy entails defining schism out of existence so that it isn’t applicable to a contemporary scenario. If there’s an established bishop already in a certain place, it is improper to establish another, rival one, in the same place. Latin Catholics in Greece or Russia ought to regard the local Orthodox bishop as their ordinary. An Orthodox Christian living in England ought to regard the local Anglican bishop as their ordinary. And so on…i.e., mutually recognized pluralism with no overlapping jurisdictions, in which each diocese represents the fulness of catholicity. That’s the overall vision I’m defending.

 

What was Rome's response when this happened? Did Rome simply say, "Oh well, those are valid Catholic bishops, so we'd better let them go about their business and let things be"? Or did they instead declare those bishops to be a schismatic, separated hierarchy and begin moving fresh, valid (in their eyes) bishops & clergy into England? In the eyes of the Roman church, weren't the English bishops and dioceses an illegitimate and parallel hierarchy at that point?

 

The CoE was excommunicated and declared heretical, but it was several centuries before Rome was allowed to establish a separate hierarchy.

Sure the Roman perspective was that the existing English hierarchy was illegitimate but the Roman perspective was also wrong. Upholding the catholic tradition isn’t just about purity of teaching; it’s also about maintaining the integrity of the episcopal office. The Anglicans did this; the Romans did not. When the latter established a separate hierarchy, they committed the sin of schism.

 

Your reasoning leaves no room for correct belief and it also does not make sense to me. Lets just look at it from the Roman point of view. The CoE went heretical and took all the ancient sees from them which Romes at the time. Once Rome was allowed to set up sees again they were the ones in schism because they sought to reclaim what was taken from them? That does not make sense. Right belief has to come in to play somewhere. Either the CoE was right to reform and take those sees from Rome because Rome had erred from the faith or the CoE is still heretical and Rome was right to reform it

 

Or perhaps the Church of England simply re-asserted its autocephalus nature from of old, from before the Augustinian Mission.