Ethos
What Anvil sets out to do
Anvil is an Anglican evangelical journal for theology and mission. It exists to encourage clear and creative thinking and practice in theology and mission, through open and scholarly debate.
Aims
The journal stands clearly within the Anglican evangelical tradition. It also seeks to engage constructively with other Christian traditions, both within and beyond the Anglican Communion, and it has a particular concern to reflect the unity and diversity of the church worldwide.
Anvil publishes original articles by contemporary writers, whether established or not, and holds them to a standard of quality and theological substance rather than reputation. It also reviews recently published books in several fields, so that readers can keep pace with current scholarship and decide which new titles are worth their time.
Who reads Anvil
The journal is written for people who take theology seriously but have limited time to read deeply. Many readers are well informed lay people; others are ordained and in parish ministry, or training for ministry. They tend to want to study theology and mission in order to apply it in their lives and churches.
Anvil tries to reach readers in the Church of England, the wider Anglican Communion and beyond who have an interest in, and some influence upon, the practical outworking of theology and mission. Some find popular magazines too light, and many academic journals too narrow. Anvil is written for the space between.
Origins
The journal began in 1984 as an initiative of six Anglican evangelical theological colleges and the Church of England Evangelical Council. Their concern was a journal focused on theology and mission that would be open to the whole range of Anglican evangelical thought, and that would provide an arena for discussion of issues facing the church.
Contributors and articles were intended to come mainly from across the Anglican evangelical spectrum, while also making room for wider perspectives, from outside Anglicanism and from outside evangelicalism, where that was helpful. The first volume included an assessment of the state of Anglican evangelicalism and two articles on interpreting Scripture, and an early issue was given to a report on the future of the church's ministry.
The journal took on the phrase, theology and mission, quite deliberately. It was meant to signal that the gospel imperative belonged at the centre of the church's life, and that neither careful thinking nor practical mission could be pursued well in isolation from the other.
Editorial policy
The material published in Anvil represents the opinions of the authors and not necessarily those of the editors, the editorial board or the trustees. Writers are asked to argue their case in the open, and readers are free to disagree.