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Undiluted Anglicanism

I haven’t posted one of Roger Salter’s articles in a while. This one is from this past Sunday’s bulletin. I did not get a chance to hear his lecture on John Donne at Beeson’s Pastors School this week. I still hope to get a copy of the tape…

The unsettledness, upheavals, and realignments within Anglicanism afford our Communion not just an opportunity to lament and protest against the disturbing elements in doctrine and practice over recent decades, but to re-establish ourselves in the genuine historic Anglicanism constituted by our founding fathers at the Reformation. Not that we are locked into the past, or mesmerized by some previous ?golden age?, but we have a foundation and heritage that has never formally been set aside through debate and universal consent within the church, which still stands as binding upon our clergy, and which has stood the test of time and withstood critical appraisal as the basis of our belief and message. The fundamental compendium from which we live, work, worship and witness as Anglicans is the Book of Common Prayer (1662), and its doctrine and liturgy guide us in our thoughts concerning God and our approach to Him. In that masterly volume we possess a thoroughly Augustinian manual of doctrine and devotion that preserves the best of ancient Catholicism and ensures the retention of the insights of the Reformation. The church is not static, but nor is it meant to be erratic, and as we move through the generations in our service of God and our outreach to men orthodoxy and stability are ensured by constant reference to our constitutional documents that define the true and essential character of Anglicanism.