Deep Church
From today’s Epistle: “ that ye, being rooted and grounded in love, may be able to comprehend with all saints what is the breadth, and length, and depth, and height; And to know the love of Christ, which passeth knowledge, that ye might be filled with all the fullness of God.” Ephesians 3.17-19
In America - this could never happen in England! - there was a feud between a good Catholic priest and his very evangelical organist, who loved Moody and Sankey Gospel hymns.
The first hint of trouble came when the priest preached on the need for change and the organist chose to sing "I Shall Not Be Moved."
Trying to believe it was a coincidence, the priest put the incident behind him. The next Sunday he preached on the need for increased giving, and was not amused as the organist led them afterwards in the hymn "Jesus Paid It All."
Sunday morning attendance swelled as the tension between the two built. A large crowd showed up the next week to hear his sermon on the sin of gossiping. The organist struck up with "I Love To Tell The Story?"
There was no turning back. The following Sunday the priest told the huge congregation that, unless something changed, he was considering resignation. The atmosphere was electric as the choir set out on the old Gospel standard "Why Not Tonight."
Other local churches were empty the following week as people crowded into the church to hear the resignation sermon. The priest explained that Jesus had led him to the church and now Jesus was leading him away. The organist could not resist it: "What a Friend We Have in Jesus."
Divisions in a church and divisions between churches are all too common and, despite the jokes, are really very sad. They are a major hindrance to the mission of the church.
In 1952, CS Lewis wrote a letter to The Church Times standing-up for the supernatural basis of the Gospel which he felt strongly was being undermined by what was then called modernism.
To a layman it seems obvious that what unites the Evangelical and the Anglo Catholic against the "Liberal" or "Modernist" is something very clear and momentous, namely, the fact that both are thoroughgoing supernaturalists, who believe in the Creation, the Fall, the Incarnation, the Resurrection, the Second Coming, and the … Last Things. This unites them not only with one another but also with the Christian religion as understood ubique et ab omnibus.The point of view from which this agreement seems less important than their divisions … is to me unintelligible. Perhaps the trouble is that as supernaturalists, whether "Low" or "High" Church thus taken together they lack a name. May I suggest "Deep Church", or if that fails in humility, Baxter’s "mere Christians"’.
Lewis's understanding of ‘Deep Church’, or ‘mere Christianity’, was not limited simply to a concept of supernaturalism.
The Latin tag ubique et ab omnibus alerts us to the fact that to talk of Christianity as believed ‘everywhere and by everyone’, is to appeal not only to the miraculous foundations of the Christian faith, but also to a common historical tradition of belief and practice that has been for centuries normative for Christian experience.
The Anglican church in London has grown fairly steadily over the past ten years, and the two major players are the broad Anglo-Catholics and the open evangelicals. As always, these groups have their fringes.
There’s the Black Mafia who carry out a weekly inquisition of the Catholic faithful over their gins and tonics, weighing up the relative unsoundness of All Saints Margaret Street compared with St Mary’s Bourne Street.
And there are those evangelicals who have such a perfect grasp on the interpretation of Scripture that they are happy to consign to the flames the majority of the church for the majority of the Christian era. They are definitely not sure about Holy Trinity Brompton, have serious reservations about All Souls Langham Place and would like Our Lord to clarify one or two points before they can accept him into the ranks of the faithful.
For many of us, like CS Lewis, all this seems nonsense: fiddling while Rome burns; rearranging deckchairs on the Titanic.
Bishop Richard has encouraged Professor Andrew Walker of King’s College - a Russian Orthodox layman who grew up in the pentecostal church, and others of us from the Anglo-Catholic grouping and the evangelical constituency, to explore together Deep Church.
The name doesn’t really matter, although it is intended to be an evocative title, even if, as Lewis thought, it might suggest a lack of humility. Another name suggested is ‘generous orthodoxy’.
Professor Walker has written:
“Deep Church, as its name implies, is spiritual reality down in the depths – the foundations and deep structures of the Faith – which feed, sustain, and equip us to be disciples of Christ.”It is about engagement with God, and not just engagement with forms of worship that we like. In our own Catholic tradition, it is the acknowledgement that ascesis, spiritual discipline and denial is part of the joyful mystery of our faith. As we said the Rosary yesterday, we were remembering the joyful mysteries of faithful Mary - all tinged by suffering and self-denial.
And it is about concern for those outside the church and for broken communities and hurting people. This is how and why all these Anglo-Catholic churches around here were ‘planted’ in the 19th century.
I remember visiting the first Vineyard Church in Anaheim, Los Angeles, back in the 1980s. It was a lively charismatic ‘new church’ that has since replicated itself around the world - there are a number in Locoman.
There were about 5,000 people in a warehouse, presided over from an electronic keyboard by the charismatic and loveable John Wimber; there was an excellent 5-piece band, made up of ageing hippy session musicians (not a bit like our own choir,,,); no Christian symbols (if you exclude the overhead projector); no sacraments at most services, no historic liturgy, nor hymns older than a decade.
It was ahistorical. Apart from a brief Bible reading there was nothing obvious to link this church with 2,000 years of history. It was deep in the Spirit and existential fervour, but shallow in its connection to the sustaining flow of God’s salvation history.
Many evangelicals, including Vineyard leaders and Holy Trinity Brompton church planters, have come to realise that there is an enormous reservoir of deep Christian experience in the fathers and mothers of the church; in the Celtic tradition; in the saints before and after the reformation; in orthodoxy; in liturgy and music.
But sadly, at just a time when we need them, too many within our own tradition have only kept these historical insights alive by becoming curators of a museum - rearranging the lace and polishing the thuribles. Anglo-Catholicism has lost its spiritual edge, and in many places, its spiritual nerve.
In other words, we need each other in this broad alliance of Deep Church. Not to merge into some lowest common denominator - Anglo-Catholics in designer jumpers will never work! - but to reinvigorate and deepen our distinctive traditions.
God has seen fit to suggest to us, that in the longer term - say 50 years from now - unless we move on together we will become but another footnote in history.
This has become increasingly clear to many Anglo-Catholics. Evangelicals, on the other hand, now account for over 70% of ordinands training for the priesthood in England. They are generally in buoyant mood.
But many of those evangelicals who have been round the block once or twice, recognise that this growth is unsustainable without a development in spiritual formation and without being more firmly rooted historically in the Christian story.
Unless all of us are part of the co-operative venture of Deep Church or generous orthodoxy - or whatever we call it - we stand in danger of missing the opportunities before us here in London, where there is at present an open door.
If we will move on and deeper into our faith, both Anglo-Catholics and Evangelicals, then we have an exciting future as we fulfil our Lord’s mandate to take the Good News of the kingdom to all people.
This was the Apostle Paul’s longing for the church:
“ that ye, being rooted and grounded in love, may be able to comprehend with all saints what is the breadth, and length, and depth, and height; And to know the love of Christ, which passeth knowledge, that ye might be filled with all the fullness of God.” Ephesians 3.17-19
