Just a thought, on your Anglo-Catholic thing etc (and I say this being very clear that I'm not exactly the kind of Anglican you're talking about, although I think I'm probably the only one regularly popping in to TLT)... mostly those Anglo-Catholics who are liberal/progressive/"insert label here" have a place to lay their heads.
Well, my thought is that on STR, Anglicans of a very Anglo-Catholic persuasion might find themselves with constant arguments with evangelical Anglicans about Catholic distinctives like a belief in 7 equal sacraments, veneration of Saints, transubstantiation (In some cases, depending on the Anglo-Catholic), Eucharist Adoration, a strong view of a three-fold ministry that includes an emphasis on Apostolic Succession and ontological marks on the soul, and so on and so forth. I feel like a liberal Anglo-Catholic Episcopalian could slide right in here and for the most part fit right in exactly, to the point where no one would know they weren't progressive Roman Catholics apart from the faith identifier and discussions about the Pope's authority or something.
So, I see at least a hypothetical group that might enjoy this as a supplement or alternate to STR the same way we already provide one for Roman Catholics relative to OBOB. Roman Catholics generally post here because they want some place to be themselves on theologically liberal issues or because they want less stringent combative environment, whereas I think with Anglo-Catholic Anglicans and Episcopalians, they would be coming here to be with a more Catholic group than STR represents as a whole (And might post in both) that sustains the Catholic side of their faith more, though of course they might also post in STR to discuss Anglican distinctives.
Of course, it seems to be a non-issue because it sounds like we're not going to be allowed to do it. It's just something I would like to have seen.
And of course in practice, those folks can already post here- in fellowship and not debating, though I would hope that people wouldn't report them for debating, which would make this less of an issue and sort of defacto extend them full membership rights except for voting, but that's going to be up to individual people who decide to hit the report button or not to hit the report button, without a rule change.
I wonder whether you might do as well or better to look eastwards and think about how to invite Orthodox and Oriental Christians with that kind of leaning, who often I think have less scope within their own traditions than Anglicans do.
Just a thought?
i would probably vote "Yes" on that if a poll were put up for it. I don't have any objection to it. The Anglo-Catholic thing is more of a pet project for me both because I think being from the western tradition like Roman Catholics, they have a very similar experience on Sundays and in their prayer lives, and also because having been an Episcopalian years ago, that church is near and dear to my heart even though I self-identify as Catholic and have not regularly attended Episcopalian Eucharists in a decade or so. I know back when I did identify that way, I would have loved to be have had a forum like this to participate in, that fed the Catholic side of my identity. I think there are probably some people out there like that today.
As we head east, the churches start to have very different liturgical and prayer practices, which may represent more of a difference in terms of perspective, even if some view their sacraments and succession as more valid than Anglican sacraments and succession. So, it'd be a further deviation from the identity of the forum as it stands, in my view. But I like including people and it would be nice to have more people who could talk about some of the eastern theology I allude to occasionally.
Ultimately, I think when people talk about including more groups, I would vote "yes" right up to a line that lands around "progressive Lutheran" (Not sure which way I'd go on that, and more Protestant I'd probably vote no because I'd figure the Liberal Christian area would be fine for them- Liberal Catholic exists as a separate area because of some Catholic distinctives as mentioned earlier in the post that Anglo-Catholic Anglicans have and Eastern Orthodox have to some extent, and *maybe* Lutherans to a much lesser extent, but are really non-existent when you get to Baptist or something, where they have their own distinctives, which I am making no judgement about in this thread except to say that they are not Catholic in practice, obviously, which I doubt they'd disagree with in the sense that I mean it). But of course the center for the forum culturally would always be Rome, it'd just be about a more inclusive vision of who can chat about Catholicism fully and be part of our forum group than maybe official church documents take when saying who is fully a part of their group in a formal real life sense).
However, what I stick my neck out for arguing for is a more select category than what I would ultimately simply click "yes" on if someone else pushed for a poll and got it.
I argue for what I'm passionate about. But given a yes or no vote on something I am less passionate about, I still might vote "yes".
That is the way I see it, too. To be "open", rather than "closed off". The problem we have, which so far we have been able to overcome, is how people perceive the term "liberal". If I say I am liberal, which I am, different people may have a wide range of views as to what that means, many negative.
Well, maybe in the long run this forum will change some minds and they won't automatically associate the word "liberal" with negative things anymore.
