An important term in the Anglican church is the term “Anglo-Catholic,” but it seems to be used by different people to mean different things. These are some of the (implied) definitions that I have seen
- Intellectual followers of the Oxford movement that created the 19th century Anglo-Catholic revival. The problem is that few understand the movement in depth, let alone adhere to all its tenets — but they still want to claim the movement’s mantle and its theological legitimacy.
- The Elizabethan (or Henry VIII) definition, i.e. Catholic but without a pope. Surely there are many Anglicans whose doctrines on real presence, apostolic succession, even the seven sacraments are identical to the Church of Rome, but refuse to join the world’s largest Christian denomination over married priests or the claims of authority (or infallibility) by the Bishop of Rome. This seems to fit the OED definition.
- Episcopal (or ex-Episcopal) traditionalists who are high church: i.e., the Nashotah alumni, not those from Trinity. If you go to Anglican blogs in the U.S. like VirtueOnline this is the most common meaning.
- High church Anglicans in general, no matter what their doctrine. In this view, if you adhere to traditional ritual — preserving the “bells and smells” — it doesn’t matter what your theology is.
- Anglican rite Catholics, typically led by married PECUSA priests who’ve fled PECUSA for the RCC.
Today I came up with a sixth definition: Anglicans who like to add Latin to their service. This was brought to me while attending a service at the most Anglo-Catholic church in all of Los Angeles:
St. Mary of the Angels, the former parish of Cecil B. DeMille whose 1930 sanctuary was funded by Mary Pickford. The church left PECUSA in 1977 and managed to keep its building.
The 10 a.m. service was a triple-header, as proclaimed by the cover of the 24-page seat bulletin:
The Institution
of the
Reverend Father Christopher Pierce Kelley, SSC
as the fifth Rector
in the ninety year history
of the Parish Church of
Saint Mary of the Angels,
with administration of the
Sacrament of Confirmation ...
and
Solemn High Mass
for the
Second Sunday in AdventThese are the Anglican who are more Catholic (at least in ritual) than today’s American Catholics. They long for the pre-Vatican II days, or, as the new rector remarked afterwards — “what Pope Benedict calls the ‘classic’ liturgy ... as in ‘Coke Classic.’ ” It doesn’t hurt that St. Mary’s is a member of the
Traditional Anglican Communion, which
is seeking to enter into full communion with the Roman Catholic Church. (Confusingly, the TAC’s US branch is called the ACA, or
Anglican Church in America).
The 11-member choir sang an entire mass (the Mass in A minor by Harold Duke), as well as separate anthems for the offertory and communion, in addition to the prelude (a Bach air on organ and cello). During communion, bells rang not only on the altar steps but in the bell tower. (Alas, the two pew hymns did not include any of the great Advent hymns in the 1940 Hymnal.)
At its peak, the altar party had 11 men, including five with purple Advent robes: the bishop (Rt. Rev. Darren Williams), two priests (Rev. Kelley and the bishop’s chaplain), two ordained deacons. The six laymen included dueling thurifiers. (A friend suggested that “tandem” is probably a better modifier than “dueling” for a dual-thurible ceremony.) No matter what you call it, a service with five purple robes, dual (duel) thurifers and plenty of Latin would seem to fit a definition of “Anglo-Catholic.”
Many of PECUSA’s fleeing Anglo-Catholics (definition #3 above) are affiliating with other provinces of the Anglican Communion. For the Diocese of San Joaquin and Bp. John-David Schofield (Rev. Kelley’s former boss), yesterday’s
historic vote to leave PECUSA (TEC) was followed by a vote to temporarily affiliate with the Anglican Church of the Southern Cone of South America under Primate Greg Venables.
The oversight by foreign primates has certainly infuriated TEC leaders, but the hope is that it will allow the ex-TEC parishes (and now dioceses) to continue to participate in the Anglican Communion. Meanwhile, TAC is going the other way — seeking communion with Rome and not Canterbury. Perhaps we could say that one of these is Anglo-Catholic and the other Cathlo-Anglican. But which one?
Interestingly, Episcopalian-turned-Orthodox blogger Terry Mattingly
once predicted that the Anglo-Catholics will be in communion with Constantinople before Rome:
One of my very first exposures to Orthodoxy, outside of a history textbook, was actually in the Episcopal Church, in which it was explained to me that there are many people within Anglicanism who think of the Church of England as the Orthodox Church of England, from before the Schism. Part of the tension between Anglicanism and Rome was that the Celtic church was such a consciously separate unit to itself. It had so many things in common with Orthodoxy as opposed to the Roman way of doing things. Primarily with regard to monasticism—they had the emphasis on monasticism as opposed to the more political Roman system of dioceses.
So it was in that context that I first heard a quote attributed to Archbishop of Canterbury Michael Ramsey. He was a very Anglo-Catholic, very conservative, traditional Anglican. He said that the mission of Anglicanism was to become Orthodoxy in the West and seek union with the Church of the East. Now I had always heard ecumenism in an Anglican context discussed in terms of ecumenical work with Rome. That was the first time I ever knew that there was a stage when ecumenical ties with Orthodoxy were actually much greater.
The original Wesley version praised the “King of Kings,” consistent with Luke’s Gospel. However, this was changed by George Whitfield to “Glory to the newborn King.” Gordon Giles identifies subtleties of Methodist and Calvinist theology that underline these decisions, but I guess I’ll have to buy his latest book on Christmas readings to learn more.
