William temple once pointed out that a commandment-keeping Christian is less likely to find himself in doublecolumn headlines than he who utters ecstatic gibberish in a public place.
Similarly, a sick bishop who reproduces aging German radicalism with just the right amount of charming diffidence is a much better journalistic bet than 1,000 Christians met in conference to discuss the pre-eminence of Jesus Christ.
The sparse coverage accorded by the secular press to last month’s National Evangelical Anglican Congress at Keele University, England, reflects the ways and values of the world. None of my Anglican brethren, whom I joined for the occasion, is likely to draw the wrong conclusions of Thielicke’s young pastor (adapted here at no extra charge): “Take thine ease, my dear soul, by thy truth thou hast produced a laudable volume of non-news, and mayest regard thyself as justified.… We thank God we are not rat-catchers or ear-ticklers like those pundits yonder after whom half of Fleet Street is running. Our lack of news value testifies to our orthodoxy.”
Yet Keele 1967 will loom large in the annals of Anglican evangelicalism, which had never attempted anything like it in size or scope. Superbly organized, with the strongest team fielded as speakers and the Archbishop of Canterbury himself opening the proceedings, it might have failed dismally. It didn’t. Opportunities were given and taken for evangelicals to commit themselves on issues both vital and contemporary.
One result was that the 10,000-word congress Statement dealt with areas where the evangelical voice has all too seldom been heard in modern Britain. Thus part of the section on “The Church and the World” reads: Christians should be involved with people at every social level. The Church should be a caring community welcoming in Christ’s name addicts, criminals, the hungry, the homeless and all in need. More important than any specific proposal is our concern to recover a vision of the Church involved prayerfully and sacrificially in all the problems raised by an affluent, leisured but bewildered society.” (How has this heresy grown up in England since F. D. Maurice’s time, that a proper social concern must necessarily be at odds with the biblical and reformed position?)
The document showed a near unanimity on topics where tension was anticipated. Effectively exploded was the myth of a substantial minority for whom secession from the Church of England was both probable and imminent. Delegates proved Erasmian almost to a man: the call was for reform from within.
The current state of Anglican-Methodist unity proposals was coolly appraised. While looking forward to an eventual merger, the Statement emphasizes that it “should be with substantially the whole Methodist Church.” Anything that needlessly divides Methodism for the sake of union would be opposed.
This once more focuses attention on the three-pronged assault likely to be launched when the final report is produced by the Anglican-Methodist negotiating bodies. Besides Anglican and Methodist evangelicals, the “higher” echelons of the Church of England (even apart from the Anglo-Romans who were always against the report) are beginning to make felt more clearly in the Church Times their criticisms of a proposed union—which (I suspect) they had hoped would be scuppered without their having to show their hand.
But to return to the Keele Statement, it was interesting to note that the Church of South India pattern maintains its appeal among Anglican evangelicals as a fitting basis for church union. The congress called for the Church of England to enter into full communion with the CSI (with which no province is yet in communion), even although Philip Hughes pointed out that with the passing of time the CSI’s internal problems have increased rather than diminished.
Turning to the Church of Rome, the Statement presents surely the most irenic attitude ever officially recorded by Anglican evangelicals: “many fundamental Christian doctrines in common … rejoice also at signs of biblical reformation … [no reunion at present, but] welcome the new possibilities of dialogue … [and] recent appointment of a team of evangelical theologians to confer with Roman theologians.” This might not produce a Protestant night of the long knives, but from the extreme right will come dark mutterings of the they-shall-smart-for-this variety.
Among other notable features, the Statement called for an end to indiscriminate baptism and for a recognition of the Lord’s Supper as the central service of the Church of England. It urged the establishment of a royal commission on abortion, and the need for greater cooperation among evangelical missionary societies.
The Church Times, largest Anglican weekly, was predictably peevish about certain aspects of Keele: bishops made “merely an optional administrative convenience” … the ministry regarded as little different from the laity … the prospect of general intercommunion as an immediate possibility. Yet even in this quarter there was generous praise: “It is good, in view of so much modern radical faithlessness within the Church itself, to have a categorical re-affirmation of allegiance to the historic faith of the Church based on the Bible and expressed in the Creeds.”
Twenty-two years ago there was published Towards the Conversion of England—the report of a commission on evangelism set up by the Archbishops of Canterbury and York. Widely acclaimed at first, it was soon inexplicably forgotten (the names of some of those associated with the report, including the present Bishop of Southwark, make surprising reading today).
We hope this will not be the fate of the Keele 1967 Statement, scheduled for publication this month. If evangelicals have really seen the folly of trying “to be the light of the world from a rather remote lighthouse” (Norman Anderson’s phrase), and feel convinced of the value and relevance of this Statement in speaking to the condition of the times, then we can expect that steps will be taken, not only to bring and keep it before the eyes of the Church, but to relate it to and implement it in every parish in England. As this goes on, the shedding of party and denominational labels may be no bad thing.
“What did you think of Keele?” I asked a participant who still believes in straight answers. His reading, not always sound, apparently takes in Emerson, for his reply included an expression of hope that the impact of the congress might not be drowned out for others by the thunder of what we were. Only he put it much better than that.
