My son has been invited to an Anglican service by a friend....

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JoeFish

Puritan Board Freshman
....and I'm having a problem deciding about whether or not to let him go, my gut instinct and conviction is to say no.
This particular Anglican group has a children's meeting on a Sunday afternoon where loud rave music is played and the kids sit around on sofas "chilling out" and eating doughnuts while smoke machines pump out whatever it is that smoke machines pump out.
One of the messages that was recently given to the children was to tell them that it's best to not tell people about Hell and the consequences of sin when you are talking to them of your faith.
I have issues with the Anglican organisation on many points, mainly their official view on homosexual and lesbian marriage and this awful ecumenical / multi faith attitude that I hear in so many of it's members.
Would you let your child go to such a place?
 
Seems to me these are clear.
1 Corinthians 15:33
Exodus 20:8.

Very clear indeed! thanks.
My son is a Christian and finds this situation very difficult as he loves his friend, I'm not completely sure that his friend is a Christian but his parents are.
The parents seem to think it's just great to get kids along to church, any church, whereas I strongly disagree with that premise.
I suppose my main concern as his Dad is how my son feels in this situation, but we pray together every day and study the Bible and he is very responsive to what the Lord reveals to him.
Should we refuse invites from friends though if we are hoping that they might accept an invite from us one day?
 
Should we refuse invites from friends though if we are hoping that they might accept an invite from us one day?
I wouldn't say that, I simply gave my opinion given the crowd, activity and the time. You will have to weigh each invite.
 
It is never a good thing to send your child off to a false church to save hurt feelings.

No way.
 
I have issues with the Anglican organisation on many points, mainly their official view on homosexual and lesbian marriage

Well, if you give us more clues about where you are and what Anglicans you are talking about, we might be able to give you a more informed answer. There are Anglican churches that are OK, Anglican churches that aren't OK, and Anglican groups that don't qualify as churches, but as synagogues of Satan.

CoE, I'd say "no way". The local Anglican megachurch, I'd no have issue with a teen negotiating an exchange visit.
 
Like Edward said, if it is a CoE church, no way. ACNA or AMiA are usually okay, but it depends on diocese and church. In which case it wouldn't be too different from the moderately conservative SBC church.
 
Thanks for the responses!
As far as I know it's Church of England, I live in England, I don't really know much about the differences within Anglican churches to be honest.
 
Like Edward said, if it is a CoE church, no way. ACNA or AMiA are usually okay, but it depends on diocese and church. In which case it wouldn't be too different from the moderately conservative SBC church.

I've not even heard of ACNA, AMiA or SBC before??
 
Forget everything I said, I've just found their website and it's not even Anglican! Sorry folks! It used to be C of E but was sold in 1998 and is now owned by the "New Frontiers" network??? Anyone heard of these guys? They're calling the meetings "LoveChurch" which sounds and looks dreadful.
 
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Go to the top of this page in the upper right where it says your user name, JoeFish. Click on that and then in the dropdown box on the left will be "Signature". Click on that.
 
Thanks for the signature.

I've not even heard of ACNA, AMiA or SBC before??

In the US, the Anglicans tend to be the good guys who broke off from the Episcopal Church. The Episcopal Church is the equivalent of the worst that you'd find in the CoE, and in communion with them (all though I have friends in the Episcopal church who are personally of the highest character). When the moderates split off from the Episcopal church, they affiliated with various foreign bishops resulting in several sub-denominations at this point, thus the alphabet soup above.

SBC is the Southern Baptist Convention, the largest evangelical group in the US. Almost always socially conservative (with a few outliers) but without a unified theology or worship style. Generally what would be considered very low church.
 
Thanks for the signature.



In the US, the Anglicans tend to be the good guys who broke off from the Episcopal Church. The Episcopal Church is the equivalent of the worst that you'd find in the CoE, and in communion with them (all though I have friends in the Episcopal church who are personally of the highest character). When the moderates split off from the Episcopal church, they affiliated with various foreign bishops resulting in several sub-denominations at this point, thus the alphabet soup above.

SBC is the Southern Baptist Convention, the largest evangelical group in the US. Almost always socially conservative (with a few outliers) but without a unified theology or worship style. Generally what would be considered very low church.
Thanks for explaining all that, seems pretty confusing.
I have found out (as mentioned above) that the church my son has been invited to isn't even an Anglican church, it used to be but a neo-charismatic organisation called New Frontiers own it now.
 
I think I have just created a signature.
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I have found out (as mentioned above) that the church my son has been invited to isn't even an Anglican church, it used to be but a neo-charismatic organisation called New Frontiers own it now.

No, parsing the website, I think you may have been more right than wrong.

It looks like New Frontiers bought the building from the Anglicans in 1988, remodeled, but sold it to this group in 2016 (after having leased it to them in 2014), with New Frontiers moving to a purpose built facility. https://www.lovechurch.org.uk/locations/lovechurch-bournemouth/

Then it gets confusing. It appears that the church was started under the auspices of Bishop Tim Dankin "In 2014, at the invitation of Bishop Tim Dakin, Tim and Debi Matthews moved from HTB London to Bournemouth." https://www.lovechurch.org.uk/our-story/

A bit more research shows that Tim Dankin is, in fact, the CoE Bishop. "He has been the Bishop of Winchester since 2011 and is ex officio a Member of the House of Lords. "
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Tim_Dakin

BUT he appears to be one of the good guys in the CoE. And he may have set this up outside the CoE structure so that they would have a better chance of preaching the gospel.

I'm concerned that they don't have a "what we believe" section on their website that I could find.

There are many of us here on the PB that would probably not be happy with their worship style, but based on what I've seen, I'm not sure I'd be willing to denounce them without additional research.
 
No, parsing the website, I think you may have been more right than wrong.

It looks like New Frontiers bought the building from the Anglicans in 1988, remodeled, but sold it to this group in 2016 (after having leased it to them in 2014), with New Frontiers moving to a purpose built facility. https://www.lovechurch.org.uk/locations/lovechurch-bournemouth/

Then it gets confusing. It appears that the church was started under the auspices of Bishop Tim Dankin "In 2014, at the invitation of Bishop Tim Dakin, Tim and Debi Matthews moved from HTB London to Bournemouth." https://www.lovechurch.org.uk/our-story/

A bit more research shows that Tim Dankin is, in fact, the CoE Bishop. "He has been the Bishop of Winchester since 2011 and is ex officio a Member of the House of Lords. "
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Tim_Dakin

BUT he appears to be one of the good guys in the CoE. And he may have set this up outside the CoE structure so that they would have a better chance of preaching the gospel.

I'm concerned that they don't have a "what we believe" section on their website that I could find.

There are many of us here on the PB that would probably not be happy with their worship style, but based on what I've seen, I'm not sure I'd be willing to denounce them without additional research.
Thanks for the reply!
I also didn't like that I couldn't find a "what we believe" section, it is very confusing and I have a lot of concerns about it.
I think I will go along just one time with my son and check it out.
 
I think I will go along just one time with my son and check it out.

Please let us know what you find. My guess is that it will be fairly inoffensive, watered down theology for folks who aren't ready for meat. I doubt that there will be any heresy.

But I could be wrong.
 
I personally find it a good teaching opportunity when we get to visit different churches when we travel. While the first option is to visit reformed churches, I still find it a beneficial experience to bring the family to attend a traditional Catholic or Eastern Orthodox service when the former is not available in the town or city.

Having sat through the said services, the theology and church history lessons stick much more vividly, and the family gains a deeper appreciation of why we worship the way we do in our church, especially against the backdrop of the other Christian traditions.

That said, I still stay away from charismatic worship services, as I find them offensive at every point.


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This particular Anglican group has a children's meeting on a Sunday afternoon where loud rave music is played and the kids sit around on sofas "chilling out" and eating doughnuts while smoke machines pump out whatever it is that smoke machines pump out.
That certainly doesn't sound like an environment that would be conducive to Sabbath-keeping. I'm glad you're concerned about your son in the situation; you should also be concerned about the sanctity of the Lord's Day. If you send your son off to this place, he will be surrounded by temptations to break the Sabbath, and I doubt that many of the attendees there care about the Lord's Day at all.

My son is a Christian and finds this situation very difficult
It's precious to hear that your son is concerned about the situation. I'll pray for both of you as you try to be a good witness to your son's friend. Just remember--compromising on worship and the Sabbath is never a good witness.
 
Please let us know what you find. My guess is that it will be fairly inoffensive, watered down theology for folks who aren't ready for meat. I doubt that there will be any heresy.

But I could be wrong.
I'll keep you posted!
 
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