Title: What Episcopalians Believe: An Introduction
Abstract: What Episcopalians Believe: An Introduction. By Samuel Wells. (New York: Morehouse Publishing, 2011, Pp- xiv, 122. $14.00.)Anglicans fond of quoting the maxim, lex orandi, lex credendi. It explains why most introductions to Anglican theology and practice begin by describing the distinctiveness of Anglican worship. Samuel Wells has shirked this tradition by writing What Episcopalians Believe, book that instead begins with an introduction titled, Triune God. He acknowledges that Episcopalians and Anglicans are notable for the way their doctrine and ethics emerge from the crucible of corporate (xiii), but it is only after wandering through the traditional categories of Christian theology - the trinity, christology, soteriology - that Wells lands on familiar Anglican territory such as The Book of Common Prayer or the famous three-legged stool of scripture, tradition, and reason.Following this tour of Anglican dogmatic traditions, Wells shifts in the final chapter on Character of the Faith from theological exposition to an account of the concrete particulars of Anglican history. He provides condensed genealogy of the Church of England and the Episcopal Church that is one of the finest of its genre. It explains, among other things, why the American church has the paradoxical reputation of being an upper-middle class cultural institution on the one hand, yet displaying remarkable concern for the oppressed and underrepresented on the other. Wells also expresses his own surprise that the Episcopal Church, despite the rifts that have threatened its unity in recent decades, has been able to form consensus around the 1979 Book of Common Prayer. He notes that the prayer book continues to be point of unity across the church's theological spectrum - something that has not always been true of other provinces in the Anglican Communion.Although the stance of the book is largely descriptive, the attentive reader will find several provocative claims along the way. Wells occasionally steps out of his narrator role to provide normative assessments which likely to raise few eyebrows. Those who champion the Episcopal Church as an agent of social justice may bristle when Wells asserts, any idea that we ourselves can save the world is bad for us and bad for the world, besides running contrary to the evidence of fragile and flawed human history (8). In section on heaven and hell, he gives nod to the idea of purgatory, musing that the final stage of transformative grace may be a more demanding and laborious process for some sinners than it is for others (28). …
Publication Year: 2012
Publication Date: 2012-12-01
Language: en
Type: article
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