Trinity School for Ministry hosted "Cradle to Grave Discipleship: A Symposium on the Historic Anglican Catechism in the Contemporary Era" from June 10 to 12 at its Ambridge campus. Organized by the Rev. Dr. Jack Gabig of the Young Anglicans Project, the event brought together scholars, educators and concerned individuals to earnestly discuss the recent Anglican Catechism in Outline (ACIO).

The ACIO was produced by the theological formation and education task force of the Anglican Communion’s Global South. Instead of following the text-based structure of a formal catechism, the ACIO attempts to lay out the rationale and direction for locally produced texts, citing the inspiration and authority of Sacred Scripture, the Creeds and the Historic Formularies (39 Articles, Book of Common Prayer and the Ordinal).

The Rev. Dr. J. Douglas McGlynn, professor and associate academic dean of Nashotah Seminary, reflected on the cultural changes that have made effective education in the basics of the Christian faith a critical piece of any vision of the future of Anglicanism. "As our dominant culture in the United States swerves increasingly away from Christian values and Biblical witness, there is great danger in remaining just a chaplain to the social order, remaining just a subculture. We have come to a time when prophetic witness demands that we become a counter-culture." McGlynn continued by stating the need to give our young people a new structure for looking at the world, a structure not based on relative truth and personal definitions of morality, but one rooted in authentic and historic Christian belief.

Another emphasis of the ACIO is the desire to return the primary responsibility for Christian education to the family, with help from the church. Peter Rothermel, coordinator of the Department of Christian Faith Formation in the Diocese of South Carolina, spoke of the impact of faith across generations. "Parents are the most effective teachers of their children. It is their responsibility to disciple and train their children and the church’s responsibility to support them." Multi-generational faithfulness and discipleship is the goal of catechesis, and the Global South’s broader view of extended family to include grandparents, other relatives and close friends can be a helpful perspective on how this might be lived out.

McGlynn summed up the conference during the closing panel discussion. "When you try to make just church members, not disciples, you base success on the number of bodies in a building, the amount of money in the bank, and the contentment of the congregation. If this remains our emphasis, we will have failed the Great Commission."

-posted June 18, 2008-