The irony is that the commendable concern by Anglo-Catholics for Christology and Trinity is creedally and coherently dependent upon justification by faith but that doctrine has largely been scorned. When I first arrived at Oxford, I was interviewed by the Anglo-Catholic Chaplain Eric Mascall who asked me what I was going to do. I replied: “I’m working on the doctrine of justification in the Carolina divines.” After repeating the phrase, he replied: “What if the doctrine of justification has any meaning at all it’s denied by the opening sentences in Evening Prayer: ‘When a wicked man turneth away from his wickedness that he hath committed, and doeth that which is lawful and right, he shall save his soul.’” (Ezekiel 17:27) Fortunately I had enough sense not to ask him how he was doing in saving his soul alive.
At the General Convention in New Orleans the ‘Final Report’ from the Anglican/Roman Catholic Council was given I asked why it was called the ‘Final Report’ when we had yet to deal with justification that Richard Hooker called “the grand question that hangeth yet between us and the Church of Rome.” Bishop Art Vogel rose to his feet and said: “There has never been any difference between Anglicanism and Roman Catholics on the question of justification.” (I should have corrected him publicly but did privately remind him that Richard Hooker was an Anglican and named a dozen Anglican and Roman Catholic scholars who know there to be a serious divide between the 39 Articles and the Council of Trent on this doctrine of justification.)
The point here is that a bishop, then regarded as the leading scholar in the House of Bishops and Dean of Nashotah House, could be so arrogantly ignorant of the “grand question that lyeth yet” between our two communions.
The Anglo-Catholic ignoring of soteriology goes back to William Laud, whose book ‘Conference with Fisher the Jesuit’ dealing with the differences between the Church of England and Rome, never in 327 pages mentions the doctrine of justification (and this coming only shortly after Hooker’s careful claim about justification.) Read more»
C. Fitzsimmons Allison | “Former SC Episcopal Bishop Reflects on Anglo-Catholics and Justification by Faith” | September 3, 2025 | Virtue Online
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