What are the Articles of Religion?

How can we have one faith if we don't submit to the ratifications of the Church?

 

I gree that we need to agree in one God, one faith, one baptism. I don't see how that demands total uniformtiy on every aspect of Christianity. St. Augustine is attributed with the quote:"In essentials, unity; in nonessentials, diversity; in all things, charity." Where the scriptures are clear, the church has the duty to witness it, proclaim it, and demand adherance to it boldly. Where they are silent, or where the words are veiled, vague, or ambiguous, the church should be tolerant of differences, making room for traditions and personal beliefs so long as they do not contradict those clearly understood and accepted scriptural truths.

Why would you choose the lesser light when the greater light is so easily available? The one infallible voice in and for the Church is Holy Scripture, therein lies our faith. Why would you settle for ratifications of the church when the church is, according to those very same ratifications, prone to error (Articles 19 & 20). I'm just saying ...caveat emptor

 

"Noticeably absent is any requirement to believe, support, or endorse the Articles of Religion. It therefore is not a requirement, at least initially, in the C of E, nor was it added in any of the American versions I reviewed."

Allow me to give a very loose analogy to that statement:think: In 2009 my son was sworn in as a Police Officer here in Indianapolis after completing 26 weeks of academy training, and as he stood on that podium with our Mayor, Police Chief, and Prosecutor, he raised his hand to take the "oath of office", but oddly that oath made no mention of ever obeying any of our laws. Some things are implied and part of the package we're "baptized into"! Great topic though!

 

The only thing we can believe is what has been ratified by the Church. We must submit to the judgment of the Church, or else leave entirely if it comes to that. We cannot be in the Church while disrespecting her beliefs.​

Lowly Layman!​

I agree with Stalwart in his comment! with the proviso that the ,'Church', is no more than a Communion of Catholic believers. Look at ,'Anglicanism,' as represented by Anglicans on this board. All decent folk, you could take anywhere once! All ,including myself, putting a different colour to the argument! To this extent he is 100% right! The Church is the Body of Christ here on earth and authority stemms from Christ's Revelation, Scripture and the teaching of the apostolic college as interpreted by the Ecumenical Councils of the First Thousand years! ​

The Articles were a disciplinary line drawn in the sand by our Fathers at the Reformation, beyond which the wild men, both Papalist & Calvinist should not pass. But, they are subordinate to the Seven Councils, because the Councils are the product of the whole Church not just two provinces!​

 

But I never said that we must have uniformity on every aspect. Neither the Patristic era, nor the Divines from the period when the Articles were passed, argued in favor of that. Heck not even the Romans (with their long lists of required beliefs) don't.

I think you're missing something important about how creedal unity is supposed to work.

Ok then, say the Church collected the essentials into one document, and made it mandatory for Church membership. That's what we're talking about here.

So then you must reject the Nicene Creed, as something that clarifies the subject of the Trinity, while yet being in conformity to Scripture and adding no new doctrine.

Just so many of the articles clarify certain important points, while everything within still remains provable. Nothing in them is, like the Roman church, a brand new addition that is unsourced and unprovable.

 

If you do not believe what is stated in the Athanasian Creed, then you do not believe the Catholic Faith.

The Athanasian Creed (QUICUNQUE VULT)

QUICUNQUE VULT

WHOSOEVER will be saved: before all things it is necessary that he hold the Catholic Faith.
Which Faith except every one do keep whole and undefiled: without doubt he shall perish everlastingly.
And the Catholic Faith is this: That we worship one God in Trinity, and Trinity in Unity;
Neither confounding the Persons: nor dividing the Substance.
For there is one Person of the Father, another of the Son: and another of the Holy Ghost.
But the Godhead of the Father, of the Son, and of the Holy Ghost, is all one: the Glory equal, the Majesty co-eternal.
Such as the Father is, such is the Son: and such is the Holy Ghost.
The Father uncreate, the Son uncreate: and the Holy Ghost uncreate.
The Father incomprehensible, the Son incomprehensible: and the Holy Ghost incomprehensible.
The Father eternal, the Son eternal: and the Holy Ghost eternal.
And yet they are not three eternals: but one eternal.
As also there are not three incomprehensibles, nor three uncreated: but one uncreated, and one incomprehensible.
So likewise the Father is Almighty, the Son Almighty: and the Holy Ghost Almighty.
And yet they are not three Almighties: but one Almighty.
So the Father is God, the Son is God: and the Holy Ghost is God.
And yet they are not three Gods: but one God.
So likewise the Father is Lord, the Son Lord: and the Holy Ghost Lord.
And yet not three Lords: but one Lord.
For like as we are compelled by the Christian verity: to acknowledge every Person by himself to be God and Lord;
So are we forbidden by the Catholic Religion: to say there be three Gods, or three Lords.
The Father is made of none: neither created, nor begotten.
The Son is of the Father alone: not made, nor created, but begotten.
The Holy Ghost is of the Father: neither made, nor created, nor begotten, but proceeding.
So there is one Father, not three Fathers; one Son, not three Sons: one Holy Ghost, not three Holy Ghosts.
And in this Trinity none is afore, or after other: none is greater, or less than another;
But the whole three Persons are co-eternal together: and co-equal.
So that in all things, as is aforesaid: the Unity in Trinity, and the Trinity in Unity is to be worshipped.
He therefore that will be saved: must thus think of the Trinity.
Furthermore it is necessary to everlasting salvation: that he also believe rightly the Incarnation of our Lord Jesus Christ.
For the right Faith is that we believe and confess: that our Lord Jesus Christ, the Son of God, is God and Man;
God, of the Substance of the Father, begotten before the worlds: and Man, of the Substance of his Mother, born in the world;
Perfect God, and Perfect Man: of a reasonable soul and human flesh subsisting;
Equal to the Father, as touching his Godhead: and inferior to the Father, as touching his Manhood.
Who although he be God and Man: yet he is not two, but one Christ;
One, not by conversion of the Godhead into flesh: but by taking of the Manhood into God;
One altogether, not by confusion of Substance: but by unity of Person.
For as the reasonable soul and flesh is one man: so God and Man is one Christ.
Who suffered for our salvation: descended into hell, rose again the third day from the dead.
He ascended into heaven, he sitteth on the right hand of the Father, God Almighty: from whence he shall come to judge the quick and the dead.
At whose coming all men shall rise again with their bodies: and shall give account for their own works.
And they that have done good shall go into life everlasting: and they that have done evil into everlasting fire.
This is the Catholic Faith: which except a man believe faithfully, he cannot be saved.
Glory be to the Father, and to the Son: and to the Holy Ghost;
As it was in the beginning, is now, and ever shall be: world without end. Amen.

 

I totally agree CA. The catholic faith is first and foremost the trinitarian faith. If one is not a Trinitarian, one is not properly catholic or even Christian imho. I personally subcribe to Lancelot Andrewes formula: "One Canon of Scripture which we refer to God, two Testaments, three Creeds, the first four Councils, five centuries and the succession of the Fathers in these centuries, three centuries before Constantine, two centuries after Constantine, draw the rule of our religion."

 

Here is an interesting nuance to the issue of the Authority of the Articles. American Anglicans are not bound to them (at least the Laity isn't), according to the "Catechism of the Thirty-Nine Articles" which Admin so generously posted a link to. Se page 7 in relevant part:

 

The laity aren't but the clergy are.

 

My point is that a number of times I've heard on this forum that if one does not hold to the Articles--more to the point, to some such particular interpretation of the Articles--completely, wholeheartedly, and without reservation, even when doing so violates the consciences of said believers; then one cannot properly call one's self an Anglican. In America, at least, that is not the case. Such an attitude of rigidity and ecclesiastical legalism, imho, betrays the spirit of the Anglican Reformation, the aim of which was not the creation of a new faith with a new creed but rather a return the the primitive catholic church of the Patristic Era, one cannot correct the influx of medieval innovations to and alterations of the faith by instituting and codifying Reformation era innovations to and alterations of the faith. When one has realized that he has been going down the wrong road and reached the wrong destination, one should not take another road and figure out as one goes where it leads. Instead one must retrace one's steps to an earlier point where one recognises familiar terrain and realizes he is back on the the well-worn right road before one turns to face the more uncertain roads ahead, leading into the undiscovered country. That is what the Anglican Reformers did. They never attempted to set up a new denomination called Anglicanism, they worked their way back to the primitive catholicism of the patristic era which they knew to be the true expression of the Christian faith. The Articles served as a tool to unify the churches of the Realm in this common enterprise, by pointing out some essentials tuths which the Church should hold fast to and some errors which the Church should avoid, but as the Convocation that formed them can only be equated to a regional council called by the region's Sovereign and the region's bishops, it cannot be binding on other jurisdictions ecxept as insofar as it is alligned with Holy Scripture and the Ecumenical Creeds and Councils of the ancient church. More than that, according to its own precepts, anything found in them that is not read in or drawn from Holy Scripture cannot be taught or held necessary as an article of Faith.

 

That's my point exactly, if you don't believe the Articles you don't have any right to call yourself an Anglican. It's our theological statement.

 

I repeat again, LL.

 

And I shall answer again, Stalwart:

If I don't believe your interpretation of the Articles you mean. I think you missed the point entirely. When someone puts the subsequently derived regional theological statements and regional prejudices ratified by a local monarch and regional Archbishop over and above Holy Scripture and the Ecumenical Councils and Creeds of the Ancient church as the basis for identifying orthodoxy and church membership, one is practicing the same errors as Papists. By requiring an American to adhere to the ecclesiatical rules formed and enforced by a foreign monarch and foreign bishops, you are just a bunch of anglo-papists. You have no problem with some civil or ecclesiastical pope or potentate making additional creedal requirements to the "faith once delivered to the saints" that are binding on all members of that faith no matter their nationality, you just think that the Pope ought to be English. If you esteem the Articles too highly you don't have any right to call yourself Anglican either. I have no need to kiss the ring of the Articles, you paper pope, to be an Anglican, despite what the self-appointed excommunicators on this forum think.

 

It's not my interpretation of them that matters but their teaching must be believed.

 

Americans are noun to the 1801 AMERICAN version of the Articles.

 

Never-the-less and in all theological attitude within the Anglican Church, theology is not a simple matter of ," I think",, "as we hear so many times on these boards and overwhelmingly in modern Anglican discussion. Anglicanism is the child of Christ's revelation, it is not something thought up by intellectual individuals our parameters are set by Scripture and the Seven Councils and it is through these two items that the Articles have to be seen or heard. There is nothing to add to Revelation, Christ revealed and the apostolic college and the bishops interpret it! The Articles were simply the outcome of 16th Century politics.

 

They aren't 'simply' that. First of all they are true apostolic doctrine, and secondly they are the crux of Anglican unity. Without them, as we've seen in recent decades, there can only be anarchy. If you don't support a unified set of doctrines you are in favor of Church anarchy, which can only benefit one Entity, and that isn't Christ.

 

Not according the quote I posted above.

 

Was there a typo here?

 

The "anarchy" we experience today is due not to the abandonment of the Articles, but to the authoritative Word of God written and the Holy Tradition of the Church, summed up in the Ecumenical Councils and Creeds.