Anglican Community Project

The focus of most of my thinking about intentional community within the Anglican tradition has two foci: the academy and the suburbs.  I focus on the academy because until just this summer, my professional home has been in the academy for my entire adult life.  And while I have enjoyed urban living briefly in stints in my 20's and early 30's, I was raised in the suburbs, have lived in the suburbs most of my life and am living here now.  So I guess that makes me a suburbanite. Part of my vision for my new ministry venture , Emmaus Road Anglican Fellowship , is to turn the suburban culture on its head.  There are things we do every day in the suburbs that we could do better if we did them communally.  So I thought I would stop and run off a quick blog post before I undertake a great suburban ritual that fits that bill perfectly--namely, mowing my lawn.  A suburban church could turn the suburban culture on its head if it fostered such community that its ...

Two recent stories in the Church Times lament the demise of religious (monastic) communities in the U.K., and especially within the Church of England. The religious life within Anglicanism has never enjoyed the level of support found in Roman Catholicism. As a church born of the Reformation, religious communities were suppressed within the Church of England. They were, however, revived thanks to the Oxford Movement of the 19th century. Even some seminaries (like the one I attend) were inspired to follow the daily rhythm of Benedictine Rule. Today, though, such communities are--again--on the decline. The stories in Church Times describe the paradox that ours is an age that enjoys anew contemplative forms of spirituality but yet membership in religious orders is at an all time low, and many communities as a whole are dying a silent death. The problem seems to be commitment. The idea of committing oneself, lifelong, to the rigors of monastic oaths--particularly, celibacy--is a...