Mercedes Benz and Evangelicals in the Church of England?

republished, with permission, from the Church of England Newspaper, 22 June 2007

'Lord, won't you buy me a Mercedes-Benz?' is the plaintive backing song used in the famous car advert in 1995, and again this year. The sentiment of the song, by Janis Joplin (from her 1971 album, 'Pearl'), raises key questions about materialism and theology, which are often echoed on our alpha courses at St Mary Islington. A great song, with deep questions: but it is the logo of Mercedes-Benz which interests me, as a possible alternative way of exploring unity and diversity in evangelical Anglicanism. More of this later - in the end is the logo - but first the context of our discussion.

Four years ago, I wrote an article, published just before the fourth National Evangelical Anglican Congress (NEAC4), 'Canal, River and Rapids: Contemporary Evangelicalism in the Church of England' (Anvil Vol 20, No 3, 2003). I stressed the exploratory and suggestive nature of the metaphor of watercourses and its fluidity:

It seems to me that our evangelical Anglican identity is 'one' but that we have 'three' theological shapes within it: conservative, open and charismatic... As evangelicals it is perfectly possible to be in more than one course at a time and at different times.

I mentioned John Stott, Michael Green and Alister McGrath as three people who 'navigate' more than one watercourse, showing again the fluidity of the metaphor.

Chris Sugden, in his article last week 'Conservative, charismatic and open. Really?' (CEN 15 June, AM 27 May), questioned the validity of this concept of three streams. The whole of that edition of Anvil is worth reading. As well as my article, it featured the addresses given at 'Islington Conversations Eclectics' in April 2003 on the theme of 'Our Mission in Britain'. Vaughan Roberts gave the conservative perspective, Christina Baxter the open perspective and Mark Stibbe the charismatic perspective.

The person who summed up the conference at the end, and whose essay is also in that edition, was Philip Giddings, convenor of Anglican Mainstream. He wrote:

So the hope for the day was that we would find clarity about our common identity as we together explored our common task. And so it proved.

Vaughan Roberts, Rector of St Ebbe's, Oxford, has since told me that he has been giving out copies of that edition, as he considered it to be very fair. He used the three streams concept in his pre-NEAC4 article, 'Rallying Round the Banner' (CEN 11 Sept 2003), as did Martin Davie in his pre-NEAC4 article 'The Three Challenges for Evangelicals Today' (CEN 1 May 2003).

Chris Sugden, last week, mentioned the powerful (who make differential definitions) and the powerless (who want to keep commonality). Is he suggesting that those who come up with suggestive definitions are the former and he is the latter?

Later he relates the issues of race and apartheid to enforced definitions. This does not fit the current discussion. Charismatics seem to me to be happy to be called charismatics - see Mark Stibbe's article mentioned above. Most open evangelicals seem happy to be call themselves 'open' - see adverts in the Church Press, Andrew Carey's article in the CEN two weeks ago, and Bishop Pete Broadbent's ten points 'Towards a definition of open evangelical' (on the Fulcrum site). Some conservatives seem happy to be so called - see Gerald Bray's letter in the CEN last week, the web site of the 'Fellowship of Word and Spirit', and the article (which concluded with some questionable hermeneutics) by its chairman, Simon Vibert, 'Why I am an Anglican' (CEN, 24 Nov 2006, AM 27 Nov 2006):

There has been much discussion about the "Evangelical Centre". Renewing the centre means making sure that the core is not rotten. It means ensuring that the word of God is at the heart of the denomination. And for that reason, whilst labels can be misleading, I own the label "Conservative Evangelical". Whilst popularly referred to, the label "Open Evangelical" is misleading. Did not Jesus say: "Broad is the road that leads to destruction?" The danger of the open way is to do with boundaries. What are the outer edges? What will keep you on the straight road and the narrow way? Only the authentically Anglican narrow way offers that.

Other conservative evangelicals, eg David Holloway, prefer the name 'mainstream', which is somewhat confusing. For if conservatives use the name mainstream for themselves, then does that have the same meaning in the title of 'Anglican Mainstream'?

People who read the Church Press have heard sharp reactions against this concept of three streams before. The Church Times of 9 January 2004 reported a paper, dated October 2003 (just after NEAC4) from a meeting of 'representatives from the Church Society, the Fellowship of Word and Spirit, and Reform,' which was 'strongly critical of some of the people who attended the conference.'

Under the heading "Where do we go from here?" the second paper also says that future gatherings should not include "open folk", but "must blow out of the water the view that evangelicalism is made up of three strands: open, mainstream and charismatic. Open must be excluded."

'Blow out of the water' is quite a violent phrase which, ironically, picks up the water metaphor of concept.

Chris Sugden wrote last week: 'There is a refusal to accept that there is common ground and commonality. It is a refusal to include'. There is no refusal to accept common ground with fellow evangelicals on the part of most open evangelicals. We believe that we are all evangelicals. I stressed that in the introduction to my Anvil article. However, from recent discussions some conservative evangelicals clearly do not want to grant the name of evangelical to open evangelicals.

So, to suggest another way of mapping our commonality and diversity as evangelical Anglicans, I return to the Mercedes-Benz logo. It could be seen as illustrative of the Church of England Evangelical Council (CEEC) as it is meant to be - rather than as it appears at the moment - ie fully representative of evangelical Anglicanism.

The logo could be interpreted as conservative, open and charismatic 'pointers in direction' (rather than 'streams'): CEEC and NEAC should encompass all three.

Now, if we move the perimeter circle inwards somewhat - and I realise that 'somewhat' is a loaded word - then we have the 'evangelical centre' ie moderate conservative, open and charismatic evangelical Anglicans. The danger of this adapted logo, of course, is the rigidity of the circle and we have lost the fluidity of the streams, or watercourses, metaphor. Well, at least it is worth a try...and, interestingly, it is at the centre of the logo where the three 'pointers of direction' converge in commonality.

With that 'dangerous' caveat, it may be worth pondering that amongst Anglicans, there are some extreme conservative evangelicals who are 'six-day creationists'; there are some extreme open evangelicals who see no problem with gay people who are in sexual relationships being consecrated as bishops; there are some extreme charismatics who downplay the medical profession and see demon possession everywhere. These examples, it seems to me, would not be within the 'evangelical centre'. As David Martin has pointed out, 'the unbounded is soon the empty'.

In the end, however, the 'evangelical centre' should be seen more in what it affirms than in what it denies - and for an attempt at that, see the Fulcrum web site.

Jacques Maritain wrote a fine book on metaphysics and epistemology Distinguer pour unir (1932). Rowan Williams, in Grace and Necessity (2005), has commented on it and translated its title as 'Distinguishing so as to unite'. We should not be afraid of distinctions based on observation and frequent use. They may indeed help the mapping and unity of our evangelical movement.

At the moment, as we approach the crucial General Synod motion on the concept of a Covenant for the Anglican Communion, commonality is the key emphasis.