Could someone please explain?

[contriteheart]

Hello all,

Could you please help me fit the Anglican/Episcopalian pieces together? I know the origins of the Anglican Church. I am assuming that Episcopalianism is simply the American branch of the Anglican Church (although this could be quite wrong).

Where does the continuing church fit in? Are the Anglicans and the ECUSA related more strongly than simply being in communion with one another? Where do the high and low churchers fit in?

I know these are dumb questions, but I'm confused. Help?

Your sister in Christ,
Grace

[Thomas2618]

You are correct that ECUSA is basically the Anglican Church's branch in the Usa. It has a different name for a few reasons, one of which being the hostility of the colonists towards England around the American Revolution. The continuing Episcopal churches are those that have broken off from ECUSA for some reason or another and are not in communion with the Anglican Communion. In the Anglican Communion world-wide there are many parishes that are either low, broad, or high church...those descriptions have to do with how the worship goes. (You also have Anglo-Catholic and Evangelical which deal more with theology) These are all found in the Anglican Communion and in ECUSA, though ECUSA tends to bear more to the broad to high church and closer to the Anglo-Catholic side, though you still find a good bit of it that is not. The continuing churches usually tend to be more Evangelical and more low church, I think.

[Wiffey]

You are correct that ECUSA is basically the Anglican Church's branch in the Usa. It has a different name for a few reasons, one of which being the hostility of the colonists towards England around the American Revolution. The continuing Episcopal churches are those that have broken off from ECUSA for some reason or another and are not in communion with the Anglican Communion. In the Anglican Communion world-wide there are many parishes that are either low, broad, or high church...those descriptions have to do with how the worship goes. (You also have Anglo-Catholic and Evangelical which deal more with theology) These are all found in the Anglican Communion and in ECUSA, though ECUSA tends to bear more to the broad to high church and closer to the Anglo-Catholic side, though you still find a good bit of it that is not. The continuing churches usually tend to be more Evangelical and more low church, I think.

Thankyou for this post. It really helps those of us who are new to understand what is going on.

And....a general thankyou to all the members of this forum who are so helpful, patient and knowledgeable! I know I've learned a lot from reading all the posts here.

[contriteheart]

Thanks, Thomas2618!

Your sister in Christ,
Grace

[Thomas2618]

No problem...I know exactly how it feels to be need clarification on things like that...I was doing my research into the Anglican Church and Episcopal Church just about a year ago. I remember having so many questions and feeling like they were dumb questions, but I found that there were no dumb questions. They are all important. By asking a lot I learned a lot, and now I feel very knowledgible; and I have much more to learn, as do all of us. We'll be here welcoming and helping as you look into our dearly loved Church.
God's peace be with you.
Thomas

[Polycarp1]

Like the Orthodox Church, the Anglican Communion is a group of autocephalous national churches in full communion with each other. In general, the adjective "Anglican" is attached to each national church, except in the Indian subcontinent, where a merger of "Protestant" denominations that preserved the apostolic succession resulted in the "Church of South India," the "Church of North India," and so on. The other two exceptions are the U.S.A. and Scotland, which use "Episcopal." The U.S. church was formed immediately after the Revolutionary War, and a reference to the established Church of England would have betrayed the ideals that gave rise to the war. In Scotland, the established church was the presbyterian Church of Scotland, and the term Scottish Episcopal Church was adopted to (a) clarify that they were the church that preserved bishops, and (b) differentiate from England, again for obvious reasons: Scotland vehemently dislikes being considered as an attachment to England rather than a full and equal partner in the U.K.

To better lay claim to their idea of preserving traditional Anglican values, which they felt the Episcopal Church was abandoning, the breakoff groups formed since 1970 that constitute "continuing Anglicanism" tended to adopt names with "Anglican" as an element of their title: the Anglican Mission in America, the Anglican Province of America, etc. An older separate group, the Reformed Episcopal Church, chose to keep the "Episcopal" title.

[Thomas2618]

Ok, so I had to go to a dictionary website and look up "autocephalous" (I know some of us were wondering...) and it looks like it pretty much means the same as autonomous or independant, though there may be some connotational differences that I don't know about. "Autocephalous" is now my new word of the week for this week.
Thomas;)