Objectives

The Ministry Development Team will be able to use the history of Christianity and the Episcopal Church to inform their teaching and leadership of their congregation in their context. Team members will be able to:

1.    Complete a Team and Individual Assessment and Learning Plan

2.    Compare and contrast the Pauline churches with the shared ministry churches envisioned by Roland Allen.

3.    Understand and articulate the theological issues that caused the first four ecumenical councils to take place.

• Explore the evolution of the creeds and their importance today

• Understand the heresies that prompted the ecumenical councils and how these ancient heresies live today.

4.    Compare and contrast the pre-Constantinian church with the post Constantinian church

5.    Explore the Reformation and its influence/evolution into today’s denominations.

• Political issues with which Henry VIII dealt

• Explore theology of Thomas Cranmer

• Explore the theological foundation of the Elizabethan Settlement by Richard Hooker and his integration of scripture, tradition and reason.

6.    Describe the roles that William White and Samuel Seabury played in the establishment of the Episcopal Church

• Describe the beginning of the American episcopate

7.    Describe the Enlightenment and how this movement challenged the Church

Readings

• Compulsion of the Spirit: A Roland Allen Reader by David Paton and Charles H. Long, editors

• Living With History by Fredrica Harris Thompsett

• Early Christian Traditions, Vol. 6 of the New Church’s Teaching Series by Rebecca Lyman

• A History of the Christian Church by Williston Walker

• Documents of the Christian Church, new edition by Henry Bettenson and Chris Maunder, editors

• The Study of Anglicanism by Stephen Sykes and John Booty, editors

• What is Anglicanism? By Urban T. Holmes

• Anglicanism and the Christian Church by Paul Avis

Resources

• St. Paul and the Church

• Understanding the Church with St. Paul

• Essential Missionary Principles by Roland Allen

• The Legacy of Roland Allen

• Why Roland Allen's 100 Year Old Book Continues to Challenge

• Timeline

• 100 Most Important Events in Church History

• The Ecumenical Councils and their Chief Doctrines

• Council of Nicea

• The Church History Institute

• The Creeds of Christendom

• Podcast: What are the 4 Ecumenical Creeds,

• Legitimization Under Constantine

• Constantine the Great Rules