An Approach to Being Episcopalian

As a result of our connective history with other Christians across the parameters of space and time, Episcopalians have more or less developed a model for discerning how we might more faithfully respond to the experiences and issues that we encounter in life. This model of discernment is driven by our willing engagement with three particular pillars of wisdom through which we can more fully converse with our own selves and one another as together we strive to listen for God’s voice among and within us.

The first of these asks us to consult what, if anything, does the Bible, the Scriptures, both Jewish and Christian, have to say about whatever it is we are wondering about. The Bible alone, depending largely upon whose wielding it and to what personal end, may not be sufficient to address our concerns. The next pillar of wisdom asks us to consult what other Christian believers throughout history and time have to add to the conversation we are engaging in. By consulting this part of the model we are engaging the rich and diverse traditions which have formed what we might call the tradition of the Church. However, just as all understandings of the Bible are subject to the interpretive skill and culturally personal perspective of the interpreter, so also, the so-called “traditions” of the Church are often subjected and limited by similar concerns.

Lastly, we engage ourselves in this process by asking what our own experiences have to add to all that we have been wrestling with. What are we thinking? What are we feeling? How are our hearts and minds responding to all that we are hearing as we gather at this table for conversing about these matters?

It is through this continual and continuing process that we hope to arrive at a more holistically informed impulse to act in ways that more fully enable us to love God with all our heart, all our mind, and all our physical strength so that, in time, we may more fully love one another and our own selves as God loves us.