Dear People of St. David’s,
This weekend we begin a new Forum series entitled “Episcopalianism 101,” which will serve as an introduction (or a refresher!) on what our particular expression of Christianity is all about.
For me, the core of Anglican Christianity—the thing that sets us apart and which serves as the particular gift that we offer to the rest of the world—is the Via Media.
If someone knows just one thing about The Church of England, the “mother church” of the global Anglican Communion, what they probably know is that ‘we were founded so that Henry VIII could get a divorce. While that is a fun fact, it is also mostly wrong. (I’ll say more about this on Sunday.) The Church of England really began with the reign of Elizabeth I, when England was on the brink of civil unrest. Protestants had been martyred for their faith. Catholics had been martyred for their faith. The big question was: Will England be Roman Catholic and submit to the Pope, or would England follow the teachings of the Protestant Reformers coming out of Northern Europe?
Elizabeth’s decision was bold: She decided that the Church of England was to be both. There would be no Roman Catholicism, and certainly no influence of the Pope. She would establish a new church—a Church of England where both Catholics and Protestants were welcome under the same roof. This is generally called the Elizabethan Compromise or the Elizabethan Settlement.
In this new Church (that she would be the head of) Catholics were welcome to bring all of their rituals, all their vestments, all their faith practices, and all their theology (except the Pope!), and Protestants were welcome to bring all their theology, all their practices, all their emphasis on Faith Alone, all their suspicion of ritualism, and all their lack of church decoration—and everyone could do their thing in the very same church family.
It cannot be said enough how different Protestantism and Catholicism were in the 16th century. They had different ecclesiologies (theologies of what the church is), different soteriologies (theologies of salvation), different sacramental theologies (ways of viewing baptism and the Lord’s Supper), different ways of viewing the roles of faith and works in the Christian Life… and on and on.
Elizabeth’s gambit might sound like a compromise that was made just to make things easier—but this was the exact opposite of easy! Inviting people who held polar opposite views into the same body posed lots of challenges. It also allowed for both of these expressions of our Christian faith to flourish in England and reflect off each other. More importantly it allowed Christians of different persuasions to focus on what they did agree on: God who created us, Jesus who redeemed us, the Holy Spirit who sanctifies us, the creeds, the saving work of the cross, the resurrection, and the importance of orthodox belief and orthodox practice.
In England today you can still clearly see the effects of the Elizabethan Compromise. You can walk into a church and immediately see it as a descendant of Anglo Catholicism. Then you can walk down that same street and walk into another Church of England Church and immediately identify it as a descendant of Anglican Protestantism and evangelicalism. In the United States you can see the same differing expressions, though the differences aren’t usually as extreme here.
This Via Media—or Middle Way—is, I think, the great gift that we as Anglican Christians have to offer the world. I think in these divided and tense times in the world—and within Christianity—this Middle Way truly has something that we need.
St. David’s is a beautiful expression of this way of being together in faith. Here, in any church service, any committee meeting, any act of service, or any Bible Study, the whole political and ideological spectrum is present. What binds St. David’s together, and what makes this such a vibrant and welcoming place, isn’t political opinion or stances on the issue-of-the-day, but it really is Jesus Christ. Therefore, what unites us is infinitely, and eternally, more important than whatever may divide us.
Because of that, we really don’t have to approach each other with suspicion or prejudice. Rather we are free to talk together about how we might follow Jesus in these times, what the Gospel says to us in these moments, and how we might move forward together into being a community of faith which lives out the Beatitudes, exemplifies the Fruits of the Spirit, and shows the world what Jesus looks like in our day-to-day lives.
I think this is what the world is hungry for. I think that this is where God might begin to show us the way of healing and where we might all be able to answer the question of how we might love our neighbor.
God’s Peace,
The Rev. Rick Morley
Rector
Published on January 23, 2026