From:  (Nigel B. Mitchell)
Newsgroups: aus.religion.christian
Subject: Re: Nigel: 39 Articles.
Date: Tue, 18 Aug 1998 07:18:52 GMT

On Tue, 18 Aug 1998 13:44:11 +1000, "Darren R Middleton"
<> wrote:

>... When I
>was ordained as an Elder and again as a Minister I had to give my assent to
>the WCF as an exhibition of how I understand Scripture(as answerable at the
>2nd coming of Jesus Christ), if I taught contrary to the WCF I could be
>charged with heresy.

What I have been trying to say is that the 39 articles were used
in that way in the 16th century Church of England, but they are
not used that way in the Anglican Church of Australia in the 20th
century. The Anglican Church is not the Presbyterian Church, we
do not use our historical documents in the same way, and we do
not expect the same sort of doctrinal uniformity that you
describe.

>You have not really a shown me how a man can at ordination assent to a
>document but not believe it or follow it.

Well, I have tried. 3 times.

>Although that Creed has no official place in our denomination I still do not
>see the congruity of discussing the relative merits of certain formulations
>to be the same as discussing as we have, your rejection of the theology of
>the 39 Articles yet still saying one assents to it. The idea of a creed is
>it expresses the sense in which you understand Scripture.

The 39 articles is _a_ creed of the Church of England in the 16th
century. It is not _the_ creed of the Anglican Church of
Australia in the 20th century. We are not a credal church, in the
sense that you describe the Presbyterian church. The Bible, the
ancient Creeds of the Church (Apostles, Nicene and Athanasian),
the 39 articles and the Book of Common Prayer (1662) together
make up the historical documents of the Church. At ordination, on
first appointment in a new diocese, and at some other times we
are required to assent to these documents, but that assent does
not imply agreement with every word and expression in those
documents. It could not, because neither separately nor together
do they describe nor define the living faith of Anglicans today. 

I hope this clarifies the matter, because I really do not know
how to put it any more simply than that.

Cheers

N+

Nigel B. Mitchell