Well. I guess I badly messed that up. Please replace # 4 with:
4: Female ministers
I’m sorry. I do understand the difference between celibacy and chastity, and I realize that I missed a major point.
My religious education is probably not the most extensive. I have always assumed that there was a lot more to Christianity than the bible otherwise what is the point of churches and ministers etc.
I keeping with the topic at hand. Why doesn’t the Anglican Church merge back with the Catholic Church? These sorts of discussions always make me very uncomfortable. How does this work does the Pope or his advisors negotiate with the Anglican Church over new doctrine? What does it say about faith and God and the Church if these things are negotiable?
I think it’s misleading to call Anglicans “Protestants”; the Church of England was not created by, nor did it participate in, the Reformation (and the same goes for Episcopalians).
Stockton: That question is one of the things that started the Reformation. While the Bible is the basic Scripture of all Christian churches, it was not part of the life of Early Christians, nor is it, today, a part of most Catholics’ daily life (nor Anglicans’, nor Orthodox Christians’).
Off to Great Debates.
(Mustn’t let this one die of travel sickness… :))
parisms, with respect, I suggest you’re presenting a rather over-simplified version of the history of the Church… the first Council of Nicaea (online translation available here) can be seen as an attempt to establish a unitary Church out of a group of more-or-less compatible Christian traditions, rather than an affirmation of an existing unity - and, even at that time, there were self-named Christian traditions that lay outside the bounds of the “Catholic” Church (the followers of Arius, for instance). I’m not qualified to judge whether an Arian is a “real” Christian or not; being a wishy-washy liberal, I think God might forgive them… Also, by the 16th century, ethnic churches such as the Coptic and Armenian rites had diverged from the Roman mainstream for over a thousand years, and the Orthodox church had a long-standing separate tradition (the “official” cut-off point for the separation of the Roman and Greek churches is given as 1054, when the patriarch Michael Cerularius was excommunicated - but that’s just an arbitrary point in an ongoing process).
stockton, also with respect, the two commandments given by Jesus in the New Testament are “love your neighbour as yourself”, and “The Lord our God, the Lord is one; and you shall love the Lord your God with all your heart, and with all your soul, and with all your mind, and with all your strength.” (Mark 12:29-31). The question which divides Christians, unfortunately, is how best to maintain that relationship with God; adherence to the Scriptures, obedience to His representatives, listening to one’s own personal conscience? Different denominations have different views.
Nametag (respect), I think the Church of England is, broadly, in tune with Protestantism… when Henry VIII decided to make his break with the Pope, he had a couple of choices available to him; he could set up an entirely new heretical church (which would have been a politically suicidal choice), or he could have joined the burgeoning Protestant reform movement… which gained him allies in northern Europe, and already had some popular and intellectual support in England (it’s difficult, for example, to support the notion that Thomas Cranmer was not a Protestant!)
Well, Henry himself wavered between Protestantism and a sort of “English Catholicism”, and I don’t think he had much sympathy for avowed Protestants…he saw the movement as anarchic, egalitarian, and dangerous. I think after he died, though, during Edward’s reign and then later, during Elizabeth’s, the church grew more Protestant.
I was asked by Exgineer, my co-religionist and co-supporter of the Fenris Revolution: 
I’m not sure how insoluble they may be, and I have high hopes that formal intercommunion (à la ELCA/ECUSA today), if not full union, may indeed take place someday.
To respond to some of the other questions before tackling your list of divisive issues, it must be admitted that the Church of England did indeed split from Rome at the time of the Reformation, and that much of Cranmer’s doctrine was what we would today call “high church Protestant” – as was, be it noted, that of Luther, Calvin, Melanchthon, and Bucer – all of them would be distinctly ill at ease in a typical evangelical “Protestant” church today, feeling that they had thrown the Baby out with the bathwater, so to speak.
On the other hand, Cranmer and his successors were at pains to preserve the essence of Catholic practice while eliminating what they considered late excrescences that distorted true Catholicism. The result is what Anglicans normally refer to themselves as, “a bridge church” that preserves the essence of Catholicism, Reformed of its inessential errors as any good Protestant would hold.
(Obviously Tom~ or Beagledave on the one hand, and Joe Cool on the other, would disagree with this self-assessment, but it fits what we feel proper.
Second, contrary to what the traditional Roman teaching holds, there was always a tension between the Greek-speaking Eastern Church and the Latin-speaking Western Church, with heresies abounding at both ends. This culminated in 1054 with a mutual excommunication by the Bishops of Rome and Constantinople, rescinded in 1434 but then reinstated until just a few years ago. So the Reformation was not the division of a bunch of radicals from what had always been a unified church, but rather their rebellion against what they considered erroneous teachings and the concentration of authority in Rome – just as the Orthodox had said 500 years earlier. Sorry if this offends Roman Catholics, but it does in fact happen to be the case. For many years the church as a whole considered there to be five leading centers of authority, with Rome, the old imperial capital, being first among equals of these five patriarchates, and Constantinople, the at-that-time-new imperial capital, holding a close second place in terms of authority. The idea that the Pope is and always has been the chief authority of the church, somehow different from other bishops, is a distortion of the historical truth of the matter.
Contrary to Steve Wright’s assertion, Henry VIII was theologically a very strong Catholic, merely opposed to the attempts of the Pope of the time to assert secular authority over the realm of which he considered himself head, in matters spiritual as well as secular. He jailed any “out” Protestants who dared come to England and teach their “heresies.”
It’s important to remember that the amount of authority in matters we’d consider non-religious exercised by the medieval and Reformation-era church was large enough that there were ongoing conflicts between Popes and monarchs, with, e.g., France from time to time barely recognizing the authority of the Pope other than as some figurehead of the church’s unity. The difference between these events and the Henry VIII issue is that the latter “stuck.” (It’s also important to realize that the Pope was not ruling against Henry’s requested annulment out of any moral concern – such annulments had regularly been granted in similar cases in the past and would be in the future – but rather because Catherine of Aragon was the favorite aunt of Charles I of Spain and V of the Holy Roman Emperor, who happened to have troops occupying Rome and evidently putting pressure on the Pope at the moment.)
On Exgineer’s issues, I don’t see how Rome can get out of the corner it has painted itself in regarding papal infallibility, and I don’t see any other independent church, including the Anglicans, buying into it. Perhaps some face-saving effort might be made, where the Pope issues an encyclical affirming his and councils’ infallibility but ordering that it never be made use of unless there is consensus among a council of all bishops, Catholic, Orthodox, Anglican, and Lutheran. (We need to table the issue of general superintendents in Protestant denominations holding that title for the moment. I’m rather sure that Jodi would be offended by the idea that her bishop is somehow not valid – but his authority derives from a much different source than that of the four groups named above.)
Transubstantiation: Contrary to what everyone “knows,” my understanding is that Rome does not demand adherence to a dogma of transubstantiation – but to belief in the Real Presence – combined with the authoritative teaching of the Magisterium of the Church that under an Aristotelian/Aquinian metaphysics the way to interpret that mystery is in terms of transubstantiation. And my understanding is that Catholic, Orthodox, Anglican, and Lutheran alike adhere to the teaching of the Real Presence, but differ in how they interpret it in metaphysical terms. This may therefore not be as major a problem as it appears.
Rome does not insist on celibate clergy as a theological issue, but rather a matter of effective church management. Their stance is that priests with wives have their attention divided between parish and family; therefore, Roman-rite priests are expected to be celibate. A married man, however, can and often is ordained a deacon in the Roman rite, and the Eastern rites of Catholicism have always had a married component to their priesthood. Married priests converting to Catholicism are welcomed and, subject to the Pope’s approval, entitled to retain their “priestly faculties” while married. The chief obstacle here might be whether bishops may legitimately be married men, the ancient tradition of the pre-Reformation church universally holding that they may not and the Anglican and Lutheran stance being that there is no problem there.
Female clergy may also be a stumbling block, since any Anglican or Lutheran will aver that they have been effectively ministered to by priests who happened to be women, while the extreme conservative rebels among Anglicans concur with Catholics and Lutherans that women cannot represent Christ before the people and therefore cannot be priests. Personally, I find that POV insulting and heretical to my Lord and to the men and women He has called to the priesthood, but that’s neither here or there.
Veneration of saints I do not see as an issue, unless extremists on either side seek to make it so. One can be a loyal and devout Roman Catholic without ever addressing one’s prayerful remarks to a saint; one may be a loyal Protestant with no heretical tendencies who finds following the Lord after the example of St. Francis or St. Paul to be personally fulfilling. The Blue Army types on the Roman side and the worship-is-due-to-God-alone types on the Protestant side could make it an issue, but making explicit the teachings of Rome, Canterbury, and the Lutherans alike that one may honor a saint and seek his or her intercession but is in no way obliged to do so should obviate that issue.
Absolution is likewise not an issue. I can sit here before this keyboard and screen and tell you that if you repent of your sins, God is faithful to forgive you of them. What a priest does in the Reconciliation of the Penitent is merely to do that officially and with the authorization Jesus gave the Apostles to pronounce forgiveness to the penitent in His Name. As scriptural as that is, it should cause no problem to a Protestant, once he or she divests him/herself of the idea that the priest is doing the forgiving. It’s orthodox Catholic teaching that even Peter never forgave anyone’s sins on his own authority, but rather spoke God’s forgiveness.
What I do see as a critical issue is the concentration of authority in the Pope, with the idea that this can be devolved to the Bishops acting collegially, whether locally or as gathered in an Ecumenical Council, functioning to alleviate that problem.
There’s obviously much more that needs to be discussed here, but it seems to be a rather good start.
[Fixed coding. – MEB]
Would a wandering moderator be so kind as to fix the turn-the-bold-off coding in that last post, please?
err… I don’t think I’m asserting that Henry VIII was actually Protestant in his theology… merely that, when he had (for political and personal reasons) to break with the Pope, Protestantism was the tool readiest to his hand for that purpose. My regrets, if I’ve given the wrong impression there.
Ahh. Thanks for the clarification, Steve; I had misunderstood your point.
Lets turn the original question on its head - why dont Catholics join the Anglican church?
You can go to a “High” Anglican church and have all the Bells and Smells of Catholicsm, without having to bother with all that Papal Infallability and No Contraception crap.
Anglicanism - Gin and Compromise Forever !
I think there are three big reasons, the last 2 have already been touched on:
1.The apostolic succession (i.e. priests and bishops coming directly from JC) vis a vis the Anglican Church is a debated issue in Roman circles today. Pope Leo XIII declared all Anglican orders “totally null and utterly void” in “Apostolica curae” on September 13, 1896. The question arises mainly because Thomas Cramner (ABC) re-did the rite of ordination, but there are other reasons RC’s question it as well. There is RC debate : A. if Pope Leo’s was a “definitive statement” (Really - hey these are the type of guys who once debated how many angels could dance on the head of a pin) B. there is also a feeling that re-looking at the whole AC apostolic succession issue from a 21st century prospective may be important (from the RC side) they want to be “right” in their exclusions - and for well meaning reasons too.
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Ordination of women
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The exact meaning of the Anglican Communion’s teaching on the Eucharist - critical stuff to believers.
I’m not sure to what extent the supposed invalidity of Anglican orders is at all an issue in Roman Catholicism today. Tom~, Beagledave, or some other knowledgeable Catholic, would you be willing to dig out recent statements touching on this issue – and preferably not the “all Christians have some access to God’s grace, but the Church holds the fullness of that grace” sort of pseudo-answer?
I’m afraid it’s still a big issue if only because, doctrinal difference about the nature of the Eurcharist aside, it’s a substantial impediment to intercommunion.
It’s not a primary source, but here http://www.americapress.org/articles/SullNewObs.htm is a link to an article which summarises the development of Roman thinking on this matter suggests that, if anything, the Roman position (at any rate as articulated by Cardinal Ratzinger) has hardened in recent years.
Holy cats.
So Apostolicae Curae is now infallible, or as close to being defined as being so as the Vatican’s rather abstruse style of teaching gets.
::: makes note not to refer to Nag’s Head Fable as having been made up around even nice Catholics anymore :::
Given that John Paul II is quite willing to accept married Anglican priests (who are fleeing the ordination of women in the Anglican Communion), putting them right into the sanctuary at Catholic churches, I would think that the RCC is no longer disavowing the possibility that Anglican orders are valid. (It is possible that the RCC simply accepts their training and “re-ordains” them, but I haven’t followed the situation closely enough to be sure.)
Despite Ratzinger’s attempts to restablish the Church at the benchmark of Trent, the dialogue over the Eucharist has produced several joint statements of common belief. I doubt that we are very far apart on that issue.
The ordination of women and the primacy of the pope would be the really big stumbling blocks that I would see dividing us.
Having read the link more closely, it is obvious they must be “re-ordaining” the Anglican “refugees.”
Maybe God will decide that he has been deprived of the sainted presence of JP II and Ratzinger for too long and call them both home. ::: sigh :::
Yes, I gather clergy coming from the Anglican churches are have a conditional or confirmatory re-ordination. Despite what Jimmmy says, I don’t think that differences over Apostolic succession are what divide the churches here. Rather, it has to do with differing concepts of priesthood.
As regards primacy, ARCIC II has produced a report on authority (The Gift of Authority, available at http://www.ecumenism.org/archive/arcic/ARCIC-authority3.htm) which goes a long way towards reconciling the understandings of the two churches regarding the primacy of the Bishop of Rome.
The ordination of women still represents a real stumbling block, at least in part because it has only arisen as an issue which divides the two churches in the (relatively) recent past, and both move slowly in developing their understanding of issues.
Expand on this, if you please, UDS. I confess that, other than the idea that Catholic priests are supposed to be offering the “unbloody sacrifice of Christ” in the Mass (and this seems to have been downplayed since Vatican II), where Anglican priests are leading the congregation in “our sacrifice of praise and thanksgiving (Eucharist),” I’ve never been clear on what the distinction might be.
Polycarp UDS :
Boys I’m sensing a bit of dismissivness to my “RC’s-don’t-see-AC- priests-as-priests” post. Well they don’t. As far as the RC church is concerned an Anglican priest is no more capable of transubstantiation or any Holy Sacrament than Polycarp and UDS and I am. Here’s a link for teenagers explaining that. Nothing that some well meaning (truly sensible people) in ARCIC II come up with changes that.
http://www.newadvent.org/faq/faq044.htm
Now you would say “this is inconsistent, they recognize something must be there in that they let married Anglican priests become RC priests” and you would be absolutely right.
First an Anglican Priest must be “confirmed” (Really) a sacrament usually taken by RC kids in the 13 to 14th yo old range. He would then take appropriate courses which would enable him to minister as a Catholic priest.
After proper examination by his Catholic bishop and with the permission of the Holy Father, he would be then ordained first as a Catholic transitional deacon and then ordained as a priest. Why they would allow this for a married someone - whose orders are “utterly null and void” I cannot answer and it IS absolutely inconsistent.
That doesn’t mean that AC priests can ever easily be accepted as RC priests without a “valid” ordination ceremony. A big stumbling block I think.