A 22-month-old denomination that started with one church and has grown to more than 100 held its first national convention last month in Kansas City, Missouri.
About 300 church leaders, including some exploring the possibility of joining the fledgling denomination, attended daytime workshops and evening worship services of the Charismatic Episcopal Church (CEC), headquartered in San Clemente, California.
Drawn to the church are charismatics who prefer liturgical worship and Episcopalians who do not like the liberal turn their own denomination has taken (CT, April 5, 1993, p. 75). Some Episcopal dioceses have recently held discussions about approving same-sex marriages.
“We’re a church that is very traditional family values—oriented,” said CEC leader Archbishop Randolph Adler, former pastor of an independent charismatic church associated with the prophetic and pro-life movements. “We believe that God is calling us today to help restore some sense of sanity to our American culture and the church.”
To do this, Adler says, the church needs what he calls the convergence of three streams of Christian emphasis that have run parallel: liturgical, with its emphasis on sacraments, tradition, and clerical vestments; evangelical, which emphasizes spiritual renewal and the authority of the Bible; and charismatic, emphasizing the gifts of the Spirit.
Adler said he was in jail when he decided to unite these three streams in his own congregation—a decision that led to the birth of the CEC in June 1992. Adler had been arrested with more than 80 members of his church for trespassing in front of an abortion facility.
The church uses the Episcopal Book of Common Prayer for its worship services and has adopted the Thirty-Nine Articles of Religion used by both the Episcopal and United Methodist churches, a standard statement of Christian orthodoxy.
Congregants in the United States number about 7,500. Membership outside the United States is about 15,000, in countries including the Philippines, France, and Estonia.
By Stephen M. Miller in Kansas City.
