Concentric Circles, pt. II.

The cosmic trail left behind by the Logos in having become Man, in having walked among us, in having gone to the Cross and risen, and in having returned to the Father, left the pattern for a new vocation on the part of creation. The Incarnation was both a vertical and horizontal movement: a pattern that can only be geometrically represented by a triangle. In other words, in the pattern established by the Incarnation, creation is renewed in its ability to represent God - and now even more fully than it could before. God the Holy Trinity, because of the simultaneous vertical and horizontal movement of Christ, is shown more fully in creation itself than He was even at the beginning, which implies in turn that every detail of creation can be seen as an icon of God, in one way or another.

This, I think, is the key to understanding the whole of the universe and the meaning of life. Life itself is an icon, and the stage on which life unfolds is an icon, which, if correct, takes account of such seemingly disparate works as Pope John Paul’s encyclical, Evangelium vitae, and Richard Hooker’s Laws of Ecclesiastical Polity.

Perceptions of the Church - Looking under the Bonnet

For all my interest in intellectual pursuits, I have a bit of a boyish weakness I have never been able to shake. I quite like cars. From F1 to WRC to the average Volkswagen on the street, I can spend far too much time thinking about cars and what goes on underneath them. But having confessed this, I know that I am not alone. Numerous colleagues of mine - men and women - will turn their head toward a nice-looking vehicle. And for good reason. Cars can represent the best in design, with lines as appealing as just about anything human beings have contrived.

Concentric Circles, pt. I.

What began as a response to R. of Nipawin’s comments to the article ‘Culture and Religious Integration‘, also seemed like an appropriate (albeit partial) response to D. Smith’s comments at the bottom of ‘Apologia pro mutatione mea, pt. VII’. At the end of the day, it is my attempt to explain how I understand the Gospel to relates to culture, how the Church relates to the world, and how the Liturgy relates to life. Like the apologia, I intend to offer it in parts. Feel free to comment.

Apologia pro mutatione mea, pt. VII.

Becoming a Catholic after one has lived life as an Anglican is not an easy thing to do. The belief of many Catholic-minded Anglicans is that whatever the Catholic Church might express in the Catechism and the Missal, the appalling way in which so many of her priests celebrate the Liturgy, the lack of attention paid to the content of homilies, and the rebellion of so many Catholic adherents on so many crucial questions, contradicts, and ultimately undermines, her declared intentions.

And so I had always believed.

Apologia pro mutatione mea, pt. VI.

There can be nothing in the world so likely to put a serious theological inquirer off the nature of Anglicanism than the mother of worldwide Anglicanism - the Church of England - herself. Before leaving Canada, I could not have imagined it possible that such a noble ecclesiastical experiment as Anglicanism could go so horribly wrong as it had among Blake’s mountains green. For all the brilliant minds that the Church of England had produced through the centuries, and for all the admirable examples of Christian faith and practice, it quickly became clear to me that this community might possibly have been destined to foster a few individuals in Catholic life, but it could never know any kind of real communion of belief.

Apologia pro mutatione mea, pt. V.

There is enough to say about my Anglican past that I could probably dedicate an entire work to it. I am conscious, however, that it is all too possible to descend into unhelpful polemic, and so to undermine one’s own argument in the process. Besides, there is so much good material available on the history of Anglicanism and its theology that there is really no need for me to reiterate things. Works of particular relevance to me included that of Aidan Nichols, who, in The Panther and the Hind: A Theological History of Anglicanism, first caused me to realise that there might be more than one reading on the subject of Anglicanism than I had so far encountered. Like the Zahl book, whatever criticisms one could make of Nichols’ writing, it would still have to be admitted that he proffers significant points to ponder. Above all, I realized that everything I had heard of the Protestant - and of the English - Reformation, was heavily biased.

Apologia pro mutatione mea, pt. IV.

As I suggested in part I, I become afraid when I talk about my experience of Anglicanism. There are so many brothers-in-ministry and living examples of a profound Catholic faith that I have left there, I would be loathe to think that any of them might consider these words an insult to their lives and various ministries. I can only re-iterate again and again that they are not. As I have tried to express in the preceding passages, it is simply a matter of me no longer being convinced that I could continue to live out an unapologetically Catholic life within the Anglican Church.

Apologia pro mutatione mea, pt. III.

Ironically, it was precisely in the context of a place like the Diocese of Saskatchewan - a place where I was free (and encouraged) to be the Anglican I wanted to be - that I began to realize my time as an Anglican would necessarily come to an end.

Apologia pro mutatione mea, pt. II.

As I have already expressed, to read Neuhaus’s words as if they were mine should be to understand that I am deeply thankful for my Anglican upbringing. Regardless of what I may now understand about the Catholic Church, I am cognizant that I would not be the kind of Catholic I am without the spiritual, theological, and aesthetical education I received as an Anglican. In fact, this is worth expanding upon at length, as so much of my religious identity depends on it.

Apologia pro mutatione mea, pt. I.

Apologies to those of you who expected something from me much earlier than this, but more than a year on, and numerous mitigating circumstances later, I think that I have finally come to a point where I might be able to say something helpful and interesting about my full, corporate entrance into the Catholic Church. This is something I hope to do in parts over the coming days and weeks. So bear with me, and enjoy….