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Published online by Cambridge University Press: 01 December 2009
Today’s changing context invites a rethinking of mission in the Episcopal Church. Based on a large-scale, grassroots intervention process in an American Episcopal diocese, this article identifies several operative missiological and ecclesiological categories in the Episcopal Church that warrant critical examination. The themes of democracy, inclusion, and benevolence are explored in light of their historical and theological background and against the sociological realities of the contemporary church. The article proposes a reframing of Episcopal mission in a more theological and Trinitarian direction using the themes of communion, companionship, creativity, and cultivation.
Dwight J. Zscheile is an assistant professor of congregational mission and leadership at Luther Seminary and an associate priest at St Matthew’s Episcopal Church in St Paul, Minnesota.
2. The conversation about a crisis of Anglican identity goes back at least as far as Sykes, Stephen, The Integrity of Anglicanism (New York: Seabury Press, 1978) Recently, the November 2007 ‘Interim Report’ of the Episcopal Church House of Deputies Committee on the State of the Church raised the issue, saying, ‘We cannot be leaders within our Church nor in the global community if we are unsure who we are or where God is calling us to go’. The recent Episcopal Identity Project (2009) is one attempt to address this. See http://www.episcopalchurch.org/AroundOneTable/.Google Scholar
3. To protect the anonymity of those involved, the diocese shall go unnamed. The process was a system-wide action-research intervention authorized by the bishop and conducted during 2006–07.Google Scholar
4. All congregations were invited to participate.Google Scholar
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