Essay competition won by member of the Diocese in Europe



Last October on this blog I announced an essay competition run by the St Boniface Trust, an Anglican charity, which was offering a prize of £1000 for the best 5000-word answer to the question "Why I am an Anglican and believe I shall remain so". 


This was a global competition, and 64 submissions came in from around the world. But the prize-winning essay was submitted by a member of one of the parishes of this Diocese in Europe, Natacha-Ingrid Tinteroff. A French convert from Roman Catholicism, Natacha-Ingrid used her essay to celebrate the best of Anglicanism and the Anglican Communion, which she believes includes its liturgy, its space to discover God's truth, and its "integral catholicity". 


Tinteroff wrote, “Being an Anglican is much more than what is currently advertised by the media. Anglican global identity is not defined by a positioning in favour or against homosexual clergy and women bishops. The overall depth of our tradition, and particularly its spirituality and liturgy, still nurtures the life of millions of Christians, including some who have formally left. At the same time, and although it is highly ignored, despite the so-called desperate situation of the Anglican Communion its churches welcome each year a considerable number of Christians who enjoy the spiritual solace provided by Anglican inclusivity. Faith in the Anglican Communion needs to be reaffirmed."

She explained that the Church of England is the only part of the Christian Church she can grow and consequently hear God. “I am able to do so because the Anglican tradition, which has welcomed me so generously, not only allows me to be a mature believer, but encourages me to be so. I enjoy the liberty that Anglicanism gives me as a scholar, and that I could not find anywhere else.”

An academic and author Tinterhoff’s prize-winning essay was was unanimously selected by the two judges, retired diocesan bishops, the Rt Revd Mark Santer and the Rt Revd Michael Turnbull.  


The winning essay can be found here.

Comments

  1. Peter Edwards2 June 2012 at 18:28

    Thank you for posting this. Not just an extraordinarily well-researched argument - sometimes distractingly academic - but a powerful testimony from a Christian whose intellect enables her faith with Reason, rather than stifling it. It deserves many re-readings.

    ReplyDelete

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