Monday, January 28, 2013

Book Notice: Sydney Anglicanism: An Apology by Michael Jensen

From Australia-

The Sydney Anglicans are, nationally and internationally, among the most influential and despised group of Anglicans in the world. I’ve seen TV documentaries about them, read scathing critiques about them on-line and in print, and even be privy to several in-house debates that they have with each other! In this book, Dr. Michael P. Jensen, lecturer in doctrine at Moore Theological College and son of the out-going Archbishop of Sydney Peter Jensen, gives us a view from one who has grown up and works in the very epicenter of Sydney Anglicanism. He attempts to give an accurate depiction of Sydney Anglicans (SA), away from the pro-SA propaganda that the Anglo-Catholic Liberals are about to over run the Emerald City, and away from the vehement rhetoric of Anglo-Catholic Liberals who caricature them as raving fundies who hate women and gays. Jensen’s book has two parts: SAs in relation to the Bible and the Church.

In part one, Jensen attempts to dispel the rumour that SAs are fundamentalists. He notes that “‘Fundamentalist’ is a playground bully among words” (13) He observes that SAs do not generally believe things normally attributed to fundamentalists like six day creation, pre-millennial eschatology, and right-wing approaches to politics. Simply believing in the primacy of scripture as SAs do does not make one a fundamentalist, but it is a good way of immunizing against fundamentalism. Jensen further points out that SAs have been at the forefront of a resurgent biblical theology movement in evangelicalism, led principally by Donald Robinson and Graham Goldsworthy. This is a particular Reformed emphasis, reading the OT and NT as a unity. In fact, Jensen states that, “The strong critiques of some aspects of [N.T.] Wright’s work offered by some Sydney Anglican scholars masks the great similarities between the approaches they share as a matter of fact” .


More here-

http://www.patheos.com/blogs/euangelion/2013/01/book-notice-sydney-anligicanism-an-apology-by-michael-jensen/

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