Anglicans, do you see yourselves as more Protestant, or more Catholic?

Esdra said:

I know, in the meantime I also value the Eucharist more than I used to when I started attending the Baptists.

By the way, there's not such a thing like Eucharist in Baptist churches. ;-)

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I have had "Communion" at Baptist churches..
There really is nothing like grape juice and soda crackers!(bleh)
I grew up in the Episcopal church and anything other than the ritual,and biblical wine and bread just don't cut it for me..Juice and crackers are a poor substitute for what Christ commanded us to eat and drink during his last supper with the Apostles.

The RCC and Anglican faiths are close in the rituals,but diametrically opposed in the praying to saints,Mary,the Rosary,the mode of Confession.

Izdaari said:

That's about what I thought. Utrecht or Lutheran would suit me well enough. RCC would never be an option for me. I don't accept papal supremacy and am generally socially liberal. I do consider RCC and EO my Christian brethren, and might visit, but would never join.

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Your comment about papal supremacy reminded me of a Monty Python skit, from THE MEANING OF LIFE. It was the part where the Catholic kids were walking single file down the hill and the Protestant couple across the street watch. The husband launches into a speech about Luther's protest and how Luther would not have understood the full significance of what he had done .... after a while he comments about "alien Episcopal supremacy", it is amusing in the context so if you're familiar with the skit you'll get a chuckle out of my reply, otherwise I suspect the humour will be lost

Anglo-Catholocism is one the four streams of Anglicanism. Devotion to Mary is alive and well in the Anglican Church; Waslingham is an Anglican shrine. Asking the saints to pray for us or others is an acceptable and certainly within the Traditions of Anglicanism. Of course, many Anglicans oppose all such practices.

Welcome to The Shrine of Our Lady of Walsingham

freezerman2000 said:

I have had "Communion" at Baptist churches..
There really is nothing like grape juice and soda crackers!(bleh)
I grew up in the Episcopal church and anything other than the ritual,and biblical wine and bread just don't cut it for me..Juice and crackers are a poor substitute for what Christ commanded us to eat and drink during his last supper with the Apostles.

The RCC and Anglican faiths are close in the rituals,but diametrically opposed in the praying to saints,Mary,the Rosary,the mode of Confession.

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freezerman2000 said:

..Juice and crackers are a poor substitute for what Christ commanded us to eat and drink during his last supper with the Apostles.

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Where did you get the idea that "what Christ commanded us to eat" was a reasonable facimile of a monogrammed piece of paper?

The RCC and Anglican faiths are close in the rituals,but diametrically opposed in the praying to saints,Mary,the Rosary,the mode of Confession.

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Very true, although we have to admit that we can find Anglicans who believe almost anything imaginable. Oddly enough, people speak of "Cafeteria Catholics" but there is no equivalent term among Anglicans.

Catholics have the CCC, the Magesterium and central authority. To be a called a"cafeteria" Catholic is to be accused of rejecting certain rules/teachings of the Catholic Church. Most Catholics reject at least some teaching (contraception and divorce are the most common).

With Anglicans, there is no such standard. How many dozen threads have we had trying to understand what Anglicans/Episcopalians have in common, other than being the denomination of the local church in their neighborhood.

Albion said:

Very true, although we have to admit that we can find Anglicans who believe almost anything imaginable. Oddly enough, people speak of "Cafeteria Catholics" but there is no equivalent term among Anglicans.

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Albion said:

Where did you get the idea that "what Christ commanded us to eat" was a reasonable facimile of a monogrammed piece of paper?

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Mark14:22-23
Sounds like a command to me

freezerman2000 said:

Mark14:22-23
Sounds like a command to me

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Really?

Did you miss the "Where did you get the idea that 'what Christ commanded us to eat'" was a reasonable facimile of a monogrammed piece of paper?

part?

freezerman2000 said:

I have had "Communion" at Baptist churches..
There really is nothing like grape juice and soda crackers!(bleh)
I grew up in the Episcopal church and anything other than the ritual,and biblical wine and bread just don't cut it for me..Juice and crackers are a poor substitute for what Christ commanded us to eat and drink during his last supper with the Apostles.

The RCC and Anglican faiths are close in the rituals,but diametrically opposed in the praying to saints,Mary,the Rosary,the mode of Confession.

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I grew up in the Reformed Church of America, and communion, held a few times a year, was little cubes of Wonder Bread and shotglasses of grape juice. Not until I became an Episcopalian did the Eucharist have the depth and meaning it does to me now.

Trainlady said:

I grew up in the Reformed Church of America, and communion, held a few times a year, was little cubes of Wonder Bread and shotglasses of grape juice. Not until I became an Episcopalian did the Eucharist have the depth and meaning it does to me now.

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It's surprising how incidentals rise to the level of "God wills it" for some people. The Eastern Orthodox, for example, have always used pieces of ordinary leavened bread'; and there is absolute certainty that the Last Supper featured multiple cups of weak wine. But we have come to think that circular hosts of wheat paste--with the emphasis upon paste that can hardly be recognized as bread of any sort--and a single chalice is thought to be the "real" way of communing (preferably distributed to the laity while they are kneeling, although there is no reason at all to think that the Apostles knelt to observe the Passover meal with Christ).

mark1 said:

Anglo-Catholocism is one the four streams of Anglicanism. Devotion to Mary is alive and well in the Anglican Church; Waslingham is an Anglican shrine. Asking the saints to pray for us or others is an acceptable and certainly within the Traditions of Anglicanism. Of course, many Anglicans oppose all such practices.

Welcome to The Shrine of Our Lady of Walsingham

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I had occasion to visit a "high church" in my area last year when we met at the convocation to discuss the upcoming search and election of our new bishop. Man, the church was more Catholic than a Catholic church. Statues everywhere, including Mary, and you could tell who the members of that particular parish were because every time they got up out of their pew for any reason and had occasion to face the altar, they got all the way down on one knee in a deep bow toward the altar. The priest wore a beanie, too. (and I have to say, he is a very warm and well-liked person.)

mark1 said:

Anglo-Catholocism is one the four streams of Anglicanism. Devotion to Mary is alive and well in the Anglican Church; Waslingham is an Anglican shrine. Asking the saints to pray for us or others is an acceptable and certainly within the Traditions of Anglicanism. Of course, many Anglicans oppose all such practices.

Welcome to The Shrine of Our Lady of Walsingham

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Thank you. I had never heard of this, but I am going to pass it along to the head of our DOK chapter. She practices devotion to Mary.

I consider myself to be Anglo-Catholic/Emerging Catholic. So, I look at Anglicanism as being more Catholic like than Protestant like.

What's an emerging catholic?

Albion said:

It's surprising how incidentals rise to the level of "God wills it" for some people. The Eastern Orthodox, for example, have always used pieces of ordinary leavened bread'; and there is absolute certainty that the Last Supper featured multiple cups of weak wine. But we have come to think that circular hosts of wheat paste--with the emphasis upon paste that can hardly be recognized as bread of any sort--and a single chalice is thought to be the "real" way of communing (preferably distributed to the laity while they are kneeling, although there is no reason at all to think that the Apostles knelt to observe the Passover meal with Christ).

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Well of course, if you're going to be strictly literalistic about it, Paul is quite clear that the ritual of breaking bread happens as part of an actual meal.

The use of unleavened bread is a western curiosity, but it does have a practical side- when I went to a low anglican service the other week, they did use leavened bread, and I must admit it did rather make me squirm to watch bits of the body of Christ go flying everywhere and get trampled into the floor. The EO avoids this problem of course by soaking it in the wine and handing the little cubes out on the long spoon.

I wonder though if perhaps you're looking at this the right way. Correct me if I'm wrong by all means but I feel you're criticising the idea that there is a 'certain way' of 'doing' Eucharist that makes it 'more real' if you like. That certain forms are taken to be imperative and authentic. Yet it seems your criticism is of the things that perhaps emerged precisely because those who worshipped felt that the externals were secondary to the actual spirit of the ritual? In other words, why criticise the use of the wafer if it actually doesn't really matter how the elements are presented?

But of course I could be missing your point...

Unshaven said:

Well of course, if you're going to be strictly literalistic about it, Paul is quite clear that the ritual of breaking bread happens as part of an actual meal.

The use of unleavened bread is a western curiosity, but it does have a practical side- when I went to a low anglican service the other week, they did use leavened bread, and I must admit it did rather make me squirm to watch bits of the body of Christ go flying everywhere and get trampled into the floor. The EO avoids this problem of course by soaking it in the wine and handing the little cubes out on the long spoon.

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First, we do not speak of "low Anglicans." It's "Low Church" Anglicanism that you are referring to, which is a term that indicates that the service or congregation is less ceremonial (but perhaps just as ritualistic) as a "High Church" one. In any case, it is as likely that you'd find leavened bread in one as in the other, and the "squirminess" you experienced of course stems from your having an different understanding of the Real Presence than Anglicans do. We do not believe that the presence of Christ exists in the elements APART from communing. That's why we don't engage in such Roman practices as "Perpetual Adoration."

I wonder though if perhaps you're looking at this the right way. Correct me if I'm wrong by all means but I feel you're criticising the idea that there is a 'certain way' of 'doing' Eucharist that makes it 'more real' if you like. That certain forms are taken to be imperative and authentic. Yet it seems your criticism is of the things that perhaps emerged precisely because those who worshipped felt that the externals were secondary to the actual spirit of the ritual? In other words, why criticise the use of the wafer if it actually doesn't really matter how the elements are presented?

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It really doesn't matter, and that is the very reason for my comments. What I don't care for--if you want to put it that way--is ridiculing one way or the other, Wine is wine; bread is bread. If someone thinks he or she has the inside track on piety because their parish uses bread of a certain shape or texture, I reject that. In the case here, I was reacting to this comment: "...communion, held a few times a year, was little cubes of Wonder Bread and shotglasses of grape juice."

Had the writer been of the opposite mindset and said, "little crackers and a jug of joyjuice" I am likely to have rejected that meanspirited characterization in approximately the same way. In fact, I think I did just that here a year or more ago.

I currently worship at a Reformed Baptist church (long story) but consider myself an Anglican at heart, and probably an Anglo-Catholic at that. The Church of England describes itself as "catholic and reformed", both un-capitalised, but not Protestant.

When you attend a truly Protestant church you come to realise just how Catholic the Anglican Church is. The centrality of the Eucharist in the Anglican Communion for a start (as opposed to the Lord's Supper) and the episcopate as a close runner up. I still flinch too when anyone drops any bread, and grape juice will never be wine for me. Liturgical worship is an important part of the communion too, and corporate worship is severely lacking in Protestant churches, with preaching the Word of God replacing it almost entirely. Most sermons in my church last 45 minutes. Of course we don't have crosses or statues, fonts or alters in our churches either.

If the Anglican Church were to become truly Protestant in nature there might be some big, big changes. The Church in England rebelled against the excesses of Rome. But then again the Church in Rome has largely rebelled against the same excesses. I suspect that one day in the far future the Church of England may well re-align or face smaller and smaller congregations until its ultimate extinction, which would be tragic.

In my former church, a Presbyterian church, communion was held once a month, the bread was usually a wholemeal loaf torn into portions and each communicant would tear a small piece from the portion that was passed to him or her. The drink was usually unfermented grape juice but was on some occasions raspberry cordial, served in small communion glasses (just before I left it was changed to small plastic disposable communion glasses). I am sure no disrespect was intended.

crimsonleaf said:

I currently worship at a Reformed Baptist church (long story) but consider myself an Anglican at heart, and probably an Anglo-Catholic at that. The Church of England describes itself as "catholic and reformed", both un-capitalised, but not Protestant.

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There are just as many Anglicans who consider the church Protestant (and for good reason) than think of it as Catholic. It all depends on which Anglican church or province one is most most familar with. No, it also depends on how one defines "Protestant."

I see the Anglican Communion as catholic, in the little 'c' sense of being part of the universal and whole church. But to answer your question, I don't see the Communion as either "Catholic" or "Protestant." I have always liked "Via Media" language, I think that it does away with the excesses of both and is very truly a wonderful example of what the church could be. We have our problems, infighting, bickering, and squabbling, but we remain, despite our differences, one. That is what I love about our Communion, and what drew me to it in the first place. Blessings!

Albion said:

First, we do not speak of "low Anglicans." It's "Low Church" Anglicanism that you are referring to, which is a term that indicates that the service or congregation is less ceremonial (but perhaps just as ritualistic) as a "High Church" one. In any case, it is as likely that you'd find leavened bread in one as in the other, and the "squirminess" you experienced of course stems from your having an different understanding of the Real Presence than Anglicans do. We do not believe that the presence of Christ exists in the elements APART from communing. That's why we don't engage in such Roman practices as "Perpetual Adoration."

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Although I have not encountered a perpetual adoration in an anglican church or religious house, I have nevertheless been to a number of Eucharistic Adorations and Benedictions in Anglican Churches, and of course a good number do keep the reserved sacrament, so I would put the breaks on claiming exactly what 'Anglicans' believe about the real presence. Personally, I don't know any Anglo-Catholics who would not say that the bread objectively becomes the body and the blood of our Lord, even if the precise mechanics are debated.

I was once even solemnly told by an ordinand not to chew the bread because it was profoundly disrespectful to Christ.

Unless of course, your point was simply to dismiss these views as not fitting with your own ideas of what constitutes 'Anglicanism'...

At the other end of the spectrum though, at the church I grew up in, I never found anyone who believed in any sort of Real Presence whatsoever. Positively Zwinglian. Do they also fail to make the cut as Anglicans?