A number of people have recently raised some good questions about "apostolic succession," especially in regards to bishops who are neglectful of their duties. Others, in reaction to such neglect, have gone so far as to suggest that the whole idea of a succession of apostolic ministers is either flawed or unnecessary. They point to honorable and faithful pastors serving under non-catholic polities, and with much justice they compare them favorably to rogue bishops such as John Spong or Frank Griswold.

As a starting point in considering these matters, it might be helpful to begin with the Preface to the Ordinal (BCP 1928, p. 529), which is for Anglicans neither optional nor merely advisory, but an obligatory statement of doctrine and discipline. The Preface opens with this key passage:

It is evident unto all men, diligently reading Holy Scripture and ancient Authors, that from the Apostles' time there have been these Orders of Ministers in Christ's Church,-Bishops, Priests, and Deacons. Which Offices were evermore had in such reverend estimation, that no man might presume to execute any of them, except he were first called, tried, examined, and known to have such qualities as are requisite for the same; and also by public Prayer, with Imposition of Hands, were approved and admitted thereunto by lawful Authority.

It's easy to miss, when various hypothetical reconstructions of the development of this three-fold ministry are trotted out, that none of them addresses the Preface's central claim that the three-fold ministry has existed in Christ's Church since Apostolic times and that this existence may be objectively demonstrated from the Scriptures and the Fathers.

Debates about the distribution of authority or of responsibility among the three orders in this place or in that serve only to prove the objective reality of the three-fold apostolic ministry and its basis in objective history. Thus, apart from wishes that the Church's apostolic ministry had been given in some other way or form, we are on safe ground in asserting that the three-fold ministry of bishops, priests, and deacons is the authoritative pastoral and teaching ministry of the Apostolic Church.

Furthermore, it is unnecessary to bog down in arguments over whether or not a bishop is an "apostle." This is not an unworthy consideration, but far more important is our Lord's saying to the Apostles on the evening of Easter Day: "Then said Jesus to them again, Peace be unto you: as my Father hath sent me, even so send I you" (John 20:21). Whatever else is true, our Lord sent forth his Apostles with the same authority to complete his Father's will of on earth as the Father had first given him. This includes the Apostles' authority to make provision for the continuation of their ministry through others, just as Jesus Christ had taken authority to continue his ministry through them.

The event that took place on that Easter evening is clearly a transmission and succession of ministerial authority from Christ to the Apostles, publicly sealed on the day of Pentecost by the descent of the Holy Ghost. Since the original authority transmitted came from the Father through his Son Jesus Christ, whose Body is the Church, that authority resides in the entire one, holy, catholic, and apostolic Church as transmitted by Christ through the Apostles.

The Apostles, in their turn, transmitted that particular ministerial authority to their own chosen successors, bishops, priests, and deacons, which orders taken together are the continuation of the Apostolic ministry, in the variety of its duties, still today. That transmission by the Apostles to their successors, in the communion of the one Church, included the authority to call, try, examine, approve, and admit by public prayer and the imposition of hands (as the outward sign of the gift of the Holy Ghost) their own chosen successors in ministry until the Second Coming of Christ.

It must be very clear. There are other ministries, and God blesses the faithful in many ways. But nothing else is the Apostolic pastoral and teaching ministry of the Christian Church, entrusted by Christ himself to the Apostles, except the Apostles' own continuation of their ministry through bishops, priests, and deacons.

When we say in the Nicene Creed that we believe in the "apostolic" Church, we are not assenting to an abstraction, but claiming that the identity of the Body of Christ is known by two objective realities: the apostolic Faith and the apostolic ministry. This standard was not invented by the Fathers at Nicaea, but given by the Holy Ghost on Pentecost. As we read in Acts, "And they continued steadfastly in the apostles' doctrine and fellowship, and in breaking of bread, and in prayers" (2: 42).

While the fact of the apostolic succession appears in the Scripture, the first surviving use of the technical term "succession" comes from Hegesippus, c. 175:

The Church of Corinth remained in the right doctrine down to the episcopate of Primus at Corinth. I had converse with them on my voyage to Rome, and we took comfort together in the right doctrine. After arriving in Rome I made a succession down to Anicetus, whose deacon was Eleutherus. To Anicetus succeeded Soter, who was followed by Eleutherus. In every succession and in every City things are ordered according to the preaching of the Law, the Prophets and the Lord.

For this and other excerpts from early Fathers on succession, see Bettenson's Documents of the Christian Church. This example will suffice, however, to demonstrate that apostolic succession consists in both the faith and in the order of the Apostles, and not in one or the other. This is very important, since there are at least three sources of confusion about what "apostolic succession" means.

The first source of confusion is the lingering effects of the 19th century effort (on the part of many Roman and Anglo Catholics) to redefine the term "mechanically." The machine was the controlling metaphor in much of 19th century thought, and so it was perhaps inevitable that the succession should be redefined as "a machine for making bishops," especially as a much too simple way of dealing with claims raised on behalf of the ministry of non-apostolic churches. Many honest people who believe themselves obligated to reject this eccentric understanding of apostolic succession also believe themselves obligated, quite erroneously, to reject the succession entirely.

The second source of confusion is the tendency to equate an office held in the temporal organization of some local church with the Scriptural office of the same name belonging to the entire one, holy, catholic, and apostolic Church. When discipline breaks down, a bishop or an ordinary member of a local church may be anything but what the Scriptures demand of a bishop or of a Christian. This state of affairs neither redefines Christianity nor disproves the episcopate. Additionally, the granting of a mere title does not confer an apostolic office unless all the objective requirements for apostolic office are met.

The third source of confusion is our fallen tendency to impose "either-or" choices when they are not necessary or warranted. The historic discipline of the Church requires both apostolic faith and apostolic order for the exercise of the apostolic ministry, and choosing between them does not leave "half an apostolic ministry" or "an impaired apostolic ministry" or an "invisible apostolic ministry," but no apostolic ministry at all.

In contrast, the Fathers, and those who continue to follow them, hold up the order of the apostolic succession as a visible, objectifiable means for the preservation, teaching, defense, and transmission of the apostolic faith. To them, the succession has no meaning apart from the fullness of the faith, and the succession is the Church's God-given means for the orderly transmission, within the communion of the whole Church and by the whole Church through her previously admitted ministers, of apostolic ministerial authority.

Thus, a person like John Spong may hold a temporal office in the Episcopal Church called "bishop," but that does not make him a complete "bishop" in terms of the apostolic succession. Such authority as he has, due to his manifest lack of apostolic faith (no mind reading is involved here), is limited to that granted by the faithful Church so as not to deprive the innocently ignorant. For example, as part of the Church's discipline, a heretic may baptize validly if the dominical words and the outward sign of water are used.

The apostolic ministers of the ancient Church did not tolerate a person such as Spong indefinitely, nor did they require that the faithful do so. They intervened in two ways. First, they actively sought the removal of a false bishop. Second, they instructed the faithful to place themselves under a true bishop until such time as their see could be supplied with a bishop who represented both apostolic faith and apostolic order.

By comparison, a faithful pastor outside of the apostolic order of the Church may hold, with the exception of the matter of order, the complete apostolic faith and be a blessing to his people. Nevertheless, he is not a bishop (or a deacon or priest). To call a man a "bishop" is not to express approval of his doctrine or of his manner of life. It is to say that he has publicly and consistently maintained the apostolic faith and that he has been publicly tested, approved, and consecrated a bishop by the ministers of apostolic order within the communion of the apostolic church. Both objective elements (faith and order) are just as necessary for him as for John Spong.

No merit attaches to the Church's maintenance of the apostolic succession, since to do so is merely to obey Christ, the Scriptures, and the Apostles. What the Church does receive through her obedience is an objective assurance of a valid faith and a valid ministry. The authority exercised by apostolic ministers is not in them, as a personal possession. It is the authority of the Father, given through the Son, and by the Holy Ghost to the Apostles. It resides in the communion of the Catholic Church, and it makes that communion visible through the continuation of the Apostles' Faith and Ministry by the three orders of ministers they appointed.