Thursday, May 20, 2004

One Sign

A good sign of a vagante church is a listing of their apostolic succession!

3 comments:

Vampire Rabbit said...

I admit that many vagantes do, but their succession is usually suspect at best. This one is far more solid than even that of the Episcopalian Protestant Church of the United States of America! Very interesting history of where the hierarchs reigned and for how long however.

C. Wingate said...

Well of course, Nick, you (in proxy for your church) do not accept the Anglican succession as valid for a variety of reasons. But that's not the point. The real Anglican churches don't even see the need to list out their succession; they do not even anticipate controversy. Various "continuing" churches (generally the more fringy ones) do list it, because they, apparently, anticipate that their succession is controversial.

ROAC's claims of succession cease to be interesting as soon as they trace back into an established Orthodox church; if there is controversy over succession it is in those first few steps backwards. ROAC baptism is, of course, perfectly valid-- for an Anglican. For other orders it is a moot issue.

Vampire Rabbit said...

ROAC of course is established, as I expect among the protestants, the "Continuing Anglican" movement would say since it has not changed to accept homosexual marriages, and lesbian bishops. I think the history of Russia's Church and the change of location and rank leading the Church is what is interesting.