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In today's world, The Anglican Church
is taken to mean those tens of millions of people who worship in churches
that are part of the Anglican Communion. Some churches whose name
contains the word "Anglican" are part of the Anglican Communion,
and some are not. The web site that you are now reading is devoted
to those Member Churches, Provinces, and Dioceses that are part of
the Anglican Communion. The Anglican Communion Office in London is
its administrative headquarters, and has its
own web page.
The Anglican Communion inherits many centuries of catholic and apostolic
tradition, especially that part which began in the British Isles.
Although Christian missionaries had reached England by the time of
the Council of Jerusalem in 50 AD, the foundation of the Anglican
Church is often described as having begun with the arrival in 597
AD of St. Augustine, first Archbishop of Canterbury.
When the Romans withdrew from Britain in 407 AD, they left a legacy
of Christianity among the Celtic people. Those Celtic Christian churches
were largely still in existence when Augustine arrived two centuries
later, though they had become isolated from Rome. In particular, they
survived in Wales, Ireland, and Scotland, and they helped to ensure
that, from its beginnings, the Anglican Communion was not exclusively
English in origin.
When the English people settled the British Empire they took their
religion with them and thus the Church
of England spread overseas. Eventually these overseas parishs
became autonomous provinces of the Communion. These churches, while
autonomous in their governance, are bound together by tradition, Scripture,
and the inheritance they have received from the Church of England.
They together make up the Anglican Communion, a body headed spiritually
by the Archbishop of Canterbury.
If an Anglican church is a member of the Anglican Communion, it is
said to be "in communion" or "in communion with the
See of Canterbury." Otherwise it is said to be "not in communion."
Generally, Anglican churches that are not in communion with the See
of Canterbury have withdrawn because of doctrinal differences. In
recent years those differences have included the ordination of women
priests and the attitude of the church towards sexuality. |
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