Anglicans - how do you come to grips with the lack of a theological origin of...

[JohnTerry]

...your religion? Henry VIII would have remained a Roman Catholic if the Church had allowed him the divorce he wanted. In that event, there'd be no Anglican chuch. The basis for Anglicanism is not theological - it was purely a matter of convenience for a portly monarch.

So today, now that it's a Queen and she's a figurehead, what's the theological relevance of Anglicanism?
cynic - Christianity was the adaptation of the reported teachings of a Jewish social reformer into Greek dualist philosphy then popular in Asia Minor. Agree or disagree with the theology itself, the origins were in fact theological. A bunch of men believed X instead of Y and a religion was formed. Forget whether you agree with the ideas - the point is that ideas were the original basis for the organization.

Anglicanism wasn't formed on the basis of any ideas other than Henry VIII's idea that he wanted a male heir and his idea that his present wife couldn't give him one, and his idea that he should be allowed to divorce her for that reason any marry someone else who might be able to produce a male heir. Those aren't theological ideas - there is no theological origin to Anglicanism. It's the "Henry VIII wanted a divorce" religion.

 

[Schroedinger'smMommym]

What do you mean "lack of theological origin"? Anglicans can claim some of the greatest theological minds of the 16th and 17th centuries as our forebears - Erasmus, Cranmer, Ridley, Latimer, Parker, Donne, Herbert - not to mention the great English churchmen of the centuries between 597 (the foundation of the English Church) to 1534 (the split with Rome), including St Augustine of Canterbury, St Cuthbert, St Bede, St Anselm, Lanfranc, and Mother Julian of Norwich. Indeed, few churches anywhere in the world have such a rich theological history as the Anglican tradition.

Henry VIII doesn't really have all that much to do with the formation of the Anglican Church. He led the break with Rome on a structural level (which was certainly a significant break), and he dissolved the monasteries in 1536 (which was much more significant in my view), but the Anglican Church in its modern form was not the product of the Henrician Reformation, which simply produced a Catholic Church without Rome and with some Erasmian traits (bear in mind that the authority of Rome at that time was less central to Catholics than it was to become after the Counter-Reformation). The Church of England is really the product of the Elizabethan Settlement of 1559, which established the Church of England as a middle-course between Catholicism and Protestantism. And such we have remained: a sensible, reasonable middle-course, eschewing extremes and repudiating violence, but trying to reconcile opposites and bring the alienated extremes together. Reconciliation, toleration, and unity in diversity are the cornerstones of the Anglican Church. We respect tradition, but recognise the need to live in the present. We adore the sacraments, but we revere the Word of God. If that isn't a sound theological basis for a Church, I don't know what is.

 

[KyleMe]

People in every nation re-invent religion to suit their needs.

For example, in USA, we have Mormonism, Christianity with an American foundation.