The Rev’d Ann Holmes Redding is an Episcopal priest. She was one of the first female Episcopal priests I met when I became an Anglican, as she was attached at Holy Apostles on Ninth Avenue in Manhattan. She is a great preacher and a good priest and celebrant.
She now has become slightly controversial, as she believes that the is both Christian and Muslim. The story is here.
I am conflicted. I would not deny anyone their own faith journey, however unconventional. But I find it difficult to accept that a person can be, as she says, “100 percent Christian and 100 percent Muslim.”
In additional to her personal journey of faith, this situation will play right into the hands of the right-wing nutcases who believe that the Episcopal Church in general has gone off its trolley. Ann’s bishop, the Rt Rev’d Geralyn Wolf, Bishop of Rhode Island, has inhibited Ann from priestly orders for a year while they both think about the situation.
Even though she resides in Seattle, I have never met her in person. As you may or may not know, she has been suspended from the priesthood for a year. Here’s an update on her story.
Reading through her stated beliefs, it becomes clear to me that she is Christian only in a cultural sense, having been raised within the Episcopal Church. There’s very little Christian about her beliefs, which more closely resemble a blend between those of Muslims and Mormons.
Well, I can attest that she is a delightful person to meet, so you might want to go out of your way to meet her wherever she ends up hanging her headscarf.
Well, when I knew her I don’t believe that she was only a cultural Christian. Her faith journey has changed her beliefs since I knew her.
Er…. Let’s recap. Christianity – basic belief: Jesus was the Son of God. Islam – Jesus was NOT the Son of God. Yes, I can see how you can be both!
Yes, but it sounds now like she isn’t being honest with herself because she wants to cling to and reconcile with traditions she holds dear. I would think anyone with the training required to become a priest would acknowledge that the Trinitarian nature of God and the Divinity of Christ are at the core of Christian belief, so not to believe in them is not to be Christian in any meaningful sense.
She states in that article that she was first drawn to Islam through the power and total surrender of the Islamic prayer. It’s perfectly natural to find such a strong connection to God in that way, since in both traditions the prayer is directed to the same God of Abraham. I would think He would be open to our prayers whether we called Him Allah or Yahweh. In fact, the type of prayer she described sounds to me an awful lot like the prayer taught by the Christian mystics. The strong attraction of such prayer isn’t, I wouldn’t think, indicative of any one creed’s legitimacy.
As I see it, she could legitimately categorize her beliefs on of four ways. (I am of course of the opinion that one cannot legitimately be “100% Christian and 100% Muslim,” as she claims.) She can ascribe to Christian beliefs and acknowledge that Mohamed might have been visited by the angel Gabriel (the way, indeed, many saints in the Christian tradition have received revelations from various divine sources). She can ascribe to Islamic belief but also acknowledge aspects of Christian faith. She can identify herself as Mormon, which is the creed her beliefs most closely seem to mirror, minus the Joseph Smith stuff. (Perhaps she ought to look into the Latter Day Saints.) Or perhaps she can just acknowledge that her particular beliefs do not fit within the framework of either Christianity or Islam but that they are hers, deeply held, and are influenced heavily by both traditions. The last would be the most honest position she could take.
In any case, I will pray that she be able to reconcile her beliefs in a manner that brings her peace and avoids further scandal.