When Is It Time To Leave My Church?

Introduction to "When Is It Time To Leave My Church?"

A slightly different version of the reflections that follow this introduction appears in the current issue of the Diocese of BC Diocesan newspaper.

The title may seem unnecessarily negative, even provocative. I admit it was intended to get the reader's attention. But in these thoughts I was seriously trying to imagine what might cause me to feel I had come to the point where it was necessary for me to leave the church that has nurtured my faith for almost all of the past fifty-four years. In the process I hoped I might clarify in my own mind what has brought certain people to the conclusion that their faith requires them to leave the Anglican Church of Canada.

I am afraid I have not come to much greater clarity on this second question. The Anglican Church of Canada has always been a slightly muddled community. This is both a strength and a weakness. Our muddle means that it is possible for a person to share fully in worship within the Anlgican Church while still experiencing some doubts and uncertainties on the way. We do not demand conformity, clarity, absolute agreement before fully embracing people as participants in our community. We are willing to allow for flexibility and to trust the intentions of peoples' hearts demonstrated in their desire to attend worship and participate in the eucharist.

The weakness in our muddle is the potential loss of any coherent identity. If we acept absolutely every expression of faith, we may eventually stand for nothing. I do not believe we as a church are anywhere near standing for nothing. We are a Christian church. We celebrate the central mystery of Christian faith over and over in the eucharist in which we acknowledge the death and ressurection of Jesus Christ and open ourselves to the life and work of God's Spirit in our midst through that action. We continue to read, study and preach the scriptures. The historic Christian Creeds continue to appear in all our officially sanctioned worship resources, affirming the fullness of the traditions and content of Christian faith. We pray together and challenge one another to live the life of love we have experienced in God through Christ.

It is possible there may be isolated clergy, or even bishops, who appear on the surface to have wandered so far afield that they have forsaken the right to identify themselves as Christian. I have never personally met, or sat down and had a protracted conversation with, such an errant cleric. It is my suspicion that, if I had the patience to seriously engage with a person within the Anglican Church of Canada who might appear to me to be swimming in a completely different ocean, that we would eventually discover that the water is not all that different after all. If we could approach each other with open minds and gracious hearts, I suspect we would find that there is more that unites us than divides us.

I was deeply moved a couple of years ago by a colleague who in a discussion around who may or may not receive eucharist, said "We feed people, not because they are converted, but so they will be converted." This seems to me to be the church of which I want to be a part. I eat at the table, not because I am converted. I eat at the table because I need to be converted, over and over, again and again, week by week. I need to come and lay before God the brokenness of my own life and allow my heart to be shattered afresh by the mercy of Christ as I receive the bread and wine of his presence. I need to be called to surrender more fully and to open my heart more deeply to the presence of Christ at work in my life. I need to be challenged to see the idols to which I cling and to allow them to be rooted out of my heart. I need to be called to examine my idolatries of thought and to listen carefully to those whose believes may seem to differ from my most fondly cherished beliefs. This is all part of the process of conversion in which I must share.

There is no means test, no theological character profile that must be administered before Christ bestows upon me the gift of his grace.

When I was in seminary, anyone who did not lay down the law pretty clearly, was accused of preaching "cheap grace." If you read Romans 5 you will discover indeed that God's grace is not "cheap"; God's grace is free! I want to be in a church where I experience God's grace as free. I want to be in a place that trusts God's Spirit to be at work in peoples' lives without always having to tell me what that work is going to look like.

As I say in the words that follow, the fundamental issue is trust. Do we trust those who kneel or stand around the table with us? Do we trust that, whatever their understanding or lack of understanding of the finer points of theology may be, the fact that they gather at Christ's table means they desire to open their hearts to God's Spirit? Do we trust that, wherever there is an openness to the work of God's Spirit, that Spirit is present and at work, even if we feel unable to see exactly how that work may be unfolding?

I choose to trust that there is love in the hearts of those who sing and pray and break bread in Anglican churches. And I believe "God is love, and those who abide in love abide in God, and God abides in them." (I John 4:16b) And I strive to model my life after Paul's extraordinary vision of this love that is "patient," and "does not insist on its own way," that "bears all things, believes all things, hopes all things, endures all things." And I take my stand on the deep conviction that, no matter what," this "Love never ends." (I Corinthians 13:4-8)

There is so much I do not understand. "Now we see in a mirror, dimly... Now I know only in part. (I Corinthians 13:12) Dimly I see the outline of Christ in your life as I pray, even if only dimly, you may see the presence of love in me. So, I cannot walk away from you. I cannot abandon you, even if you are wrong, perhaps especially if you are wrong. Paul tells me to "Welcome those who are weak in faith." (Romans 14:1) So I welcome you, as I pray you may welcome me when my faith is shaky and my heart is dark. A church that welcomes me when I struggle, is a church that it will be hard for me to find a reason to leave.

When Is It Time To Leave My Church?

In twenty-five years of parish ministry I have seen many marriages end. The end usually comes when the talking is over. When it is no longer possible to have conversation, any hope of keeping a relationship together is usually dead.

There are those in the Anglican Church of Canada who have concluded that the time for talking is over. For some members of the Anglican Church there seems no longer to be any value in continuing the conversation. Our differences are too great; the gaping chasm separating us cannot be traversed by words.


But perhaps people are more complex than this simple scenario suggests. In my experience, the end of a marriage usually happens even before the conversation stops. The fact that words have run out is simply the final dying gasp of a relationship that has been suffering for some time.

So, what causes the death of a relationship?

There are many causes for the demise of any relationship. But, common to all relational death is the end of trust. Somewhere along the way, one or both parties decide it is no longer worth the risk of extending the gift of trust. The likelihood of betrayal and violence is too great to make the risk of trust worth the price. It feels as if the only hope for safety is to withdraw from relationship with this person who has become too threatening.

In some marriage breakdowns the betrayal has been so great that it is probably unrealistic to expect any resumption of trust. Family violence, repeated marital unfaithfulness, and consistent unwillingness to deal with substance abuse, all represent such a fundamental betrayal of the marital relationship that the preservation of the health and sanity of at least one person may require separation.

Parishioners, or whole parishes that are determined to leave the Anglican Church of Canada have, apparently concluded that a betrayal of such magnitude has occurred that the preservation of spiritual health and sanity makes separation essential. As a person who remains in leadership within the Anglican Church of Canada, I can only look with sadness at the departure of people I have known and loved, in some cases for as long as thirty years. Any marriage breakdown is always a tragedy. The further fracturing of the church institution in our day can only be seen as a continuing manifestation of the brokenness that lies at the heart of human experience.

The end of any relationship is an important time for serious self-examination. When a marriage ends, I want to ask both parties, what was your contribution to the demise of this relationship. As a person in leadership within the Anglican Church of Canada, I must ask myself what offense I may have caused that has led others to conclude they can no longer worship with me. Is there anything in my ministry that is so abusive, violent, offensive, and wrong that I would recommend anyone to break trust with me and refuse to break bread with me at Christ’s table?

No doubt in thirty years of ordained ministry, twenty of them in the same community, I have made many mistakes. I have done stupid things and, at times have been petty, mean and insensitive. But I have done all these things in my marriage. Yet my marriage survives, even thrives in spite of times of pain and struggle. These are simply the normal routine bumps along the road in any relationship. It would take more than the frequent but relatively minor manifestations of my own frailty to derail my marriage.

Many people in the church I serve have experienced the disappointment of my bumbling efforts to be a faithful priest and servant of Christ. There are people who have, at times been deeply hurt by my insensitivity and failure. But we continue in community. We exercise forgiveness and forbearance. The betrayal has not been so great that trust has been irredeemably broken. Recognizing our weaknesses and bearing one another’s failures, we carry on in the journey of imperfect human community.

There must be something more than the common failures of human relationship to cause a final break in community. What has the Anglican Church of Canada done that has made it necessary for some of our members to feel they must come out from among us in search of a community of greater faithfulness and truth? Why can we no longer worship together? Why are we unable to continue in allegiance to the same bishop?

I suppose I am the wrong person to answer these questions. As one who remains generally content within the frail vessel that is the Anglican Church of Canada, I obviously have not felt so abused by this institution that I must leave in order to preserve my spiritual well-being. What might cause me to feel I must leave a church? How would I know it was time to say this relationship is over?

These are difficult questions. The burden of biblical directive is to “Bear with one another and, if anyone has a complaint against another, forgive each other.” (Colossians 3:13. See also Ephesians 4:2, 32; Romans 14:13, 19, 15:7) We are instructed in the Bible to forgive, to put up with each other, to be humble, gentle and caring toward one another. We are to bear one another’s burdens, to stand by the one who is weaker, to honour others above ourselves, to encourage one another, and to avoid judgment, provocation, biting, devouring, and favouritism. Leaving another person will always be difficult for anyone who seeks to embody these qualities in relationship.

So what might cause me to separate from another person?

I have twice encouraged one partner in a marriage to leave the relationship. In both cases it was my perception that the person I counseled to leave was in serious danger in relationship with a person who was completely unwilling to address the issues causing the presence of violence in their relationship. Since people have left my church, I must ask myself if I am the perpetrator of such violence that it is no longer safe for such people to share in worship under my leadership. What would such violence look like in a church?

Violence in the church usually takes one of two forms. I have witnessed violence in the church when a person in power uses their position for personal gain against the well-being of the person who the leader is abusing in pursuit of his own physical, material, spiritual, or emotional gratification.

The second form of violence I have seen in the church occurs when a person in authority demands that everyone conforms to the leader’s vision despite what church members may perceive to be their conscience. This conformity may take the form of a demand that you believe all that the leader believes or behave like the leader because the leader knows that his or her choices are universally true and right for all people at all times.

I would encourage anyone to withdraw from a community that accepts leadership that uses its position to seek personal gain, or demands conformity of belief and behaviour contrary to personal conscience. The sign that a church leader has reached the point at which withdrawal from that leader becomes necessary, is when that leader is unwilling to entertain even the possibility that he or she may be wrong.

Paul taught that the sign of God’s Spirit is the presence of freedom (II Corinthians 3:17). He suggested that the purpose of Christ’s mission was that human beings might live in freedom (Galatians 5:1). Where there is freedom there is hope. Where there is freedom we can always trust that God’s Spirit is at work. Error will be corrected in time. Fellowship can be sustained because we walk together in respect and love for one another. When I fail it is because I do not trust the work of God’s Spirit in the lives of those who may conceive of following Christ in ways different than my understanding. Where I have done violence to others is where I have been unwilling to discern the faint outline of God’s Spirit at work in those whose experience of life has brought them to a place different than the place I find myself. When I encounter such violence it is time to leave my church.

I do not see this violence in the Anglican Church of Canada. I see struggle and difference. I see an occasionally messy community striving to stay open to the Spirit of Christ and to be faithful to its perception of where that Spirit is leading. As long as I find room within this church to follow where I believe God’s Spirit is leading, it is not time for me to leave my church. I will not leave those who give me the respect of freedom and openness. I pray others may find in me the grace I desire to extend to them. To stay in community I need only the willingness to continue the mysterious journey of discerning the work of God’s liberating Spirit in our midst.

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Why I Remain an Anglican

this post originally appeared in the January 2009 edition of "The Diocesan Post" of the Anglican Diocese of British Columbia.

If you have your own reasons "Why I Remain an Anglican" add them to the comments section.

Seven years ago I was invited by a local paper to write an article explaining why I “remain an Anglican.” The request came in response to a fellow priest’s decision to resign from the Anglican Church and start a new church.

Today things are not greatly different than they were in 2001. I remain an Anglican, serving now in the parish I served then and people continue to leave our church. Usually they depart one by one, sometimes as families. Occasionally whole congregations pack up and move to the other side of town. And so I wonder how might I answer the question if it were posed to me today, “Why remain an Anglican?”

I could give historical reasons; there are several and they are good. I could give reasons argued from theology; but theology can always be argued in a variety of directions. My real reasons for remaining an Anglican are deeply personal and they organize themselves around five basic convictions about the nature of life and of the Anglican Church.

1. I remain an Anglican because I know that life is messy. People are often disagreeable, hard to get along with, cantankerous and sometimes just irritating. We will always find things in other people that are disagreeable. No group of people larger than one will ever experience blissful harmony all the time. Families would seldom survive if we parted company every time we disagreed or had a squabble.

Seven years ago I said, “The tendency to separate seems to be contagious. The history of the Christian church indicates that those who divide will likely divide again. I cannot imagine what might merit risking one more break in the already fragmented body of Christ.” The last seven years has proven this again and again. Communities that divide because their way is the only right way soon find another way that someone in their new community is getting it wrong and division continues to spread.

Does this mean I have no convictions? Does this mean I settle for anything that goes just so we can stay together?

2. I remain an Anglican because the Anglican Church is a community of Christian faith. In 2001 my brother who left the church said he had to go because the Anglican Church “has increasingly allowed the values and demands of a decadent and demoralized western culture to set more and more of its agenda.” I did not see it then; I do not see it now. I do not believe we are any more or less greedy, self-obsessed, power hungry, or violent than every church has ever been throughout all of history.

The “agenda” in the church where I serve has not changed one bit in the last seven years.

We are a community of Christian faith. We exist to worship God who is known to us in Jesus Christ. We desire only to follow faithfully where God’s Holy Spirit leads us and to serve all people with love, compassion and grace. We believe God calls us to grow daily in our ability to bear the fruit of the Spirit in “love, joy, peace, patience, kindness, generosity, faithfulness, gentleness, and self-control.” And, as I said seven years ago, “I will never learn these qualities from people with whom I always get along.” I need uncomfortable people, people who disagree with me and with whom I argue in order to learn “patience, kindness,” and the faithfulness to which Scripture calls us again and again. So I must not give up on those in my faith community who I find difficult or awkward.

3. I remain an Anglican because love never gives up. Even if the church to which I belong makes mistakes, or is at times compromised, confused, even a little bit chaotic love is stronger and more lasting than all of the ways in which we might get it wrong.

My mother recently died. As I write these words, my desk is covered with cards expressing love, compassion, care and concern for me and for my family. Many of the expressions of condolence I have received over the past few days have been deeply touching in their sensitivity, gentleness and kindness. These cards come mostly from Anglicans. Some of them come from Anglicans with whom I worshiped as a small child representing fifty-four years of connection and affection. The people who wrote these cards are people in whom I see the face of Christ. They are people who, even when the reflection was terribly faint, have been willing to continue struggling to see the face of Christ in my life. In these lives I experience the deep work of God’s Spirit. It is hard to imagine what would motivate me to leave these people.

4. I remain an Anglican because the Anglican Church is a large and diverse community. We live in a world that is deeply broken with often violent and horrifying results. Almost the only surviving international communities left in our world are the corporate consumer communities that are bound together by a common economic interest. The world desperately needs to see that it is possible for a community to hold together across barriers of culture, language, ethnicity, and race without the binding motivation of self-interest, or the benefit of economic gain or power advantage.

The Anglican Church contains people of many races, languages, and ethnic backgrounds. It is a church that has room in it for everyone. We do not demand that you achieve a certain socio-economic status before you join. You do not have to pass a theology test before you qualify for membership. We ask only what Jesus asked, that you acknowledge your poverty and are willing to mourn. You need only to “hunger and thirst for righteousness,” be pure in heart, willing to exercise mercy, and to live as a peacemaker. (Matthew 5:3-9) And, in the end, we embrace one another even when we fail miserably to reach any of these exalted goals.

And so, my final reason for remaining an Anglican is the most important reason of all.

5. I remain an Anglican because I am a failure. The Anglican Church is a church for failures. The Anglican Church is a place where I can beat my breast and say, “God, be merciful to me, a sinner!” (Luke 18:13)

I remain an Anglican simply because there is room in this church for me. The Anglican Church is my home. And home is the place where they always have to take you in. If I can only belong when I get all the right answers, I will never be at home in any church. If there is only room for me because my behaviour measures up to some external standard of prescribed conduct, I will always be excluded. There is no room for me in any community where I need to be smart enough, good enough, clean enough, pure enough.

I can only belong in a community where I am trusted, not that I will always get it right but that I am doing the best I can to follow God’s Spirit. I can only belong in a community where, when I kneel at the altar rail and put out my empty hands, I am told that God believes the intention of my heart and desires to fill me with love, blessing, grace and mercy. I remain an Anglican because, when we gather at the Lord’s Table, we are all the same. None of us is special, none is better than anyone else. We gather with our shared poverty, our deep hunger and hearts that desire only to open to God in Christ and to receive again and again the bread that feeds us for eternal life.

You see, no matter how low I set the bar, there are no standards to which I can measure up. There are no great achievements I can hold out to say, this proves I am worthy to eat at the table with you. The only reason for us to separate is if you can no longer accept me just as I am - stumbling, confused, broken, and often lost, but longing to have you see Christ in me, as I long to see Christ in you. In the Anglican Church, I am encouraged to see Christ in broken vessels and to find the riches of God’s mercy in failing followers like myself. This community of mercy rooted in faithfulness and love is the only place I will ever be able to belong. This is why I remain an Anglican.

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