What Do Anglicans Believe? a Study Guide to Christian Doctrine from Anglican and Ecumenical Statements
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What do Anglicans Believe? A Study Guide to Christian Doctrine from Anglican and Ecumenical Statements Theological Education in the Anglican Communion (TEAC) 2020 What do Anglicans believe? A Study Guide to Christian Doctrine from Anglican and Ecumenical Statements First edition. Published July 2020 Theological Education in the Anglican Communion – TEAC Copyright © The Anglican Consultative Council 2020 This publication may be downloaded, copied, used and distributed in its entirety without charge; but no commercial exploitation, including selling or hiring for a fee, is permitted. The use of extracts for education purposes is permitted free of charge provided that the following credit line (including URL) is used in full: “‘What do Anglicans believe? A Study Guide to Christian Doctrine from Anglican and Ecumenical Statements’ is copyright © The Anglican Consultative Council 2020 and is used with permission. www.anglicancommunion.org/teac.” The Anglican Consultative Council Saint Andrew’s House 16 Tavistock Crescent London W11 1AP United Kingdom ISBN: 978-1-913863-00-5 What do Anglicans Believe? Contents Introduction .................................................................................................................................5 I. What is Doctrine? ....................................................................................................................8 Resources for Judging 1. Where does doctrine sit in the life of the church? ....................................................... 10 2. Where does doctrine come from? ....................................................................................... 11 3. How is doctrine handed on? ................................................................................................... 12 4. How has doctrine been revived in recent decades? ................................................... 12 5. Why engage in dialogue about doctrine? ......................................................................... 14 6. Can churches learn doctrine from each other? ............................................................ 15 7. Is there a need to find new ways to express doctrine? .............................................. 16 II. What is the Doctrine of the Creeds? ............................................................................18 lll. What is the Church? ..........................................................................................................21 Resources for Judging 1. Where to begin? ........................................................................................................................... 23 2. What is the calling of the Church?....................................................................................... 24 3. How is the Church one? ........................................................................................................... 25 4. How is the Church holy? .......................................................................................................... 29 5. How is the Church catholic? ................................................................................................... 31 6. How is the Church apostolic? ................................................................................................ 32 7. What is the place of the Sacraments? ................................................................................ 35 8. What is communion? .................................................................................................................. 38 9. How to sum up? ............................................................................................................................ 39 Recommended Further Reading .........................................................................................43 List of Anglican and Ecumenical Statements ..................................................................44 3 What do Anglicans Believe? 4 What do Anglicans Believe? Introduction In his great set of poems ‘The Four Quartets’ T.S. Eliot describes how we can have an experience but miss the meaning. This can be as true for theological students as anyone else: they can become so preoccupied with the practicalities of ministry and church life that they lose touch with the meaning of what it is all about. Spending time in study of the doctrines Communion. It has been produced by of the Christian faith, the beliefs which members of the Inter Anglican Standing undergird all that we do, can make all the Commission on Unity, Faith and Order difference. This study guide provides an (IASCUFO) working in partnership with opportunity for students to do this, with the Anglican Communion’s department the help of Anglican and ecumenical texts of Theological Education in the Anglican freely available on the internet, not least Communion (TEAC). It has been compiled for those across the Anglican Communion to be uploaded onto the theological who do not have access to theological education pages of the Anglican libraries. Furthermore, as Eliot goes on Communion website, to be freely available to say, finding the meaning ‘restores the for use by all. experience in a different form.’ To help readers engage with the texts The study guide builds on the dialogue the study guide uses an interactive about doctrine that Anglican churches approach, with questions and answers have had with each other and with running through every chapter. It other churches across the world ever begins with broad questions, namely since they were formed. Over recent what is doctrine in general and what decades these conversations have is the doctrine shared by all historic produced a rich and authoritative churches, and from there narrows down collection of agreed statements, written to specific Anglican doctrine. The first by Anglican theologians in partnership chapter looks at the nature of doctrine with theologians from other churches, in general, introducing its place within to create a broad and rich map of the discipleship and mission as a whole. The Christian faith as it has been received second chapter turns to the doctrines and handed on by these churches. of the Nicene Creed, the most ancient and widely used creed today, shared by In this study guide, then, taking advantage churches of both East and West, South of the availability of these statements and North, using a recent and widely from various websites, a concise and welcomed ecumenical text that unpacks well-grounded introduction to Christian and applies its meaning for today. doctrine is assembled for use in home This chapter will offer a structure for groups, study programmes, seminaries and engaging with it. The third and longest theological colleges across the Anglican chapter turns to the doctrine of the 5 What do Anglicans Believe? Church, drawing on a rich selection of See Anglican and ecumenical ecclesiological statements, to approach this topical This first step is all about coming to see and important subject from a number of the situation in which we find ourselves directions, also touching on the nature – our ‘context’. Such an analysis will ask of the sacraments. what is happening, who is involved, and what are its effects. In this case, with Agreed statements, however, only doctrine as the subject, the questions take us so far. They need to be not will be about what is the current role of only read but understood, interpreted doctrine (or specific doctrines) in the life and expressed in worship, mission and of our church (whether local or regional), discipleship. There need to be moments who is involved in that role, and what when ‘the penny drops’ and the effect does it have. This first step of the meaning of doctrines becomes clear and pedagogical process requires a degree energising and we go on to express them of social analysis and is best done as in our lives. a group exercise, involving those who share this reality and who can analyse it All of this will be very different in together. different places, depending on the social and cultural realities of the respective Judge context. Each study group will find its own way of doing these things, at a level The second step is all about gaining and in a way that is appropriate for them. a critical perspective on the subject, The person leading the study process will by learning from authorities such need to be sensitive to these dynamics as scripture, church teaching and and fashion the study accordingly. scholarship, and comparing and contrasting what is currently the case To help with this, this study guide in our context with what could and draws on an approach to learning often should be the case. As far as doctrine described as ‘See-Judge-Act’, or ‘Taking is concerned, this step involves reading in, Taking stock, Taking action’.1 It is a and learning from authoritative simple but effective three-step method ecumenical and Anglican statements, of reflection and action which moves on the meaning and place of doctrine from the learner’s context to the text in and specific doctrines in the life of the question and then to a practical response, church, and then reflecting on how the to be repeated again and again: situation uncovered by the first step 1 See, for example, Simon Cuff, Love in Action: Catholic Social Teaching for Every Church, London: SCM Press, Chapter 8: ‘See, Judge, Act’. Cuff traces the origins of this approach back to St Thomas Aquinas. On ‘Taking in, Taking stock and Taking action’ see God’s Justice: Just Relationships between