An Indictment against the German Bishops

Latins and also Protestant leaders. The German Protestants may deny that the Reformation was a failure, but it was.

Amazing map showing the long term effect of Germany’s partition, on religious beliefs.
ht @urbanthoughts11 pic.twitter.com/VNtRQOzkHP

— Lionel Page (@page_eco) January 14, 2021

The Jesus Psalter

As we commemorate the Most Holy Name of Jesus, I cannot help but think of the Jesus Psalter, beloved by English Christians before the Reformation and on the lips of many of the Martyrs: Jesus, Jesus, Jesus, be to me a Jesus! pic.twitter.com/21HvMgi8rN

— Fr James Bradley (@FrJamesBradley) January 3, 2021

Chancel Screens Since the Reformation

Nearing finalisation of the proofs for @Ecclsoc's "Chancel Screens Since the Reformation." Hugely grateful to all contributors: Peter Doll, @Salpotintirah, @TrvrCooper, John Roberts, Andrew Derrick & @InterWarChurch. Great scholarship, free to @Ecclsoc members. pic.twitter.com/eydUX1AUBd

— Dr Mark Kirby (@Kirby5Mark) November 12, 2020

Fr Josiah Trenham on Eastern Orthodox Theology, Catholicism, and the Reformation

Reformation Day

Celebrate #ReformationDay by learning about the aim of spiritual life and the keys to attaining it. Follow the ancient path of Holy Orthodoxy and escape the apostasy of the West.

Theosis: The True Purpose of Human Life - Part I https://t.co/vNqi9GOCKr pic.twitter.com/0HXEcQE82L

— Timothy Honeycutt (@AudioScribeOW) October 31, 2020

Fr. Panayioti, "The Protestant Reformation and the Orthodox Christian East"

A historic lecture given in Wittenburg Germany on the 500-year anniversary of the protestant reformation. Fr. Panayioti weighs in with a lecture called: The Protestant Reformation and the Orthodox Christian Easthttps://t.co/Z2GLtp0rpm pic.twitter.com/mUXY6wDQxk

— Trisagionfilms (@TrisagionFilms) July 30, 2020

A Severe Lacuna

No discussion of the schisms affecting the Church in the first millenium and after. (First between the Chalcedonian and non-Chalcedonian Churches and those with the Church of the East, and then the schism between the Chalcedonian Churches of "East" and "West.") The discussion of the Protestants is very much slanted towards a Latin pov.

The Church’s history has not been, as commanded in John's Gospel, a record of a united community of love ushering in the kingdom of God & thereby transforming the world as a whole in an enduring way. Its history is much more mixed... --Brad Gregoryhttps://t.co/6RUnreDfJX

— Church Life Journal (@ChurchLifeND) June 3, 2020

Three More Thoughts on the Anglican Catholic Liturgy

1. I remembered that the Anglican tradition was supposedly in need of correction by competent Roman authorities. Standing as an outsider now, I would expect that one of the problems Latins and Latinizing Anglicans would have with the BCP would have to do with its sacramental theology or the presence or absence of the word "sacrifice," given their adherence to Tridentine Latin Catholicism. How much disagreement was there in the past between Latins and Anglicans (and Protestants generally) about the Eucharist being a "sacrifice"? And was this debate grounded upon a misunderstanding of a principle, that is the meaning of "sacrifice" in Scripture and the Apostolic tradition?

Some sort of agreement between Anglicans and Latins was reached some time ago:
ARCIC-28 ~ Sub-Commission on the Notion of Sacrifice in the Eucharist in Anglican and Roman Catholic Theology
Agreed Statement on Eucharistic Doctrine (1971)

If I were to do further research on this topic, I would have to find out who the experts in Anglican Eucharistic theology are. But here are some affirmations by Anglicans that the Eucharist is a sacrifice. Does that mean certain of their worship books were deficient with respect to form because they don't reflect a Tridentine Latin understanding of sacrifice? Maybe. Does that mean that they are objectively deficient from the standpoint of Apostolic tradition? Maybe not. Latins will insist that their understanding of sacrifice is dogma, promulgated by a valid "ecumenical council" and not just a preferred theologoumenon of that time -- will that barrier to dialogue have to be addressed first or is there some other common principle which we can employ?

Fr. Matthew S.C. Oliver:
No end to sacrifice: The legacy of Gregory Dix
No end to sacrifice: Anglicans on ‘offering’
No end to sacrifice: Mitchell and Meyers, Praying Shapes Believing

Eucharistic Sacrifice in Anglicanism

Anglican Eucharistic Theology: Essentially Compliant with both High and Low-Church Traditions.

A Companion to Anglican Eucharistic Theology: Volume 2

On the Eucharistic Sacrifice and the Christian Priesthood. by Alan S. Hawkesworth (1896)

Episcopal Church Glossary: Eucharistic Sacrifice

How We Worship

Greg Goebel:
Good Friday: Do We Still Need A Sacrifice?
What do Anglicans Believe about Holy Communion?

Calvinism and Eucharistic Sacrifice by Rev. Dr. Eric M. Parker

From 2013: Ordinariate Mass - look carefully and you can see Lutheran and Calvinist influences by Fr Gregory-Palamas

A Comparison of the Roman Missal, Missale Romanum and Divine Worship Forms of the Roman Rite Eucharistic Liturgy
2. Before the introduction of Divine Worship in 2015, people asked and even hoped for some sort of restoration of the Sarum Use, but translated into hieratic English. How "Sarum" is Divine Worship? Is there any possibility of a future creation and introduction of another Missal that is more "Sarum"? And would a Sarum rite, whether in hieratic English or Latin, have to be revised, just like the Roman rite, if the Latin notion of sacrifice is found to be in need of correction or modification?

From 2012: Sarum Use in the Ordinariates (see the tagged posts under Sarum and Anglicanorum Coetibus)
The Future Liturgy of an Anglican Ordinariate: Why not Sarum? - The Use of Sarum
What Happened to the Sarum Rite?
The Death of Sarum

3. On the Epiclesis:
Some Anglicans did introduce it, whether it was in imitation of non-Latin rites (or the Pauline Missal?) or because they erroneously thought one was originally present in the Roman Canon, I do not know.

I know Fr. Hunwicke is opposed to its introduction to the Roman rite, because apparently the Roman Canon must remain unchanged (or unreformed, that is unrestored?). Is organic development of the liturgy possible, especially one takes into account the ecumenical councils of the first millenium, which one could say that the Church of Rome has not received properly, not because of its rejection of the councils, but because of its conservatism with respect to its own ecclesial tradition? Should the Roman Canon (and the Eucharistic prayers of Latin rites in general) be more Trinitarian and explicit about the Holy Spirit, even if it is recognized that it is not "sacramentally deficient in form" in the current texts of the EF?

I say Latin rites though acknowledging that it is debatable whether any of the others are celebrated in a way that can be called "living," reflecting a proper engagement and liturgical spirituality of the people that includes an appropriate understanding during the liturgy of what is being prayed and a participation in those prayers.

Related:
Romantic and Patristic Liturgy in Louis Bouyer

NCReg: From Earth to Heaven With England’s Glory: Sarum Vespers Resound in Philadelphia
Catholics prayed together in the Pre-Reformation English form of the Roman Rite familiar to St. Thomas More and his contemporaries.
Peter Jesserer Smith

Debating Theological Explanations for the Real Presence

First Things: The Theology of Transubstantiation
From First Thoughts
Brett Salkeld and Mark discuss Reformation-era debates over the Real Presence and what Catholics and Protestants believe about the Eucharist. Continue Reading »

What if?

Could the split of the Protestants have been prevented if the Latins had first reconciled with the Eastern Chalcedonian Christians ealier, and instead of elevating scholastic theological opinion as dogma at Trent, written the decrees differently?

Then we wouldn't have a problem about bishops endorsing practically unconditional intercommunion with Protestants.

The Intercommunion Proposal of the German Bishops is Unbiblical by Brian Kranick

CWR: Natural No Maas: The disintegration of the concept of all law in Luther by Timothy J. Gordon

Classical Protestantism is a voluntarist form of Christianity, such a radically different view of human and divine will that it must be differentiated from non-voluntarist Catholicism not only as a different sect, but as a fundamentally different worldview.

First Things: Latimer and Ridley Are Forgotten A Protestant understanding of England’s martyrs by Peter Hitchens

Hidden in the northern suburbs of Oxford are the last traces of a path first trodden by multitudes of country folk hurrying to see the burning of the Protestant martyrs Hugh Latimer and Nicholas Ridley on October 16, 1555, and trudging home afterward. For some years I lived very close to this track, . . . .

Brad Gregory on Luther

Law and Liberty: Luther’s Rebellion: A Conversation with Brad Gregory by Brad S. Gregory

Rebel in the Ranks

An Orthodox Perspective on the Reformation

Cardinal Koch on the Protestant Reformation

CWR: Cardinal Koch: “The commemoration of the Reformation reminded us of what unites us”

“In the commemoration of the Reformation,” says the President of the Pontifical Council for Promoting Christian Unity, “the emphasis was above all on what we have in common; but open questions still remain, as before.”

A Consequence of the Filioque? "Really?"

Fr. Andrew Stephen Damick on the Reformation

An Orthodox Take on the Effects of the Reformation

CWR: Eamon Duffy’s “Reformation Divided” revises assumptions, offers deep historical insights by Michael B. Kelly

Among the very significant contributions in Reformation Divided are the three chapters devoted to Thomas More, who has suffered from much hagiographical treatment, both good and ill.

Orthodoxy and the Reformation