Church Growth and Secularisation

What is church growth? We seem to spend a good deal of time talking about it. Some people love it. Others seem allergic to the subject, claiming that the church cannot intend to grow because it does not primarily exist to grow.

In response to this I want to offer a threefold definition of church growth that builds on the secularisation theory offered by Charles Taylor in A Secular Age. Here Taylor offers three definition of what it is to be secular. The first two are fairly uncontroversial, bu the third, which is Taylor's central theme, is the key idea that is seen as powering the other two movements in history.

Firstly, the secular means declining congregations. It means that fewer and fewer people are engaging in the practices of religion, whether that be in the form of the occasional offices or in regular Sunday worship. That such a moment has occurred in the twentieth century is beyond doubt, as is its ongoing influence: many congregations are small and elderly, and have struggled to hand on the faith to younger generations.

Secondly, and associated with such a change, is the loss of influence that religion has within a society. Here we note that religious leaders no longer have the automatic social status that their position once afforded them. Yes, some religious leaders continue to be important, but often because of their charisma or achievements rather than because of their position. This means that religious representatives matter less, and are less likely to be consulted in matters social and political, and religious ideas no longer have the appeal that they might have had to previous generations. Statements from religious leaders can simply seem bewildering or irrelevant in contemporary secular society.

Briefly put, here you see the classical problems that evangelicals and liberals try to grapple with: evangelicals generally being drawn to dealing with the first issue, and liberals with the second. But Taylor goes on to ask why it is that these two things have happened to our society, and this he locates in the modern understanding of the self.

Thirdly, the secularity of modern people is based on a self identity that excludes the transcendent and refers all things to an immanent imagined self whose priority is maximising the material welfare of all and minimising the amount of suffering.  For this secular self all things are explained naturally, and the universe and time are considered as regular and devoid of any particular meaning. The experience of life is flat and regular. This sense of the self is so strong that it will either see religion as an unnecessarily restrictive set of demands that achieve little, or as a soft form of escapism for those who cannot face up to the realities of life.

Church Growth, I want to suggest, has to deal with all three of these questions.

Firstly, it is about congregational growth. This means doing everything that we can to make our churches welcoming communities into which people can come to experience something of God. Churches do therefore need to offer really good hospitality and welcome, and also think about how their worship connects the congregation with God and if this could be improved.

Secondly, it does mean that the church must engage with society, however hard and challenging that might be. The obvious problem here is that secularised authorities are very rarely open to religious ideas. The fundamental task that the church faces is showing that most of the values that our society upholds are derived from the Christian narrative, and indeed they make little sense without it. However, this is a difficult argument to make as most people are schooled to think that these ethical  positions are simply 'natural' ones, and cannot see how they have been constructed through Christianity. The church will therefore have to show that its stories are relevant and life changing, and not irrelevant and unnecessary. 

Thirdly, the church faces the related challenge of making the faith that many of our congregants publicly profess into a living narrative that shapes lives. The danger is that religion becomes as aesthetic consumer product that provides a particular form of entertainment (whether that be in the style of Radio 1, 2, 3 or 4). How does the Christian message break into lives that are rooted in a secular narrative of meaning? This is what Setting God's People Free is seeking to address, and is the subject we address when we talk about discipleship.

The question for the church is therefore how it becomes a community that shapes and forms character. Taylor notes that we now live in an 'age of authenticity' in which the key question is 'does it work?' This is deeply challenging for western churches whose predominant model has been based around offering religious services to passive 'audiences'. In this context there seems to be great truth in the assertion of Stanley Hauerwas that the church needs to learn to be more like the church: a place of truth and goodness in which people learn that they are a forgiven people.

The essence of Anglicanism

A good deal of time and ink has been spent on an attempt to define Anglicanism, and this is now played out in an international row between 'conservatives' and 'liberals' about what the future of the worldwide communion should look like. For some Anglicans this has resulted in them leaving the communion so that they can set up 'more Anglican' Anglican churches elsewhere. It is my contention that this debate is largely fruitless because it fails to understand the simplicity of Anglicanism: the sharing of communion.

Many of the definitions of the uniqueness of Anglicanism I find unconvincing. 'A common liturgy': the same could be said of Orthodox, Roman Catholic and Lutheran Churches. 'Sung Evensong': the Roman Catholic Church has sung vespers and Benediction. 'The 39 Articles': these bear a strong relationship to the Confession of Augsburg and numerous Reformed Confessions. 'An historic episcopate': the Roman Catholics and Orthodox can claim the same. 'A national Church': the same could be said for a number of reformed and unreformed church across the continent, and many of them with greater integration into the life of society than an Anglican Church. 'A Broad Church': this could be said about most denominations in the twenty-first century. 'Catholic and Reformed': a lot of Reformed churches would say the same, although they may interpret catholic in rather a different way. 'A via media between Rome and Switzerland': Anglicans did not invoke this for centuries after the Reformation, and in the Tractarians' day it was thought that the Lutherans were closer to Rome than Anglicanism. So, it is all a bit of a mess.

As I stated in my post on the use of mitres, there is a trend in global Anglicanism at the moment to make the period 1559-1620 the norm for Anglican life, concentrate on one interpretation of the 39 Articles, and ignore any subsequent developments. Of course there is a great deal of debate about what documents or liturgies provide the norms for this 'authentic' expression of Anglicanism, but each sets up a golden age by which the present is meant to be measured, and this ignores the way in which practice and interpretation have changed over time. What is not clear in any of these reconstructions is why we are to prefer the stated interpretation over the other possibilities. Why should the years after the Reformation, the Oxford Movement or the US 1928 Prayer book be considered as golden eras for the Communion?

On the other hand, many of the arguments advanced by progressives are also a golden age based in the ideas of Thomas Arnold and William Temple. Here the golden age is a bit later, generally the modernism manifest in the communion from the 1930s to the 1990s. Here non-doctrinal national liturgical religion is upheld as a norm for Anglicanism: the religion assumed in That was the Church that was. However, it is also not clear on what basis that this very modernist form of religion is regarded as normal for the Anglican Communion: why could not the Communion change its mind and move on to another identity?

Our debate mirrors the one taking place in Roman Catholicism at the moment: liberals backing a modernist interpretation of Vatican II, whilst conservatives want a conservative interpretation of Vatican II that makes it but one council among many, and to be interpreted accordingly.

Yet ultimately what makes an Anglican an Anglican, and a Roman Catholic a Roman Catholic, is a matter of relationships. The old questions goes, 'Can you be more Catholic than the Pope?' From a Roman Catholic perspective the answer is no: to be in communion with Rome is what it is to be a Roman Catholic. For Anglicans similarly, you cannot be more Anglican than Canterbury: to be in communion with Canterbury is what it is to be Anglican. True Anglicanism is shaped by its history and its formularies, but ultimately it is about relationship.

The Ordinariate's Divine Worship: An Anglican perspective

There have been a number of comments online from Roman Catholics about the new Ordinariate Rite, Divine Worship, whether very positive about the introduction of Cranmerian English and traditional devotions, or more critical about the introduction of Protestant eucharistic theology into the Roman Catholic Church through the back door. What has generally been lacking, however, is an Anglican comment on the rite, possibly because most Anglicans see it as a bit of a cul-de-sac. However, I think there are lessons that Anglicans could, and possibly should, learn from Divine Worship about the nature of modern Anglo-Catholicism.

With many Roman Catholic writers, I tend to agree that Divine Worship does not really work as Roman Catholic liturgy. Why? Well, a good deal of it is inspired by the shape of the rite in the very Reformed 1552 Prayer Book, and that book's subsequent influence on the rites of 1559 (which was 1552 with some small but substantial modifications) and then 1662. This seems odd, when the order of the rite in the 1549 Prayer Book, or indeed that of the Order for Communion 1548, would provide a more traditionally catholic reading of the liturgy.

For example, consider the placing of the confession in Divine Worship. DW does not follow the 1548 and 1549 rites in having confession, absolution and the prayer of humble access in that order immediately before communion, but rather in DW only the prayer of humble access is immediately before communion. Instead the comfortable words and confession are placed before the eucharistic prayer: in DW the comfortable words and the confession occur just before the offertory, whereas in the Prayer Book order of 1552 it occurs just after. That this has happened is significant. In Cranmer's early work he was essentially following a medieval view of confessing immediately before communicating, the sacrifice having been offered and the presence of Christ now resting on the altar under the forms of bread and wine (even if Cranmer questioned this himself by 1549). The 1552 book relocates these prayers, so that confession occurs before a eucharistic action in which bread will be blessed, broken and eaten as part of the eucharistic action. The absolution and 'comfortable words' in 1552 and DW assure us before the eucharistic action, rather than before a eucharistic presence located in the elements.

That Divine Worship follows this pattern possibly demonstrates just how Anglican it really is. Rather than the Ordinariate looking back to the medieval church and using the Order for Communion with the Sarum Use or the Extraordinary From of 1962, the liturgy looks back to the days of Anglo-Catholic illegal rites in the 1920s: bits of Roman liturgy fitted into a Prayer Book service. One almost expects that half way through the Roman Canon provided in the DW rite the celebrant will move from speaking in sotto voce to saying loudly 'All glory be to thee...'

From that perspective, what we have here is something very Anglican, albeit inspired by 1920s Anglo-Papalist illegality.  It is interesting to note that very few changes would be needed to turn the service into a legal Anglican one: replace the Roman Canon with CW Eucharistic Prayer C, and 'us' with 'you' during the absolution, and you are on the way to having a legal 'Service of the Word with Holy Communion'.

As such, I want to suggest that DW may be of more interest to Anglicans than Roman Catholics. Let me explain why...

One of the things that is most notable about Common Worship is that 1. it lacks traditional language propers (no CW Holy Week texts, no CW Festivals texts for Holy Days) 2. it lacks the more traditional propers, such as introits, sequences, offertory sentences, communion sentences. The problem with CW traditional language is that it provides for 'said 8 o'clocks', but really is not adequate to provide for main services for the church's year. This may be one of the reasons why, during my ordained ministry, traditional language services have gone from the mainstream to being a bit of a fringe interest. This I think is rather sad, not because I do not like the modern language liturgy that I commonly use, but because something is in danger of being lost: the Church of England's memory of the central prayers of her traditional rite has been eroded. It may be true that these are matters indifferent but, when we have prayers of such beauty, it would be a shame to consign them to history. 

Which is where DW comes in. If Church House Publishing could publish an altar book with propers in a similar form to the DW missal with introits and sentences to fit our rite and calendar, with CW collects and post communions, prefaces and prayers over the gifts, all in traditional language and set to the relevant music found in the RSCM publications, we would have a useable traditional rite in one book. And after all, if my memory is correct, I believe Thomas Cranmer was rather fond of one book solutions to liturgy!

Being a resurrection people: an Easter Reflection

What is the point of the resurrection? This might sound like a bit of a silly question for a Christian to ask, but actually it is possibly the most important question we can ask.

For many in our society language around 'the resurrection' is not really to do with resurrection at all, but about the immortality of the soul: life is envisaged in essentially Platonic terms in which the body is a transitory container that will fade away, but the soul after death will float up towards the one. It is Plato rather than the ideas of Christianity that most inform popular ideas about life after death: 'Do not stand at my grave and weep.... I am not there, I did not die'; 'Death is nothing at all...'

This is not how Christians envisage life, death or eternity. Instead death is a radical discontinuity: when we die, we can expect to stop existing because we cease to have a physical life. We are buried in the earth: 'we are but dust, and to dust we return'. The body is not a container, but is part of who I am. It matters, and the death of my body means the death of me.

When Jesus died, he was dead. No one expected him to return. He was gone. When friends or relatives die, we know we will never see them again. This is why we feel grief and loss.

Easter is about joy because it is the assertion that Christ rose from the dead. This is not the assertion that he continued to be exist due to the immortality of his soul and he appeared as an apparition. No. It is the assertion that he was physically raised from the dead and had a transfigured corporeal existence: he had a body.

Christ's resurrection is the type of resurrection that Christians believe in when they talk about 'the resurrection of the body'. We believe in a miracle that overcomes our physical death and gives us a fully human existence with God in heaven. We are not less than ourselves after death, but a fully human and physical self is that which enjoys eternity.

For Christians this makes Easter very significant. Christ's resurrection from the tomb is not an example of how immortality works, but rather it is a miracle that is a victory over the grave. It changes the way in which we think about life and death, and gives us the opportunity to live as a different kind of people who have been freed from the fear of death (and the need to deny death).

Anglicans and Mitres

Recently there has been an upsurge of interest in episcopal headgear (Ian Paul's blog had an article on the subject last July), with the suggestion that mitres are an innovation in Anglicanism that did not exist before Bishop Edward King of Lincoln and 20th century ritualist episcopal successors. However, the matter is more complex than many of the protagonists may like to think, and indeed reflects the complex nature of Anglican identity itself.

The legal position:

Many take their starting point from the ornaments rubric of the Prayer Book 1662 (and its predecessor of 1559). This lays down that the ornaments of ministers should be those of the second year of Edward VI (i.e. 28 January 1548 to 27 January 1549). During this period the old Latin Mass was still in use, with the English Order for Communion being introduced during the year. According to this interpretation of the rubric, bishops should wear full pontificals, including mitre, crozier, ring, cross, gloves, episcopal tunicle and dalmatic, plus the normal full eucharistic vestments. Current standard Anglican practice might be thought to be a modernised version of this.

Alternatively, one could note the the Act of Uniformity that introduced the 1549 Prayer Book was agreed by the Lords on the 15th January 1549. On this reading the ornaments that were approved for use were the more limited ones of the 1549 Prayer book. This allowed only for eucharistic vestments, copes and croziers. A contemporary chronicler noted that when Cranmer celebrated at St Paul's later in 1549, he did so in a cope (not a vestment) with a satin cap on his head (which he did not remove for the consecration), and no mitre.

The problem for this latter as an interpretation of an Anglican norm is that the rubric implies the ornaments that were in 'use' until the end of January 1549 are those that should be used, which would tend to imply full medieval vesture, and the authority of Parliament would therefore refer to the Royal Supremacy. It should be noted that this is the opposite of what is argued by Walter Frere.

The actual history:

As with most matters Anglican, the matter of practice is more complex than the legal position.

The period from the introduction of the 1549 Prayer Book to the introduction of the 1552 BCP saw a vast number of changes in liturgy. From 1550 altars were taken down and replaced with communion tables, and episcopal injunctions were issued that banned manual actions that would allow the 1549 Prayer Book to be celebrated like the old Sarum Use. In radical parishes diaper copes were purchased to celebrate communion, and all other vestments were put out of use, seating was installed, and communion cups replaced chalices. In effect the plain aesthetic of the 1552 BCP had already begun in 1550. However, in more conservative parishes and dioceses, inventories from 1553 suggest that a very traditional use of the 1549 book continued. On this understanding there was probably a wide range of practice amongst the episcopate, and that a very conservative view could still be justified until the ordinal replaced the old pontifical in 1550 and mitres were omitted from episcopal consecration.

1552 would clearly have meant the end of any use of mitres. 1553 would have seen the restoration of the full medieval rites under Mary, and this can be seen on Bishop Thomas Goodrich's grave: the leading reformer and friend of Cranmer was depicted in full pontificals on his tomb.

The beginning of Elizabeth's reign would have seen a continuation of the medieval norm until the 1559 Act of Uniformity and the imposition of the Prayer Book in June 1559. After that time it seems that the use of mitres was discontinued despite the ornaments rubric. In fact official guidance on vesture was tending to head towards simplification. The Prayer Book rubric implied vestments, but the injunctions ordered surplice and cope. By the time of the Advertisements, parochial clergy were simply to wear a surplice. Archbishop Parker indeed rejoiced that he was the first Archbishop to go without the normal episcopal vestures. Mitres were almost certainly abandoned by the Elizabethan episcopate, although conformist suffragens from the Henrician period (e.g. Dean John Salisbury of Norwich, who held the suffrage title of Thetford) may have continued to use one, but this is an argument from silence. Episcopal seals of this period (such as that of Durham) do not include a mitre. This was the accepted norm until the time of archbishop George Abbott.

It was with the Laudians that mitres begin to appear again. Bishop Samuel Harsnett was buried in the 1630s, and the effigy on his grave depicts him in cope and jewelled mitre. Mitres continued to appear after the Restoration in heraldic designs, and silver post-Restoration mitres still exist. What of course none of this proves is that mitres had any liturgic function in the Church of England until the advent of Ritualism, and the use of powdered wigs by the episcopate probably discouraged any developments in this direction. During the rationalism of the eighteenth century it is most likely that, along with the use of incense and copes in cathedrals, mitres were just another medieval irrelevancy that was never used. It was with the spread of Ritualism and full blown Anglo-Catholic ritual at the turn of the twentieth century that the current liturgical use of mitres was restored to the church.

So what of mitres today?

Mitres are not part of the first millennium of church history, but I think that does not really matter as the same could be said for scholastic or Reformation theology. They were not really part of the liturgy of the Church of England until the Ritualists revived them. However, they were there as a symbolism of episcopacy from the beginning of the seventeenth century, and they are a well known symbol in our society. If one argues against mitres, then it is even more logical to take offence at pectoral crosses and episcopal rings: not contained in the ordinal and not even referred to in paintings and heraldry. Purple shirts and cassocks are also a relatively recent innovation, along with red chimeres for bishops without an Oxbridge doctorate. The list could go on...

However, what concerns me about the arguments against mitres is the assertion that the period 1559-1620 can be regarded as normative for the life of the church. There is good reason to suggest that one of the strange dynamics of Anglicanism is that the church generally changed its mind about some aspects of the Reformation programme in the 1630s, and decided to reverse some of the changes (such as the position of the 'altar'). Post-Restoration Anglicanism in the form of the 1662 Prayer Book and the architecture of Wren was given shape by the conflict caused by the 1630s. The 1559 Settlement has had a wide variety of interpretations down the centuries, and I am not sure that we should be over hasty in assuming that one is correct to the exclusion of others. The history of episcopal headgear reflects this complexity.

So, at a practical level, does any of this debate about headgear matter? I am inclined to think not, and invoke Anglican adiaphora. It is what bishops do to lead the church, rather than what they wear, that makes the difference.