What can the Anglican Tradition offer Blue Collar Americans?

I come from a colorful history. My name was bequeathed to me by Scots-Irish Highlander turned Presbyterian ancestors; the rest of my family was Irish, Spanish, and French Catholic immigrants. My great grandparents were a curious mix of a Castilian lady, a Methodist circuit rider, a few Trotskyist activists, and a Texas outlaw. My Baptist upbringing mingled with my Catholic grandparents and somehow turned me into an Anglican.

I suppose I fell into the Anglican tradition a bit by accident; disillusioned with religion as I had encountered it but longing for a church community, I happened into a rural, Episcopal Church with lovely stained glass windows and a liturgy that spoke to my soul. And I stayed.

As the years have gone by, I have become more aware of the role the Episcopal church has played in U.S. history and how it has related to social class. In a book we are reading in the diocese during Lent, People of the Way, Dwight Zscheile reflects; “The Anglican Church in America went from being the officially established church to the church of the establishment as it remained favored by many of the socioeconomic elite. The resurgent Baptists and Methodists succeeded in luring away many of the lower classes through their revivalistic preaching and more open, egalitarian approach to church leadership. As long as the Episcopal Church tended to uphold the status quo of a stratified economic system and a rationalistic faith, it failed to attract and retain wider swaths of the American populace.” This is historically true, though I would suggest from experience that many Episcopal churches have and continue to appeal to rural and urban working class people, even if the wider culture of the church may favor a more educated clientele.

This statement, and my own history, has prompted me to ask the question: what does the Anglican tradition have to offer my people—particularly to working class people in the U.S.? I can only answer this in an anecdotal way and in light of my own history and experience. But I think it is a worthy question to ask. 

1.                   An incarnational theology and ethics. The Anglican tradition at its best is obsessed with the incarnation. It can offer an earthy spirituality, deeply connected to the natural world with a deep acknowledgement of the grittiness of life. We can find God in ordinary things and in the ordinary stuff of our lives. We can find mystery in our lived experiences and we can find Christ in ourselves and those around us. For people who live rooted and grounded in “ordinary life” and in the gritty “real world”, this offers a space to find Christ in everyday life. 

2.                   A Eucharistic faith. The Eucharist is foundational to the Anglican tradition. In the Eucharist, we take the stuff of everyday life and celebrate the incarnation, remembering death and hoping for new life. We acknowledge, too, the depth of suffering in the body of Christ in the world. The Eucharist is a place where we can bring the depths of our own personal and collective suffering and remember a Christ in solidarity with us. It is a place we can bring our hope for healing and wholeness and life. For a people who live in close contact with the pain of a divided, unequal, and exploited world, the Eucharist offers a place of solidarity.     

3.                   A community focused ethos. Most Protestant traditions are deeply individualistic, focused on individual salvation and personal holiness. The Anglican tradition acknowledges our need for community—and for working class people, community is central in their lives. A community focused ethos and theology allows the patterns that are already present in blue collar communities to be celebrated. It offers the possibility of developing local theologies, where a community comes together and articulates their faith and lived experiences in light of the Biblical tradition.

4.                   An open spirituality. My early encounter with faith, not unlike a majority of working class Americans, was often with a faith that was harsh and judgmental. Recent studies have shown that it is the working class that is leaving the church in droves. This is partly because working class people are less and less “respectable” by evangelical standards. As economic pressures grow, more and more working class people remain unmarried, become single parents, or live less and less stable lives. Unable to meet the standards required by most churches that cater to the working class, they are going to church less and less, though they continue to identify as people of faith. The Anglican tradition can offer a place of healing, a place for people to be as they are, and a place for people to discover God apart from a strict system of behavioral rules.