STATEMENT OF FAITH

The faith of the Anglican Rite Diocese is deeply seated in the historic Creeds and Sacraments of the Church. We have no doubt that our faith, as confessed in the Creeds, is real, true, and accurate.

We believe that the Church must nourish and sustain the faith by its devoted defense of that Creedal faith. The Church believes that the instant the Creedal faith is compromised we cease to be Christians and Anglo-Catholics and we enter into a new age of distortions and blasphemy. There simply can be NO compromise in the belief in God or in His son Jesus Christ our Lord, or The Holy Spirit. There can be no doubt as to the importance of the Holy Spirit's role in our lives.

We teach our children not only that our Lord was crucified, died, descended into hell, and rose from the grave; but that He did all those things for them personally. Had they been the only ones ever created as sinful man, He would have died for them.

We, as Anglo-Catholics believe that we must rejoice in the knowledge that our Lord reigns from the right hand of the Father and that He will come again as the just judge of all. We rejoice that we are truly members of the communion of the saints, that we can be forgiven, and that one day the dead in Christ Jesus will rise and have eternal life in Christ.

We further believe that our seven sacraments were instituted by our Lord. We believe that the sacraments are life-giving life-comforting expressions of love by God for His people. The sacraments are the visible vehicles of the Holy Spirit discernably active in our lives. Through the action of the sacraments, sacramental grace, the grace of the Holy Spirit, is given by Christ to us and by His grace we are sealed as Christ's own, fed, forgiven, cleansed, and made victorious in Christ.

We recognize that the sacraments are equal in importance, but a very special devotion to Baptism and the Holy Eucharist is embraced by all. We acknowledge one Baptism for the remission of sins. The Holy Eucharist is based on the absolute faith that when Christ said "This Is My Body" and "This Is My Blood", He told us that He would be physically with us and given for us to feed upon. He sacrificed Himself for His Own.

The faith is very personal in that we believe it is paramount to our faith that we develop a personal relationship with our Lord, not simply a theoretical or intellectual understanding. We must build on our relationship, and the Church is our primary dispenser of nourishment for that relationship.

We accept the responsibility in ensuring that the children of God are instructed in the faith and fed and strengthened by instruction in the scripture and in the sacraments.

Email: Contact The Bishop of the Diocese