From Catechesis at Saint Paul’s on Sunday, Nov. 27, 2022. Page numbers are from Kindle edition, not the print book. Quotes from Chapter 6 of The Thirty-nine Articles: Their Place and Use Today by Prof J I Packer and R T Beckwith. Link: https://amzn.to/3VdalJ6

“If confessing the faith is a Christian duty, the Creeds are a Biblical and ecumenically-acceptable way of carrying it out.”

“…the Articles are common to almost all the Anglican churches, and are one of the strongest link between those churches and continental Protestantism…”

“To play down our Reformation heritage is to ignore reality and to be untrue to history… ”

The Articles predate:

• “the scientific revolution”
• “historical approach to the Bible”
• “Anglo-Catholicism”

“It is the Holy Spirit who enables a man to understand Scripture…”

“visible and invisible, but is not two churches”

“The smallest unit of the Church is the Christian family and the next size is the local congregation…”

“The name ‘priest for presbyters was retained at the Reformation only because it is etymologically short form of ‘presbyter’, not in a sacrificial sense.” (6.1.12)

“…the presbyter has an office of authority (shown both by his title, which means ‘senior man’ and by the references to presbyters ‘ruling’).”