DEFINITIONS
Orthodox: Someone who believes in Apophatic Ecclesiology, i.e. he is not Western
Roman Catholic: Someone who believes that the Pope is Infallible, and often wrong.
Episcopalian: A Unitarian with Trinitarian liturgy.
Anglo-Catholic: A pretend Roman Catholic who prays like Shakespeare
Methodist: A Unitarian who sings Trinitarian hymns
Unitarian: Someone who rejects the very idea of dogma, and dogmatically rejects the Trinity
Baptist: Once saved always saved, and does not believe in Indulgences
Pentecostal: Part Baptist, part Medieval mystic
Calvinist: Someone for whom the words of Christ shed light on the teachings of John Calvin.
Lutheran: Someone for whom the words of Christ shed light on the teachings of Martin Luther
There. Now I have offended everybody equally. I have even offended myself. In fact, I have offended me so bad that I will never talk to myself again.
Hilarious, but you went off the tracks when you got to Calvinist. The Lutheran one was on-the-mark too though.
ReplyDeletePuritan:
ReplyDeleteApparently, you have not met all of the same Calvinists I have met.
Fr. Robert Hart,
ReplyDeleteNice!
However you forgot the truly prayer book Anglican who believes in true prayer book use and does it while truly preaching from Holy Scripture as interpreted by the earliest bishops and Catholic fathers. Since you haven't offended him and me, you must have something wrong but I am incapable of finding it so you must, in your charity, point it out. I'm waiting.
ReplyDeleteGood cheer and blessing to the wonderful readers of the Continuum.
P. S. How is it, Father Hart, since we have never met, that we seem to have met the very same Calvinists? Or do we need an Einstein to do a theory?
ReplyDeleteRemember that the definitions are designed to offend. This is a healthy exercise, giving everyone a chance to take it on the chin. As Bob Dylan sang: "I would not feel so all alone/ Everybody must get stoned."
ReplyDeleteI know the post isn't to be taken too seriously, but I should point out that I've known Lutherans who thought it was unfortunate that the name Lutheran was attached to their church and prefer "Church of the Augsburg Confession" as well as the label "Catholic Evangelical." Even so, it seems a little odd to name a Church after a confession that occurred 16 centuries after the events of the New Testament. Didn't Melanchton (sp?) write the Augsburg confession anyway?
ReplyDeleteAs a Catholic-minded Lutheran, back in what now seems like the mists of prehistory, I initially came to prefer "Church of the Augsburg Confession", but soon developed the same discomfort you express. I also came to the conclusion that it matters very little what name one selects for oneself -- one is known by the names others give one. I think I see traces of this right in the Book of Acts. It appears that the early followers of Jesus prefered to call themselves by mere descriptives such as "this way" and did not name themselves until, at Antioch, presumably outsiders, began calling them "Christians". Lutherans did not name themselves, nor Methodists, nor Anglicans, for that matter, but outsiders began labeling them by what seemed to them to be the most prominent distinguishing characteristic. In almost all cases, those so labeled end up adopting the label, even if it was intended to be insulting. That's the way language grows.
ReplyDeleteBTW it's Melancthon, and he was indeed the principal author of the Agsburg Confession.
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