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Are Anglicans Pentecostal?

May 31,  2009  - Dale

A silly question some might think. It would be hard to think of two churches farther apart than Anglican and Pentecostal. One is supposed to be staid, conservative, even rigid, the other wild and noisy and very un-Anglican. Anglicans are seen by some as a safe refuge from Pentecostal excesses.

But what is Pentecostal? It does describe a group of churches and the theology and practices that have developed since the modern Pentecostal movement began in 1901. But the roots of the movement go back to some staid Anglicans – very sober priests who devoted themselves to a holy way of life involving much prayer and reading of the bible (in Greek and Hebrew).  Many interesting things happened in the eighteenth century in England but one of the most astounding was a revival which had two Anglican priests at its head – George Whitfield and John Wesley. 

One of the influences on them was a German pietist group headed up by Count Nicholas von Zinzendorf. Their roots lay back on the edges of the European reformation in the followers of the Bohemian Jan Huss who had in turn been inspired by the Lollard followers of the Englishman John Wyclif.

The radical reformation did not invent this kind of spiritual fervour of course. The source is found in the New Testament itself. Pentecostal is a way of describing a particular kind of church tradition. But it also describes the roots of that tradition in the New Testament.

Pentecostal, then, can describe the kind of Christian life characterised by the impact of the Day of Pentecost. Is the Anglican church against this? On the contrary. The Collect, or special prayer, for Pentecost Sunday in the Book of Common Prayer asks God to help us have “a right judgment in all things” (that sounds very Anglican!) by the teaching of the Holy Spirit – and “to rejoice in his holy comfort” (that sounds comfortably Anglican too!). But comfort here refers to the “Comforter” – the Holy Spirit who would lead the disciples into all truth and help them do the miracles that Jesus did – and more to boot (the gospel reading in the BCP for Pentecost Sunday is from John 14).

Holy comfort might be termed holy coaching. The work of the Holy Spirit who runs alongside us urging us on, guiding us on the right paths, giving us energy and enthusiasm and perseverance.

Regularly in the history of the Anglican church the Holy Spirit has broken in to revive, reform, judge and teach – often by influences from the outside.  Let us pray that he will continue to do so.

Dale