Theo Hobson, writing in the Guardian, says that he was just about to give up on organized religion because “all major forms of church were full of illiberal assumptions.”
But when he explored other forms of church he found that most forms of alternative, post-modern were “run by the dastardly C of E!” After meeting some Christians who stayed away from Church he found that they were “too laidback to do anything, beyond meeting up for a chat.”
It was a catch-22. Organised religion was intolerably illiberal, but only organised religion seemed able to organise Christian ritual – without which Christianity is just a bunch of vague ideas. My desire was for ritual to be liberated from the institutions but, frankly, I didn’t know how this could happen. After a few years staring at this question, I was no nearer to answering it.
He was just about to give up when he found the Episcopal Church.
Then, last year, I moved to New York. I wanted to see if there was a stronger post-institutional Christian culture here, a more substantial “emerging church” movement. There is, but I’m not yet sure what I make of it. I was also curious to see what I would make of the Episcopal church, the American branch of Anglicanism. It is proudly disestablished, and has broken with the homophobic legalism of the rest of the communion, so would I find it a model of liberalism, or still complicit in the various ills of organised religion? I was assuming the latter. But, to my surprise, a taste of Episcopalian worship got me asking: “What’s not to like?”
Looking back at the crisis in the Anglican communion, I find that I am impressed by the boldness of the Americans. Instead of backing down over Gene Robinson’s consecration, they insisted that a basic Christian principle was at stake: the need to oppose moral legalism, and spread the good news to everyone. This was Paul’s project – which is why it is so ironic that Paul also supplies the conservatives with their main ammunition. You could say that the crisis is an argument within the mind of Paul.
I grew up believing (vaguely) in liberal Anglicanism, and then gradually found that it was mainly a myth: the C of E had always been ambivalent about liberalism. Instead of daring to face up to this, it shrugged smugly. Surely there are some intelligent liberal voices in the C of E? Yes, but their scope is limited: they have pragmatically agreed to ignore the elephant in the room, the old illiberal curse that hangs over their church.
The air is fresher here. The American branch of Anglicanism has emerged in the past decade as the global pioneer of liberal Christianity. It has persuaded me not to give up on the church just yet.