The Anglican Church is one of the most important Christian denominations worldwide, with about 75 million members.
Much of Anglican worship, like that of other churches, is based on traditions stretching back for centuries. The Anglican Church welcomes new members, but faces a serious difficulty; to a newcomer, much of what we do in church looks puzzling or entirely incomprehensible. The most vocal Christians are often the minorities who hold extreme views, and so the general public view of Christianity is not necessarily accurate. (Some Anglicans are actually nice, sensible people.) Please read on - we hope you might be pleasantly surprised by what you find. .
What is the Church for? Why not be a Christian in private?
The Church fulfils three important functions. Worship is one of them. We don't worship God because we have to, or because we're afraid of what God might do to us if we don't. We worship God because we believe that God is a being who fully deserves our respect and love. Worshipping God is simply the most appropriate behaviour for the beings He has created, and a church service is an effective and time-honoured way of carrying out this behaviour.
The second purpose of the Church is teaching. Partly this is something we do to each other; passages from the Bible are read out in church, and sermons comment and enlarge on them and other issues, and relate Christianity to real life. But Christians also have a responsibility to make their own insights about God available to the rest of the world, and an organized Church can attempt to do this in ways that individual Christians cannot.
Our third purpose is fellowship; we are a community of people with a common goal, supporting and strengthening each other as we work towards that goal. An important part of Christian teaching is the need to have compassion for others, and so this, too, is an external as well as an internal activity. The Church provides material support for the needy, and it attempts to promote social justice to the rest of society
Who can come to an Anglican service?
Anyone! You don't need to be an Anglican or even a Christian to come along. (Holy Communion, a ceremony which takes place during many of our services, is technically restricted to baptized Christians; see section 3 below.) Attending a service doesn't commit you to anything. We will (hopefully) try to be friendly, but that's all. You can become a Christian at your own pace.
We don't charge membership fees. (We're always after donations, but how much you contribute is up to you, and entirely private.) There's plenty of ceremony in a typical Anglican church, but we don't have secret initiation rites or anything else scary or sinister. We don't even have a dress code - people normally dress tidily for church, but you don't have to wear a suit or a big flowery hat.
Audience participation in an Anglican service isn't particularly strenuous. The words of the service are provided, either in the Book of Alternative Services (the green book) or an equivalent, or on a piece of paper. If you're not familiar with the service, just sit near the back and do what everyone else does. You can stay in your place when people go up to the altar for Communion, if you don't want to take part in this section of the service.
1: What do Christians Believe?
There are two important parts to Christian belief. Firstly, Christians believe in a God who is an all-powerful intelligent being, existing independently of the physical Universe, and responsible for its creation. We also believe that God cares deeply about the Universe and all of its inhabitants.
This belief is common to many major religions. Jews, Muslims and Christians all worship the same God, in different ways.
Secondly, Christians believe that Jesus of Nazareth (c. 6 BC to AD 27) was a manifestation of God on Earth as a human, and that His teaching as recorded in the Bible is therefore a direct insight into God's wishes for humanity
Lots of people have claimed to be gods. Why do Christians believe Jesus really was?
There are several good reasons. Firstly, He taught a path of self-denial and caring for others, and followed these teachings Himself, and as a result He was executed by the Romans. This is hardly the behaviour you'd expect from a person claiming to be the Ruler of the Universe – unless He was telling the truth.
Secondly, He was clearly not a construct of people's expectations. The Jewish people of the time had prophecies concerning a Messiah, but they were expecting an Earthly ruler - although with God's authority - who would kick out the Romans and make Israel great again. Jesus was not at all what they had expected. Later theologians had great difficulty in finding Old Testament ‘prophecies’ which actually seemed relevant. And yet - without once commanding an army or any material wealth - Jesus became the most influential person in recorded history.
Finally, Jesus rose from the dead shortly after His execution, and appeared to hundreds of his followers before (we assume) returning to God. Whether you believe this or not depends on how much weight you give to these eyewitness accounts, and to the simple fact of Jesus’ continuing, dramatic influence on history through the people who had known him.
So what did Jesus teach?
Jesus came not to form a new religion, but to reinforce and improve people's existing relationships with God. His main commandments were to worship God, and to care for other people. He said that God has very high standards - but that God understands that we usually can't live up to them, and loves us nonetheless. God is always willing to forgive, and let us make a clean start, as long as we keep trying.
The very presence of Jesus shows that the God who created the universe, and who probably knows the position and state of every subatomic particle, also cares deeply about individual humans, and wants us to love Him and live fulfilling lives in accordance with good moral principles.
Christians believe that when Jesus became a human, He opened the door for us to become more closely connected with God. And no, we do not actually know how
There are many differences between individual Anglican churches, but we hold four things in common:
- The Bible as a basis of our faith;
- The Nicene and Apostles' Creeds, basic statements of Christian belief;
- Recognition of the sacraments of Baptism and Holy Communion, and
- The historic episcopate; that is, the continuity of the line of bishops since the time of Christ.
It has been said that the Anglican Church rests on the three pillars of Faith, Reason and Tradition. The unique strength of Anglicanism lies in our balance of these three aspects of our religion.
Is the Anglican Church male-dominated?
It's trying not to be. Most services and modern hymns use inclusive language. Some traditional hymns and forms of service do unfortunately contain male-specific language which can't be removed without damage to their poetic quality. We still often (but not always) refer to God as ‘He’ and ‘Father’, because sadly the English language has no suitable neutral terms other than the horribly impersonal ‘it’. We are working on improvements in this area
What Happens in Church?
The core of many Anglican services is Holy Communion, also known as Eucharist. This is a ceremony derived from the supper, which Jesus held with his followers on the night before his arrest and execution. Christians believe that this ceremony creates a special sort of contact with God, which helps to strengthen us as Christians.
What can the Church do for you?
The Church can bring you closer to God. We believe this is more important than anything in ‘ordinary’ physical existence. It can also help teach you to become a better person by living in a more ‘God-like’ way. The Church answers the human need for something greater than themselves in which to believe, and gives our lives a sense of meaning.
The Church also provides community with fellow humans, all working towards a common goal.
What can you do for the Church?
Many Christians become involved in the life of their Church in ways other than simple attendance. Any member of the congregation can undertake many functions in a church service, such as reading lessons from the Bible. Many churches have choirs and music groups.
Parishes also run groups, which operate outside the confines of Sunday services. These include youth groups, studies and courses, and community service organisations.
Christians can also become qualified as ministers. Becoming a priest requires several years of study, and a deep commitment to Christianity. However, all Christians have a part to play, using their own individual talents in their everyday lives to further the work of the Church and bring the world a little closer to the way God wants it to be.
Baptism: the ceremony of cleansing used when a person becomes a member of the Christian Church.
Confirmation: a conscious reaffirmation of baptismal vows, for those baptised as babies.
Congregation: the group of people who attend a church.
Creed: a formal statement of Christian belief.
Diocese: a regional grouping of parishes under the direction of a bishop.
Eucharist: another term for Holy Communion, or the service containing it.
Gospel: one of the four accounts of the life of Jesus in the New Testament.
New Testament: the part of the Bible dealing specifically with Christianity, and containing the Gospels.
Old Testament: the part of the Bible predating Jesus, and containing Jewish religious laws and traditions.
Parish: an individual church, and the area for which it has responsibility.
Sacrament: one of the core ceremonies of the Church, defined as 'outward and visible signs of inward and spiritual grace'.
Theologian: a scholar who studies questions of God and religion.
Trinity: the combination of the three recognised aspects of God, known as Father, Son (Jesus of Nazareth) and Holy Spirit.
