By Deacon Joshua Steele.
Based upon my "fieldwork" in starting and running a blog called "Rookie Anglican" at AnglicanPastor.com, I was asked recently by The Telos Collective to write a post about what attracts people to Anglicanism.
You can read my entire post over at the Telos Collective's blog, but here's a sample.
First, I address the apparent lack of "seeker-sensitivity" within Anglicanism. On one hand, I think this is a good thing.
No “culture of this world” can be equated with the culture of Jesus Christ. This is, I suggest, the important sense in which Christians (and not just Anglican ones) should not be “seeker-sensitive.”
And yet, on the other hand, the very mission of the church seems to demand that Christians be “seeker-sensitive” in the best sense of the phrase. This is because the gospel, though it does contain a powerful critique of a world alienated from God, is only “good news” to the extent that it resonates with (and does not merely refute) the cultures in which it is proclaimed.
So, perhaps we Anglicans need to do a better job of being “seeker-sensitive”—in the sense of resonating with the culture(s).
“Resonating” with the culture, however, does not necessarily mean “approving.” Instead, the church’s resonance with the cultures around it will frequently be “subversive”. . .
Toward that end, I’d like to consider some ways in which I’ve noticed the Anglican tradition subversively resonating with the culture(s) around it—especially those in the United States of America in recent years.
If you'd like to read the rest of the piece, please click here to view the post at the Telos Collective's blog.