A Distressing Discussion

One of the things I love about – and that attracted me to – Anglicanism was that orthodox people of varying churchmanship could have communion in the same church. Far more so than I, at least, have seen elsewhere.

One of the most amazing services I’ve ever attended was a Holy Communion service at the last Reformed Episcopal General Council with our APA friends joining us as well. While we were receiving the sacrament, some were swaying back and forth to gospel songs, while a few of the priests were making crosses every chance they got like the Anglo-Caths they are. The only thing missing was incense. Worship styles ran the gamut yet fit into a whole.

That’s the closest I’ve come to seeing a service that looks like what Christ’s church looks like. I shed a tear or two it was so beautiful.

That’s what orthodox Anglicanism at its best looks like.

So this discussion at Stand Firm distresses me. When I hear people I respect suggest not only that evangelical and Anglo-Catholic orthodox Anglicans won’t be able to stick together, but even venture that perhaps they shouldn’t try too hard to stick together – well, I just pray they are proven wrong.

I revere J. I. Packer and I love my Anglo-Catholic friends (and prefer their style of worship). And I want to be in the same church and have communion with them.

And that’s the way it should be! Christ’s church includes all these. Why shouldn’t orthodox Anglicanism?

UPDATE: Dr. Packer has disavowed the article. It was mistakenly attributed to him.