Friday, February 17, 2006

Prayer Book and Articles Again

If the Book of Common Prayer, the law of prayer which is the law of belief, is subject to interpretation by the 39 Articles of Religion and not vice-versa, what do we do with the teaching of the Lambeth Conference of 1930, which explicitly stated:

'We have declared that the Doctrine of the Anglican Church is authoritatively expressed in the Book of Common Prayer, and that the meaning of the XXXIX Articles must be interpreted in accordance with the Book of Common Prayer.'

Must Holy Tradition, embodied in lex orandi, lex credendi, in Apostolic Creed and Liturgy, give way to historically-conditioned statements never intended to be utilised as comprehensive expositions of doctrine or as a confession of Faith? We must always recall that the Articles are Articles of Religion, not Faith, and have never been used by Anglicanism as a protestant confession analogous to that of Augsburg or Westminster. Anglicanism's 'confession' is the Common Prayer Book. Must not the local and particular nature of the Articles by necessity require interpretation by the Faith and practice of the whole Universal Church? Just a thought.

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