It never really stops in college. It's the night before the first of the interview in the Curacy appointments process, and I've been sitting researching an essay, for the most part. The essay is for Anglicanism, and I'm looking at the Preamble and Declaration of 1870. It was the Church of Ireland preparing for disestablishment (that is, freedom from state control, and being seen as a wing of the civil service), and defining itself.
Stating clearly what it was, and was not. An interesting document, and one of the few places in the Church of Ireland's formularies (maybe even the formularies of the entire Anglican Communion) where the Church is question is defined as 'a reformed and Protestant Church.' Elsewhere, the phrasing would be 'catholic and reformed' but here, they went full kilter for the declaration that the Church of Ireland was protestant.
While the declaration talks about a lot more, I think I'm going to focus in on the self-identity of the Church, looking at the background to this statement, and also what relevance it has for the Church of Ireland of today.
Prayers, as always, greatly appreciated for the interviews tomorrow, Friday and Monday. Oh, and by the way, my darling has summarised our last few months in great style at her blog in a post entitled 'The road less travelled.'
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