God Being My Helper

Two Sundays ago (I was meaning to write sooner, sorry), I was received into the Anglican communion at SJE as they celebrated the beginning of their Jubilee year. As usual, their liturgy was perfect, full of the things I love (and you can tell they're taking it seriously when there's a rehearsal). I am not indifferent to beautiful ritual.

Everything seemed to come together nicely for me: two years less a day after making my decision to leave the Roman Catholic Church, I was received at a parish whose rich liturgy I love, attended by some people from my home church, and was sponsored by someone I know from school and whom I greatly admire. In short, all the disparate elements of my faith journey coming together.

Many people have asked me why I chose to be received at all, since it makes no tangible difference. After all, they pointed out, I was already receiving Eucharist. I was a reader, on the Parish Council, helped at morning prayer, led a talk on Anglican liturgy, went to Bible study and had been allowed to preach several times. "As far as we're concerned," they said, "you're already Anglican."

I suppose there's no single answer. I wanted to be received because I came from a tradition that values it. Because I believe in the grace that accompanies sacramentals. Because I wanted to make a public declaration of my faith. Because I wanted to feel like I really belong to the Church instead of just being there. Because I love the Anglican Church and wanted to be a part of it in every possible way.

The ceremony itself was fairly simple. The candidates were introduced, then we knelt in front of the bishop. He took our hands and said this: "we recognize you as a member of the one holy Catholic and Apostolic Church and we receive you into the fellowship of this Communion. God, the Father, Son and Holy Spirit, bless, preserve, and keep you. Amen." We had all renewed our baptismal vows. That we had to promise we believed the Creed before we were received really drives home the point about what the Anglican Church believes it is: a part of the one Church of Jesus Christ. It seems to me that, while we have a distinctive worship and some unique beliefs, what really defines us is our deeper unity with the whole of the Christian Church. It is only in and through oneness that we bind ourselves to this Communion; it is only as Christians catholic and apostolic that the Anglican Church as a way of living our faith embraces us as members.

I felt both happy and relieved. Happy because I'd been waiting for this a very long time. Relieved because I felt like I wasn't in a no-man's land of churchlessness anymore. The time between excommunication and reception was uncomfortable, to say the least!

I'm proud and happy to say I'm Anglican. To be a full member of this Church, to live the baptised life within this Communion.

"Will you endeavor to keep God's holy will and commandments and to walk in the same all the days of your life?"

--I will, God being my helper.