Seven whole days

This post is part of a Lenten series on the 39 Articles.

Article XXXII: Of the marriage of priests
Bishops, Priests, and Deacons are not commanded by God’s laws either to vow the estate of single life or to abstain from marriage. Therefore it is lawful also for them, as for all other Christian men, to marry at their own discretion, as they shall judge the same to serve better to godliness.

Here’s another article that’s quite straightforward. It is obviously a response to the Roman Catholic teachings concerning clerical celibacy. The topic of clerical marriage is less interesting to me than the question about church discipline and when it can be changed. In its beginning, the church permitted clergy to marry. And then, for well-rehearsed reasons primarily related to property, the church changed its tune. Morality was surely an issue too, but that didn’t exactly go away once authorities declared that clergy were celibate. But I digress.

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This post is part of a Lenten series on the 39 Articles.

Article XXXI: Of the one oblation of Christ finished upon the Cross
The offering of Christ once made is the perfect redemption, propitiation, and satisfaction for all the sins of the whole world, both original and actual, and there is none other satisfaction for sin but that alone. Wherefore the sacrifices of Masses, in the which it was commonly said that the priests did offer Christ for the quick and the dead to have remission of pain or guilt, were blasphemous fables and dangerous deceits.

Back when I wrote about Article 22, I said that labeling an opposing argument as “a fond thing vainly invented” might be quite effective. If there’s an even better way to zap your debating partner, it’s labeling their claims as “blasphemous fables and dangerous deceits”.

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This post is part of a Lenten series on the 39 Articles.

Article XXX: Of both kinds
The Cup of the Lord is not to be denied to the lay people; for both parts of the Lord’s sacrament, by Christ’s ordinance and commandment, ought to be ministered to all Christian men alike.

Finally, here is an article that is straightforward. Both consecrated bread and wine are to be administered to the congregation. This is, of course, in response to the medieval practice of offering only the bread to lay people, out of fear that wine might be spilled. Never mind that this is still practiced in some quarters today!

For the reformers, the fullness of the sacramental symbol was more important than the risk that wine might be spilled. Presumably, we would agree with this principle, right? Sadly, too often we prioritize expediency over richness. Lots of places use oil-filled candles, plastic covers on Holy Tables, liturgical shortcuts, and any number of other ways to make things convenient. Some people would put communion wafers, rather than actual bread, into this category.

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Every week, Agnus Day posts a cartoon about the Sunday lectionary readings. They are usually funny, and often they are thought provoking. Here’s the one for this coming Sunday.

That seems about right. At the beginning of the Palm Sunday liturgy, we just can’t quite imagine where the joy is going to take us. It always strikes me as strange when so many people say Palm Sunday is their “favorite” Sunday. How can this be? What makes it better than, say, Easter or Pentecost or even the First Sunday in Lent? My observation is that many folks who call Palm Sunday their favorite are the same folks who skip right past the Triduum. They find power in the triumph and passion as it is expressed in our liturgy. And they would be blown away by the Triduum Sacrum if they ever gave it a chance.

Do you know someone who skips the Three Holy Days? Encourage them to give it a try this year. I always promise people their lives will be changed if they come to all three services. No one has ever challenged me on that claim once they’ve lived through Maundy Thursday, Good Friday, and the Great Vigil of Easter.

I do love a parade. And I love the Palm Sunday parade, even though it is calling us to take up our cross and follow our Lord on a difficult journey.

This post is part of a Lenten series on the 39 Articles.

Article XXIX: Of the wicked, which eat not the Body of Christ in the use of the Lord’s Supper
The Wicked, and such as be void of a lively faith, although they do carnally and visibly press with their teeth (as Saint Augustine saith) the Sacrament of the Body and Blood of Christ; yet in no wise are they partakers of Christ: but rather, to their condemnation, do eat and drink the sign or Sacrament of so great a thing.

I’m not going to lie: this Article is nearly inscrutable. It seems so short and obvious, and yet there is an entire controversy lurking just behind the text. For my understanding of a long-passed crisis, I’m grateful to Gerald Bray’s book on the Articles, to which I have referred repeatedly. Since the controversy at hand has passed, I’ll let it be. If you are curious, go do some reading on Gnesio-Lutherans. Back in the day (and by this I mean the 16th century), this particular Article was all the rage.

For our purpose, the Article is basically clarifying that those who receive consecrated bread and wine unworthily receive none of the benefits and all of the penalties. Since you aren’t worthy, you can’t receive grace at the altar rail. For your audacity in approaching the rail, you receive condemnation.

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This post is part of a Lenten series on the 39 Articles.

Article XXVIII: Of the Lord’s Supper
The Supper of the Lord is not only a sign of the love that Christians ought to have among themselves one to another, but rather it is a Sacrament of our Redemption by Christ’s death: insomuch that to such as rightly, worthily, and with faith, receive the same, the Bread which we break is a partaking of the Body of Christ; and likewise the Cup of Blessing is a partaking of the Blood of Christ.

Transubstantiation (or the change of the substance of Bread and Wine) in the Supper of the Lord, cannot be proved by Holy Writ; but is repugnant to the plain words of Scripture, overthroweth the nature of a Sacrament, and hath given occasion to many superstitions.

The Body of Christ is given, taken, and eaten, in the Supper, only after an heavenly and spiritual manner. And the mean whereby the Body of Christ is received and eaten in the Supper, is Faith.

The Sacrament of the Lord’s Supper was not by Christ’s ordinance reserved, carried about, lifted up, or worshipped.

There is a tradition, among a certain kind of Anglican, of wearing a cassock with 39 buttons on the front. The wearer then leaves some spots unbuttoned, indicating which Articles the wearer finds disagreeable. This Article is exactly the sort of thing that would provoke such a person to leave a spot unbuttoned. Plenty of people object to this Article because it forbids the reservation of the Eucharist, a very widespread practice. Here we see an obvious example of the way in which the theological and liturgical pendulum had swung one way when the 39 Articles were written, and how it’s swung another way today.

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This post is part of a Lenten series on the 39 Articles.

Article XXVII: Of Baptism
Baptism is not only a sign of profession and mark of difference whereby Christian men are discerned from other that be not christened, but is also a sign of regeneration or new birth, whereby, as by an instrument, they that receive baptism rightly are grafted into the Church; the promises of the forgiveness of sin, and of our adoption to be the sons of God, by the Holy Ghost are visibly signed and sealed; faith is confirmed, and grace increased by virtue of prayer unto God. The baptism of young children is in any wise to be retained in the Church as most agreeable with the institution of Christ.

Are you born again? If you’re an Anglican, then this Article says your answer should be “yes”. In baptism, we are regenerated — grafted into the Body of Christ. You can also read about baptism in Article XVI, which deals with whether or not we can fall from grace after we are baptized. The theology expressed here is quite like what we read in the 1979 prayer book, though today we tend not to talk about a “sign of profession and mark of difference”.

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This post is part of a Lenten series on the 39 Articles.

Article XXVI: Of the unworthiness of the ministers, which hinders not the effect of the sacraments
Although in the visible Church the evil be ever mingled with the good, and sometime the evil have chief authority in the ministration of the word and sacraments; yet forasmuch as they do not the same in their own name, but in Christ’s, and do minister by His commission and authority, we may use their ministry both in hearing the word of God and in the receiving of the sacraments. Neither is the effect of Christ’s ordinance taken away by their wickedness, nor the grace of God’s gifts diminished from such as by faith and rightly do receive the sacraments ministered unto them, which be effectual because of Christ’s institution and promise, although they be ministered by evil men.

Nevertheless it appertaineth to the discipline of the Church that inquiry be made of evil ministers, and that they be accused by those that have knowledge of their offences; and finally, being found guilty by just judgement, be deposed.

Here we encounter a 16th century response of sorts to the Donatist controversy of the fourth and fifth centuries. The Donatists had refused to accept the sacraments offered by those deemed unfit in their conduct. However, the wider Church decided that sacraments had effect even when administered by those who had strayed from the faith of the Church. This position is reiterated here: sacraments are valid, even when the minister is wicked.

That’s a good thing, too. News flash: all ordained persons are sinners. If sacramental validity hinged on the “worthiness” of ministers, then I’m afraid we wouldn’t be enjoying any valid sacraments. Now, that said, notoriously “wicked” ministers are to be disciplined, since they corrupt the discipline of the church. This should all be uncontroversial, right?

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This post is part of a Lenten series on the 39 Articles.

Article XXV: Of the sacraments
Sacraments ordained of Christ be not only badges or tokens of Christian men’s profession, but rather they be certain sure witnesses and effectual signs of grace and God’s good will towards us, by the which He doth work invisibly in us, and doth not only quicken, but also strengthen and confirm, our faith in Him.

There are two Sacraments ordained of Christ our Lord in the Gospel, that is to say, Baptism and the Supper of the Lord.

Those five commonly called Sacraments, that is to say, Confirmation, Penance, Orders, Matrimony, and Extreme Unction, are not to be counted for Sacraments of the Gospel, being such as have grown partly of the corrupt following of the Apostles, partly are states of life allowed in the Scriptures; but yet have not the like nature of Sacraments with Baptism and the Lord’s Supper, for that they have not any visible sign or ceremony ordained of God.

The Sacraments were not ordained of Christ to be gazed upon or to be carried about, but that we should duly use them. And in such only as worthily receive the same, have they a wholesome effect or operation: but they that receive them unworthily, purchase to themselves damnation, as Saint Paul saith.

We receive sacraments all the time, but how often do we ponder them? Why do we have sacraments? Of what benefit are they to us? Many Episcopalians might remember that they are “outward and visible signs of an inward and spiritual grace” but so what?

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This post is part of a Lenten series on the 39 Articles.

Article XXIV: Of speaking in the congregation in such a tongue as the people understandeth
It is a thing plainly repugnant to the word of God and the custom of the primitive Church, to have public prayer in the Church, or to minister the sacraments in a tongue not understanded of the people.

This Article is pleasantly straightforward. We should celebrate our liturgies so that the people may understand what is happening. Who could argue with that? My little essay could end there, but what fun what that be? Allow me to make four points and a bonus trivia note.

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This post is part of a Lenten series on the 39 Articles.

Article XXIII: Of ministering in the congregation
It is not lawful for any man to take upon him the office of public preaching or ministering the sacraments in the congregation, before he be lawfully called and sent to execute the same. And those we ought to judge lawfully called and sent, which be chosen and called to this work by men who have public authority given unto them in the congregation to call and send ministers into the Lord’s vineyard.

The Reformers were all about grace, except when it came to maintaining church and social order. For example “priesthood of all believers” has a nice ring to it, as long as most of the “priests” sit in their pews where they belong. Martin Luther was all over the map on this one, depending on how chummy he was with the local princes at any given moment. At times, he was all about freedom and grace, and other times, he was quick to point out the need for princely rule and orderly worship.

Americans might not quite grok this Article, with our deeply embedded notions of church/state separation. But for those places for the church and state are very closely linked — where the minister has some power beyond the conduct of worship — it becomes important to regulate who can and who cannot be a minister. After all, you don’t want to be elevating the riff-raff into positions of actual power!

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This post is part of a Lenten series on the 39 Articles.

Article XXII: Of purgatory
The Romish doctrine concerning Purgatory, Pardons, worshipping and adoration as well of Images as of Relics, and also Invocation of Saint, is a fond thing vainly invented, and grounded upon no warranty of Scripture; but rather repugnant to the word of God.

The poetry of the language here is lovely. No one talks this way any more. Just think how different life would be if the next time you had a disagreement, you said, “Your opinion is a fond thing, vainly invented.” I doubt if the argument would be any less intense, but it would be more beautiful.

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