 We hold the faith once delivered to the Saints revealed in the Holy Scriptures of the Old and New Testaments, the Apostles, Nicene, and Athanasian Creeds, declared in the first Fourecumenical Councils, and clarified in the 39 Articles of Religion of the Church of England. We proclaim that we are protestant churchmen, inheritors of the Doctrines of Grace expounded by our reformation fathers in the establishment of an evangelical, protestant, and reformed Catholic Church of England. We invite those who are like-minded in the faith to join with us in the fellowship of the body of Christ, the blessed company of all faithful people; to be the Church in this age, and with the help of God’s Holy Spirit, to secure the Church unspotted from the work in the ages to come. WE MAINTAIN That we are an Anglican jurisdiction, loyal to the heritage of the Church of England, and to the doctrine, discipline and worship originally help by the Protestant Episcopal Church founded in the United States of America in 1789. That the doctrine of the Church is expressed in the Holy Scriptures of the authorized (King James) version of the Bible, inerrant and infallible, holding the Scriptures to be the plenary word of God, containing all things necessary to salvation. That the discipline of the Church is established in adherence to the Articles of Religion, and to the Constitution of Canons of the Protestant Episcopal Church, c. 1958. That the worship of the church is practiced according to the 1928 Book of Common Prayer, as written, recognizing the authority of the antecedents of the 1928 BCP. That the scriptural norms for the ordained ministry of Bishop, Priest (Presbyter) and Deacon and that the ministerial priesthood proceeds from the fatherhood of God the Creator, the sonship of Jesus Christ as the head of the Church and therefore is to be represented only in the male gender. That only a man and a woman may be joined in holy matrimony, according to the Canons of the Church, and that sexual activity outside of the marriage bond is immoral. That the doctrine of the person and work of the Holy Spirit is taught by Scripture and the standards of the Church Catholic, i.e. that we are regenerated by grace through the Holy Spirit, we are justified by grace through the Holy Spirit and we are incorporated into the body of Christ by the Holy Spirit. We affirm the teaching of St. Paul, that there is "....one Lord, one Faith, and one Baptism," contrary to the teachings of those who hold with a second work of grace (Ephesians 4:4-5), a second Baptism (I Cor. 12:13), or a second revelation (John 15:26). The modern phenomena of glossolalia (speaking in tongues) as well as other charismatic restorationism of first century experiences are not of scriptural warrant for this age, and therefore are not to be practiced by the Church. |