Foundations of the Anglican Church CXI

A somewhat typical 17th century
Oxfordshire Communion Table

With the restoration of the monarchy and the episcopacy in 1660 and the subsequent imposition of liturgical conformity on the Church of England with the Act of Uniformity of 1662 there was an opportunity to make revisions in the Book of Common Prayer that set the form for the Anglican Liturgy.  The Savoy Conference of 1661 failed to reconcile the Presbyterian/Congregationalist faction which, in rejecting the Act of Uniformity, went on to become separate Churches and this separation, in turn, permitted the High Church wing of the Church of England to make several revisions in the Liturgy that stressed its Catholic heritage.  You may remember that one of the things that triggered the Civil War and the abolishment of both monarchy and episcopacy (in 1649 and 1646 respectively), was Archbishop Laud’s attempts to push some liturgical changes that departed from the puritan/Calvinist theology in favor of more a more ancient (read: Catholic) approach. 

The words “bishops,” “pastors,” and “ministers” were to be replaced in most instances with the terms “bishops,” “priests,” and “deacons.”  In the Liturgy itself, a prayer for the departed was inserted into the prayer for the Church Militant and while it was not so much intercessory as it was commemorative it is still a most noteworthy addition as it marks the first such commemoration of the faithful departed since the 1549 Prayer Book was superseded by the 1552 edition.   

There was also a re-introduction of the idea of “offertory” with the insistence that the alms be placed on the holy table alongside the bread and wine with the accompanying prayer: “We humbly beseech thee to accept our alms and oblations…”   Previously there was no mention of placing the elements on the holy table though obviously they had to get there somehow.  Their inclusion alongside the alms—which had formerly been placed directly in the poor-box—signifies an idea of the people offering their gifts and word “oblations” gives it a sacrificial connotation.     

The “Black Rubric” which had insisted on kneeling for Holy Communion, but insisted also that the kneeling should not imply the Real Presence much less adoration of the Sacrament had been dropped in the 1559 Prayer Book.  It was now introduced in an altered form to read

"Whereas it is ordained in this Office for the Administration of the Lord's Supper, that the Communicants should receive the same kneeling; (which order is well meant, for a signification of our humble and grateful acknowledgment of the benefits of Christ therein given to all worthy Receivers, and for the avoiding of such profanation and disorder in the holy Communion, as might otherwise ensue;) yet, lest the same kneeling should by any persons, either out of ignorance and infirmity, or out of malice and obstinacy, be misconstrued and depraved: It is hereby declared, That thereby no adoration is intended, or ought to be done, either unto the Sacramental Bread or Wine there bodily received, or unto any Corporal Presence of Christ's natural Flesh and Blood. For the Sacramental Bread and Wine remain still in their very natural substances, and therefore may not be adored; (for that were Idolatry, to be abhorred of all faithful Christians;) and the natural Body and Blood of our Saviour Christ are in Heaven, and not here; it being against the truth of Christ's natural Body to be at one time in more places than one."

As Protestant as this might sound, there is a significant shift from the 1552 text which read

… Lest yet the same kneeling might be thought or taken otherwise, we do declare that it is not meant thereby, that any adoration is done, or ought to be done, either unto the sacramental bread and wine thereby bodily received, or to any real and essential presence, there being of Christ’s natural flesh and blood.”

 Whereas in the 1552 text, it is denied that Christ is really and essentially present, the 1662 text denies the corporeal presence of Christ’s natural flesh and blood.  We Catholics can easily miss the distinction, but it would be very clear to a 17^th century Protestant.  The 1662 text is ambiguously worded to permit belief in the Real and Essential Presence of Christ as long that Presence is not confused with his physical Body that was Raised from the Dead and has ascended into heaven and has taken his place at the right hand of God.  In other words, while the 1552 text insists that Christ is present only in a spiritual or commemorative sense, the 1662 Book permits belief in a Real but not a corporeal Presence.  This distinction is strange to us Catholics, but it would be a crucial shift in theology for English Protestants of the time. The 1662 text was wary of a physicalist understanding of Christ’s Presence in the Eucharist but it was not denying that Christ was truly Present in a sacramental sense even as we might find him truly present but not physically present to us in moments of intense prayer.  This might even be compared to what Saint Teresa of Avila writes about the presence of Christ in a vision where he is, the Saint says, present but not corporeally. 

We Catholics, of course, believe that the Presence of Christ in the Eucharist is a corporeal presence and that, in fact, the bread and wine of the Eucharist have been transformed into the true flesh and true blood of the Risen Lord, indistinguishable from the flesh and blood that was conceived in the womb of the Virgin Mary, that died upon the Cross, and that was raised from the dead.  This revised text in the 1662 Book does not meet Catholic orthodoxy, but it does mark a significant step away from the Zwinglian understanding of Eucharist as memorial to an eating and drinking of Christ’s sacramental (as distinguished from physical) Presence.

Catholic theologians of the period had lost the intrinsic connection—so clear in the Eucharistic theology of Saint Augustine—of the Eucharistic Presence of Christ and the Ecclesial Presence of Christ (The Church as the Body of Christ)—and of the Ecclesial Presence of Christ with the Physical Body of the Risen Christ.  The 1943 Encyclical Letter of Pope Pius XII, Mystici Corporis, has helped us recover our awareness that we, as Church, are the Risen Body of the Lord, but the imagination of most Catholics even today restricts the Presence of Christ’s Body to the Eucharistic Bread and Wine.  For them, Christ is in heaven and he is in the tabernacle and nowhere else.  Consequently their belief in the Real Presence becomes an assertion in his Real Absence from our daily lives and leaves us with a very truncated understanding of both the Eucharist and the Church as well as a highly disempowered Christ who has no involvement with the world in which we live but only in the world that awaits us beyond death.  This distortion of Christ reduces his kerygma of the Kingdom of God to the post-mortem paradise and frees the believer from taking any responsibility for this world beyond his or her own moral righteousness.  Ironically this leads to the same over-spiritualization of the Christian faith that results from the purely Spiritual understanding of the Eucharist that has permitted the bi-level morality of Protestant/Capitalist Western Society.  There is no social sin, only personal sin because God has no investment in human society.  But enough of that.  I tend to digress, but thank you Max Weber for your insights about The Protestant Ethic and the Spirit of Capitalism. 

In addition to the text of the Liturgy, there were a number of rubrical changes.  The priest was required to wear as a vestment the surplice and not simply the black gown preferred by the Puritan wing.  The priest was also required to take up the bread and wine in his hands during the Words of Institution (Words of Consecration) and break the bread as he speaks the words.  These “manual acts” imply the priest consecrating the bread and wine as he reenacts the actions of Jesus while speaking Jesus’ words.  Perhaps the most dramatic revision was that whatever consecrated bread and wine remained after the Holy Communion were to be reverently placed on the Holy Table and covered with a fair linen cloth until after the service, at which time they were to be reverently consumed.  Previously the Eucharistic remains were to be given to the priest for daily use.  This rubric suggests that the “real and essential” (though not-corporeal) Presence remained, or perhaps better that the Presence was an objective reality regarding the bread and wine and not merely the subjective apprehension of the believing communicant. 

As to other matters, there is no mention of cross or candles upon the Holy Table and the Holy Table is still to be positioned in the chancel—supposedly in its accustomed spot in the center—with the priest standing on the north side.  In fact, more and more the Holy Table was placed in Laud’s preferred position at the east end in the traditional positioning of the pre-Reformation altar.  Normally, however, in this position the priest still stood at the north end of the table (which in its eastward positioning was no longer a long side); it would be some time before priests resumed the eastward facing positioning as it was important to the Prayer Book mentality that the “manual acts” of the priest breaking the bread and holding the cup be visible.  

The Service of Holy Communion was unquestionably Protestant but it was no longer a Zwinglian commemorative meal.  Freed of Puritan influence, the Church of England was free to chart a new course.  It would over the next century and a half take steps in several different directions.  

In the Spirit of Matthew 25:40

Sal Cordileone, on his way to  

take a solemn pontifical shower?

Pope Francis recently installed several banks of showers just off St. Peter’s Square where the homeless of Rome could get cleaned up for the day.  Borrowing an idea from his boss, Archbishop Cordileone of San Francisco also installed several banks of showers outside his cathedral.  The Cordileone showers are designed to go off every thirty to sixty minutes throughout the night drenching the homeless who seek shelter from the night, sleeping beneath the doorways of Saint Mary’s Cathedral in San Francisco.  For God’s Sake, Sal, these are the least of Christ’s brothers and sisters, not pigeons to be shooed away.  I had previously thought of this protégé of Grand Poobah of the Knights of Malta to be simply another Burke Buffoon but this shows him to be a mean-spirited prick and he should be fired for this.  

Of Rainbow Shamrocks and Protestant Parades

Great parade yesterday up Fifth Avenue and past Saint Patrick’s Cathedral.  Cardinal Dolan was the Grand Marshal.  Previous Grand Marshals include Governor Al Smith, (first Catholic to run for President of the United States)1925; Mayor Jimmy Walker (1932); Mayor Robert Wagner (1954); Governor Hugh Carey (1976); Cardinal John J. O’Connor (1996); Maureen O’Hara (1999); and Cardinal Edward Egan (2002).   There was some controversy because for the first time in parade history a LGBT group, Out@NBCUniversal marched under their own banner.   (It would be naïve—at the least—to think this was the first time gays marched in the parade.)   While openly gay participation in the past has been blocked, Grand Marshal Cardinal Dolan made a point of saying that he thought it a wise decision to make the parade more “inclusive” and that he welcomed everyone.  The Krazies, of course, are furious but then anger is their mother’s milk. 

I only watched the first half hour or so of the parade, but one curious factoid I heard implied it (wasn’t actually said) that this parade has always been a Catholic celebration.  The panel of NBC commentators were remarking on the history of the parade which originally was in lower Manhattan.  (In the eighteenth century today’s midtown site of the parade was nothing more than open fields and “truck gardens” that supplied the city with food.)  One of the commentators, admittedly I don’t remember who, remarked that this was because the Old Saint Patrick’s Cathedral was in Greenwich Village.  Two problems.  The Old Saint Pat’s is not in the Village but on Mulberry Street in what would become Little Italy and is now Chinatown.  But the more egregious mistake is that while the parade dates back to 1762, the Cathedral was built only in 1809-1815.  You see, despite the implication—and the common historical misperception—the parade was not originally a Catholic sponsored event.  To the contrary: those who marched in the first parade of 1762 were all Protestants.  And such would have been the case for the first twenty or more years—it was a Protestant event.  In fact it was at least predominately a Protestant event well into the 19^th century.

The first Saint Patrick’s Day parade in New York was comprised of Irish soldiers in the British Army.  Until 1778 Catholics were prohibited from joining the army (and their commissioning as officers was even later).  In fact, while all other churches and religions, even Judaism, were legally tolerated, it was illegal to be a Catholic in New York until the 1777 State Constitution that marked independence from Great Britain. 

The 1737 Boston Saint Patrick’s Day Parade, generally considered the first in the colonies—and thus the oldest American Parade to honor Ireland’s national saint, was also comprised of Irish Protestants who had immigrated to Massachusetts.  Irish nationalism in the 18^th century—and the Saint Patrick Day Parades were celebrations of Irish Identity and Nationalism within the British Empire—was not a Catholic phenomenon but a Protestant one.  The Catholics had been so beaten down by the Penal Laws, and especially so in Ireland after the 1688 victory of William of Orange over the Catholic James II, in the British Empire that they were a political non-entity.  The principal advocates of Irish Nationalism from William Molyneaux to Jonathan Swift to Henry Grattan to Samuel Nielson to Wolfe Tone to Robert Emmet were all Protestants as would later be Charles Stewart Parnell, and literary figures W.B Yeats, Lady Gregory, and Seán O’Casey.  And the artist and indomitable Irish revolutionary, Baroness Markievicz, who advised her female admirers to: “Dress suitably in short skirts and strong boots, leave your jewels in the bank and buy a revolver,” was Protestant until she was in her 50’s when she was received into the Catholic Church. 

 Two of the first four Presidents of Ireland, Douglas Hyde and Erskine Childers were Protestants.  By no means has Irish Nationalism been a exclusively—or even predominately—Catholic phenomenon.

In those pre-Revolutionary (and Protestant) days in America, Saint Patrick’s Day was marked by the Irish in the larger colonial cities such as New York by dinners in the more elegant taverns such as Bolton and Sigel’s, now known as Fraunces Tavern.  For a day such as St. Patrick’s Day they would feast on oysters, lobster, turtle soup, cod, duck, goose, venison, and smoked hams.  Meats would be eaten roasted, or potted, or cooked in pasties—pies and hot-pockets.  Winter vegetables would include turnip, parsnips, carrots, squashes and winter cabbage.   Apples and pears conserved from the previous autumn would be pricey but available and a wide variety of summer fruits would have been put up into jams that might be served as is or used as fillings for pies.  Hard cider was the most common drink, but ales and beers would be common enough as well as rum imported from Jamaica and home-distilled whiskies.  Alcoholic beverages were drunk with no thought of moderation, especially for celebrations like today’s feast.  Desserts would include a variety of pies, sweetmeats (candied fruits), nuts, and boiled puddings such as whitepot, figgy pudding, or plum duff.  There were also such puddings as flummery, syllabub, and blancmange.  Celebrants would sit down to dinner midafternoon and the feast would last into the night or as long as the alcohol held out. 

It was only in the 1820’s that Catholic Irish began to migrate to New York in significant numbers and the floodgates opened with the Great Famine after 1846.  The second half of the nineteenth century and the first three decades of the twentieth were the high-water mark of Catholic Irish immigration.  The “established Irish,” Protestant and Catholic, did not particularly welcome the immigrants who were of much lower social and educational status.  The Catholics were embarrassed by their immigrant co-religionists and the Protestants disowned them completely thinking them to be superstitious savages. But the immigrants were quick to organize themselves in an effort to better themselves by mutual help.  Among their first acts was to organize a separate Saint Patrick’s Day Parade which they had done by 1858.  Immigrant Irish participation in the Northern cause of the American Civil War not only united the Irish among themselves but gave them a certain political clout in New York and other Northern cities.  By the end of the Civil War the New York Parade was firmly under the control of the Ancient Order of Hibernians, an immigrant association formed to fight the prejudices against (Irish) immigrants that had been strong in the decade immediately before the Civil War. From that time on the New York Saint Patrick’s Day Parade has been firmly in the hands of Irish Catholics, yet it has always been a civic parade and not a religious procession.  Never in its history has it been a religious procession and while there was an active policy of excluding groups identified with the LGBT movement these forty years and more since the gay liberation movement has appeared, the exclusion of LGBT marchers or groups certainly can’t be argued on religious grounds.  

Real Evangelicals Set Lazarus At Their Gate As Their Priority

In the old days he would have
worn purple and fine linen 

There was an interesting article in The New York Times this morning about political strategist David Lane who is attempting to organize a force of approximately 300,000 “Evangelicals” on behalf of the Republican party.  Read below:

DES MOINES — One afternoon last week, David Lane watched from the sidelines as a roomful of Iowa evangelical pastors applauded a defense of religious liberty by Senator Ted Cruz of Texas. That night, he gazed out from the stage as the pastors surrounded Gov. Bobby Jindal of Louisiana in a prayer circle.

For Mr. Lane, a onetime Bible salesman and self-described former “wild man,” connecting the pastors with two likely presidential candidates was more than a good day’s work. It was part of what he sees as his mission, which is to make evangelical Christians a decisive power in the Republican Party. “An army,” he said. “That’s the goal.”

And Mr. Lane is positioning himself as a field marshal. A fast-talking and born-again veteran of conservative politics with experience in Washington, Texas and California, Mr. Lane, 60, travels the country trying to persuade evangelical clergy members to become politically active. . . .

But close observers of evangelicals and their political involvement say Mr. Lane is emblematic of a new generation of evangelical leaders who draw local support or exert influence through niche issues or their own networks.

My intention is not to write about the political side of this, but the religious—just what is an “Evangelical” and do these people fit the bill or are they counterfeit disciples.

So, what is an “Evangelical?”  Evangelical comes from the Greek word εὐαγγέλιον, which means “good news” and specifically the news of a victory.  The Greek word for Gospel is εὐαγγέλιον because it is the Good News of God’s Victory in Christ, the Victory of Christ over sin and death which is the authentication of his message of the Kingdom of God.  A true evangelical announces the Good News of the Kingdom of God, the central message of Jesus which he handed on to his disciples to be preached to the four corners of the earth until the end of time. 

Jesus spoke constantly of this Kingdom—it was his mission, his raison d’etre for coming into this world.  He was faithful to this mission to death and because he was faithful he was, we Christians believe, raised from the dead and given the place at God’s right hand as a validation of his mission.  But we make a huge mistake by conflating this message of the kingdom into some “pie in the sky when you die” and robbing it of its true import for our life in this world.

Heaven was not a particular pre-occupation of Jesus and his preaching.  He didn’t talk about it very much.  As a Pharisee himself, Jesus was not so focused on heaven as he was on the Resurrection at the end time.  Like other Pharisees (and unlike the Sadducee’s) Jesus believed  that the faithful would be raised at a final judgment to eternal life and the sinners to an eternal punishment.  He didn’t talk much about what happened between death and final-day resurrection.  He did, of course, mention that Lazurus (the poor fellow whose sores the dogs used to lick while he lay at the rich man’s gate, not his friend from Bethany) was carried to the bosom of Abraham while the rich man was in hell where he “was in torment.”  And he does promise the repentant thief on the cross that “this day you will be with me in paradise.”  That is about it for what Jesus says about life after death and before the resurrection.  But he has plenty to say about the Kingdom of God and he makes it very clear that the Kingdom of God is not some post-mortem picnic in a celestial park but a commitment to here-and-now fidelity to God—to live lives of conformity to God’s Kingship.  What does that a life of subjugation to that kingship look like?  Well, there is a lot about forgiving others even as we ask God to forgive us; something I recall that the measure with which we measure forgiveness out will be used to measure forgiveness to us.  And there is that passage about leaving your gift at the altar and being reconciled with anyone who has a bone to pick with you before you return and offer your gift.  There is quite a bit actually about “the poor having the good news preached to them.”  And there is something about I was hungry and you gave me to eat; a stranger and you welcomed me (migrants like this one); in prison and you ministered to me, sick and you visited me.  These last seems to be particularly important as they constitute the “final exam” by which our eternal destiny is determined.  I definitely remember something about you can’t serve God and wealth.  And there is that line about “love your enemies; pray for your persecutors.”  Hmmm, but did Jesus know about ISIS?  Would he really have said that if had?   Maybe we need to do a more critical edition of the gospels, don’t you think?  You know, take out some of these “inconvenient truths?” (Apologies to Al Gore.)  I think that we are not supposed to store up wealth where moths devour and rust corrodes—or even in bigger and bigger barns—lest we be called to account this very night.  And of course there is that thing about turning the other cheek?  Does that mean I can’t shoot the SOB?  The NRA says I can. 

This kingdom of God is, as St Paul sums it up, a matter of integrity, of peace, and of the joy that comes from the Holy Spirit.  (Romans 14:17)  I am choosing integrity but some translations say “justice,” some say “righteousness.”  This righteousness or justice means that we have aligned ourselves to the Divine Will.  We are obedient to God, our hearts (wills) are surrendered to him.  Can we honestly say that we are righteous when we have more of this world’s goods than we can use while others of his children lack for their basic needs?  (Some radicals call this “income inequality.)  Is there righteousness in God’s sight when so many of his children have no grounds for hope for a decent life?  When life is structured to exclude them from a future in which they can realize their God-given potential. 

Real evangelicals are not those who cry out Lord, Lord, or who say “We ate and drank with you (think Holy Communion) and you taught in our streets (we went to Church every Sunday and listened to the sermons).”  Real evangelicals are those who see in the systemic injustice in our society and are determined to set right that which our collective sinfulness has set wrong.  And you know, God bless David Lane and army of Republican activists, but they just don’t get it.  You are not a genuine evangelical if you are keeping the stranger in our midst from making a home.  You are not a genuine evangelical if you are dividing your world into “us” and “them.”  You are not a genuine evangelical if you support the 5% rich who control 80% of the world’s wealth when 60% of the Lazaruses of this world are undernourished.  You are not a genuine evangelical if you believe we can use violence to rid this world of violence.  I would love to see evangelical leadership our nation—genuine evangelicals—but frankly I don’t see anyone in either party who fits the bill—or even comes close.  

Let’s continue on with some more excerpts from the same article

Bob Perry, the wealthy Texas home builder and Republican donor, who later funded the Swift Boat Veterans campaign against John Kerry in 2004, gave Mr. Lane $3,000 of seed money to get started in Washington, where Mr. Lane began working for Carl Channell in support of President Ronald Reagan’s “Star Wars” defense system.  Oh yeah, I remember the Swift Vote Veterans—they spread lies to accomplish their agenda?  Evangelicals?   I don’t think so.  Children of the Father of Lies, maybe.

After Gov. Chris Christie of New Jersey made a good impression at a Republican event later that year, Mr. Lane offered him the chance to join primary state pastors on a “Reagan, Thatcher, John Paul II” tour to California, London and Rome.

“They turned it down,” said Mr. Lane, who smiled when asked if he thought that was a mistake.

Instead, Mike Huckabee, the former Arkansas governor, jumped at the opportunity, subbing former Nazi concentration camps and Oskar Schindler’s former factory in Poland for the stop in Rome.  Well Christie is a Catholic, Huckabee has long shown his bigotry against Catholics, thus scratch Rome.  We don’t want to be associated with that Roman anti-Christ—even some of his own followers are saying he’s a commie. 

Last month, Mr. Lane took 60 members of the Republican National Committee to Jerusalem at a cost, he said, of about $500,000. A trip to Israel with Mr. Jindal is planned for July.

Missing from his travel manifests and events are the Republican Party’s establishment candidates. While Mr. Lane is technically neutral at this point, he clearly is no fan of the more moderate wing of his party. He said he tried to rescue the 2008 and 2012 tickets by advocating Mr. Huckabee for vice president.

“If the Lord were to call 1,000 pastors in America — 1,000 — and they ended up with an average of 300 volunteers per campaign in 2016, that would be 300,000 grass-root, precinct-level, evangelical conservatives coming from the bottom up,” he said to the ballroom full of pastors. “It would change America.”

I’m sure it would change America, but not for the better.  I am not saying that David Lane and his “evangelical” army are frauds; I am sure they are sincere in their beliefs.  I am only saying that they are not evangelicals because their agenda is inconsistent with the Gospel of Jesus Christ, the Kingdom of God.  Like so many they have made god in their own image and likeness, and to their convenience; a deity that shares their view of the world, rather than tailoring their view of the world to the revelation that God has given us in Jesus Christ.  Lane is right, we need to bring our Christian faith to bear on our political life; he is only wrong in what he determines to be Christian faith.