Do you support open communion?

Discussion in 'Theology and Doctrine' started by Dallas Rivera, Oct 29, 2017.

  1. Invictus

    Invictus Well-Known Member

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    There are echoes of this in modern Eastern Orthodox practice as well. I have personally witnessed clergy halting would-be communicants because the clergy did not recognize them. More often than not, if they turned out to be Orthodox, they were allowed to take Communion on the condition that they went to Confession ASAP. I personally found clerical relations toward the laity to be rather overbearing overall, and I don't think we should hold that kind of method up as something to be followed now, whether or not evidence can be unearthed to show that it was the practice of the post-apostolic Church. The social circumstances then were very different from what they are today, to put it mildly.

    It seems difficult to account for Art. 29-30 of the Articles of Religion without some operative assumption that the responsibility for determining fitness for receiving Communion had shifted - somewhat - from clergy to laity:

    Then consider the Exhortation of the Priest immediately preceding the Communion Rite in the 1662 Book of Common Prayer:

     
    Last edited: Jun 4, 2021
  2. bwallac2335

    bwallac2335 Well-Known Member

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    If you don't or can't hold to some form of the real presence then I am not sure you should be taking communion in an Anglican Church. Holding to the real presence of Christ in the Eucharist is a high view of the sacraments.
     
  3. Invictus

    Invictus Well-Known Member

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    But, again, are there not Anglicans with a “high” view of the sacraments and a “low” view of the real presence? One would think Barthian Anglicans would fall into this category, along with past evangelical Anglicans such as J.C. Ryle. The Prayer Book itself in some places appears to endorse this position, and indeed was understood to have done so by its proponents and critics alike.
     
  4. bwallac2335

    bwallac2335 Well-Known Member

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    But they do believe in some form of the Real Presence. As long as you don't view it as just a memorial meal
     
  5. Invictus

    Invictus Well-Known Member

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    Cranmer himself was a Zwinglian memorialist. The 1552 Book reflected this view. Ryle was a memorialist also. So was Barth, whose theology has had a significant following among Anglicans. What the Articles exclude are transubstantiation, and the view that the sacraments are not means of grace. The 1662 rite of communion for the sick also explicitly states that those unable to receive communion receive by faith all that is contained in the sacrament. That in itself is a strong argument for open communion.
     
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  6. Tiffy

    Tiffy Well-Known Member

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    I support open communion right up until someone proves themselves unworthy of the invitation. Like some did in the Church of Corinth. :(
    .
     
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  7. bwallac2335

    bwallac2335 Well-Known Member

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    That is a bold statement about Cramner. The question has to be which Cramner are you talking about? Also the 1552 was just used for a matter of months really. The 1559 yielded itself to a real presence interpretation and it lasted until the 1662 and the 1662 also yields itself to the real presence. You allude to Spiritual Communion in the Visitation of the Sick. That is still a thing. The fact that he did not push his personal view on the BCP as his own personal views did not define Anglican Doctrine.
     
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  8. Invictus

    Invictus Well-Known Member

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    The 1662 combined memorialist statements from the 1552 with more traditional language from the 1549. The Articles, in line with the other Reformed confessions, define the presence as “heavenly and spiritual”, and explicitly deny that those who lack faith truly partake of the Body and Blood (which ruled out the Lutheran view). Since the Anglican formularies rule out a substantial presence, I am not sure how coherent it is to speak of a “real” presence at all in those circumstances. I certainly don’t see how any basis can be found for a litmus test on those grounds. “Effective presence” seems better suited to describe it.
     
  9. bwallac2335

    bwallac2335 Well-Known Member

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  10. Invictus

    Invictus Well-Known Member

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    Luther’s Large Catechism states explicitly that the worthy and unworthy alike receive the Body of Christ. The 39 Articles explicitly deny this. Whatever real presence may be spoken of, is in the Anglican formularies at least partially dependent upon the state of the recipient. That is an argument for open communion. How can a priest possibly know whether a would-be communicant has genuine faith?
     
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  11. Tiffy

    Tiffy Well-Known Member

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    Actually, the same applies in the case of baptism, whether believers baptism or infant baptism we can only go on the assumption that the word of the relevant persons can be trusted, and trust them we do. Only God knows the secrets of the heart but we are called to trust and believe unless we have absolute proof otherwise, and that is rarely forthcoming. We walk by faith and not by sight.
    .
     
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  12. Stalwart

    Stalwart Well-Known Member Anglican

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    There are at least two:
    -by far the most important, is there’s an incredible risk of eating the sacrament to one’s own damnation. Whereas there’s no mandate (at all) to receive it even when one isn’t ready. If you shouldn’t receive the most sacred thing there is in the world, then why don’t you hold off until your soul is clear and you are not polluted by some heinous sin you recently committed? There is no pressure to receive right away; but there’s awful consequences if you receive wrongly.

    -connected to it is the sin of profanation: it is very easy to forget the fact that the sacrament is “the most thing there is in the world”. It doesn’t look or feel like it. To understand what this is, you need immense preparation, whereas the hyper-frequent communion of the 20th century produced a Church utterly tired of receiving the boring and bland wafer which doesn’t seem to mean very much. Less is more.

    In the Middle Ages most people received it once a year; in the patristic era and in the more modern times the practice has been to only receive every so often, and intense sacramental manuals are widespread in the Anglican tradition where you’d spend an entire week preparing yourself to receive the sacrament.

    Receiving it too often, with complete indifference to whether you’re clean or impure, with little discernment of what the sacrament is, with few thoughts of what it can do to you, how it may harm you — that is the profane atheistic church of the modern times.
     
  13. Stalwart

    Stalwart Well-Known Member Anglican

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    Sorry, you’re relying on corrupt modernist scholarship, of the same kind that tries to claim that the Reformation was “between protestants and catholics”. As @bwallac2335 says, no one has recognized anything wrong in the 1552 until the very recent times.

    The last century has seen an avalanche, the very tidal wave of rubbish scholars, like Diarmaid MacCullough, a gay atheist who tried to pretend that was writing an authoritative history of the Reformation, or of Thomas Cranmer one of the holiest men in the history of the Church. Cranmer held one of the highest views of the sacrament, and whose views have certainly been reproduced in Anglican prayerbooks and devotionals since his time. This isn’t the thread for it but I’d defend Cranmer’s sacramentology against anyone. Most of the church fathers held to a lower view of the blessed sacrament than he did.
     
    Last edited: Jun 5, 2021
  14. Rexlion

    Rexlion Well-Known Member

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    Rather than reproduce what I've already written on this point, I'll just direct attention to my previous post (#43) in this thread. I'm really doubtful that many (if any) people in this day and age would partake of the Eucharist with the mindset that it's just a bite of food. That was the error being addressed by Paul to the Corinthians.
     
  15. Botolph

    Botolph Well-Known Member

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    Indeed when it comes to a view of the most holy sacrament of the altar, most reformers held views that were indeed much higher that much of what passes in contemporary thought. I don't think Calvin would recognise the sacramental theology being espoused by many who call themselves Calvinists today.

    It is also probably worth noting that that the reformation, and the 1549,52,58,1628,1661/2 prayer books all happened in a world before existentialism was a thing. For them spirituality, not physicality was the foundation of reality.
     
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  16. bwallac2335

    bwallac2335 Well-Known Member

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    It is a slam dunk when you read that passage and let the church fathers interpret for you. They n ever took a memorial view of Communion. That is the problem with just letting anyone interpret the Bible. You can make up what it means as you go. You have to put scripture first, then tradition second. the Bible is interpreted through tradition. Without it we might has well use be non demon and go with the coolest pastor.
     
  17. Rexlion

    Rexlion Well-Known Member

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    That's true. The Ante-Nicene fathers do not support a strictly memorialist view, although many of them do discuss the memorial and symbolic aspects of the Eucharist at some length.

    That said, a memorialist is unlikely to know or believe what the Ante-Nicene fathers have written on the subject. The memorialist is likely relying upon the written word of God, pretty much by itself. And since the word of God itself does not rule out the memorialist view, will our Lord condemn or punish the person for his lack of theological education (punish him for "eating and drinking unworthily")? Will God make the person sick for knowing only that the bread and wine are symbolic, representational, and in memory of Jesus' death on the cross? I hope not. Nor would I want to be the one to judge them for it.
     
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  18. Tiffy

    Tiffy Well-Known Member

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    If you had gone to bed sooner and not tryped this sentence it might have made sense. :laugh: Good job we can translate gibberish.
    .
     
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  19. bwallac2335

    bwallac2335 Well-Known Member

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    Baby tired is my excuse.
     
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  20. Stalwart

    Stalwart Well-Known Member Anglican

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    Does the word of God also explicitly condemn the Arian view? After all didn’t Jesus say that his father is greater than him? I don’t see explicit condemnations of Arianism. So then by rights we should have full permission to permit Arians and Unitarians as fellow people of God. And we should allow in the Sabellians, and Montanists, and Antinomians, and all the others who have been cast out as heretics from the Church.