This morning my wife and I attended an Episcopal Church – I think a first for both of us in that tradition. The step was another in our continuing effort to find a church in which we can both serve and at the same time have a worship experience that is appropriate for our ages and (continually developing) Christian formation. This particular Episcopal Church is an affiliate of the Anglican American Council, a group of Episcopal parishes who wanted to maintain their focus on celebrating the authenticity of the Holy Eucharist sacrament but who also have pulled out of mainline American Episcopalianism because of its ”move further and further away from the historic biblical Christian faith, as if … in a dance of death with the postmodern Western culture”. That part sounded just fine.
After the service, we talked about it. Kay Lynne did not relate well to the worship experience at all, mostly due to her feeling that the priest (and parishioners) “ran through the liturgies so fast that they couldn’t possibly have contemplated its meaning”. On the other hand, I was somewhat prepared for it and tried to grasp meaning from its order and execution. However, I have to admit that my wife had a point. We both respect the merits of proper liturgy, but if it is glossed over, the meaning, for us, has little chance to take effect.
Our move to the pacific northwest in 2004 has given us perfect pause to reflect on our changing reasons for becoming active in any church. Neither of us relate well to the incessantly repetitive “praise choruses” in most evangelical churches, which are tediously prolonged each week in our estimation. (What happened to the great old hymns of the church which sustained the generations before us? Why are post moderns so different?) We also look for solid orthodox Biblical exegesis from the pulpit, which seemingly is rapidly being replaced by pop-culture expositions that sound good and make you feel good – for a few minutes – but that have little life-affecting impetus.
I’ve also been reading Randy Maddox’ wonderful book on the “practical theology” of John Wesley called, Responsible Grace. In it, Maddox talks of the “Wesleyan Quadrilateral”, a synthesis of four elements of good faith practice – 1) Scripture, 2) Reason, 3) Tradition, and 4) Experience. To me, the “Wesleyan Quadrilateral” could certainly be the balance-guide for any church I’d want to attend. But try to find one with a balance even resembling that.
A significant issue, currently, for me and – I think – for my wife, is this balance. I’m interested to know, for instance, why so many evangelical traditions today have virtually thrown away the liturgy, many of the sacraments, and the traditions of the historical church. For some 16 centuries the Eastern Orthodox and Roman Catholic churches appear to me to have been more homogeneous than different – though they, of course, might disagree. Then the reformers reacted to many and significant “abuses” of this tradition and doctrine and “protested”. Now in our post-modern world the “protest”-ants have further divided and we have in many an amalgamation of doctrine and practices that seem to me to be in perpetual imbalance.
Even mainline Methodists are today some distance away from balance in their own Wesleyan Quadrilateral. My theology prof son pointed out to me that "for many present-day UM’s, experience and reason 'trump' traditional readings of Scripture". So where does one find balance? My wife and I really enjoy the Free Methodist worship (at least at Seattle First Free) – which to us does seek that balance – but alas, there is no such church near enough for us to participate in.
And so, it was in seeking a balance of faith and doctrine (hopefully somewhat akin to the Wesleyan Quadrilateral) that we ventured into the Anglican Episcopal world this morning (in fact, wasn’t John Wesley once a part of this body?). However, the effect of today’s tentative dance with our Anglican brethren likely will be that we will continue to search for a compatible partner.
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