Objective Faith

It is critical for us, in this age of relativism and consumerism with which we all struggle, to avoid giving the impression that Anglicanism, or any form of orthodox catholicity, is a 'Baskin-Robbins' of 39 flavours from which one may feely choose one's most desired variety, instead of asserting with conviction that the Anglican Church is a branch of the Catholic Church with her own integrity and authority which must be obeyed. In a nutshell, this is Anglicanism's ongoing problem: authority. Who is right? Which interpretation is right? The Catholic Faith is not a cafeteria selection from which we are free to select what we like and leave tidily lying that which we do not prefer - we must all continually be reminded of this truth. Our culture wages war against it. We must embrace the kata' holon, the Faith according to the whole, the fullness of the Christian revelation. We must all strive to avoid private judgement, the bane of modern Christianity, and remain with the threnoma patricum, the Mind of the Fathers, by submitting ourselves wholeheartedly to consensus fidelium, the interpretation of the Christian Faith delivered to us by the Lord, the Apostles, the Fathers, and the Bishops (to paraphrase Saint Irenaeus of Lyons), which for us is enshrined in the Holy Scriptures, the Book of Common Prayer, and in the Great Tradition of the whole Catholic Church both East and West.