In 1942 the San Juan River Valley, a remote waterless, scrubby corner of South Eastern Utah was possibly the last place someone would expect to find a middle aged, Anglo-Catholic priest like Harold Baxter Liebler. The area was not a hotbed of Anglicanism, or even of Christianity. The tiny town of Bluff, Utah was little more than a trading post. There were few white settlers and no church; the Mormons had tried to evangelize the

One of the principal debates between Catholics and Protestants in the Reformation pertained to the issue of whether Christ’s righteousness is imputed or imparted to the Christian. The Protestant doctrine of imputation occurs within a legal framework: sinful humanity cannot meet the demand of God’s perfect righteousness. In becoming Incarnate and dying on the cross, Jesus does what humans could not do by satisfying that demand. Imputation, then, is the “legal (or forensic) crediting of

In the early 1830s, the British Parliament infringed on the Church’s ecclesial authority through the Whig party’s Church Temporalities Act (1833). This legislation attacked the Church of Ireland through restructuring, and ultimately decreased the number of bishoprics. These governmental oversteps served as a catalyst for John Keble’s sermon “National Apostasy,” preached at St. Mary’s, Oxford, where he urged his fellow clergymen to submit to the Church rather than the state—particularly where the state was misguided.

“Prayer comes first. Neither serving nor preaching is good if you are not praying. If you have not got Christ within, you cannot give him to others. You can put words and doctrines before people, but that is not preaching the Gospel. It is only when you have the Gospel and Christ within that you can communicate it to others…The Gospel is primarily not a word to be preached but the Spirit to be communicated”1

“Tradition is not static but dynamic, not stifling but liberating. Orthodoxy is a tool, not an end…I sometimes feel that a traditionalist means one who is effectively ignorant of the tradition in its richness and complexity but who clings, neurotically and fiercely, to the conventions of several decades past.”1 “Conventionality and orthodoxy are completely different matters, and that many who boast the name of Catholic would be surprised and shocked at what the tradition actually

On the Cross we see what it means for God to be God, and for a Human to be human. On the Cross we see the fullness of God and the fullness of humanity revealed. On the Cross we see what it means for God to exist as love. On the Cross we see what it means for humanity to reach the summit of love. In the selflessness of Christ crucified, we see how the

Introduction to the Series: This post begins an ambitious project, one which will engage the theological concept of personhood. I readily admit that I am in way over my head on this one. While the topic excites me (in a scary nerdy way), it is a theological behemoth. Yet, my hope is that, after years of study, I can unpack and promote ideas that bring clarification, instead of confusion, to the discussion table. Many theologians

Last August, my family and I transitioned into Anglicanism, and I began the process of ordination to the priesthood. For the last several months we have been fully immersed in an environment that is about as Anglican as it can possibly get here in the United States. At Nashotah House Theological Seminary, the Daily Offices are prayed every single day in chapel without exception. A Benedictine way of life is inhabited (as best we can,

“Heresy” apparently has become the new buzzword these days within Christian circles. There are plenty of individuals trolling through blogs and social media forums, posting articles, and publicly declaring others as given over to heretical ways of theological expression.  All the while they themselves exude a confidence in their own aptitude to judge what’s what in terms of the parameters of orthodoxy. Personally, I am hearing the words “heresy” and “heretic” thrown around more these

The title of this article may sound quite oxymoronic to some. If you are someone like I used to be, you may find yourself wondering what an ancient Saint, a monastic one at that, would have to teach us about being missional today. Those who pursue the study of missional theology often do not place reading books about the reclusive lives of the monastic saints too highly on the priority list. Missiologists, from my experience,