A couple of luminaries writing in the Niagara Anglican reckon that churches are emptying because the diocese is determined to hold on to such outmoded esoterica as the Virgin Birth and the Resurrection of Christ.
This is odd, since all the priests who still believe these arcane curiosities left the diocese around 2008 – and the churches are still emptying.
From here (page 3):
Visitors to a church service from the secular world, hearing the creeds, listening to priests threatening Judgment Day, claiming that the Bible is the inerrant Word of God, asserting that Jesus was literally born of a virgin and literally raised from the dead, must shake their heads in astonishment. Those who cannot tolerate what they consider hopelessly out-of-date do not return.
I don’t quite understand. If these visitors were coming to a Christian Church, why would they expect to find anything but a Christian perspective and Christian practice? It would be like going to McDonald’s for a meal, but expecting 5-star dining with linens and fine wine, or arriving at a university lecture hall to find it filled with 4 yr. olds learning the alphabet (well — that one may be more believable, come to think of it) instead of Philosophy 202. Even the title/adjective “CHRIST-ian” would be a giveaway, I would say. And by the way, I heard more outlandish promises than this made by the “Financial Expert” who ran a recent workshop I caught a few minutes of, and I was the only one who got up and left…..
Somehow I am not too surprised by this. After all I cannot remember the last time I heard the Creed of St. Athanasius recited in Church. And can any of us remember the last time a Priest in the ACoC pronounced the Exhortation (especially now that we are in Lent)?
The statement “secular people think all Christians are yelling because we have nothing new or valid to say.” strikes me as a particularly apt description of strident liberalism.