Corby, what are you doing?

Anglican? Deacon? Robes? White collar tab thingy? What the heck? What happened to Calvary Chapel? What happen to Bible teaching? Are you basically Catholic now? All mostly valid questions. I'm not going to be able to answer everything in one post. I'm not on the defensive nor am I on the offensive. I want to do two things with this site:

1. Share with long-time brothers and sisters in the faith what I have found as I have explored this part of our Christian family tree. I was taught to believe that anything traditional was spiritually dead. I have found the exact opposite to be true, at least for myself. Like the Transformers, Anglicanism is "more that meets the eye."
2. Extend an olive branch to the unchurched, dechurched, exvangelical, deconstructing brothers and sisters who have become burned out in or burned up by Western/Americal style church. I don't want to recite wrote answers to your questions, criticisms, and doubts. Rather, I want to help you explore them, as well as explore possible answers. I want to do what Jesus did; answer questions with quetions, to help you learn how to think, not what to think. This helps me grow in my own faith as well.

Here are some short answers to some questions, as well as what I'm actually doing with all of this for the time being. I intend to write more comprehenisive posts on these and other topics in the future. Subscribe to the site!

Current Ministry

Occupationally, I'm the full-time IT Director at a private Christian school in Vancouver. There is no sign of that changing any time soon.

Without going into the whole story here, I am currently serving as a Deacon (an ordained office but not quite a priest) at Christ Our Hope Anglican Church in Olympia, WA while they begin to look for a new priest. This means I'm leading the Sunday liturgy and serving communion in a different capacity than a full priest would. I get to teach regularly again, and I get to walk with people through the liturgy that more or less saved my own faith from shriveling up and dying. I will be posting my sermons here along with the lectionary readings. Stay tuned.

At the same time, we are seeking to plant an Anglican Church in Ridgefield by beginning with an in-home Evening Prayer service, starting Saturday, Nov. 26th, with the beginning of Advent.

FAQ

"Do you still believe the Bible like you did before?" - Yup! 100%. My own understansing about a few practices we have in the church, specifically Comunion and Baptism have expanded a bit, but I still believe everything I did before, theologically.

"Do Anglicans teach the Bible?" - Yup! 100%. I think it's safe to say that there is actually more Bible reading happening durring the course of an Angical Sunday gathering that I have experienced in any non-denominational service. While it isn't strictly verse-by-verse exegetical in its presentation (though it could be if the Priest chose to do it that way), it does follow a fixed through-the-Bible reading plan called the Lectionary that all church follow at the same time. A good priest on a Sunday will preach from the Lectionary reading which goes through the entire Bible in three years. Nothing precludes a Priest/church from having a mid-week Bible study that could be more exegetical in style.

"Isn't Anglican the same as Episcopal? Or is it more Catholic?" - Catholics think Anglicans are protestants. Most protestants think we're Catholics. Where does this put is? In the middle. We have been called the via media, the middle way. So no, not Catholic. The Episopcal Church (TEC) in the US has become incresingly liberal in it's teaching and understanding of the Bible, as has the Church of England (CoE). Having said that, all of these fall under the banner of the Anglican Communion that broke away from Rome in the 1500s in England (Eng, Anglo, Anglican). The Anglican Church of North America (ACNA) is a Province (organized group of Diocese and churches) in the global Anglican Communion that takes a more conservative view of the Bible. Meaning, we take it seriously, as the very Word of God. But the form and expresion of our gatherings are more ancient.

OK, I'm going to stop there before I get ahead of myself. I'm so excited to finally share this with all of you! I would love questions to come in for me to answer. Sign up for the site and lets have a conversation int he comments.

The Lord be with you!