The Problem of Communion: It’s a Two Way Street

Or how church leaders can destroy communion, illustrated

Up to now in this series, I’ve approached the Problem of Communion mainly from the point of view of individuals and congregations. But an excellent post yesterday from David Roseberry reminds me that communion is a two way street. Church leaders and denominations must do their part to preserve faithful communion. To put it another way, don’t be The Episcopal Church in 1967.

1967 and the Unraveling of the Episcopal Church

When church leaders dishearten or even alienate people in the pews or whole congregations or even whole faithful dioceses (as The Episcopal Church did in 2003 and afterward), said church leaders have only themselves to blame when people leave.

However, as I mentioned Monday in my podcast, faithfulness and truth can cause people to depart. Even Jesus had people walk away from him. (John 6:60-66)

But I will here focus on how to drive people away by error or foolishness. On how leaders and church bodies can foolishly cause the faithful to walk away. In short, prompted by Fr. Roseberry’s narrative, I will do a brief how-to on how church leaders can destroy communion.

Put anything (other than God of course) above faithfulness.

I could almost stop right there. So much apostasy and breaking of communion on the part of leaders comes from the warped priorities and resulting unfaithfulness.

And some of those warped priorities mean well. In recent decades there’s been a whole movement that has prioritized being “seeker sensitive” and “winsome” at the expense of proclaiming the Truth. Most of those churches began as pretty orthodox but have slowly — or maybe not so slowly — departed from The Faith.

Of course, many of what are now fake churches in the “mainline” denominations put their own opinions and pseudoscholarship above faithfulness and God’s word and thereby went straight to apostasy.

The first priority of church leaders must be faithfulness to God and his word. . . . Oh, I forgot. This is supposed to be a how-to on how to destroy a church and communion. Anyway, you get the picture, I hope.

I’ll move on but much of what follows are also warped priorities that neglect faithfulness.

Become the Church of What’s Happening Now.

I preached a sermon on this back in 2022.

What was “happening now” at that time was wokeness. Now that is being discarded or at least watered down by those who are not thoroughly indoctrinated. Which illustrates a big problem with trying to be a Church of What’s Happening Now. In a very few years, you become a Has Been Church. Heck, I think I will make an almost infallible law out of that:

A Church of What’s Happening Now will become a Has Been Church.

And let’s be honest. Churches aren’t good at being hip. Those old enough, remember how lame “contemporary Christian music” was? Or remember all those U2charists . . . when U2 was declining in popularity? Hey, I can shake my head at some of the ways I tried to be hip and relevant back in my pre-Anglican days. With too few exceptions, when churches try to be cool, they end up being naff.

And, yes, I probably illustrated my point with some of the slang I used there. But even without my groovy rap, you’ve probably noticed when churches try to be with it, they are actually a few years behind the times. The world is always better at being worldly.

Even worse than being cringe, churches often end up being unfaithful when they try too hard to be with it and relevant. Bishop Strickland made this point well earlier this week.

The Carpenter’s Measure: Christ’s Standard and Doctrinal Integrity

In every generation, the temptation arises to nudge the line just a little – to shift doctrine to suit the times. But the truth has a weight to it. It falls straight from heaven, like the plumb line of the prophet Amos, like the tool held in the steady hand of the Carpenter from Nazareth. You cannot push a plumb line. And you cannot bend doctrine without departing from Christ….“Jesus Christ, yesterday, and today, and the same forever” (Hebrews 13:8).

He does not change. His words do not change. And those who hold fast to Him must not change either.

As Pope Pius X warned in Pascendi Dominici Gregis: “The true friends of the people are neither revolutionaries nor innovators, but traditionalists.”

We are not clinging to old things for their own sake. We are clinging to Christ’s measure – because it is divine.

When church leaders do otherwise to be “relevant”, their churches are in peril.

Errant politics

This section is inspired from this story from Fr. Roseberry’s post:

One Sunday after church, I stood beside Fr. Ridge—never Fr. Chuck— watching him greet parishioners. Most offered kind words: “Nice sermon, Father.” “Thank you for your prayers.”

But then I remember one man—an older gentleman in a suit with big, wrinkled hands—stepped forward. He took Father Ridge’s hand and pulled him close. “I’ll be damned if I’m going to give a penny to the Episcopal Church,” he said through clenched teeth. “They are communists.”

If this gentleman were still with us, I’m sure he would appreciate this meme, which is too true (and which I stole from Yuri Bezmenov).

And when you think about it, Marxist-backed “social justice” has subverted and harmed whole churches. (And it’s been documented that the KGB was behind Liberation Theology and more.) But even if you do not appreciate this meme, I’m confident you’d still agree that few things are more infuriating than one’s church taking the opposite side of political issues on which one has strong convictions. I know the mainline Presbyterian Church supporting with both words and money pro-abortion and pro-communist groups enraged me and eventually led me to wipe the dust off my feet and leave.

Now I do not think churches should be completely apolitical, and I do think politically involved Christians like Calvin Robinson are needed. But the church should take pains to avoid being on the wrong side of political issues. For example, do not support the Invasion of the U. S. and the West and do not oppose deporting criminal invaders like ACNA’s Tish Warren has.

Nor should churches feel they must take a stand on every political issue. I still remember Jerry Falwell taking a stand, from the pulpit, on the SALT Treaty.

And the church should be careful not to get political in an inappropriate fashion, even if it might be on the right side. Do not turn services into political rallies. Black churches in the United States are notorious for this, usually on behalf of Democrats. But First Baptist Church Dallas has gone overboard a time or two in supporting Trump. And I say that as someone who supports Trump.

Usually the best route to take, particularly in the context of services, is to teach principles of orthodoxy and orthopraxy (i. e. right living in line with orthodoxy) and teach them well, then trust the people to apply them in their decisions, including political decisions. That works most of the time, and it teaches basics that are more lasting than particular politics and avoids needless offense.

But, of course, there are the easily offended, particularly among the woke and woke adjacent, who are offended unless you clearly take their side on political matters, even during services. And there are others who want the church to be silent about societal evil. With both of these sorts, you might have to practice “what would Jesus do” and let them walk away.

Directly drive the faithful away

Of course, the simplest way to break communion and drive the faithful away is to make it clear that the faithful and their faithfulness are not welcome. Pope Francis did just that with his numerous derogatory comments about traditional Catholics and by suppressing the Traditional Latin Mass. Of course, traditional Roman Catholics are too loyal for their own good, so few have left that I am aware of. But if we had a Francis II, one wonders how much longer they would put up with such abuse. It appears Pope Leo XIV is more reasonable, so we probably won’t have to find out.

Unfortunately, we may find out in the Anglican Church in North America, which already was experiencing impaired communion before the Archbishop stepped in it. No, Archbishop Wood’s press release about Calvin Robinson is not nearly as consequential as Pope Francis’ actions. But it does send a “I have no need of you” (I Corinthians 12:21) message to more than Calvin Robinson only. And that message is not in isolation. I am among those in ACNA who received the message quite clearly.

Churches that act that way sow the seeds of their own demise. Sometime I may write of how the Great Ejection of Puritan leaning clergy in 1662 and the expulsion of Non-Jurors in 1691 cast out many of the best and most zealous in the Church of England. I think those sad events began the decline of that great church.

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This is not an exhaustive list of how leaders and denominations can destroy churches and tear apart communion. The ways of error and division are manifold and broad! But if you want to drive the faithful away and destroy a church, do what the Episcopal Church and the mainline Presbyterian Church and too many other church bodies have done, and you will do quite enough damage.

Communion is a two way street and has to be a two way street for unity in Truth to continue.