Is there such a place as Hell? Do people go there? Was the death of Jesus on the cross a rescue or an example? Officially the Church of Ireland believes that Heaven and Hell are real and that people need to trust in the death of Jesus if they are to be rescued from Hell and fitted for Heaven. At least that’s the official (historic) theology. But what’s the actual working theology of the Church of Ireland?

Judging from its activities, we seem to have a difference between the official and the actual theology of the Church of Ireland. There doesn’t seem to be an aweful lot of evangelism going on. There was once upon a time, back in the last century, ‘a decade of evangelism’, but nothing much ever came from it. Bishops marshalled often reluctant parishes and clergy to do something vaguely connected with ‘mission’. So much time was spent debating the meaning of words like ‘evangelism’, ‘outreach’, and ‘mission’, that the idea of presenting a message of God’s rescue in Christ was defined out of existence.

The truth is, with some few exceptions, there is a spiritual malaise about the Church of Ireland. Somehow, taking seriously its official theology is akin to fundamentalism. Nobody wants to touch it. It’s far better and easier to organize political action, ecumenical action, spend thousands of euros on endless Synod committess coming up with endless ideas about secondary matters. But evangelism?! Telling people that they are on the broad road that leads to Hell and that they need to repent and turn to Christ?! That’s just fundamentalism, isn’t it?

No Christians please! Christians need not apply for posts with the Irish civil service! That’s the latest message from an Irish government TD, Martin Mansergh, in the light of the Civil Partnership Bill currently making its way through the Irish political system.

The Irish government are so far refusing to contemplate an opt-out clause for Christian conscientious objectors in the marriage registry office, who cannot carry out their duties in relation to performing ‘civil marriages’ for same-sex couples. In a recent address at Trinity College Chapel, Dublin, TD Mansergh said that ’state officials are required to implement the law without reference to their own religious beliefs’; and ‘that to act otherwise would imply that religious beliefs should be allowed to take precedence over State impartiality and, in effect, to discriminate through a la carte implementation of the law.’ Astoundingly, he goes on to say that ‘no-one is obliged to be or to stay a public official, if a conflict of beliefs occurs!’ The plan is then to follow up anyone who refuses to perform a civil ceremony with a fine and even imprisonment!

Effectively, Mr. Mansergh and the Irish government, if they pass such legislation, are saying there is no religious freedom for state officials. It’s reminiscent of Cromwell’s policy - Connaught or Hell! Surely, a government that wants to ensure equality for all its citizens would be able to provide a body of sufficient registrars, those with no strong religious beliefs, to perform the necessary duty for homosexual and lesbian couples without either jailing, fining, or forcing other civil servants out of a job!

Mr. Mansergh even had the audacity to attempt a theological justification for such a politically repressive move. Just as God gave way to the Israelites, he said, in giving them a king against his will, thus bowing to the people’s will, so God today in Irish society should bow his will to the growing secular will of the people. Not being much of a theologian, it’s not surprising that Mr. Mansergh misses the whole point of the election of Saul as King. God is not surrendering his sovereignty, rather in his sovereignty, he’s giving the people what they want, that they may come to see that this is a rejection of him. In the same way, in Romans 1, Paul argues that God gives sinners over to what they want, not because he is not sovereign but so that they might reap the full outcome of their sinful rebellion. By such reasoning, we can expect that the Irish state is not only moving further from God’s will, but will reap what it sows in the growth of sinful, ungodly lifestyles that will have a detrimental effect on the health of the nation.

The front cover of the Church of Ireland Gazette (12/3/2010) carries an insightful article on the reality of bullying in the church. It’s a brave article, very courageous in that it’s bringing out into the open for the first time, a nasty side of denominational life that most people really want to sweep under the carpet. Particularly it cites the case of an English rector bullied by his congregation and the failure of the hierarchy to support the rector. It also relates that the largest UK Union, Unite, has received numerous calls from churches of instances of bullying of clergy from those in power and authority over them.

That some clergy have been at the receiving end of bullying from some bishops is certainly true within the Church of Ireland. How widespread and how frequently it happens, probably no-one will ever know, but that it does happen, is something we do know. Ordinands and junior clergy have been known from time to time to have been the subject of some episcopal bullying, whether it’s to do with organizations they might belong to, such as Reform Ireland, or they’ve been harangued by bishops because they won’t conform to the way the bishop wants things done.

But not just ordinands or junior clergy, senior clergy in the Church of Ireland have also been summoned to the episcopal office for reprimanding and bullying pressure applied to make sure the offender falls into episcopal line. Even worse than that, episcopal threats about their future have been known to be made. Of course, not every bishop is like that, but that doesn’t take away from the reality that episcopal bullying of clergy does happen.

Especially we see this in the theologically liberal episcopal church in the United States. There’s no -one quite as intolerant or bullying as a liberal. The Episcopal Church (TEC) along with their Canadian counterparts have a long history of bullying faithful, biblically-orthodox churches, clergy and bishops, who have disagreed with their policies over homosexuality. Whole churches and even dioceses have been virulently pursued and sued by TEC because of their failure to conform to TEC’s gay agenda.

So, well done to the Church of Ireland Gazette for headlining and bringing out into the open something that we all know does happen but prefer not to speak about. The church belongs to our Great Shepherd, Jesus Christ, and those who are given positions of power and authority in his church, need to follow his example always. No Christian should be a bully, whether parishoner, clergy, bishop, Evangelical or liberal, and where we have fallen short, we must have the humility to accept we’ve been wrong and seek forgiveness. That’s the only way to deal with bullying in the church.

The new Anglican Church in North America (ACNA), recently recognized by the General Synod of the Church of England, has just announced its intention to plant a 1000 new anglican churches in the USA over the next few years. At a church-planting gathering in Plano, Texas, it pledged itself to promoting the Gospel in America via sending out trained and able Gospel workers to start new churches. It’s a breath-taking vision, a bold move that could, under God, see it continue to grow and eventually overtake the Episcopal Church (TEC), the theologically liberal and deeply unfaithful anglican body from which ACNA has departed.

What about Ireland? What’s happening here in connection with planting new churches? There are some indications that some are taking this seriously, with ‘fresh expressions’ of church being encouraged in some dioceses. This is certainly to be welcomed, but by and large the picture of the Church of Ireland is of a denomination that is very little interested in evangelism or church-planting. For one thing, theological liberalism has a strong grip on many bishops and clergy. This has the effect of deadening any move towards promoting a Gospel which liberals see as mere ‘fundamentalism’. Yet while they write off the biblical gospel, they have nothing to promote in its place beyond a sickly ecumenism and watery socialism.

Imagine how Ireland would be effected if the Church of Ireland were full of bishops, clergy and churches seeking to reach a dispirited and disillusioned people with the wonderful news of Christ crucified. There probably has been no more opportune time in Ireland’s history to reach out to the people of Ireland with the biblical gospel than right now. Growing disillusionment within Irish society with many once trusted institutions has left a real void. Where is the Church of Ireland in all this? What has it got to say? It’s simply not enough to mouth the kind of platitudes and words that any politician could easily say better. Surely, it must be speaking of Jesus.

Despite the attempts of liberals to create a church with no biblical doctrine, the Church of Ireland does have a biblical doctrine and a powerful message to proclaim - at least on paper. Isn’t it time that the Church of Ireland rediscovered that? Now is not the time to retreat from the amazing message of Jesus Christ that can make people new, turn lives upside down and right way up!

So, what about church-planting? What about the Church of Ireland developing a more evangelistic approach to the needs of Irish people? It will take imagination in how to reach different kinds of people in different kinds of situations. It’s not just a matter of saying “Our doors are open for people to come in,” for by and large people are simply not going to walk in. The Church of Ireland has got to take seriously Jesus’ command to ‘go and make disciples.’ This will mean evangelism. This will mean church-planting. This will mean re-discovering Christ’s commands to go out and be fishers of men, disciples who make disciples, churches that plant churches. The Church of Ireland will need to become generous in promoting this, more flexible in releasing all kinds of people to be involved, less clergy dependent, less centralized in its organization, and more willing to resource local churches which take the risk of undertaking such church-planting.

How about it? Does the Church of Ireland see the need? Is it ‘up’ for the challenge? Is it even willing to get a conversation started, a debate going, never mind taking the amazing step of promoting an Anglican church-planting conference?

Headlines in the Irish Daily Mail newspaper (Thursday February 18th) announced the opening of an Islamic university in Ireland situated in CityWest, Dublin. What caused this to be headlines is that the School is being funded by Saudi Arabia, which has funded similar schools in England where controversy has surrounded aspects of the curriculum. In England, a British Muslim teacher who had taught for 18 years at the King Fahad Academy, a London school owned, run and funded by Saudi Arabia, claimed that pupils at the school were being taught from Arabic textbooks which described Christians as ‘pigs’ and Jews as ‘monkeys’. Indeed, the paper reports that in 2008, an enquiry into Muslim schools in Britain by a leading think-tank suggested that more than 60% of them are linked to potentially dangerous Islamic fundamentalists. The fear in Ireland is that this new school could promote the same kind of intolerant and racist thinking.

The announcement of the opening of this school makes sense of a recent bizarre change to the Irish Blasphemy law in 2009. This law, which led to outrage amongst Ireland’s atheist community, was a puzzle to many as no-one had called for such a change and no public controversy had preceeded it - it was simply introduced and narrowly passed in Leinster House. The new law was introduced to protect religions other than christianity and defines blasphemy as ‘publishing or uttering matter that is grossly abusive or insulting in relation to matters sacred by any religion, thereby intentionally causing outrage among a substantial number of adherents of that religion, with some defences..’

It seems then, along with the recent announcement by the Irish government that it is to allow the introduction of Shariah law in the Irish banking system, that the Blasphemy law was designed to pave the way for the introduction into Ireland of Saudi schools and Saudi money. The Irish government is desperate for a way out of its present economic crisis that has left Ireland in billions of euros of debt. Saudi money, whether in banking or building schools, seems to be regarded as a good bet, but at what price? Saudi Arabia is a state associated with extremism and the funding of terrorist organizations as well as the persecution of Christians. What impact will Saudi funds and Saudi funded institutions have on Irish society and relationships in Irish society? Will its promotion of an extreme form of Islam be felt in Ireland? One thing is for certain, the new Blasphemy law will be no protection against Islamic extremism. Rather, its introduction would seem to be for the purpose of prohibiting any discussion, debate or criticism of the religious views and teachings of Ireland’s new Saudi masters.

This year’s General Convention of the the Episcopal Church (TEC) has witnessed the victory of liberal-catholic theology over the teachings of the Bible.   The convention voted to overthrow a moratorium on allowing gay bishops and to start preparing liturgies and theological resources for the blessing of same-sex partnerships and gay marriages.  But what sort of victory is it?  Looking at what is happening in TEC, it has all the hallmarks of  a ‘Pyrrhic victory’, a victory that has come at devastating and ruinous cost.  

Over 200 of its own clergy have already left TEC because it has walked away from the plain teaching of the Bible and traditional Christian doctrine, expressed in Anglicanism in the 39 Articles and 1662 BCP.   Along with these clergy and many individual parishes, the bishops and dioceses of San Joaquin, Pittsburgh, Quincy, and Fort Worth are being litigated against because they are leaving the denomination in protest over TEC’s militant gay agenda.  Millions of dollars are being spent by TEC in litigation and at this year’s convention over 4 million dollars has been set aside to pursue further litigation.  Within TEC itself, 26 Bishops have since signed a minority report, repudiating the action of the General Convention.  With many orthodox and conservative anglicans having already left TEC to form the Anglican Communion in North America (ACNA), and the numbers in TEC declining, the latest triumph of liberal-catholicism may yet prove to be fatal for its future survival.  

Already, much of world anglicanism has officially through the GAFCON movement rejected the unrepentant TEC as a Christian entity.  The ‘god’ worshipped by TEC is not the God and Father of our Lord Jesus Christ, as the Scriptures proclaim.  Rather, it is a ‘god’ of their own canons, a ‘god’ fashioned in the image of their own secular society.  Its latest pronouncements will do nothing to bring it back into the fold of mainstream anglicanism.  By its victory, it has consigned itself to a stagnant backwater, spiritually unhealthy and dangerous to all who come near it.

The same intolerant, militant liberal-catholicism that has led to this in TEC is at work in the Church of Ireland.  When these people look at the havoc caused by the actions of TEC, is that really the kind of future they want for the Church of Ireland?   Are they prepared to ruin the Church of Ireland in their quest to get their own way?  If they are, faithful anglicans within the Church of Ireland cannot afford to let them take our denomination in this direction and must work hard to ensure that Irish Anglicanism remains true to the Gospel of our Lord Jesus Christ.    

On Monday 6th July, the Fellowship of Confessing Anglicans UK & Ireland was launched.  It was attended by over 1600 people, including members of the Church of Ireland.  Indeed, two Irish bishops, Ken Clarke of Kilmore and Harold Miller of Down and Dromore,  were publicly welcomed by the organisers.

Contributors to the day emphasised that this was not a schism - that has already been introduced into Anglicanism by the Episcopal Church of the USA when it consecrated an openly gay man to be bishop of New Hampshire in 2003.  Rather, the FCA UK & Ireland is  a movement of those concerned for Anglicanism to remain true to its biblical and historic doctrinal roots and to promote the Gospel of Christ on this ground alone.  Originating from the GAFCON meeting in Jerusalem 2008, the FCA seeks to offer a safe haven to those marginalized by a militant liberal-revisionist ecclesiastical hierarchy as well as to be a voice for orthodox anglicanism.

How does it affect the Church of Ireland?  The short answer is no-one knows yet.  Appearances suggest that the Church of Ireland is hiding its head in the sand when it comes to facing upto the major issues that are dividing the Anglican Communion.    The danger with this is that the Church of Ireland could find itself cut off from mainstream Anglicanism represented by the FCA.  In the meantime, individuals and churches within the Church of Ireland are signing upto the FCA.  As that gathers momentum, the Church of Ireland will have to face up to the new reality within worldwide Anglicanism that FCA represents.

One can only hope and pray that the Church of Ireland as a denomination will not walk away from the historic Christian faith but will firmly align itself with the majority of Anglicans worldwide who want to promote the Gospel and the traditional Christian and bibilical standards that have so long characterized Anglicanism.

The GAFCON Statement, including the Jerusalem Declaration, has been released, and can be read online here.

Login and comment below about what you think of it, and what it means for the Church of Ireland.

One of the features of GAFCON being held in Jerusalem have been the visits to various sites associated with the story of Jesus. From time to time during the last week participants of GAFCON have de-camped en masse from the conference centre, to board buses and be transported to places around Jerusalem, Bethlehem and Galilee. No mean feat to accomodate and choreograph tours of over 1000 people!

Today, being the Jewish Sabbath, the conference staff were given a rest as GAFCON participants took to their buses to visit Galilee. Take away the ornate church buildings and claims that ‘this is the spot where’, the tour really did drive home that Christianity proclaims a message that is based on historical facts. Seeing the landscape of the Judean wilderness, the Jordan valley, the Golan heights on the far side of the Sea of Galilee, the excavated ruins of the village of Capernaum and its Synagogue (built on the visible ruins of an earlier Synagogue from the time of Jesus), truly brought home the historicity of the story of redemption.

Christianity rests on events that truly happened! We know they happened because of the eye-witness evidence of the people who walked with Jesus, and saw the crucified and risen Lord. More than that, they talked and ate with him, and listened to him as he explained the meaning of it all. This is what they wrote: ‘That which was from the beginning, which we have heard, which we have seen with our eyes, which we have looked upon and touched with our hands, concerning the word of life - the life was made manifest and we saw it, and testify to it and proclaim to you the eternal life which was with the Father…’ (1 John 1:1-2): and again, Peter says, ‘ For we did not follow cleverly devised myths when we made known to you the power and coming of our Lord Jesus Christ, but we were eye-witnesses of his majesty.’

In other words, not only do we have historical events (reliably eye-witnessed), but also the Spirit given interpretation of those events. We truly know why Jesus came, why he did what he; why he died; and why he rose again. Because we have God’s interpretation of these events recorded in Scripture, we are not left with uncertainty as to what the message of Christianity is.

The present crisis in the Anglican Communion is precisely about this interpretation of the meaning of Jesus for today. Those in the revisionist camp want to do away with the NT interpretation of the life, death, and resurrection of Jesus in favour of their own interpretation, which unsurprisingly reflects 21st century secular western cultural mores. However, since none of the bishops of TEC and other revisionist bishops are either Apostles or eye-witnesses themselves of the life, death, and resurrection of Jesus, their re-interpretation of the Gospel events carries no weight whatsoever. In any case, since their re-interpretation is tied to the changing views of western culture, one day they believe one thing, and the next another!

GAFCON is calling the Anglican Communion back to the apostolic message of Jesus. Not only is this apostolic interpretation the only valid interpretation of Christ, but it is the only message that is the power of God to bring forgiveness and Christ-like transformation to the lives of sinful mankind.

Today was a short day at GAFCON, but a highly significant day. Details will be released later by the GAFCON leadership, but what can be said is that decisions are being taken by those at GAFCON in a very tangible atmosphere of prayer, joy and worship. Not only is there a deep sense of fellowship in Christ, but also there is a huge desire to move forward under the Lordship of Christ to accomplish his mission in the world.

Yesterday, a wonderful aspect of the corporate worship of GAFCON was the marvellous singing led by the members of the Mothers’ Union Choir of Nigeria. But even that was trumped by a choir of four south American bishops, one toting a guitar, leading in a time of joyful praise - in spanish! Joyful as the fellowship is at GAFCON, it is most certainly not a spiritual ‘jamboree’. There is a serious determination to be about the heavenly Father’s business and this is expressed in the workshops, the plenary sessions, and in casual conversations.

Those who profess faith in Christ and are suspicious, or dismissory, or sceptical, or fearful, or downright hostile to GAFCON, should pause to think what exactly they are doing. Here at GAFCON are joyful, committed believers in Christ, faithful Anglicans, intensely loyal to the teachings of the Scripture as expressed in the formularies of Anglicanism: here, amongst the throng at GAFCON are some of Anglicanism’s best scholars and leaders; here are some of Anglicanism’s best evangelists; and here are people committed to godly living in Christ Jesus. What’s bad about that? Are those who sneer at or dismiss GAFCON jealous of the vitality and christian determination of the churches represented here? Do they feel threatened by the Gospel emphasis of GAFCON? If so, how then can they claim with any integrity to really have faith in Christ? They should be rejoicing at GAFCON, not keeping it at arm’s length!

GAFCON represents a movement that, under God, will renew Anglicanism and take it forward in serving Christ in the world. Isn’t that what those who have the Gospel at heart and the best interests of the Church of Ireland want to do? Then, if that is so, the decisions and statements of GAFCON should rejoice the heart and cause us in the Church of Ireland to want to align ourselves in joyful committment to the Gospel imperatives they reflect.