In defense of Fr. Wells

(this follows comments to a previous thread)

Theological debate can be as emotionally engaging as political debate, if not more so. The recent thread about the gifts of the Holy Spirit took on a subject that I have thought about very little over the last several years, but one about which my mind has been made up for a long time. That subject was the gifts mentioned in I Corinthians chapters 12-14, and the discussion centered to a surprising degree on one gift, tongues. The strongest opinions with which I was in disagreement came from Brian G. and Fr. Laurence Wells.

With all due respect for my fellow blogger and fellow priest, Fr. Matthew Kirby, I cannot see in the comments of Fr. Laurence Wells some evidence of "objective mortal sin." I believe my somewhat advanced age and decades of experience entitle me to lay my opinion before the readers as exactly that, simply my opinion. But, mine is an educated opinion. I welcome "robust if polite" debate; and when it comes to debate about Scripture I am on my native ground, and am accustomed to being the winner. Bible wrestling among gentlemen is a wholesome sport , and should end like the fight in The Quiet Man, when afterward John Wayne and Victor McLaughlin walk home singing together as the best of friends, and sit down to dinner and beer (even though the ladies may find this impossible to understand ).

I do not know what the Charismatic movement among Anglicans has been like in Australia, but as a self-confessed current tongue-speaking alumnus of the Charismatic movement American style, I know without being told exactly why Fr. Wells has spoken in disparaging terms about the movement. Whereas I disagree openly and strongly with any Cessationist view, and whereas "I thank my God, I speak with tongues more than ye all," I know why Fr. Wells has expressed his views colorfully (in keeping with his personality of honesty to a fault). It is not "objective mortal sin." Indeed, when I met Fr. Wells one thing was obvious above all: The observable fact of charity engraven on his very features, the kind no one could acquire by pretence or theatrics.

He is free to write and correct my assumption; but it would surprise me a great deal. Here is a priest who was pastor to a congregation for decades, and who has been forced to clean up problems created by the most radioactive kind of Charismatics: Those who promised miracles and healing as if they could manufacture them; those who divided churches by demanding that everybody must have the same gifts, or implied that those who cannot speak in tongues are somehow deficient in faith; those who proclaimed boldly that anyone who is yet sick or disabled lacks faith.

Yes, I believe there has been much good that has come from the Charismatic outpouring, and I ascribe to God the great evangelistic explosion that it produced, as well as the awakening to faith it created among many nominal Christians including myself back in 1973.

But, honesty compels me to say that there was also a great deal of foolishness, heresy and pride exhibited by the kind of individual St. Paul describes in the words, "intruding into those things which he hath not seen, vainly puffed up by his fleshly mind..." (Col. 2:18). It is no mark of sanctity or spirituality that one has any gift, even the gift to work miracles. Otherwise the Lord would have said in vain: "Many will say to me in that day, Lord, Lord, have we not prophesied in thy name? and in thy name have cast out devils? and in thy name done many wonderful works? And then will I profess unto them, I never knew you: depart from me, ye that work iniquity. " (Matt. 7:22,23) Even a gift to work miracles is no evidence of sanctity, any more than it was evidence of true virtue that Balaam's donkey could speak. And, indeed, even a man who may have the power to heal by God's grace, is an ass when he exercises his jawbone to condemn as faithless, a disabled or sick believer who has not been healed in body. God's power and gifts are not at our command.

With all due respect for Fr. Kirby, I believe that the frankness of Fr. Wells was no sign of "objective mortal sin," but the seeming fierceness of a pastor who loves intensely.

Poll: More Americans 'pro-life'

By Jennifer Harper (Contact) | Saturday, May 16, 2009

More Americans now say they are "pro-life" than "pro-choice," according to a Gallup poll released Friday.

A majority of respondents 51 percent are against the practice of abortion, while 42 percent classified themselves as being pro-choice.

You may read the whole article by clicking here.

Prayer Book Catholic vs Missal Catholic?

Some of our respected interlocutors, Death Bredon and Canon Tallis especially, have claimed in the past that use of the Missals by Anglican Catholics is opposed either to sound doctrine or fidelity to the Anglican liturgical patrimony, or both. They believe that the use of the Prayer Books according to “English Use”, as explained by, for example, Percy Dearmer in The Parson's Handbook, is in fact the only acceptable or honest alternative. Subsidiary to this is the claim that use of the Missals is contrary to the Affirmation of St Louis.

Taking the second claim first, the claim that the 1928 and 1962 Books of Common Prayer (BCP henceforth) have some absolute liturgical priority due to the Affirmation ignores the fact that its historical context was North America, just as new, questionable liturgies were taking hold in ECUSA and the AC-Canada, at the beginning of the Continuing Church. Which is why those 2 books were said to be the exclusive standard at that time: "No other standard ... exists". Since then the Anglican Catholic Church has become international and other BCPs have joined the authorised list of liturgical resources described as the "Standard of Public Worship" (in Article XIV of the Constitution), such as the Indian and South African, "together with" the Missals. The Missals thus form part of that standard. Indeed, Abp Haverland appeals to them to make the point that receptionism is ruled out by our liturgical formularies considered in full (see p.113 of Anglican Catholic Faith and Practice, Second Edition).

On the other aspects of the BCP vs Missal, Sarum vs Tridentine issue, permit me to quote something I have written before, with new material added:

All Anglican Catholics agree that the BCP was never intended to be a full ceremonial instruction manualⁱ, and that therefore resort must be had to wider and/or earlier Catholic custom to “fill in the gaps”. Supporters of the English use have focussed on what was earlier, and specifically English, and so a genuinely “ancestral” Catholic custom for Anglicans. Supporters of the Roman or Western use have focussed on what is wider and more contemporaneous, and so a living Catholic custom as practised in the Roman Catholic Church. The former are less prone to varying from or adding to the BCP rite in the actual prayers, the latter more so.

There are two related aspects of the English vs Roman use choice, ritual (the words) and ceremonial (the actions).

All the talk about Church architecture, decoration and extra-liturgical devotions that is often brought in is a separate issue in reality, as neither the BCP nor the Missals say anything about these. One could and can find parishes using the missal but with reserved practices in the other areas, and parishes that have BCP Mass but also Benediction at times.

So, if one sticks to the main question, one finds that the argument for English usage (BCP and Percy Dearmer) and against Roman usage (the Missals and Ritual Notes) may be summarised as follows:-

1. Catholics must go by authority in liturgical matters.
2. The BCP and all that its Ornament Rubric implies, as well as its "lack of rejection/overuling of mediaeval ceremonial customs implying permitted/expected retention" are that authority for Anglicans, along with what Bishops command.
3. The Roman Church and its decrees on liturgy are not authoritative for Anglicans.
4. Therefore, the English Rite is obligatory for Anglican Catholics and the Roman rite illicit.

The problem is that we know that insertions of non-BCP ritual material into the post-Reformation English Liturgy were made in the 16th Century from the Roman Missal by Catholic-minded C of E priests, in the 17th Century by Bishops such as Andrewes from personal compositions based on ancient precedents, and in the 18th Century by the Non-Jurors using similar sources. The latter two groups at least are heroes of "PB Catholics", as is early 17th Century Anglican apologist Dean Field, who said the Latin Rite contained nothing in its Missals contrary to sound doctrine. More than 200 years later we had the Evangelical Dean of Canterbury, Henry Wace, saying the same thing. So, the High Churchmen were not as different to the 19th Century Ritualists as has been implied. Even one who largely stuck to the Prayer Book, Bp Overall, did so by re-appending the prayer of oblation and thanksgiving to the Consecration prayer, showing that he was not enamoured of the then-contemporaneous (and authoritative!) English BCP Rite unaltered. And, in fact, it was successfully argued long ago (1685!) in a legal context that additions to the BCP service that did not substitute for it were permissible.

An extraordinary oversight by those opposing as illicit additions to the BCP rite which are not covered by any rubric is consideration of the history of hymnody in the Church of England. At first hymns were inserted into the liturgy by Low Church clergy for what can fairly be called evangelical reasons. This was frowned upon by authority but not stamped out. Indeed, by the beginning of the 19^th Century, even the “frowns” were disappearing. Nevertheless, while the use of hymns in Holy Communion increased and became generally accepted during the 19^th Century, it was not until 1890 that the Lincoln Judgement officially “allowed the use of hymns provided they did not interrupt the course of the service” (The Oxford Dictionary of the Christian Church, Third Edition, p. 811). And there was still no rubrical permission at all within the BCP liturgy itself for these additions, which are undeniably the addition of extra public prayers. These hymns are the source of the Sarum-based additions defenders of the English Rite inserted, including the Introit, Gradual, Offertory and Communion sentences. Now, if such additions to the authorised public prayers were accepted by all, based on a common-sense understanding of the need for enrichment of the service and a resultant developing custom, how much more must Missal additions of non-public prayers be justifiable? After all, the forbidding of unauthorised prayer seen in, for example, Elizabethan legislation -- “all Ministers shall be bound to ... use ... all ... Common and Open Prayer, in such Order and Form as is mentioned in the said Book ... and None other or otherwise” [emphasis added] – clearly does not apply to personal prayers of the Celebrant not said to be audible to the people, but just as clearly does apply to all those hymns and other public services or rituals additional to the BCP which either Evangelicals or “Prayer Book Catholics” of the English Rite have accepted happily. Therefore, if anything, the Missal approach had less of an “authority problem” than the alternatives, especially given that Low Church Anglicans had often illegally varied from the rite, including by deletion, for a long time before the Ritualists came along. But, in fact, the forbidding abovementioned was never taken absolutely literally or applied consistently by the Church of England, and High Church Anglicans always understood Catholic tradition to have priority.

Therefore, at the very least, Missals which take the BCP rites and add to them from the Latin rite are following Anglican precedents in principle and not breaking any Church laws, especially since most of what is added consists of private prayers of the priest said in the low voice. (In other words, when I say the Mass according to the Anglican Missal 1549 Canon option, I am being a faithful Anglican Catholic.) If there are plausible arguments that the introduction of the BCPs and quashing of the old rites were not done in a completely canonically regular manner, which there are, then even the "BCP must not be contradicted in any way" principle need not be considered sacrosanct. (That means if I wanted to use the Gelasian Canon translated into English in the Missal instead of the 1549 BCP Canon, I need feel no discomfort. However, I prefer the 1549.)

As for the rulings of bishops, which naughty Ritualists are supposed to have ignored to their own condemnation as congregationalists, the following facts should be noted. Many 19th and 20th Century bishops tried to stop anything looking Catholic, even those things mandated by the Ornaments Rubric, and they made no distinction between English and Roman ritualism. Anybody who supported Eucharistic Vestments, Candles, Incense, etc., was the enemy. By the time such unjustified and uncanonical persecution ceased, the bishops who were happy for all these Catholic customs to be re-introduced also made little distinction between the Rites in the main, as I understand it. So the episcopal jus liturgicum was to begin with largely irrelevant to the choice between Rites because unlawfully anti-BCP, and irrelevant to the choice later because by then many bishops were either permitting the Roman usages (being by then well-established customs) or turning a blind-eye to them.

Therefore, the claim that the BCP rite and its explicit and implicit [i.e., neo-Sarum, Ornaments Rubric-based] ceremonial cannot be touched or enriched without being unAnglican and unCatholic is false. Once tradition, law and reason are taken into account, the authorities mentioned in point 2 above are seen to be important but relative, not absolute.

The question then becomes "but is the Latin Liturgy after Trent in any way appropriate or authoritative as a source for Anglicans?" The answer is "Yes" for three reasons. One, the RCC is our main sister Church in the West, to whom we are in many ways closer liturgically and culturally (at least with respect to their Latin Rite) than to the EOC, so its practices provide a relevant, easily accessible and useful precedent. Even the Old Catholics with whom we were in communion used the Tridentine rite. Two, common-sense reference to such a handy precendent is NOT equivalent to claiming that this option MUST be taken simply because it has Papal backing. So, the fear that using the Tridentine Rite for supplementary or alternative material is the same as uncritically accepting the absolute monarchy of the Pope is an unreasonable one. Three, even the cleverest arguments by pro-English Rite apologists cannot hide the fact that when it came to determining how we should "clothe" the BCP liturgy when that need became more apparent and pressing in the 19th Century there was a lack of binding, explicit and unambiguous instruction within Anglicanism that answered that question in detail. The Ornaments Rubric implies the tools to be used, but not how to use them. And the pre-Reformation English ceremonial said to have implicit authority (at most) had in fact been in desuetude for centuries, and had perhaps never been actually used by anybody with the 1662 rite until then. With such an authority vacuum, once the convenient Roman option had been established, and then become customary and eventually explicitly permitted in places, any later attempt to paint this option as merely rebellious has to be seen as illegitimate. Basically, Anglican Catholics of the 19^th Century had a choice between: painstaking historical reconstruction of old, native ceremonial to be re-inserted as much as appropriate into an (almost) unchanged BCP rite in a way that quite possibly had never been done before, but which could be rationally defended on the basis that the loss of ceremonial had never been necessary or mandated and so remained a valid source; or quick reference to the most closely related living rite of the time, but one which had diverged a bit from the native precursors, in order to use both ceremonial and extra non-public prayers. Either could be defended as according with respect for Catholic custom and common-sense.

Finally, this is largely an argument about nothing. Most Prayer Book Catholics are content to follow their traditions and let Missal users follow theirs without interference, and the feeling is mutual, even within the ACC. The differences in ceremonial are not very great since both "The Parson's Handbook" and "Ritual Notes" allow use of incense, the mixed chalice, Vestments, Frontals, Candles, crossings, etc., etc. The differences in the prayers used are somewhat greater but irrelevant, since the pre-Tridentine English Rites (e.g., Sarum) were not that different to the Tridentine rite, and, as mentioned above, the insertions from these and other sources had been made long before Tractarians or Ritualists existed and such insertions were never condemned by lawful authority but instead sometimes used by respected bishops! More importantly, both English and Western/Roman rites within Anglican Catholicism are almost 100% BCP when it comes to the “Common” prayers anyway, if the Gelasian Canon is not used. In some parts of the liturgy, where Missal usage could be justly criticised for unnecessary duplication of supplications or thanksgivings already covered by BCP material, the Anglican Missal makes explicit the optional nature of the Missal addition for just this reason, e.g., the rubric before Domine Jesu Christi, Fili Dei vivi. Indeed The People's Anglican Missal, in speaking of the prayers additional to the BCP said by the priest in a low voice, states on page 256: “The worshipper may profitably recite these devotions even if the Celebrant omits them ... no Rubric requires their use”. Therefore, it must be remembered that Missal additions to the BCP rite are intentionally given as optional, not mandatory.

These are just some of the reasons why I have followed both traditions at different times and felt comfortable with both. There is no need to pronounce against those who use a tradition you don't prefer, as both have a defensible place within the greater tradition, and both are used to worship God in reverence and truth and to edify the people of God.

iThe agreement on this point is important and worth noting. The arguments given by English and Roman use supporters are bascially identical. Compare, for example, the Preface to the Directorium Anglicanum (pro-Western use) and the essay “English or Roman Use?” (pro-English use).

Grace and Sacraments Part III

This follows Parts I and II.

No substitute.

The Sacraments were not ordained of Christ to be gazed upon or to be carried about, but that we should duly use them. And in such only as worthily receive the same, have they a wholesome effect or operation... Article XXV

We have seen that grace is the purpose of the sacraments. For this reason they impart what the Law cannot impart. We have seen also that our knowledge of heavenly things, and spiritual things such as sacraments, is limited to what God has allowed us to know. Beyond his revelation we know nothing about these mysteries; and therefore Anglicanism has never pretended to establish limits to the grace of God. We are constrained within the limitless sphere of the sacramental system, commanded and commissioned to minister according to what we have been told to do in expectation of God's faithfulness to his own word. We know that in each sacrament there is a promise of Divine action. What we do not know is how and when God imparts sacramental grace beyond our ability to administer it, and in that ignorance we may take comfort and may hope that the same grace is, at least in some measure, effectual among all Christians everywhere.

But, lest anyone misunderstand what I said in the second half of Part II, it is necessary to clarify that we must work within the revelation we have been given. It is very clear that among other Protestants, those who have not maintained faith in the sacramental system and who have failed to maintain a valid episcopacy, a sense of emptiness and need compels them to create substitutes. As a reader named John reflected in a very recent comment (providing for me a perfect example of what I was going to say):

I notice increasingly that protestant clergy attempt to sacramentalize their actions while continuing to reject authentic catholic sacramental expression. The example of Billy Graham's altar calls are a case in point. I once asked a friend who had attended a number of Billy Graham Crusades if he always responded to the altar call. He replied, I always go forward. It is wonderful to accept Jesus Christ as my Lord and Savior again and again and to "feel" the love and support of all those laying their hands upon you. I don't feel that at my local church.

Indeed, as I was saying in Part II, we do not limit the grace of God, and we have reason to hope that the grace normally imparted through sacraments can nonetheless extend to others who, through ignorance or circumstance, cannot receive them. Nonetheless, it is clear that such believers feel that something is missing, and for those who learn why they feel the emptiness, this too becomes a manifestation of God's grace. Some may awake to the fact that they ought to receive something that is missing.

The substitutes for sacraments may include many different things. They may include among Pentecostals a need to, as Oral Roberts used to say: "Expect a miracle every day." The problem is, though we believe-indeed know-that God works miracles, nowhere has he promised to grant such things every day. For that matter, he has never promised to grant them most days; and some may live a lifetime without seeing a miracle, just as John the Baptist did no miracles.1 Faith requires a promise, a word from God revealed in Scripture; and he has never made a promise to work a miracle everyday.

Even the insane behavior of snake handlers in "signs following" churches is a substitute, sometimes a deadly substitute, as they do dangerous and foolish things simply because they crave some assurance. They read Mark 16:9-20, and do not take notice of the Scriptural commentary on Scripture.

And when they were escaped, then they knew that the island was called Melita. And the barbarous people shewed us no little kindness: for they kindled a fire, and received us every one, because of the present rain, and because of the cold. And when Paul had gathered a bundle of sticks, and laid them on the fire, there came a viper out of the heat, and fastened on his hand. And when the barbarians saw the venomous beast hang on his hand, they said among themselves, No doubt this man is a murderer, whom, though he hath escaped the sea, yet vengeance suffereth not to live. And he shook off the beast into the fire, and felt no harm. Howbeit they looked when he should have swollen, or fallen down dead suddenly: but after they had looked a great while, and saw no harm come to him, they changed their minds, and said that he was a god. 2

In Acts we see that St. Paul was unharmed when an accident occurred that would have interrupted his work before God was finished making use of him. He was not harmed. But these deluded people tempt God, and sometimes die, seeking a substitute for valid assurance in their faith. They serve as an example that reaches the limits of extreme and deadly (literally speaking) Enthusiasm. Most attempts at a substitute are much less colorful.

Sacraments do two things that impart grace. They effect what they signify and signify what they effect. The first imparts grace directly: The supernatural reality of the sacraments is charismatic, and the direct effect, though invisible, gives life and salvation. The second way, by signifying what they effect, touches our faith and acts through it. The word that comes to mind is assurance. The sacraments signify, that is, they are a pledge, a promise, and therefore provide assurance. Jesus promised that by eating his flesh and drinking his blood we will live by him, and have eternal life. He promised that when his apostolic representatives forgive sins, they are forgiven. He promised that we are born of the Spirit, from the death of Adam to the new life of his resurrection, in baptism. Amid whatever pain, confusion, excitement or lack of excitement, we pass as we walk through this valley of the shadow of death, that is our earthly life, we have in addition to what has been effected, assurance of faith through what has been signified.

There is, therefore, no substitute for the sacraments among those who come to understand them. In the sacraments God's promises are concrete; they have taken on an objective and physical form in our actual experience. We have, therefore, grace and also assurance of that grace. For the sacraments effect what they signify, and also (thank God) signify what they effect. This second part truly imparts grace, acting through our faith.

The source, the Incarnation

And God saw every thing that he had made, and, behold, it was very good. - Gen. 1:31

That which was from the beginning, which we have heard, which we have seen with our eyes, which we have looked upon, and our hands have handled, of the Word of life; (For the life was manifested, and we have seen it, and bear witness, and shew unto you that eternal life, which was with the Father, and was manifested unto us;) That which we have seen and heard declare we unto you, that ye also may have fellowship with us: and truly our fellowship is with the Father, and with his Son Jesus Christ. And these things write we unto you, that your joy may be full. -- I John 1:1-4

The Church is the sacramental community because it springs from the Incarnation of the Word. Jesus, the human manifestation of the Logos, did not merely make known his presence in the earth by sending signals, or supplying emotional needs. He is incarnate of the Holy Ghost by the Virgin Mary. He could be seen and touched, standing before the disciples as a man of flesh and blood, and later as the firstfruits of the Resurrection unto immortality as a man with flesh and bones. "Behold my hands and my feet, that it is I myself: handle me, and see; for a spirit hath not flesh and bones, as ye see me have." 3

It is true that everything the Church needs for the sacraments can be found in a proper kitchen, bread, wine, water and olive oil. The created order is good, indeed very good. And, as we have seen from the opening of the first Epistle of St. John the Apostle, one definition of the Church is that it is the fellowship of those who have fellowship with the Apostles, and therefore with the Father and with his Son, Jesus Christ. We have assurance that has been passed down, literally and concretely, passed down sacramentally in the community founded by the Apostles who saw and touched the Incarnate Logos. Their fellowship, from the birth of the Church until now, extends to us in the physical reality of this time and space world, in this creation of God that includes energy, matter and a very real history.

Ultimately, the grace and full assurance of grace, both of which come to us through the sacraments, extend from the Incarnate Christ. There can be no substitute.
______

1. John 10:41
2. Acts 28:1-6
3. Luke 24:39

A Bishop of the ACC reflects on the Charismata

Recently I sent my Bishop Ordinary, Bp Brian Iverach, the links to the posts Fr Hart and I wrote concerning the gifts of the Spirit, and asked for his feedback. His very encouraging reply is given here, with his permission.

Dear Father Matthew,

I have read the posts in the above Subject on The Continuum with great delight. Personally, for many years now I have taken it quite for granted that the Charismata are an essential part of our ministry in Christ to the world in the Anglican expression. Ever since experiencing the power of the Holy Ghost, having asked to receive the gifts of the Spirit at a Jesuit run retreat, now decades ago, my life has been in heavily reliance on Him for guidance and comfort. Prayer language is a normal for proper balance in prayer life. Our disciplines of Prayer Book and Breviary are well complimented by glossolalia. There are times when there is no other appropriate expression than glossolalia when I am using the Anglican Breviary in Oratory. There is nothing to fear when the Holy Spirit Himself prompts in public either.

In the Philippines ministry the healing and glossolalia gifts were not uncommon. Many miracles were witnessed as a result of Holy Unction and Holy Mass.

I have witnessed men healed instantly from addiction by laying on of hands and prayer, in other countries too. The men wanted to be delivered.

I have seen in America communicants healed by the Blood of Christ, in one case from the holy chalice administered as 'the healing cup of salvation' (not the authorized administration admittedly, but one prompted by the Spirit for the occasion). As if in a message in confirmation of gifts in God's grace, the man communicated came back the following Sunday to witness personally to healing of mind in his search for employment. He had been unemployed for almost a year flunking many interviews. He had obtained excellent employment after the administration of the Blood of Christ. Only one example of so many healings know, not accounting for many unknown.

Lana [the Bishop's wife] had the damage to her eye caused by a sharp stick healed without the necessary opthalmic surgery. A miracle of healing that set her on the path to 13 years of healing prayer ministry at the Church of the Resurrection, Dallas Texas. Her neighbour came to her after the accident in her home and prayed for the healing of her eyes and God answered the prayer that night to the amazement of hospital emergency attendants the next morning. God used Lana in His special way for His ministry to the sick in mind, body or spirit. She introduced the Order of St. Luke the Physician into the Roman Catholic Diocese of Dallas.

In Kenya we have taught the ministry of healing from Scripture, reason, tradition, and from Agnes Sanford's The healing gifts of the Spirit ISBN 0-06-067052-5. Esther Ndegwa, the wife of Fr. John Ndegwa heads up the healing ministry at Good Shepherd in the slums of Korogocho in Nairobi Kenya. Many miracles of healing are taking place in that distressed country.

It is better to have a confident faith in the Gifts of the Spirit, obviously, than to disparage them, or worse still, abuse the gifts of the Spirit. But even then, God often chooses whom He chooses and heals when He wills. An over concern for protocols of liturgy can backfire. In an Episcopal congregation in Dallas, TX the vestry appointed a committee (flies on the back wall as they became later known) to vet any attempt at prophesy from the nave. All prophesy ceased thereafter and many other spiritual gifts as well. A president confident in the Spirit should be able, in his spirit, to discern when God chooses to move in His Spirit. There is a holy hush that comes upon the congregation at such times, and the Spirit is not going to disrupt His own worship. On rare occasions someone of vocal compulsion might stand to deliver a word not from God, but there being no interpretation, the person is seated by silence without recrimination. It is most likely to be the humble quiet person that God chooses to give prophetic utterances during a worship service and the voice will be clearly heard in every corner. If God chooses to do this in the middle of Holy Missal Mass so be it. Even though Holy Mass in the Anglican Missal exudes the Holy Ghost, it is but a liturgy, the best man can devise. We must be careful to worship God in the fullness of the Spirit and not worship the liturgy. All in good order. The blessed Apostle was addressing some gross misbehaviour in the church of his time, most unlikely in an Anglican Catholic congregation properly instructed.

All of these experiences really came as no surprise after reading the Venerable Bead's History of the English Church. The miracles he recorded in gifts of the Spirit date much later that the lifetime of the Apostles. Such wonderful Anglican precedents exist for application of the gifts of the Spirit in our continuum. Bishops, should, because of the charismata of both ordinations and consecration, be active instruments of the gifts of the Holy Spirit. But the gifts are not limited to the ordained alone. The gifts of the Spirit are given to the priesthood of believers who seek them of the heart, as God's chosen vessels. First they must hear and/or read about the gifts of the Spirit and believe. To be so chosen after prayerful request is no occasion for pride. One simply does what he is called to do, such as has been told to us by Jesus Christ and handed on to us in the traditions of the Church. Normal Christian practice to the glory of God.

In Christ,

+Brian

Grace and Sacraments Part II

This follows Part I, posted on May 8th.

The purpose of the sacraments is to impart grace, and as we have seen in Part I, this involves grace for things both as natural as "states of life," and as supernatural as salvation from sin and death. The Law of God has a different purpose, and that purpose is to show us that we were born of the flesh, in Adam, dead in trespasses and sins. In this way the Law serves as "a schoolmaster to bring us unto Christ, that we might be justified by faith."1 The sacraments of the Gospel, that is, the two that are "generally necessary to salvation," 2 come to us with promises of eternal life in Christ, provided that they are accompanied by repentance and faith.

That is not because they could be invalid and ineffectual without repentance and faith, but rather the very opposite; because they are always, if administered properly, effectual and valid. In the sixth chapter of his Epistle to the Romans, St. Paul never suggests that baptism can fail to be effectual: Rather, he states boldly that baptism has produced its powerful effect in each person who has received the sacrament, and that for this reason the baptized person has no longer any obligation to sin, but instead an obligation to holiness. We ought to meet it with faith, and the resolve to live in the new life by yielding the members of our bodies as "servants to righteousness unto holiness." 3 The same applies to Holy Communion: Because it is real as an objective fact, those who eat without faith and repentance add sin to sin; that is, they eat and drink unto judgment. 4 Paul does not say that the person who eats and drinks unworthily has merely failed to receive grace; he says something very different. In both of the "Sacraments of the Gospel," also known as the Dominical Sacraments (because they were instituted by the Lord himself 5), grace unto eternal life is imparted directly by God, providing a χάρισμα (a gift or grace) that empowers the believer.

And, so it is that the sacraments, properly administered, cannot fail. They obligate the one who receives them, but not in the way that the Law obligates. For the Law is weak through the flesh, 6 and therefore it cannot provide a power to rise above the pull of the world, the gravity of our own flesh that takes us down into sin and death. But, the Dominical Sacraments do provide the very χάρις (grace) needed to live up to the obligations they impose. That is, they are the work of no one less than the Holy Spirit who gives life and power through them, aiding us to become saints. Received with faith, they impart grace that is both merciful and powerful. We are assured that our sins are forgiven, and we are given power to live by grace; and living by grace is the only way to grow and be transformed in holiness that the Law, by commandments, cannot provide.

However, the Law can tell us we are sinners, and in that way can slay us. Understood properly, the Law acts as a schoolmaster to show us we need the Savior. Those individuals, mentioned in the Gospels, who thought themselves justified by the Law, were deceived about themselves; for an honest reader sees by the Law that he is exactly like other men. This is the very irony our Lord intended to convey in the parable of the Pharisee and the Publican 7. The man who should have been convicted more deeply of his own sin was the Pharisee; indeed, even more so than the Publican who confessed his sins and prayed to be forgiven. For the Pharisee knew the Law better and should have been able to see in that mirror what kind of a man he was. 8

The Sacraments of the Gospel must be combined with a true knowledge of God's Law in the life of every Christian. Only then do we see the grace that is imparted. Only then do we see how much we have to depend on grace, not on our own flesh or simply on our limited willpower; "for the spirit is willing, but the flesh is weak". 9 Because we have the grace that is given by the Holy Spirit, who imparts grace upon grace when we continue to feed on the Living Christ in the food and drink of eternal life, we have a greater obligation not due strictly to commandments, but because the power that is in us overcomes the world through our faith. 10

Absolutely null and utterly void

A multitude of the people, even many of Ephraim, and Manasseh, Issachar, and Zebulun, had not cleansed themselves, yet did they eat the passover otherwise than it was written. But Hezekiah prayed for them, saying, The good LORD pardon every one that prepareth his heart to seek God, the LORD God of his fathers, though he be not cleansed according to the purification of the sanctuary. And the LORD hearkened to Hezekiah, and healed the people. - II Chron. 30:18-20

And one of the malefactors which were hanged railed on him, saying, If thou be Christ, save thyself and us. But the other answering rebuked him, saying, Dost not thou fear God, seeing thou art in the same condemnation? And we indeed justly; for we receive the due reward of our deeds: but this man hath done nothing amiss. And he said unto Jesus, Lord, remember me when thou comest into thy kingdom. And Jesus said unto him, Verily I say unto thee, Today shalt thou be with me in paradise. - Luke 23:39-43

Because the Sacraments give what the Law cannot give, it is ironic if we perceive them strictly in legal terms. On one hand, the Church must do everything with great care because we are commanded and commissioned to minister according to the pattern shown to us on the holy mountain-not Sinai, but the mountain in Galilee where the Risen Christ appeared to the Apostles and gave the Great Commission. 11 We must baptize in the Name of the Father and of the Son and of the Holy Spirit; and on that other mountain, Jerusalem, earlier, back on the night in which he was betrayed, our Lord gave us a commandment and commission. All things must be done with care, such as the Laying on of hands according to what St. Paul recalled in his Epistles to Timothy and Titus where we see the Scriptural pattern of Apostolic Succession in some of its earliest examples. 12

Anglicans have always known that the Bible and the understanding of the Church in Antiquity give us no option. We must maintain the Apostolic Succession, because the Sacraments that require Ordination require, for obvious reasons, a valid Episcopacy. These are not only the Sacraments of Baptism and Holy Communion, but others that are related. Confirmation follows Baptism and completes it. 13 Receiving Holy Communion is unthinkable without Absolution. 14 And, Absolution ties these Sacraments to healing with the Anointing and prayer for that purpose, which is a priestly sacrament. 15 Frankly, only Matrimony seems to be simply a sacrament of "states of life allowed in the Scriptures," inasmuch as these others are all related somehow to the two Dominical Sacraments, and so play a part in salvation. Maintaining the Episcopacy and holding fast to the Formularies and Laws of our Anglican Patrimony is, therefore, necessary for the work we are commanded to do. And so our Anglican heritage clings to and understands the Divine appointment of the Episcopacy in the clearest possible terms. 16

But, as I have argued before, this does not limit God to work within the rules he has given to us, for he has never imparted grace through the Law in any age. We must be careful to do all things shown to us, and according to the revealed pattern. But, the need we may feel to dismiss the working of God's grace in many places where this knowledge is lacking, must be resisted as a temptation. And, we have the example in Scripture of the thief on the cross to show that God is not bound to the Sacraments (though we most certainly are) to give us hope for the people unable through ignorance or circumstance to receive the sacraments.

Once I heard Billy Graham explain in sacramental terms his practice of what Baptists and other Evangelicals refer to as an "Altar Call." He said, "You say, by coming, I receive Christ; I repent of my sins, of my former life. You see, it is an outward sign of the inner and invisible work of the Holy Spirit in your heart." It is easy to react and say, "but there is no sacrament of the Altar Call." Nonetheless, it was obvious to me that Dr. Graham deliberately used terminology from sacramental theology, and that it was far from mockery or irreverence. Indeed, we may have a real and well founded hope that people who sincerely went forward and prayed received grace that was in no way alien to the grace of the sacraments; rather, grace that flowed from that same Source.

Contrary to what many have thought, Anglicanism never goes so far as to deny the effect of what most Protestant bodies refer to as sacraments. Neither does Anglicanism affirm them. Simply, we claim not to know how God may work within those venues. We cannot do as the Roman Catholics have done, that is, to declare ministries to be "absolutely null and utterly void." The reason is simple. God has revealed what the sacraments are, and we have been given in that revelation a proper and Traditional way to administer them. But, he has clearly revealed something more, namely his willingness to work beyond the limits of what we understand, and that is because of his mercy and love. Therefore, we see the thief on the cross assured of salvation by the Lord himself, even though he was never in baptism buried with Christ and raised to newness of life, and had not eaten and drunk the food and drink of eternal life. I know that many people have had a life changing and permanent conversion in Billy Graham Crusades and other Protestant venues. Some, upon becoming Anglicans, received the sacraments and all the grace and assurance of grace God promises through them.

In these matters we cannot know more than what God has revealed, and therefore we have the comfort of hope for those who have not received the sacraments as we have. Grace does not come by the Law, and we are not in bondage to a system of thought so rigid that we should feel obligated to explain all the mysteries that God himself has not explained to us. We are not in Rome, and need not do as the Romans do; we need declare no ministry "absolutely null and utterly void," and, thanks be to God that we are are free from so terrible a burden.

This does not give us the liberty to ignore, in our own churches, the proper way to live the sacramental life. Our people must be baptzed, and taught how and when to receive the sacraments fully in accord with what has been revealed and handed down to us from the beginning of the Church, "from the Apostles' time," as the Preface to the Ordinal says. We have rules and must have rules, and we cannot treat everyone's claim to have sacraments as a valid claim; often we must act as if they are not. We have no liberty to treat Episcopacy and the sacraments connected to it as optional. We may, however, rejoice that the whole purpose of the sacramental system is to impart grace that cannot be obtained through the Law, and we may have sincere and honest hope for the many Christians beyond our reach. That is the truly Catholic way.
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1. Gal. 3:24, Eph. 2:1, Rom. 6
2. As taught in the Catechism and the Offices of Instruction, shedding light on the meaning of Article XXV.
3. v.19
4. I Cor. 11:19-34. "Judgment" is a better translation of κρίμα than "damnation" in v.29.
5. Baptism was practiced by John the Baptist because the ritual; bath of cleansing is in the Torah. Thus, baptism was a Jewish rite that was applied to all converts because a Gentile needed to be cleansed from all uncleanness in addition to circumcision when he converted. John's work at Jordan testified to the back-slidden Jew that he had strayed from God's holy covenant and needed a conversion as great as any Gentile. Nonetheless, the Lord established Christian Baptism in the Great Commission of Matthew 28: 16-20, giving it both a Form and Intention that sprang from his resurrected life, and with the full revelation of God's Name; so it is for us a Sacrament of the Gospel, that is, a Dominical Sacrament.
6. Rom. 8:3
7. Luke 18:9f
8. James 1:22-25
9. Matt. 26:41
10. I John 5:4
11. Heb. 5:8, Matt. 28:16f
12. Titus 1:5, II Tim. 1:6,7; 2:2
13. Acts 8:14-16, 19:3 in context.
14. John 20:22,23 I Cor. 11:28
15. James 5:14-16. The word for "elders" could be translated as "priests." It is πρεσβύτερος.
16. See these examples from The Laws of Ecclesiastical Polity by Richard Hooker:

'The first Bishops in the Church of Christ were his blessed Apostles, for the Office whereunto Matthias was chosen the sacred History doth term episkopen, an Episcopal Office.' (VII.4.1)

'And yet the Apostles have now their successors upon earth, their true successors, if not in the largeness, surely in the kind of that Episcopal function, whereby they had power to sit as spiritual ordinary Judges, both over Laity and over Clergy where Churches Christian were established.' (VII.4.3)

'...Presbyters must not grudge to continue subject unto their Bishops, unless they will proudly oppose themselves against that which God himself ordained by his Apostles, and the whole Church of Christ approveth and judgeth most convenient.' (VII.5.8)

'And what need we to seek far for proofs that the Apostles who began this order of Regiment by Bishops, did it not but by divine instinct, when without such direction things or far less weight and moment they attempted not?' (VII.5.10)

Easter 4 Sermon 2009

“Every good gift and every perfect gift is from above, and cometh down from the Father of lights, with whom is no variableness, neither shadow of turning.”+ [James 1.17]

God is pure light, pure goodness. He is perfectly trustworthy and eternally consistent. And that is why he is the source only of what is good and what is perfect.

Why does St James seem to distinguish “good” and “perfect” gifts here? (It may be merely an idiomatic way to emphasise the point, rather than a genuine distinction, but this is not necessarily the case: it is reasonable to assume that every word contributes something "extra" in the Scriptures, to search for the deepest meaning, the sensus plenior.) Does he mean that some gifts God gives contain some evil or failure? No, that would contradict the denial of any “shadow” in God from the same verse. But not every goodness achieves perfection, that is, completion in or for us, instead perhaps taking us part of the way. This is not bad, it is just the nature of being finite creatures who grow step-by-step and experience happiness and fulfillment progressively over time. So, this verse tells us about ourselves as well as God.

We might also find it strange that God is described as the Father of “lights” rather than just of light. But, again, this corresponds to the relationship between the Infinite, One God and his many finite “offspring”. What do I mean by offspring? Well, a Father is the Father of a child, a child which resembles that Father. So, if God is the Father of lights then he is the Light, so to speak. That is, he is the fundamental Truth (as light helps us to know), the absolute Power (light is energy), and the ultimate Good (as light represents goodness). That means that whatever being He has created, or quality it contains, that partakes of these glories or represents them, is in some sense a small-l light. Now that applies to everything God has created, but to some things more than others. Christians are said to be lights to the world by our Lord (Mt. 5.14). There is a light that enlightens every person, according to St John's Gospel (1.9). But all creaturely innocent joy and true wisdom or justice, and even every inanimate object or living being, can be considered a light given by the Father of lights. We know that all of Creation is considered a visible witness to God by St Paul (Ac. 14.17, Ro. 1.20) and the Psalmist, who wrote: “The heavens declare the glory of God” (19.1).

At this point, person might well object: “What about the darkness? Where does it come from? What about the many cruel or wasteful aspects of Nature or Humanity? How can you claim Creation is full of pure light?”. And the Christian answer is that all that is truly dark, truly evil, is not created by God that way but the result of distortion of Creation by sin, whether of fallen angels or fallen humans. The gifts of God have been ungratefully and rebelliously damaged or destroyed.

However, we must also be careful not assume everything that offends our aesthetic sense or superficially appears a deficiency is in fact so. For example, those who point to the evolution of plants and lower animals through much competition, death, and extinction as evidence of cruelty or wastefulness might have identified, unbeknown to themselves, the effects of the angelic fall which, according to some Fathers, was an indefinite time before humanity's existence or Fall. (Angels are portrayed as specially related to material nature in both Scripture and Tradition, so their fall could have had cosmic effects.) But those who see all this as Nature's viciousness or vanity might also be, to some extent, illegitimately anthropomorphising the sensations and experience of these creatures (that is, treating them as if they had human-like feelings and capacity for pain and fear). And they might be imposing on God a standard of “efficiency”, as well as an approach that makes all life worthless if it does not lead to humans or serve humanity, that is merely a limited human prejudice. Sillier still, some see the vastness of the Universe, almost all of it probably without life (and without "intelligent" life, specifically) as wasted space or meaninglessness, or black holes as evidence of a cosmic theme of destruction that undermines the concept of benevolent Creation. As if God could not create beauty and power beyond our vision or need just for its own sake!

“Of his own will he brought us to birth with the word of truth, that we should be a kind of firstfruits of his creatures. ” So, despite what I have said before, we should not doubt that we are a summit of physical Creation and at the centre of God's concern. We must remind ourselves as well that it is by His will and His word that we have been given new life, born again, and not by our initiative to seek Him or by our wisdom in finding Him. “Of his own will”, “with the word of truth”. In other words, we matter enormously, infinitely to God, but not because of our virtues.

“Ye know this, my brethren”. How often do we need to be reminded of the things we theoretically know? Quite often, according to Scripture. If human teachers must use repetition even with engaged and willing students, how much more must God bring us “back to basics” as sheep so easily lost and led astray, so ready to wander?

“[S]o let every man be swift to hear, slow to speak, slow to wrath: For the wrath of man worketh not the righteousness of God. Wherefore lay aside all filthiness and residue of wickedness ”. How hard it is to listen and how easy it is to talk! Note that it does not say all wrath or anger is evil. “Slow to wrath” does not mean “never angry” any more than “slow to speak” means “never talking”. However, Christians are called to consciously discipline all these tendencies: the plenitude of words that so often rests in proud self-assertion, the quick resort to anger that so often ends in hate and unjust imaginings, and, most ruthlessly, the tendency to the ease of compromise with sin, even if just a residue.

But how can we do this? We cannot do it persistently unless we simultaneously take in to the soil of our hearts, as softened by the plough of discipline, the seed of the word, the Gospel. “[A]nd receive with meekness the implanted word, which is able to save your souls.” Through the ministry of Word and Sacrament, and through private reading of and prayerful reflection on Scripture, we can receive the implanted Word. And in all this we will, if we are wise, put our full trust in the core of that Seed, the very DNA of our salvation: the Gospel promise of God's pure goodness, perfection and changelessness, in His mercy towards us. +

Grace and sacraments

The following is Part I of a series I will be writing and posting here. This follows the line of thought in this earlier post.

I. Grace: A definition

χάρις: Charis: Gift, gratuity.

Too often the definition of "grace" is limited to mean the unmerited favor of God to fallen man in terms of his mercy on sinners, and in classic Reformed Theology (following earlier writers in the western Monastic tradition) this has led to a sharp distinction between the Covenant of Creation and the Covenant of Grace. To a certain degree this distinction is useful, and has led to a necessary aspect of teaching such as we find in John Murray's short book The Covenant of Grace.1 Nonetheless, as my brother David Bentley Hart wrote in his first book, The Beauty of the Infinite,2 we need to see the entire act of creation and the giving of life itself as a gratuity. Nothing in creation is necessary; that is to say, God who has no need of anything, created and gave life as a gift, not to meet any need or desire of his own. "God that made the world and all things therein, seeing that he is Lord of heaven and earth, dwelleth not in temples made with hands; Neither is worshiped with men's hands, as though he needed any thing, seeing he giveth to all life, and breath, and all things," said St. Paul on Mars Hill.3

So, with all the value we receive by drawing a line between the Covenants of Creation and of Grace in the western tradition, it is necessary, if only to see God himself in the light of the revelation of Holy Scripture, to remember that is was an act of χάρις when God formed man from the dust of the earth, and breathed into his nostrils the breath of life. This was unnecessary, for God needs nothing. It was unmerited, for Adam was given life and as yet deserved nothing. It was favor, gratuity or grace, a gift freely given.

And the rib, which the LORD God had taken from man, made he a woman, and brought her unto the man. And Adam said, This is now bone of my bones, and flesh of my flesh: she shall be called Woman, because she was taken out of Man. Therefore shall a man leave his father and his mother, and shall cleave unto his wife: and they shall be one flesh. 4

The first sacrament is given before the Fall. God himself does the work. Making use of Matter, that Matter being the very rib of the man to divide Man into two sexes; and making use of the words of Adam which constituted a Form which expressed Intention, it is God who makes them into one flesh. This too is a gift (χάρισμα) added to a state of life 5 in which (even now after the Fall and Christ's Redemption) God's creative act continues both to propagate the race of Man, and for believers becomes a means to add yet more grace whereby the husband and wife aid one another to salvation and sanctification. It is significant that of the Seven Mysteries (μυστήριον) or Sacraments, Matrimony is established before the Fall; and even more so that it signifies Christ and the Church as somehow a reality independent (in limited human terms) of the Fall, and therefore existing in the plan of God before (so to speak) the emergency that occasioned our redemption from sin and death.6 "This is a great mystery: but I speak concerning Christ and the Church," writes Paul about the deeper truth signified by marriage.7

Before he was a sinner, Adam was a husband; and the first time we see a sacrament in Scripture it is while man is yet in his innocence. As the Solemnization of Matrimony declares in the English Book of Common Prayer: "Dearly beloved, we are gathered together here in the sight of God, and in the face of this congregation, to join together this Man and this Woman in holy Matrimony; which is an honourable estate, instituted of God in the time of man's innocency, signifying unto us the mystical union that is betwixt Christ and his Church." The three elements of a sacrament are present, and so is the feature that, along with Form, Matter and Intention, constitute a Sacrament (even this sacrament of a state of the life, rather than of the Gospel), namely God's promised and, therefore, predictable working. For Jesus taught that marriage is God's own work, and nothing less: "What therefore God hath joined together, let not man put asunder."8

We must conclude that grace is the very life of all creation, for none of the things in the created order are necessary for God to be whole, complete and without need; rather, it is we who need to be alive, and we exist soley due to his gift, his gratuity, of life. We must conclude that even before the Fall, sacramental grace is revealed to have been in operation, and that this sacramental grace signifies both the Incarnation and the election of the Church in a glorious mystery of Divine love, and does so before the emergency occasioned by the Fall of Man into sin and death.

Grace is everything to the created order, including beasts, Man and angels.

_________________

1. Murray, John The Covenant of Grace, The Tyndale Press: London in 1954

2. Hart, David Bentley, The Beauty of the Infinite, Wm. B. Eerdmans Publishing, Grand Rapids/ Cambridge, 2003

3. Acts 17:24,25

4. Gen. 3:22-24

5. "...partly are states of life allowed in the Scriptures..." Art. XXV

6. This gives further evidence to the theory of Duns Scotus, which I summarize this way: Man was made for the Incarnation, independent (again, speaking within human limitations of expression) of the emergency occasioned by the Fall.

7. Eph 5:32

8. Mark 10:9

Confusing the nuvo "Reformed"

I have been included, for reasons unknown and by a likely practical joker also unknown, in a discussion with "Reformed Anglicans." I question their use of the word "Reformed," because I am a Recovering Reformed (almost) Presbyterian (as in, "there but for the grace of God, go I"), having broken my addiction to that brand of theology and having been clean for several years through a 12-step program called The Apostle's Creed. Some of the men in this discussion may claim to be both Calvinists and Anglicans (which begs a question of episcopal polity in the most obvious way), and to be Reformed; and they may delude themselves into thinking they base their ideas also on the Articles and Formularies, and somehow on all the Reformers, English and Continental at once; but they are really just "Reasserters," fooling themselves. It is obvious that they will not accept the correct definition of "Tradition." Others are well-read and educated. Here, taking an admittedly naughty delight in confounding their expectations, I defend my use of two words, "Tradition" and "Antiquity."

From me:

The necessary question is this: Who gets to interpret Scripture with the authority to teach its meaning? The Scripture was written and recognized (which recognition is just as important in the long run) within a community that was established with the authority of the Apostles and the men they ordained and consecrated. The Canon of Scripture was recognized, and though this was vox populi (where the people knew they could hear God's own voice), the recognition was ratified by universal episcopal consensus. So, the Church teaches with authority that these books have God as their Author.

The interdependence of the Church and Scripture in Antiquity is impossible to deny. Without the Church having recognized the word of God well enough to define the New Testament Canon as part of One Canon in two Testaments, where would we be? Therefore, the Reformers meant, by sola scriptura, to return the Church to that standard in which the Church and Scripture spoke with one voice on the essential doctrines, such essential doctrines as we confess in the Nicene/Constantinopliatan Creed. The Anglican Article on the Creeds (Article VIII) cannot help but reassert this interdependence, for in it the Church of England taught with authority that the Creeds are to be received, and then adds that they may be received because they agree with Scripture. Therefore, they confidently stated that any interpretation of Scripture that contradicts the Creeds must be rejected automatically, and is not to be given a hearing.

If the Anglican Communion in modern times had held to that Ancient standard, none of today's problems would exist. For example, we see Dr. Rowan Williams interpreting Romans chapter one in a very private manner; and his private interpretation is the standard "Scriptural" defense used by the Homosesexualists. We say he and they are wrong because none of the Fathers in Antiquity, nor the universal Church at any time, interpreted it his way. Will we then receive a Fundamentalist defense of Dr. Williams' private interpretation according to this strange modern definition of sola scriptura?

This gets back even to the subject of Thomas Aquinas. The Reformers accepted the same standard of Sola Scriptura, but they accused the Medieval theologian/philosopher of inconsistency, which allowed for what we call today Development of Doctrine (which has itself developed since the passing of Newman); that kind that both Rome and modern Protestants of the Williams/ Louie Crew variety accept because it allows new doctrines to become dogma.

We may believe in the Reformer's definition of [Thomas Aquinas' pharse] Sola Scriptura, because they meant to bow in obedience to Scripture as understood in Antiquity, which did not reject the authority of Tradition.

Robert Hart +

Reply to me:

No, that was not the intention of the Reformers in the first place. Tradition is NOT limited to Antiquity, or is Antiquity the only best 'interpreter' of Holy Scripture. The value of Tradition is not interpretation but TRANSMISSION, i.e. fidelity to the external clarity of Scripture so that the Deposit of the Faith is maintained inviolate. This is true catholic and apostolic meaning of 'paradosis,' - 'TO PASS ON.'

Hence, the role of Tradition is first and foremost the faithful PROCLAMATION of the oral and sacramental Word in the context of the Divine Liturgy as God's vehicle of grace.

The 'consensus fidelium' lies precisely in the CONTINUATION of the proper distinction between Law and Gospel which constitute the proclamation of the oral and sacramental Word in the life and witness of the Church, as grounded in the hermeneutic reversal wherein it is Scripture which interprets the confessor, and not the other way round because Scripture is self-interpreting.

My response follows:

I am not in complete disagreement. I think this part was very good: "Hence, the role of Tradition is first and foremost the faithful proclamation of the oral and sacramental Word in the context of the Divine Liturgy as God's vehicle of grace."

The word you used, paradosis (παράδοσις), is translated in the New Testament as "traditions" in a positive sense.

"Therefore, brethren, stand fast, and hold the traditions which ye have been taught, whether by word, or our epistle." II Thes. 2:15

You wrote:
"Tradition is NOT limited to Antiquity, nor is Antiquity the only best 'interpreter' of Holy Scripture."

The word Antiquity has been employed in order to make a simple point: Every interpretation should conform to what we know to have come earlier. The Vincentian Canon (Quod ubique, quod semper, quod ab omnibus creditum est) exists in order to prevent error. To call the Scripture "self-interpreting" is naive and dangerously idealistic, if only due to the dullness and sinfulness of fallen man, including Christians; and it appeals to a level of self-confidence that is frightening, and that is also quite evident in heretics. If the Scripture is to be treated as self-interpreting then obviously, one has to think that the meaning of Scripture is always 100% in accord with every bias of his own and with every gap in his own knowledge. Clearly, one must judge himself infallible in order for your theory to work; otherwise it is impractical at best.

By the time the Church had a new generation of bishops it had established traditions of doctrine and practice, and these had come from the Apostles. But, the New Testament Canon was not a settled issue yet. The burden you have, in your argument, is the burden of proof. Prove that a doctrine can be true if it is not in accord with both Scripture itself and the understanding of Scripture held by those who learned directly from the Apostolic college that wrote the Gospels and Epistles, and who knew what their own words meant; not to mention the Paradosis as recorded in Patristic times.

The Puritans and others who held to the Geneva Discipline tried to defend their own ideas in England, and they ran into Richard Hooker who knew both Scripture and history better than they. Their "church government" appeared scriptural to them (as it does to Presbyterians today) because they were lazy and sloppy in interpretation, and always had to give recourse to the excuse: "That was a 'special' kind of ministry." When given this reply in my own experience I point out that our polity (episcopacy) has not only the witness of the ancient writers (e.g. Ignatius of Antioch who learned directly from Paul, Peter and John), but it actually fits the pattern in Scripture, especially the Pastoral Epistles. Why must they justify a later innovation with the flimsy excuse that the Biblical pattern is there to be ignored, that is, treated as a "special case"? If only they would have allowed the ancients to interpret, with the humility it requires to heed one's teachers, they would have known better.

No, the problem is not Tradition, but innovation that pretends to be Tradition because it becomes a teaching or practice established by custom or precedent (e.g. all-celibate clergy). These customs and precedents are the actual traditions of men, the man-made traditions, condemned by our Lord, that embolden them to set aside the Word of God.

In English history, the Reformers were the genuine Traditionalists, if only by intention. They demonstrated this by their own appeals both to Scripture and Antiquity, quoting the Bible and the Fathers (assuming we may allow them to speak for themselves). When Cranmer wrote to Calvin, his request for a Synod was an idea modeled after the Ecumenical Councils, and to take a stand not against Tradition, but against innovation. In that letter he wrote, "Our adversaries are now holding their council at Trent, that they may establish their errors." This one line sheds light on many things, including Article XXI.

XXI. Of the authority of General Councils. ENERAL Councils may not be gathered together without the commandment and will of princes. And when they be gathered together, forasmuch as they be an assembly of men, whereof all be not governed with the Spirit and word of God, they may err and sometime have erred, even in things pertaining to God. Wherefore things ordained by them as necessary to salvation have neither strength nor authority, unless it may be declared that they be taken out of Holy Scripture.

The danger of Trent was the potential for unrestrained innovation, as if the Episcopalians were having a vote in General Convention today that could be forced on millions of people in many countries, no matter what demonic madness gave birth to it. Thank God they have not such power; but Rome was seen as having exactly that kind of international power, with the aid of worldy governments. Transubstantiation * ("which overthroweth the nature of a sacrament" Art. XXV) and other ills were the result. And, none of these errors came from Antiquity, but from refusing to learn from the same. Over time, to justify further innovations (such as Papal Infallibility in 1870) Rome had to say the same thing, Mr.... that you have said: ""Tradition is not limited to Antiquity, nor is Antiquity the only best 'interpreter' of Holy Scripture." Indeed, they overthrew the Vincentian Canon and replaced it with Newman's theory of Doctrinal Development, since nothing else could justify their past innovations and the claim to possess infallible authority to create dogmas in the future (what next? Co-Redemptrix?)

How can they err if Scripture is "self-interpreting"? Because every man, no matter how sinful, thinks his own interpetation to be correct, including whatever man will hold their highest office. So, how do we know the true interpretation of Scripture? Not by innovations, concerning which Cranmer could foresee the outcome of Trent. Yes, we must hold dear the teaching of Antiquity, and avoid new ideas that simply cannot be consistent with the meaning of Scripture, and that the ancient Church would never have tolerated-indeed, in certain cases did not tolerate..

At the moment Rome is free of the error of Women's Ordination: But what is to stop Doctrine from such a Development in years to come, especially with an Infallible authority who reads "self-interpreting" Scripture? Or, we can ask the same about homosexual "marriage."

But, I may ask, just whose side are you on? It seems to me you would make a good Roman Catholic in the worst way. I suggest that instead you cultivate a healthy taste for Quod ubique, quod semper, quod ab omnibus creditum est.

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Dr. ... wrote:

"The cure for this is not the exaltation of Tradition and telling the laity that they don't really know what God's book says..."

Dr. ... The error was not Tradition, but abandoning Tradition- including Traditional interpretation of the Bible, and creating "Development of Doctrine" theories, the worst coming much later from an ex-Anglican, the terribly confused apostate Newman. Tradition does not mean Medieval Roman development; nothing is more Traditional than Billy Graham's trademark claim to authority for his preaching: "The Bible says..."

A proper definition of Tradition does the opposite of telling the people they don't understand. It tells them that they do understand. Even those who are not scholars, but who let the Creeds teach them the meaning of Scripture, are safe from, e.g., the "Jehovah's Witnesses."

Robert Hart+

* As understood in that century.

Third Sunday after Easter

(Michelangelo Merisi da Caravaggio; 1573-1610)

The Epistle. 1 St. Pet. ii.11f  * The Gospel. St. John xvi.16f

A little while, and ye shall not see me: and again, a little while, and ye shall see me, because I go to the Father

We must hear in these words their blunt, literal, objective meaning. If we become overly-mystical, or even slightly allegorical, in our interpretation of them, we rob them of their power and effectiveness. We cannot afford ever to treat the crucifixion and death of Christ, and his victory over death by rising again the third day, as a poetic allusion meant to teach us simply to hope for relief from the difficulties of this transitory life. The Gospel of Christ, with his real death and his real resurrection, is not by any means a tale told to relieve the pain of worldly stress, or to inspire us to keep on keeping on. We should not belittle the Gospel by referring to our emotional ups and downs as, to quote one very unworthy individual, "God bringing an Easter out of a Good Friday."

If anything, our own life experiences work the other way around. When God brings us out of any trouble or sorrow, it is nothing more than a foretaste of what he has in store for those who love him. Frankly, God will not bring us out of every trouble and sorrow in this transitory life; for we all shall have our final trouble, our last sorrow, or sickness or injury, and we shall depart this mortal life never to return to it.

Our hope therefore, because of Christ's death, is that God will not deal with us as our sins deserve. Because Christ laid down his life for you, you may appear before God as righteous and without spot or wrinkle, that is, without sin. Christ's death saves you from estrangement and isolation, cut off from God to wander as a lost soul; that is, from Hell. Because he died, if you are sincere in your own repentance from sin, you are forgiven and cleansed. That brief time, in which his disciples faced despair because they did not see him, has bought your soul back from sin and its end. God is the one, as St. Paul wrote to the Church in Colosse, "Who hath delivered us from the power of darkness, and hath translated us into the kingdom of his dear Son: In whom we have redemption through his blood, even the forgiveness of sins (Col. 1:13,14).”

Because he rose again from the dead the third day, your hope is not in this world only, but in the world to come when God makes everything new. St. Paul wrote to the Church in Rome, "But if the Spirit of him that raised up Jesus from the dead dwell in you, he that raised up Christ from the dead shall also quicken your mortal bodies by his Spirit that dwelleth in you (Rom. 8:11).” We do not believe merely in a symbolic resurrection, something to help us feel good about worldly things, about transient emotional turmoil or desires. Our hope is not about this world that passes away, or the things of this world that so easily draw away our love from God to carnal affections. It is not always the will of God to deliver us from our perceived problems or to give us what we think we want for ourselves. Frankly, some of our desires are petty, some are sinful and selfish, and some are simply irrelevant to the things concerning which God calls our attention.

But, our hope is sure and certain. Easter is a fact of history certified by the blood of many ancient martyrs who chose death rather than deliverance; they did not recant their testimony that they had seen the risen Christ in the flesh as he stood before them, as he showed his hands, his feet his side, and said "Peace be with you." They chose to die for the truth of their testimony, as the Roman authorities persecuted them to the death, so that we could be certain, yes so that we their children in the Faith all these centuries later could know, that they had indeed seen the risen Christ.

Easter is a fact of history and it is our sure and certain hope of the future. For "we know that, when he shall appear, we shall be like him; for we shall see him as he is," wrote St. John. (I John 3:2) St. Paul, writing to the Church in Corinth, says: "But now is Christ risen from the dead, and become the firstfruits of them that slept. For since by man came death, by man came also the resurrection of the dead. For as in Adam all die, even so in Christ shall all be made alive. But every man in his own order: Christ the firstfruits; afterward they that are Christ's at his coming (I Cor. 15:20-23).”

The imagery is from the harvest. In the Spring we have the firstfruits, that first growth of the field; it is a foretaste of what comes later in the harvest. The Book of Leviticus has the Feasts of Israel, those feasts that God commanded the people of Israel to keep through all their generations, and all of which have special meaning that foretells the Gospel. About the firstfruits we see this:

“And ye shall count unto you from the morrow after the Sabbath, from the day that ye brought the sheaf of the wave offering; seven Sabbaths shall be complete: Even unto the morrow after the seventh Sabbath shall ye number fifty days; and ye shall offer a new meat offering unto the LORD. Ye shall bring out of your habitations two wave loaves of two tenth deals: they shall be of fine flour; they shall be baken with leaven; they are the firstfruits unto the LORD (Lev. 23:15-17).”

After the Sabbath they were to present the firstfruits, just as Christ would rise and appear to witnesses after the Sabbath, on the first (and eighth) day of the week. The firstfruits are a pledge of the future, a promise of what is to come. As Christ rose from the dead in the springtime of the world, he will come again at the time of harvest. As he rose from the dead never to die again, so shall those who love God and look for his appearing also rise again at his coming, and enter into his Easter life, his resurrected and eternal life, his immortality, never to die again.

St. Paul in his Epistle to the Church in Rome, writes, "Christ being raised from the dead dieth no more; death hath no more dominion over him. For in that he died, he died unto sin once: but in that he liveth, he liveth unto God (Rom. 6:9, 10).” You see, "when he shall appear, we shall be like him; for we shall see him as he is." Easter is history and future. It happened and will happen. The third day, the day after the Sabbath, was Christ's Easter. The day when he comes again shall be our Easter - our Passover; and like him, all who have looked for his appearing again, all who love God, will enter his immortality. Though we will have died, we will die no more; Death shall have no more dominion over us; for it has no more dominion over him (Romans 6:9). This is our future if we hold to the faith of Christ.

Never take those words in today's Gospel and lower their meaning to speak of the things of this life that ends, and of this world that passes away. Do not settle for something so low and ultimately worthless; "If in this life only we have hope in Christ, we are of all men most miserable (I Cor. 15:19).” Modern religion all too often is about feeling good in this life, or being successful in this world, or even about health and prosperity, all of which, though they may be good for a time, are ultimately worthless; for this life ends. "Here we have no abiding place." These words that Jesus spoke mean so much more. They mean everything.

The Gospel events of which St. Paul wrote, as he opened the fifteenth chapter of his first Epistle to the Church in Corinth, include that very important fact that Jesus Christ, after he rose from the dead appeared to witnesses. In that passage, Paul tells us that Christ died for our sins in fulfillment of Scripture, that he was buried and rose again the third day in fulfillment of Scripture, and that he then appeared to witnesses on several occasions. In one address to people in Jerusalem, St. Peter said, "But ye denied the Holy One and the Just, and desired a murderer to be granted unto you; And killed the Prince of life, whom God hath raised from the dead; whereof we are witnesses." Another time he said, "The God of our fathers raised up Jesus, whom ye slew and hanged on a tree. Him hath God exalted with his right hand to be a Prince and a Savior, for to give repentance to Israel, and forgiveness of sins. And we are his witnesses of these things; and so is also the Holy Ghost, whom God hath given to them that obey him." In the house of Cornelius, Peter said, "And we are witnesses of all things which he did both in the land of the Jews, and in Jerusalem; whom they slew and hanged on a tree: Him God raised up the third day, and showed him openly; Not to all the people, but unto witnesses chosen before of God, even to us, who did eat and drink with him after he rose from the dead." (Acts 4:14,15; 5:30-32; 10:39-41)

As I said on Easter Day, Christ's post resurrection appearances are part of the Gospel if we preach it correctly. We fail to say enough if we throw around the term, "the empty tomb." By itself the empty tomb proved nothing; the proof was that Jesus Christ appeared to witnesses after his resurrection from the dead; he ate with them, he showed them his wounds in his hands and feet and side; he bid them touch him and be certain. As the Gospel of Luke tells us:

“And he said unto them, Why are ye troubled? and why do thoughts arise in your hearts? Behold my hands and my feet, that it is I myself: handle me, and see; for a spirit hath not flesh and bones, as ye see me have. And when he had thus spoken, he shewed them his hands and his feet. And while they yet believed not for joy, and wondered, he said unto them, Have ye here any meat? And they gave him a piece of a broiled fish, and of an honeycomb. And he took it, and did eat before them (Luke 24:38-43).”

In the recent weeks, leading up to Easter, we kept getting closer and closer to Passiontide and Holy Week. In our liturgical tradition we lived through the troubles and fears of those ancient disciples; the five hundred disciples and the eleven apostles who were closest to the Lord. Think again of the words He spoke to them, as we hear them again:

“A little while, and ye shall not see me: and again, a little while, and ye shall see me, because I go to the Father…Verily, verily, I say unto you, That ye shall weep and lament, but the world shall rejoice: and ye shall be sorrowful, but your sorrow shall be turned into joy. A woman when she is in travail hath sorrow, because her hour is come: but as soon as she is delivered of the child, she remembereth no more the anguish, for joy that a man is born into the world. And ye now therefore have sorrow: but I will see you again, and your heart shall rejoice, and your joy no man taketh from you.”

In Passiontide we hid from our eyes the things that remind us our Lord’s presence, all under purple veils. But, afterward, when you walked through the door on Easter the veils were gone, and you rejoiced at the presence of the Risen Christ. For a while you did not see Him, then you saw Him, and your joy could not be taken from you. Think about what the disciples had gone through; their Lord was dead. They had placed not only their love, but they had placed all their hope in this one Man. He had said that he was One with the Father, that He would be the Salvation not only of Israel, but the light to the Gentiles, the hope for all nations. Several times He told them how it would be. He would be handed over and crucified, and rise the third day. But, like most of us, they could only hear just so much. Their minds blocked the rest until they had gone through the worst of it.

So, instead of watching Him take his throne that justly belonged to him, the Son of David, King in Jerusalem, they saw that he was humiliated, unjustly condemned, and given to the Romans to die the worst death of all, the death of the cross. Their hope was shattered. They mourned and wept while the world rejoiced. But, after three days He appeared to them alive again. He had not conquered Rome; he had not ended the rule of that empire. He had, instead, conquered the real enemy. He had overcome sin and death. He had been the Suffering Servant spoken of by Isaiah the prophet; now he was the man who died, and would, as the prophet had said, after dying “prolong His days” as the one in whose hand the will of the Lord would prosper (Isaiah 53:10).

Their joy no man could take from them.

A little while, and ye shall not see me: and again, a little while, and ye shall see me, because I go to the Father

For a brief while they did not see him, and then they saw him. We must hear in these words their blunt, literal, objective meaning.

He suffered under Pontius Pilate, was crucified, dead and buried. The third day he rose again from the dead.