Reformed Churchmen

We are Confessional Calvinists and a Prayer Book Church-people. In 2012, we remembered the 350th anniversary of the 1662 Book of Common Prayer; also, we remembered the 450th anniversary of John Jewel's sober, scholarly, and Reformed "An Apology of the Church of England." In 2013, we remembered the publication of the "Heidelberg Catechism" and the influence of Reformed theologians in England, including Heinrich Bullinger's Decades. For 2014: Tyndale's NT translation. For 2015, John Roger, Rowland Taylor and Bishop John Hooper's martyrdom, burned at the stakes. Books of the month. December 2014: Alan Jacob's "Book of Common Prayer" at: http://www.amazon.com/Book-Common-Prayer-Biography-Religious/dp/0691154813/ref=sr_1_1?ie=UTF8&qid=1417814005&sr=8-1&keywords=jacobs+book+of+common+prayer. January 2015: A.F. Pollard's "Thomas Cranmer and the English Reformation: 1489-1556" at: http://www.amazon.com/Thomas-Cranmer-English-Reformation-1489-1556/dp/1592448658/ref=sr_1_1?ie=UTF8&qid=1420055574&sr=8-1&keywords=A.F.+Pollard+Cranmer. February 2015: Jaspar Ridley's "Thomas Cranmer" at: http://www.amazon.com/Thomas-Cranmer-Jasper-Ridley/dp/0198212879/ref=sr_1_1?ie=UTF8&qid=1422892154&sr=8-1&keywords=jasper+ridley+cranmer&pebp=1422892151110&peasin=198212879

Monday, March 26, 2012

Dr. Alan McCann: Review of Church of Ireland & Conference on Gay Issues

This is Rev. Dr. Alan McCann's review of a recent and rather tidy-sounding conference on the issue of homosexuality, as sponsored by the Church in Ireland. McCann, if representative, summarized the affair this way:  "Tokenism towards the authority of Scripture was the order of the day."  At one point, he says:   "There is no middle ground."  Dr. McCann hears an American Anglican's echo, "Don't waste 15 years of your ministry in this listening process as we did." It's not a cheery review or good news.  The obsessive-compulsive addiction to this issue, now a distinctive of Western Anglicanism thanks to liberal Americans, will be its epitaph in church history.  We need a modern Shakespeare to offer us a "quippy quatrain." What else do many of these leaders offer besides this trajectory?  This narrative?  This thesis?  This legacy in history?  Quite charming, quite catholic, quite biblical, quite historical, and quite holy.  Declining numbers is one part of the legacy, as the American church dwindles into irrelevance.  Oh the irony as the grand-mother of decent and biblical worship degenerates into this tragi-comedy with the leaders suffering from character flaws, theological errors, pride, judicial hardening, judicial blindness and the--inevitable--results of woeful obstinacy.  Or, worse, another part of the legacy will unfold when He "shall come again to judge the living and the dead..." (if that's believed anymore, of course).  The realignment will continue despite the tidy-up efforts.  McCann's review is found here:  http://www.virtueonline.org/portal/modules/news/article.php?storyid=15750.  The conference was 9 Mar 2012.  We carried the press release here:  http://www.blogger.com/blogger.g?blogID=7768158695430580276#editor/target=post;postID=6247532579690280319

IRELAND: Bishop's Conference on Human Sexuality
I think we do need to make it clear that this is the line in the sand for the orthodox believer in the Church of Ireland and there can be no compromise on this issue

By Rev. Dr. Alan McCann
Special to Virtueonline
www.virtueonline.org
March 26, 2012

It has been almost two weeks since the two day conference in the Slieve Russel Hotel and time to pen some thoughts on what emerged.

My initial reaction is that nothing new has emerged, no consensus, no agreement and to be very honest very little real engagement. The programme was incredibly packed and one can only conclude that either this was a deliberate control mechanism or the house of bishops is seriously out of touch with the reality of time management.

Whilst no one could fault the wide range of seminars on offer there was little opportunity for real engagement with the issues raised.

Each session seemed to be constantly being called to a close before any real discussion got going.

There was no real engagement with the biblical texts, despite some valiant efforts by contributors.

One must say that hearing JEDP trotted out almost brought on laughter. Even the liberals were rightly embarrassed by this contribution.

I do wish people would engage with the actual bible text, the lack of clear exegesis was astounding.

Instead what we were often treated to was emotive language (Hitler even got a mention), social policy statements and sound bites, but then time constraints played a part in this as well.

When we got round to discussing the passages in the groups it was amazing to see how few bibles were opened which reflected the true nature of the discussion.

Tokenism towards the authority of Scripture was the order of the day.

15 minutes to discuss the Old Testament texts relating to human sexuality - just goes to show how seriously the Church of Ireland wanted to hear from God's Word. A token gesture is all that could be said of this.

In my own group the lack of biblical knowledge, even basic knowledge such as Leviticus condemns homosexuality, was quite frightening.

Again and again any serious engagement with the text and the issues at hand was curtailed by time and avoided if it at all possible.

The seminars seemed to be well presented and provided some useful information.

However, once again the lack of engagement with Scripture was very apparent and the emotive language continued.

We had one contributor state that Paul was a repressed homosexual, quoting Spong as if he was on par with Scripture.

Emotive language, metaphors, imagery and illustrations in favour of the acceptance of homosexuality was a recurring feature of many of the pro-gay contributions over the two days.

My lasting impression is that the Church of Ireland is in a worse state than I actually thought it was. Any talk of a 'middle ground' on this issue was shattered by this conference. There is no middle ground. To be very honest I am not sure if a motion went to General Synod upholding the current orthodox teaching of the Church of Ireland on human sexuality it would receive the necessary majorities to pass.

It really is that serious. The orthodox have been sleeping whilst the liberal revisionists have tunnelled under the very foundations of the Church of Ireland. It is an edifice with no foundations at present due to the biblical ignorance of its clergy and laity. We find ourselves in a very precarious position at this moment in time.

I have no doubt many came away very positive as it was the Church of Ireland at its nicest, no arguments, no disagreements and no votes. Everyone could go back to their parish, views unchanged, satisfied they had listened, but to what as it certainly wasn't to the Word of God, the spirit of the age maybe??? I came away quite depressed and saddened by it all with the words of an Episcopal priest friend from the USA ringing in my ears: "Don't waste 15 years of your ministry in this listening process as we did."

The liberal revisionists will call for endless conversations which just mean berating you to till you either agree or leave." I can already hear the 'we have started the conversation' brigade siren calling us towards the liberal revisionist rocks on which the Church of Ireland will be shipwrecked.

Maybe we need to listen and learn from our brothers and sisters who were forced out of TEC and not to waste our time, energy and resources but to actually bring it to a head at this synod so that we can truly know where we all stand.

Having spoken to other members of general synod who were present at the conference they, like me, came away depressed and very fearful for the future of the Church of Ireland. Like me they had heard of this 'middle ground' which this conference has exposed as a fallacy. I think the only positive is that for some it was a wake-up call as they thought it was only the more conservative voices being alarmist in the past. Now they realise they have been sleepwalking into a nightmare, the only problem is that it is reality and not a dream.

Where to from here? All we can do at present is to await the proposal put forward by Standing Committee.

I think we do need to make it clear that this is the line in the sand for the orthodox believer in the Church of Ireland and there can be no compromise on this issue.

Anglican fudge will not be accepted, it cannot be accepted if we believe the plain teaching of Scripture and the historical teaching of the Church. We can and we must pray for the members of General Synod to have their eyes opened by God to the plain truth of His Word. We must pray for our clergy that they would hold to the plain truth of Scripture and not only teach it but order their lives according to it.

We must pray for our House of Bishops that they would remember the promise they made at their consecration to chase error from the Church and that they would have the courage to do this at this time, despite the spirit of this age. Finally, we must pray for ourselves that we too would remain faithful to Scripture and live lives of holiness before God and the world.


---The Rev. Dr. Alan McCann is Rector of Holy Trinity Woodburn, Diocese of Connor. He is a founding member of Reform Ireland. Holy Trinity is the youngest parish in the Church of Ireland, being a church plant from St Nicholas' Carrickfergus. Membership is now 300. McCann received his B.A.(Hons) in Business Studies at the University Ulster, Jordanstown, before doing his B.Th. at Trinity College Dublin. He completed his M.Phil at The Queens University, Belfast, and wrote his thesis on the 'The Charismatic Movement in the Church of Ireland, a Historical and Theological Introduction.' He recently obtained his D.Min from Union Theological College in Belfast.

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