(This was my response on social media to the following article: Why is Anglicanism a Gateway to Catholicism? I adapted it slightly for the purpose of being put on this blog. I recommend you read the article first, then look at this response.)
Apparently I should be a Roman Catholic, yet those who know me well know very much I'll never be joining Rome unless they repent.
And I will say this: he claims that "The departures to the Roman Catholic Church are especially pronounced among the young, the highly educated, and those who came to Anglicanism as disaffected evangelicals." I find this problematic on a number of levels.
1) No citations given for such a claim, nothing beyond an assertion. Which is problematic when it's central to your entire argument. Also, he cites extensively in this article, so it's not in the least unreasonable to ask for such a citation.
2) I do not know a single person who's joined Rome from Anglicanism who fits all three, whether in real life or on social media. I know literally one in real life, through seminary, who was raised Anglican who became a Byzantine Papal Catholic. I know three or four others online (and I know literally thousands of people online). None of them fits all three criteria.
Also, while this doesn't speaks explicitly of ACNA conversions to Rome, I do find it important and interesting that, according to Pew research, Roman Catholicism in the US experiences the largest net loss in membership.
I'd like a citation for the Institutes being the most popular read at the time. And honestly I don't deny it, but I'd still like to see it cited rather than asserted.
The Institutes is, by the way, far too Catholic for many of the Reformed today. I myself have a copy of the Institutes, and I read it. There is a lot of good in it; I say that as a self-described Anglo-Catholic. Do I agree with everything? No. But if I lived at that time I would still have been reading it. To claim that it was popular is not to claim that it was adhered to 100%.
He treats "Protestant" and "Catholic" as mutually exclusive. That is not the case.
"The contrary view, that Anglicanism is historically a via media between Catholicism and Protestantism, has been so often debunked it only lives on in potted histories for Anglican rookies."
^^^The problem here is that, fundamentally, we are and have always considered ourselves to be Catholic. We confess that in the Creeds. So either we confess a known lie intentionally or we confess what we actually believe.
"Many of our fellow Christians find their beliefs distinguished and decisively rejected in the Thirty-Nine Articles, the Black Rubric, and the exhortations in the Communion service."
The Black Rubric was illegally inserted into the 1552 Book of Common Prayer, and is far too controversial to be simply tossed about as casually as that. The 1662 Rubric that took its place is better, while I still have issues with it.
His stuff on the mindset of Anglicanism being "the hallway" of the Mere Christianity House is, I think, accurate; Lewis himself explicitly states that the hallways are not the place to stay in. I don't know if Anglo-Catholics can be accused of doing that, though. There is a major difference between Catholicity (which is what every Anglo-Catholic I know of points to) and being non-denominational. For instance, as an Anglo-Catholic you must believe in the Real Presence of Christ in the Eucharist. If you hold to Anglicanism being the Hallway, then that isn't necessary. There are Christians who hold to a symbolic view. Rather, this Anglicanism as Hallway mentality sounds more like a least common denominator mentality.
His second point, I'm amening all of the way until his critique of the "extra offices" and ceremonies in the 2019 Prayer Book. He argues (or implies, at least) that Cranmer's "Of Ceremonies" argues against any additions of ceremonies or offices. I think that the second paragraph really demonstrates that is not the case, especially in the first sentence, "And although the keeping or omitting of a Ceremony, in itself considered, is but a small thing; yet the wilful and contemptuous transgression and breaking of a common order and discipline is no small offence before God, Let all things be done among you, saith Saint Paul, in a seemly and due order: The appointment of the which order pertaineth not to private men; therefore no many ought to take in hand, nor presume to appoint or alter and publick or common Order in Christ's Church, except he be lawfully called and authorized to do so."
As well, in the first paragraph, he argues that even superstitious ceremonies did not necessarily come from bad intentions, and that one could get back to them with their original intention.
Also, if we are going to claim that Calvin is a major influence upon Anglicanism, the fact is that Calvin did not see iconography as intrinsically evil, according to R.C. Sproul (who was, if you don't know, a Presbyterian), for example. Calvin's mindset, which is similarly seen here in Cranmer's "Of Ceremonies" is that the taking away of these certain Offices and Ceremonies has specifically to do with their cultural moment. The conclusion of this is most certainly that they can be reintroduced once we get further away from them. For instance, a smartphone is not bad. However, if I am addicted to it I might need to have mine taken away, at least until I can be healed of my addiction.
And I always find it interesting that, literally in Cranmer's own words, we find this warning, "For as those be taken away which were most abused, and did burden men's consciences without any cause; so the other that remain, are retained for a discipline and order, which (upon just cause) may be altered and changed, and therefore are not to be esteemed equal with God's Law." Later he writes, "And in these our doings we condemn no other Nations, nor prescribe any thing but to our own people only: For we think it convenient that every Country should use such Ceremonies as they shall think best to the setting forth of God's honour and glory, and to the reducing of the people to a most perfect and godly living, without error or superstition; and that they should put away other things, which from time to time they perceive to be most abused, as in men's ordinances it often chanceth diversely in divers countries."
So this is hardly a claim that the Reformation Ceremonies HAVE to be kept for all time; it would, in fact, be a gross error to claim such a thing. As well, "Of Ceremonies" would explicitly reject any judgment of the ACNA's practices, as the ACNA is not in England.
I'm glad he points to the error of the "Anglicanism as Hallway" mindset. I agree. That's not an Anglo-Catholic thing, though. Saying that we do not innovate on the Faith is not the same as saying we accept all innovations on the Faith. Now, that is a critique of the ACNA's, perhaps. It's certainly a critique I have with the new Prayer Book, as much as I like it. But it's not a critique of Anglo-Catholicism. Not in the least.
"Modern Anglicanism offers much of the ceremonial of Catholicism, but it can offer only a second-best. Constrained, however modestly, by its own history and the Articles, it cannot match the full range of Catholic ceremonial."
...Has he been to a Novus Ordo? I regularly have Roman friends of mine admit that Anglo-Catholics do liturgy better than Roman Catholics. We can surely match and exceed Novus Ordo masses, insofar as ceremonials are concerned. This is really just an odd claim.
"Why is it surprising, then, if they embrace a church that lays claim to precisely the same inheritance, but with a more perfect unity of its pre-Reformation ceremony and pre-Reformation doctrine?"
That's just historically not true, and embarrassingly so. There were multiple forms of the Latin Rite. And Rome's current doctrine is an absolute mess. Anglo-Catholicism, again, is not an "anything goes" form of Christianity; it's actually impossible to even envisage it as such, in my estimation. Even with the non-denominational "relationship not a religion" "doctrine divides" types, you can grasp a fundamental set of positions: opposes infant baptism, opposes any efficacy in the Sacraments, is charismatic, opposes liturgy, etc.
I need to make this into either an article or a YouTube video, now. (I did.)
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