THE REJECTION OF INSTITUTIONAL CHRISTIANITY:

THE BRITISH EXPERIENCE

I wrote a paper while a seminarian at St. Mary's Roman Catholic Seminary where I concluded that denominations are the scandal of Christianity and denial of the Holy Eucharist predicated on one's denomination is its heresy. I also stated as part of the conclusion for that paper that religions become extinct when they no longer meet the needs of the people whom they are to serve. Consequently, Christianity and denominations thereof including the Roman Catholic Church will become extinct when they no longer meet the needs of the people. You can imagine the red ink bleeding from that paper when it was returned to me.

However, 35 years later look at the state of Christianity in Europe. It no longer meets the needs of the people. The latest survey I saw indicates that less than 40% of the population of England considers themselves Anglican and Anglicanism is the state religion of England. In fact, although main line Christianity is not yet extinct in England, it is well on its way because over 50% of the population identifies themselves as not belonging to any of the major Christian denominations but rather as Evangelicals, Muslims, adherents of Far Eastern religious practices, and atheists with over 20% claiming to be atheists.

As a literary Anglophile from the first time I read Beowulf, Sir Gawain and the Green Knight, and as a descendant of Scottish Highlanders of Clan Cameron, I try to keep aware of what happens in England and Scotland. British political and religious commentators are united that one of the principle reasons for the decline in Christianity in England was the Pontificate of John Paul II.  Why? The reason was his insistence that the theology of the Roman Catholic Church on life issues, especially regarding abortion and fetal stem cell research, be made the law of the land. Unfortunately, his insistence was not directed at Catholics only but the nation as a whole which soured not only many Roman Catholics but Protestants as well toward Christianity.

Again, one may ask why the people of England had such a visceral reaction to John Paul’s demands. The answer is that from the 16^th to the 18^th centuries England was embroiled in religiously based warfare between Catholics and Protestants of which two wars are known as “The Bishop’s Wars.” The underlying cause of these wars was twofold yet as interconnected as the Gordian Knot. The first cause was whether the monarchy, and thus all of England, Scotland, and Wales, would be Roman Catholic or Protestant. The second cause was England’s sense of entitlement that it had a right to rule Scotland.

The most recent demand from England's Roman Catholic bishops is that hybrid animal-human embryos must be given the same protection to exist from conception to natural death that it claims for a completely human fetus. Moreover, it claims such embryos should be implanted in human hosts and raised as human children. The irony of this position is that the Roman Catholic Church considers all forms of artificial conception to be illicit, immoral, and illegitimate. There is no question in the minds of British commentators that this irrational demand will only bring further discredit to the Roman Catholic Church in particular and to Christianity in general leading even more people to abandon both.

While the Roman Catholic position on life issues plays well with British conservative Cathoics and Evangelicals, given the anti-Catholic history of England’s Protestants especially those of Scotland, the first step of what is happening is a very strong reaction by British Protestants against what they perceive as the Papacy again trying to take over England and make it a Roman Catholic country. The second step of this reaction is a rejection of the Church of England and other main line Protestant denominations because they did not, during the Pontificate of John Paul II, and still do not, publicly rebut and rebuke the Roman Catholic position on life issues strongly enough. Additionally, they do not feel that the Church of England or Protestant Churches have opposed the entrance of the Roman Catholic Church onto the political stage strongly enough. Thus, members of the Church of England and main line Protestants no longer feel their churches meet their needs and continue to leave in droves.

These commentators also see that in addition to the problems caused by the Roman Catholic Church, a third step is the agitation caused by some of the African Anglican bishops and their supporters that are in lock step with the Roman Catholic Church on the same life issues but especially homosexuality who have propelled World-Wide Anglicanism to the brink of schism. Many natal Anglicans do not understand why or how these bishops are allowed to function without outright censure and repudiation of their position on homosexuality from the world's Anglican bishops, especially the Archbishop of Canterbury, because what the African bishops are  claiming as "historic Anglicanism" is in fact not so. Consequently, Anglicanism no longer meets their needs and they are leaving the Anglican Church.

If these commentators are correct in their assessment, what is happening in England is a blueprint for what is already happening in many nations that are not predominantly Roman Catholic. The Roman Catholic Church’s politicalization of faith beliefs on life issues, homosexuality, and the demand that they be made the law of the land will become the major wedge issue throughout the Western World for at least the first half of the 21^st century and in the final analysis the result will be rejection of institutional Christianity.