Education In The Episcopal Church

[Note: This is a slightly revised version of a comment I left on this post at Father Jake Stops the World.]

I believe that one of the root causes of our current troubles in the Episcopal Church is our lack of education. I do not mean to suggest that Episcopalians are uneducated people. However, over the last 20 years or more we have not done a good job of teaching our younger generations or those coming into the Episcopal Church (from other denominations or from among the "unchurched") what it means to be an Episcopalian. What is our history? What is our theology? What do we believe? What does it mean to have bishops? How is our church governed?

I also think that there is an appalling lack of biblical literacy in the Episcopal Church. By literacy I do not mean memorizing long passages of Scripture or the entire Bible. The stories are important. The histories are important. The Gospels and the Epistles are important. But we also need to know how the Bible came to be. What shaped the book we know today? Why is it still important to us as Episcopalians--not to mention as Christians--today? How does it continue speaking to us today?

Nor do we teach about the Book of Common Prayer. The prayer book is what binds us together as Episcopalians--and as Anglicans. What is so special about the prayers and liturgies it contains? Why do Anglicans continue to use various versions of it some 460 years after it came into being? What is its history? How has it changed over the years? Why is it important to us as Episcopalians?

And we need to educate ourselves about ourselves. Who is sitting in the pews now? Not 50 years ago during the great, near-mythical "heyday" of full churches and overflowing Sunday Schools, not 40 years ago during the civil right era, not 30 years ago when so much energy was focused on prayer book revision and the ordination of women, not 20 years ago, not 10 years ago, not even 5 years ago. Who is in our churches NOW? It makes no sense to plan a large Sunday School program for a parish with five children and the rest of the congregation full of "widows and orphans," all of whom are over 40. Or to plan prayer services and bible study groups during the day when 95% of the congregation is made up of commuters who often do not arrive home until well after 6:00 p.m. Who is here now, and what do they/we need? What are the skills we have now, and how can we use them to reach out to the greater community?

The Episcopal Church does not mandate a curriculum to be taught in all Sunday schools across the whole church. I do not think that doing so resolves the issue. Nor does it address the issue of educating newcomers or continuing education. However, we must educate ourselves and our future generations about what it means to be a part of the Episcopal Church.

Thoughts? Ideas? Suggestions?

Peace,
Jeffri