Individualism Versus the Communion of Saints

The Right Reverend Doctor Peter Toon on Worship:

"Attempts are sometimes made to assimilate the
prayer of the Liturgy to that of the individual, but
such attempts are really misguided. Services of a
popular character (using the word popular in its
best not its cheapest sense) are necessary to the full
expression of individual devotion and must exist
side by side with the Liturgy, but the two must not
be mixed or substituted for one another. A sensitive
soul instantly feels that extempore praying and
subjective hymn-singing, while eminently right at
a prayer meeting, are out of place at the Eucharist,
though perhaps he may not be able to say why
he feels it. The individualist, on the other hand,
wants to find in public prayer the direct expression
of his own spiritual condition and needs, and to
him therefore the Liturgy seems to be generalized,
formal and cold…"

From: http://www.episcopalian.org/pbs1928/Mandate/2005-09-10-Mandate_Web_pp01-04.pdf

I think Dr. Toon has made an excellent point here. If we are to be the church, we must maintain a corporate unity in worship while maintaining a private piety. I believe the analogy of the outward sign and the inward grace are appropriate here. We must have unity afforded us in the outward signs of a common liturgy but the inward graces are given by God supernaturally and sought out by us as God gives us the grace to want such means of graces as He has appointed to us through the church.

May we be committed to the Holy Scriptures and the five solas of the Reformation that are contained therein. But may we also be committed to the Anglican tradition and way as the only means of true Anglican unity!