Click on the picture for very edifying and useful wisdom for the Lenten Season. We posted this last year in the pre-Lenten Season. If you desire to comment, I suggest returning first to this page.
Friday, February 19, 2010
Ken on Lent
Click on the picture for very edifying and useful wisdom for the Lenten Season. We posted this last year in the pre-Lenten Season. If you desire to comment, I suggest returning first to this page.
Today
At this time we have new offerings since Ash Wednesday for your interest, informative and challenging. Fr. Charles Nalls has written an essay that about the works of Bishop John H. Hobart showing how his exhortations are relevant to our own time (and Fr. Nalls has also provided, in that essay, an instructive mastery of prose that any aspiring writer can learn from). Bishop Peter Robinson of the UECNA, who has agreed to join us, has begun already to post here, with the kind of thinking we need as Continuing Anglicans, for some quite possibly a necessary course correction. Just below you will find my latest contribution. All three of these may be found by scrolling down.
Diagnosis of Dr.Tighe
Dr. William Tighe (known to me as Bill, as I am known to him as Bob) is Associate Professor of History at Muhlenberg College in Allentown, Pennsylvania, and a faculty advisor to the Catholic Campus Ministry. He is a Member of St. Josaphat Ukrainian Catholic Church in Bethlehem, Pennsylvania. Like me, he is a contributing editor for Touchstone. His articles are well-known, above all his Calculating Christmas, which boldly puts forth the thesis that the dating of the Feast of the Nativity is not of Pagan origin, and that in fact the Christian feast on that date appears to have come first. For over ten years he has been, also, my friend. Indeed, a generous friend, often buying me books and having them delivered to me, good books worth reading. Part of that generosity includes one element in which he is, and always has been, quite sincere; he sees it as a sacred duty to help Anglicans swim the Tiber, to come "home to Rome" and the Communion of "the Successor of St. Peter."
No doubt, he has sent me excellent reading material because he expects me to find in it reasons for taking the plunge. In fact, my reading of books that have come my way, due to his generosity, probably has popped up to haunt him, because the evidence I see in them only strengthens my commitment to classic Anglicanism, and strengthens my apologetic for the same. His idea has been that Anglicans like me have many true and good beliefs (most obviously rejection of women's ordination), and that we need only to add to our convictions the true understanding of the papacy to be complete-sort of like the old expression that Jews need to become completed. His effort to help me become a Roman Catholic, or a Byzantine Catholic like himself, have been one of the features of our friendship. For a man who possesses such convictions, it is only reasonable and honest. But, how honest is it for self-proclaimed Anglicans to adopt his arguments as their own?
What does it mean, then, when he becomes a contributor to the Orlando Florida based blog that calls itself The Anglo-Catholic? Aside from the obvious damage its low standards of erudition and public expression could inflict on his reputation (and that I say quite seriously) it says nothing about Dr. Tighe. He is not an Anglican. He was raised Roman Catholic, and despite a brief flirtation with Anglicanism in the early 1970s, he has been only a Roman Catholic and Byzantine Catholic. As I have said, I am not at all critical of a man with his convictions making some effort to convert Anglicans to (and this is not a pejorative) Papist beliefs. Certainly, Dr. William Tighe is no Anglo-Catholic, yet he is one of The Anglo-Catholic bloggers now. What, then, does it tell us about the real intention of that blog? How do we diagnose them if they choose to call Dr. Tighe one of their own?
First of all, it confirms the criticism I have made concerning their choice of a name. They are not Anglo-Catholics, and their writing proves it. Anglo-Catholics, seeing that camp as taking its strongest shape with the Oxford Movement, were willing to express hope in some possible future reunion with Rome, yes. But, the greatest thinkers of the Anglo-Catholic movement never meant for that possible reunion to take place strictly on the conditions that the See of Rome would impose; rather they saw the possibility as the end of a process that had not yet begun, but that would include theological discussion in which Rome would undergo at least some amount of reformation and recovery of the Consensus of Antiquity. In this way, they merely picked up an idea so old that it was Richard Hooker himself who first proposed it. And, despite the attempts of the "Anglican (?)" Use Society to paint some of the later Anglo-Catholics giants as "wannabe" Roman Catholics, which we have addressed, Anglo-Catholics never accepted the current Vatican I position on the papacy. (Though Dr. Tighe himself has mentioned certain remarks made about the See of Rome by E.L. Mascall and Dom Gregory Dix that were positive, neither man accepted the Roman belief about the papacy; both wrote critical rejections of it, and neither man swam the Tiber.)
But, the bloggers down there in Orlando openly advocate full acceptance of all the Papal claims, and total submission. We suggest that The Anglo-Catholic blog reconsider the deceptive nature of their misnomer. We suggest they use an appropriate name that reflects the position they advocate openly, such as that suggested by Fr. Laurence Wells: The Former Anglican. In time, they might consider, The Roman Catholic, which even now would be a more honest and accurate name than what they choose to go by. These suggestions are quite reasonable, and should not be dismissed as insults; nor are they intended as such. Rather, we ask them to stop creating confusion by using a false label, a brand to which they have no true claim.
Second, it shows incoherence. Dr. William Tighe knows better than to agree with their view of Anglicanorum Coetibus. No doubt, he champions it; but, he is unable to say the same things about its meaning that they say in Orlando, and he knows perfectly well that the promises made by Archbishop Hepworth are, at best, overly optimistic. For example, Dr. Tighe has said many times over the years, that whatever it is that the Traditional Anglican Communion (TAC) hopes for, they will never be allowed to have married bishops if they come under the See of Rome. Also, he has made arguments (at least in email forums) for why it is that Rome has never permitted an Anglican "uniate" church to be formed, and why the idea is impossible. On these scores he has been right all along. His accurate diagnosis of that, however, contradicts the propaganda that his new blogging colleagues have been putting forth. They have been laboring to convince everybody that the new constitution will give them full "uniate" status with married clergy from among their own ranks, henceforth even forever, and preserve certain unique "treasures of Anglicanism" that neither they nor the writers of Anglicanorum Coetibus (with all its Norms) have, as yet, been able to identify. And, their assertions, if one knows Roman Canon Law, or bothers to take the writers of the new "Apostolic Constitution" at their word, are not based on any Roman offer and contradict the offer that has been made.
Related to this, Andrew Brown uncovered recently some correspondence between Bishop Andrew Burnham (Diocese of Ebbsfleet, Church of England) and Australian Roman Catholic Bishop Peter Elliot, mentioning "Archbishop Hepworth ('clearly a charming man … but not everything he says … synchronises fully with what we know from other sources')." The revelations we gather from these messages, that have fallen into Brown's hands, are useful. But, Brown himself needs to pay more attention to Bishop Burnham's caveat about Archbishop Hepworth. For, swallowing whole the propaganda that the TAC leader has been spouting, Brown writes: "Anglicanorum Coetibus is the pope's plan to allow disaffected Anglicans to convert as a group, and to keep their own bishops." Finding that hard to stomach, I posted the following comment:
"Interesting that Andrew Brown wrote: 'Anglicanorum Coetibus is the pope's plan to allow disaffected Anglicans to convert as a group, and to keep their own bishops.' Nothing in the constitution offers any such thing, and in fact makes their bishops into laymen who may or may not be accepted as postulants to the diaconate. 'Disaffected Anglicans' is also a most curious phrase for TAC people-isn't that who the Affirmation of St. Louis was written for? Disaffected, among Continuing Anglicans, by what?"
Erastian religion?
My own disagreements with Dr. Tighe always have been part of our friendship, even when over a Beer and lunch on the Eastern Shore of Maryland, or dinner at his home in Pennsylvania years ago. His view of Anglicanism is that it is entirely, first to last, a Protestant church. In a sense, we agree on that; Anglicanism is Protestant. What we do not agree on is what that means about Anglicanism being, at the same time, fully Catholic in every genuine and charismatic (χάρισμα) way. He believes that the English crown subjugated the Church of England so completely that it became simply an arm of the State, an Erastian religion. I believe that the King of Spain subjugated the Church of Rome to the same extent that Henry VIII managed in England; Spain maintained dominance over the papacy into Elizabeth's time, if only by threat of assassination, having demonstrated earlier its power by jailing a pope to show who was boss (a machismo "show-off" flexing of the muscles). The Church of England was certainly tied to the State in the 16th century, no less when Mary Tudor was Queen than when Elizabeth Tudor was Queen. In the struggle between Elizabeth I of England and Phillip of Spain, we see the one "act of God" most undeniably visible when the armada sunk, bringing to mind the words, "even the winds and sea obey Him." (Matt. 8:27)
Frankly, all the churches in Europe were State churches, and the mixture of politics and religion had been a source of corruption since after the reign of Constantine, certainly since the reign of Theodosius I (11 January 347 – 17 January 395), his grandson. The political realities of the time in which the Tudor monarchs reigned, as with any time, presented challenges particular to that era for the bishops whose responsibility it was to teach and care for the souls of the people. That they found a way to make the best use of the circumstances is to their credit, no matter how much the glory may rub off on the State to whatever degree it is or is not deserved, or no matter how much politics cannot help but stain the Church if only by reputation. What I have been writing here, for four years now, defends and even praises the English Reformers and Anglican Divines for their accomplishment as theologians, teachers and pastors. The legacy they left us is an authentic expression of the true catholic religion of the ancient bishops and doctors.
Whatever the motives of a tyrant named Henry, the English Reformation that flourished under Elizabeth, and that continued to develop in the generations that followed, restored true Catholic Faith to England, and eventually allowed it to prosper in other lands. The fruit of those English teachers lives even now among us. And, if the relations of Church and State are to be considered, it was no Erastian religion that gave the Church of England its power over the throne in 1936. For not the Archbishops of Canterbury and York, but the King of England, had to abdicate when the constitutional crisis of marriage to a divorced woman, with no grounds for annulment, placed him outside of the Church's communion.
No, the Professor and I will never agree about Anglicanism.
And his presence among the Orlando bloggers only adds to the transparency of their purpose. Their purpose is to convert Anglicans into Roman Catholics. For Dr. Tighe, that purpose is honest and honorable; for the rest of the crew, it is neither honest nor honorable, at least until they stop calling their blog and themselves by a misnomer.
No doubt, he has sent me excellent reading material because he expects me to find in it reasons for taking the plunge. In fact, my reading of books that have come my way, due to his generosity, probably has popped up to haunt him, because the evidence I see in them only strengthens my commitment to classic Anglicanism, and strengthens my apologetic for the same. His idea has been that Anglicans like me have many true and good beliefs (most obviously rejection of women's ordination), and that we need only to add to our convictions the true understanding of the papacy to be complete-sort of like the old expression that Jews need to become completed. His effort to help me become a Roman Catholic, or a Byzantine Catholic like himself, have been one of the features of our friendship. For a man who possesses such convictions, it is only reasonable and honest. But, how honest is it for self-proclaimed Anglicans to adopt his arguments as their own?
What does it mean, then, when he becomes a contributor to the Orlando Florida based blog that calls itself The Anglo-Catholic? Aside from the obvious damage its low standards of erudition and public expression could inflict on his reputation (and that I say quite seriously) it says nothing about Dr. Tighe. He is not an Anglican. He was raised Roman Catholic, and despite a brief flirtation with Anglicanism in the early 1970s, he has been only a Roman Catholic and Byzantine Catholic. As I have said, I am not at all critical of a man with his convictions making some effort to convert Anglicans to (and this is not a pejorative) Papist beliefs. Certainly, Dr. William Tighe is no Anglo-Catholic, yet he is one of The Anglo-Catholic bloggers now. What, then, does it tell us about the real intention of that blog? How do we diagnose them if they choose to call Dr. Tighe one of their own?
First of all, it confirms the criticism I have made concerning their choice of a name. They are not Anglo-Catholics, and their writing proves it. Anglo-Catholics, seeing that camp as taking its strongest shape with the Oxford Movement, were willing to express hope in some possible future reunion with Rome, yes. But, the greatest thinkers of the Anglo-Catholic movement never meant for that possible reunion to take place strictly on the conditions that the See of Rome would impose; rather they saw the possibility as the end of a process that had not yet begun, but that would include theological discussion in which Rome would undergo at least some amount of reformation and recovery of the Consensus of Antiquity. In this way, they merely picked up an idea so old that it was Richard Hooker himself who first proposed it. And, despite the attempts of the "Anglican (?)" Use Society to paint some of the later Anglo-Catholics giants as "wannabe" Roman Catholics, which we have addressed, Anglo-Catholics never accepted the current Vatican I position on the papacy. (Though Dr. Tighe himself has mentioned certain remarks made about the See of Rome by E.L. Mascall and Dom Gregory Dix that were positive, neither man accepted the Roman belief about the papacy; both wrote critical rejections of it, and neither man swam the Tiber.)
But, the bloggers down there in Orlando openly advocate full acceptance of all the Papal claims, and total submission. We suggest that The Anglo-Catholic blog reconsider the deceptive nature of their misnomer. We suggest they use an appropriate name that reflects the position they advocate openly, such as that suggested by Fr. Laurence Wells: The Former Anglican. In time, they might consider, The Roman Catholic, which even now would be a more honest and accurate name than what they choose to go by. These suggestions are quite reasonable, and should not be dismissed as insults; nor are they intended as such. Rather, we ask them to stop creating confusion by using a false label, a brand to which they have no true claim.
Second, it shows incoherence. Dr. William Tighe knows better than to agree with their view of Anglicanorum Coetibus. No doubt, he champions it; but, he is unable to say the same things about its meaning that they say in Orlando, and he knows perfectly well that the promises made by Archbishop Hepworth are, at best, overly optimistic. For example, Dr. Tighe has said many times over the years, that whatever it is that the Traditional Anglican Communion (TAC) hopes for, they will never be allowed to have married bishops if they come under the See of Rome. Also, he has made arguments (at least in email forums) for why it is that Rome has never permitted an Anglican "uniate" church to be formed, and why the idea is impossible. On these scores he has been right all along. His accurate diagnosis of that, however, contradicts the propaganda that his new blogging colleagues have been putting forth. They have been laboring to convince everybody that the new constitution will give them full "uniate" status with married clergy from among their own ranks, henceforth even forever, and preserve certain unique "treasures of Anglicanism" that neither they nor the writers of Anglicanorum Coetibus (with all its Norms) have, as yet, been able to identify. And, their assertions, if one knows Roman Canon Law, or bothers to take the writers of the new "Apostolic Constitution" at their word, are not based on any Roman offer and contradict the offer that has been made.
Related to this, Andrew Brown uncovered recently some correspondence between Bishop Andrew Burnham (Diocese of Ebbsfleet, Church of England) and Australian Roman Catholic Bishop Peter Elliot, mentioning "Archbishop Hepworth ('clearly a charming man … but not everything he says … synchronises fully with what we know from other sources')." The revelations we gather from these messages, that have fallen into Brown's hands, are useful. But, Brown himself needs to pay more attention to Bishop Burnham's caveat about Archbishop Hepworth. For, swallowing whole the propaganda that the TAC leader has been spouting, Brown writes: "Anglicanorum Coetibus is the pope's plan to allow disaffected Anglicans to convert as a group, and to keep their own bishops." Finding that hard to stomach, I posted the following comment:
"Interesting that Andrew Brown wrote: 'Anglicanorum Coetibus is the pope's plan to allow disaffected Anglicans to convert as a group, and to keep their own bishops.' Nothing in the constitution offers any such thing, and in fact makes their bishops into laymen who may or may not be accepted as postulants to the diaconate. 'Disaffected Anglicans' is also a most curious phrase for TAC people-isn't that who the Affirmation of St. Louis was written for? Disaffected, among Continuing Anglicans, by what?"
Erastian religion?
My own disagreements with Dr. Tighe always have been part of our friendship, even when over a Beer and lunch on the Eastern Shore of Maryland, or dinner at his home in Pennsylvania years ago. His view of Anglicanism is that it is entirely, first to last, a Protestant church. In a sense, we agree on that; Anglicanism is Protestant. What we do not agree on is what that means about Anglicanism being, at the same time, fully Catholic in every genuine and charismatic (χάρισμα) way. He believes that the English crown subjugated the Church of England so completely that it became simply an arm of the State, an Erastian religion. I believe that the King of Spain subjugated the Church of Rome to the same extent that Henry VIII managed in England; Spain maintained dominance over the papacy into Elizabeth's time, if only by threat of assassination, having demonstrated earlier its power by jailing a pope to show who was boss (a machismo "show-off" flexing of the muscles). The Church of England was certainly tied to the State in the 16th century, no less when Mary Tudor was Queen than when Elizabeth Tudor was Queen. In the struggle between Elizabeth I of England and Phillip of Spain, we see the one "act of God" most undeniably visible when the armada sunk, bringing to mind the words, "even the winds and sea obey Him." (Matt. 8:27)
Frankly, all the churches in Europe were State churches, and the mixture of politics and religion had been a source of corruption since after the reign of Constantine, certainly since the reign of Theodosius I (11 January 347 – 17 January 395), his grandson. The political realities of the time in which the Tudor monarchs reigned, as with any time, presented challenges particular to that era for the bishops whose responsibility it was to teach and care for the souls of the people. That they found a way to make the best use of the circumstances is to their credit, no matter how much the glory may rub off on the State to whatever degree it is or is not deserved, or no matter how much politics cannot help but stain the Church if only by reputation. What I have been writing here, for four years now, defends and even praises the English Reformers and Anglican Divines for their accomplishment as theologians, teachers and pastors. The legacy they left us is an authentic expression of the true catholic religion of the ancient bishops and doctors.
Whatever the motives of a tyrant named Henry, the English Reformation that flourished under Elizabeth, and that continued to develop in the generations that followed, restored true Catholic Faith to England, and eventually allowed it to prosper in other lands. The fruit of those English teachers lives even now among us. And, if the relations of Church and State are to be considered, it was no Erastian religion that gave the Church of England its power over the throne in 1936. For not the Archbishops of Canterbury and York, but the King of England, had to abdicate when the constitutional crisis of marriage to a divorced woman, with no grounds for annulment, placed him outside of the Church's communion.
No, the Professor and I will never agree about Anglicanism.
And his presence among the Orlando bloggers only adds to the transparency of their purpose. Their purpose is to convert Anglicans into Roman Catholics. For Dr. Tighe, that purpose is honest and honorable; for the rest of the crew, it is neither honest nor honorable, at least until they stop calling their blog and themselves by a misnomer.
Thursday, February 18, 2010
The Affirmation of St Louis - Some Thoughts
The Anglican Catholic Church, the Province of Christ the King, and the UECNA all list the Affirmation of St Louis among their important founding documents. However, there have always been difficulties about how it should be used and interpreted. The major disagreement has been whether it is a prism for the understanding of the older formularies - the Articles, Homilies and the BCP - or their replacement. None of the three "St Louis Churches" has ever come down in favour of one view or other. In the absence of any official pronouncement, we must look at the Affirmation itself, and the Anglican theological tradition for guidance.
The Affirmation of St Louis came about in response to a theological emergency. The complete abandonment of the Apostolic Ministry and partial abandonment of the Christian morality by the Episcopal Church had left orthodox Episcopalians without a spiritual home. As a result the St Louis Congress of Concerned Churchmen was held, during which the Affirmation was accepted as a basis for a revived Anglican body in North America. The framers of the Affirmation of St Louis were also far sighted enough to see that the Episcopal Church's support for abortion "rights" and the ordination of women to the diaconate and priesthood would lead to a whole string of theological and moral innovations. These have led, in an absolutely logical progression, to the ordination of practicing homosexuals and the blessing of homosexual unions as revisionist notions of social justice has replaced divine justice as the animating spirit of theological discourse in the Episcopal Church. In the face of this particular manifestation of zeitgeist, the framers of the Affirmation of St Louis wished to preserve the theological and moral integrity of the Anglican tradition. In order to do so they affirmed the Church's traditional theological understanding - the centrality of the Bible, the Creeds and Councils, and the Anglican tradition. They also affirmed traditional Christian moral values such as the sanctity of human life, and the sanctity of (hetrosexual) marriage. Read with unprejudiced eye, the intent was to maintain the Anglican Tradition whilst linking it unequivocably to the faith of the Church before the disunion of East and West.
In terms of 1970s Ecumenical thinking, that meant that the Thirty-nine Articles, Prayer Book, and Homilies had to be read within the context of the Seven Ecumenical Councils. However, it is possible to make far too much of this provision. This appeal to antiquity does not compromise the integrity of the Anglican theological tradition, even though Anglican theologians have often been uncomfortable with the Seventh Council. Archbishop Parker and other Anglican theologians from the 1550s onwards have always maintained that the Anglican Formularies be read "in the most catholic sense," an idea continued in the provisions of the Affirmation of St Louis. Jewel, Parker, Andrewes and Laud - like the framers of the Affirmation of St Louis - had appealled to the witness of the Ancient Church, of the Bible, Creeds, Early Fathers, and Councils against the innovations of the modern Church. This appeal to antiquity has been an abiding theme in Anglican theology since the beginning and it remains part of our inheritence as Continuing Anglicans.
Sadly, the Affirmation of St Louis has been misused to attempt to re-engineer Anglicanism into a species of Old Catholicism. This has always been a tendancy with some Anglo-Catholics, but in the covtext of post-1977 Anglicanism it has been even more divisive than it had been in the Episcopal Church, main due to the lack of liberals to unite the various conservative groups. The three provisions that they have fastened on to most often have been the requrement that the Church adhere to the first seven Councils, the inclusion of the idea of the seven sacraments in the Affirmation, and the provision that the 39 Articles and the BCP be read in accordance with the provisions of the Affirmation of St Louis.
Of the three, most use has been made of the provision that the Articles of Religion, etc., be interpreted "according to this Affirmation" as a Trojan Horse for the re-engineering of Anglicanism within the Continuum. This is especially ironic given that the provision itself reflected Caroline thinking on how the Articles and BCP should be read. Instead of continuing the old practice of reading the Articles within tradition, a concerted attempt has been made by some to interpret this as making the Articles, etc., redundant. This is a piece of wishful thinking, as any provision that requires one to interpret existing documents in accordance with it is acknowledging the continuing relevence and authority of those formularies. On the other hand, given the sort of logic chopping that the Articles have been subjected to, there was a need to establish a standard of interpretation in accordance with the traditional Anglican principles. The appeal made by the Affirmation is to the Catholic and Apostolic faith of the first eight centuries, this is perfectly in accordance with the principles laid down by Bishop Jewel and Richard Hooker back in the sixteenth century.
This appeal to antiquity has always been a central plank of the Anglican repudiation of both Papalist additions and Puritan subtractions from the Faith. It now also serves as an essential defense against liberal revisionism. On the whole, the tone of the Affirmation of St Louis is that of continuity, not innovation. The main thrust of the Affirmation is to restore and maintain the connection between Anglicanism and the Catholic faith of the first centuries - a connection that had been continually made by the Reformers, the Caroline Divines and other mainstream Anglican theologians. To read the Affirmation of St Louis in any other manner is to do violence to, even betray, the whole idea of the Continuing Anglican Movement, but that has not stopped people from making the attempt. If the Continuing Anglican movement is to achieve lasting unity, it needs to get away from the desire to innovate, and place all its energy into maintaining and continuing the Anglican tradition that has its roots in the ancient Fathers and Councils of the Church.
This post was originally published on the own blog "The Old High Churchman" - http://theoldhighchurchman.blogspot.com/ - and has been republished here in the hopes of reaching a wider public.
The Affirmation of St Louis came about in response to a theological emergency. The complete abandonment of the Apostolic Ministry and partial abandonment of the Christian morality by the Episcopal Church had left orthodox Episcopalians without a spiritual home. As a result the St Louis Congress of Concerned Churchmen was held, during which the Affirmation was accepted as a basis for a revived Anglican body in North America. The framers of the Affirmation of St Louis were also far sighted enough to see that the Episcopal Church's support for abortion "rights" and the ordination of women to the diaconate and priesthood would lead to a whole string of theological and moral innovations. These have led, in an absolutely logical progression, to the ordination of practicing homosexuals and the blessing of homosexual unions as revisionist notions of social justice has replaced divine justice as the animating spirit of theological discourse in the Episcopal Church. In the face of this particular manifestation of zeitgeist, the framers of the Affirmation of St Louis wished to preserve the theological and moral integrity of the Anglican tradition. In order to do so they affirmed the Church's traditional theological understanding - the centrality of the Bible, the Creeds and Councils, and the Anglican tradition. They also affirmed traditional Christian moral values such as the sanctity of human life, and the sanctity of (hetrosexual) marriage. Read with unprejudiced eye, the intent was to maintain the Anglican Tradition whilst linking it unequivocably to the faith of the Church before the disunion of East and West.
In terms of 1970s Ecumenical thinking, that meant that the Thirty-nine Articles, Prayer Book, and Homilies had to be read within the context of the Seven Ecumenical Councils. However, it is possible to make far too much of this provision. This appeal to antiquity does not compromise the integrity of the Anglican theological tradition, even though Anglican theologians have often been uncomfortable with the Seventh Council. Archbishop Parker and other Anglican theologians from the 1550s onwards have always maintained that the Anglican Formularies be read "in the most catholic sense," an idea continued in the provisions of the Affirmation of St Louis. Jewel, Parker, Andrewes and Laud - like the framers of the Affirmation of St Louis - had appealled to the witness of the Ancient Church, of the Bible, Creeds, Early Fathers, and Councils against the innovations of the modern Church. This appeal to antiquity has been an abiding theme in Anglican theology since the beginning and it remains part of our inheritence as Continuing Anglicans.
Sadly, the Affirmation of St Louis has been misused to attempt to re-engineer Anglicanism into a species of Old Catholicism. This has always been a tendancy with some Anglo-Catholics, but in the covtext of post-1977 Anglicanism it has been even more divisive than it had been in the Episcopal Church, main due to the lack of liberals to unite the various conservative groups. The three provisions that they have fastened on to most often have been the requrement that the Church adhere to the first seven Councils, the inclusion of the idea of the seven sacraments in the Affirmation, and the provision that the 39 Articles and the BCP be read in accordance with the provisions of the Affirmation of St Louis.
Of the three, most use has been made of the provision that the Articles of Religion, etc., be interpreted "according to this Affirmation" as a Trojan Horse for the re-engineering of Anglicanism within the Continuum. This is especially ironic given that the provision itself reflected Caroline thinking on how the Articles and BCP should be read. Instead of continuing the old practice of reading the Articles within tradition, a concerted attempt has been made by some to interpret this as making the Articles, etc., redundant. This is a piece of wishful thinking, as any provision that requires one to interpret existing documents in accordance with it is acknowledging the continuing relevence and authority of those formularies. On the other hand, given the sort of logic chopping that the Articles have been subjected to, there was a need to establish a standard of interpretation in accordance with the traditional Anglican principles. The appeal made by the Affirmation is to the Catholic and Apostolic faith of the first eight centuries, this is perfectly in accordance with the principles laid down by Bishop Jewel and Richard Hooker back in the sixteenth century.
This appeal to antiquity has always been a central plank of the Anglican repudiation of both Papalist additions and Puritan subtractions from the Faith. It now also serves as an essential defense against liberal revisionism. On the whole, the tone of the Affirmation of St Louis is that of continuity, not innovation. The main thrust of the Affirmation is to restore and maintain the connection between Anglicanism and the Catholic faith of the first centuries - a connection that had been continually made by the Reformers, the Caroline Divines and other mainstream Anglican theologians. To read the Affirmation of St Louis in any other manner is to do violence to, even betray, the whole idea of the Continuing Anglican Movement, but that has not stopped people from making the attempt. If the Continuing Anglican movement is to achieve lasting unity, it needs to get away from the desire to innovate, and place all its energy into maintaining and continuing the Anglican tradition that has its roots in the ancient Fathers and Councils of the Church.
This post was originally published on the own blog "The Old High Churchman" - http://theoldhighchurchman.blogspot.com/ - and has been republished here in the hopes of reaching a wider public.
Wednesday, February 17, 2010
Infallible You
Several weeks ago, a commenter on one of my columns mentioned his affection for the works of Bp. John Henry Hobart (1775-1830), the third Episcopal bishop of New York (1816–1830). Bp. Hobart vigorously promoted the extension of the Episcopal Church in Central and Western New York, founded General Theological Seminary in New York City and established Geneva College, later renamed after him. Some historians consider Hobart an example of the American proto-Oxford Movement. Beginning with the good bishop and extending throughout the denomination by way of the General Theological Seminary back in the day, there was a renewed emphasis on Catholic essentials which predated the Oxford Movement by more than a decade. Bp. Hobart “preached Apostolic Succession, the sacramental life, prayers for the dead, and daily offices.”
Having read only a few bits of Bp. Hobart’s work, I set about remedying an obvious chink in my own Anglican armory in my customary way: I ordered everything I could find on Amazon immediately and began to watch the post for that too-familiar box. Happily, the last mail before our blizzards in D.C. brought my newly acquired Hobart collection, and the snow afforded the opportunity for quiet reading and reflection on another ignored and underrated Anglican giant. Among Hobart’s works are episcopal charges to the clergy of Connecticut and New York entitled The Churchman (1819) and The High Churchman Vindicated (1826), in which he accepted the name high churchman, and stated and explained his principles in distinction from The Corruptions of the Church of Rome and from the Errors of Certain Protestant Sects (1817). It is this latter work that is the subject of this reflection. I would add one cautionary note at this point: most of the Hobart corpus is available only in reprint or facsimile editions. Some of these are of quite poor quality, and the buyer will want to review some sample pages before making a purchase.
Beware Popular Opinion and Private Judgment
In Corruptions, Bp. Hobart cuts right to the chase, warning against “going with the flow” of popular opinion. In civil life, such a course is merely dangerous, “in matters of religion, not only dangerous and unwise, but criminal.” To borrow from the Apostles, no strangers to assaults from prejudice and from passion, “Believe not every spirit,” but “try the spirits, whether they be of God”; “Prove all things: hold fast that which is good.” In this regard, Hobart noted that it is
[m]uch more pleasant is it to swim with, than to stem, the current; to be carried along by the popular gale, than with incessant and wearying exertion to struggle against it; to be hailed by the applauses of the hosts, in whose ranks, or as whose leaders, men bear to a triumph the opinions or the measures of the day, than to meet their odium by refusing to enlist with them, or by opposition, somewhat to perplex their progress, if not to diminish their success.(It is a bit like writing an article on the Apostolic Constitution for The Continuum!)
The problem before us today is the same as that in Bp. Hobart’s: sailing that difficult course between the Scylla and Charybdis of private judgment and claims of infallibility. In the first case, a faith grounded in purely private judgment will lead to the renunciation of that wisdom the ages have sanctioned-wisdom that all regard to the voice of the Church catholic, not in the restricted sense in which the Church of Rome claims that title, but in its extension, semper, ubique, apud omnes, always, every where, among all. This rule of receiving what has been believed in the Church, known as the Vincentian Canon, is a yardstick of orthodoxy. Bp. Hobart cautioned against, those “claiming the right to interpret the word of God, and to deduce from it the unerring articles of doctrine, without any regard to the faith of the universal Church.”
This is not to say that there is no right of private judgment in matters of religion, but that the right should be properly exercised. Hobart notes that
the doctrine that every man being individually responsible to his Maker and Judge, must, in all those concerns that affect his spiritual and eternal welfare, act according to the dictates of his conscience, is that cardinal principle of the Protestant faith which should be most strenuously guarded.
Interestingly, Bp. Hobart anticipates the Second Vatican Council by 150 years. As noted in the first paragraph of the Decree on Religious Liberty Dignitatis Humanae:
… the council professes its belief that God Himself has made known to mankind the way in which men are to serve Him, and thus be saved in Christ and come to blessedness. We believe that this one true religion subsists in the Catholic and Apostolic Church, to which the Lord Jesus committed the duty of spreading it abroad among all men. Thus He spoke to the Apostles: ‘Go, therefore, and make disciples of all nations, baptizing them in the name of the Father and of the Son and of the Holy Spirit, teaching them to observe all things whatsoever I have enjoined upon you’ (Matt. 28: 19-20). On their part, all men are bound to seek the truth, especially in what concerns God and His Church, and to embrace the truth they come to know, and to hold fast to it….This Vatican Council likewise professes its belief that it is upon the human conscience that these obligations fall and exert their binding force. The truth cannot impose itself except by virtue of its own truth, as it makes its entrance into the mind at once quietly and with power….Or, more succinctly, Canon 748 ß1 of the 1983 Code of Law of the Roman Catholic Church confirms that, “All are bound to seek the truth in the matters which concern God and his Church; when they have found it, then by divine law they are bound, and they have the right, to embrace and keep it.” Quite clearly, then, according to Vatican II, the role of conscience is to seek God's Truth, embrace it, and then hold on to it once found.
However, Bp. Hobart cautions that there is a wide difference between the unlimited and the restricted right of private judgment;
“between each individual forming his code of religious doctrine, without employing as lights amidst the innumerable and jarring opinions that perplex his researches, the faith of the universal Church, as far as he can ascertain it; and the same individual, while he claims the right, which no intelligent creature can surrender, of judging for himself, seeking with humility and with deference, that guidance which is to be found in the faith of the Church universal.
We may, indeed, fail in our efforts, liability to error is inseparable from our present fallen state. But there is much less danger of error, when we follow the light, as far as it is disclosed to us, which has shone on the Church universal. To borrow from Article XX of the Thirty-Nine Articles, it is on this sound principle of human nature, as well as on those declarations of Scripture, which pronounce the Church to be ‘the pillar and ground of the truth,’ and which commands us to ‘hear the Church,’ that our Church declares in her articles, that ‘the Church is a witness and keeper of holy writ,’ and has ‘authority in controversies of faith.’“By the Church we mean, ‘a congregation of faithful men, in which the pure word of God is preached, and the sacraments duly administered according to Christ's ordinance.’ This presupposes Apostolicity, as those authorized to minister the sacraments, ‘are chosen and sent by men who have public authority given to them for this purpose.’ We can be in no doubt whom she considers as having this public authority to call and send to the ministry, when we hear her declaring that Bishops, to whom she assigns this power as distinct from Presbyters and Deacons, ‘have been from the Apostles’ times,’ and ‘instituted by God's Providence, and by his Holy Spirit.’ [Preface to offices of ordination, and prayers in those offices.]
“Certainly, the authority which the Church possesses in matters of faith, ‘is exercised by all orders of men constituting her communion, her Bishops, Clergy, and Laity.’ ‘But those who are especially commissioned to minister in sacred things, and to whom, as the stewards of the mysteries of God, it peculiarly appertains to dispense his sacred word, are particularly entrusted with the office of preserving Christian verity, and of guarding the fold of their Master from the assaults of heresy and schism.’ Thus, there is a high calling and duty placed upon those in Holy Orders ‘to search for the old paths, and to continue therein,’ rather than withhold truth, because it may be difficult; or to give in to a love of popularity which would rather bow to some modern idol, than worship the God of our fathers in the faith and unity even when ‘modern liberality may style [it] bigotry and uncharitableness.’”
Connected with the extreme exercise of private judgment in matters of religion, and arising indeed from it, is the little regard which is paid to the Church as a divinely constituted society. Bp. Hobart critiques “hard Protestantism” for failing to “bring into view the divine institution of the Christian Church, and the divine origin of its powers.” They reduce the sacred institution, founded by a divine hand and governed by Him, to whom “all power is given in heaven and on earth,” to a level with those “associations which have no higher origin than human power, and no other object but human policy.”
There is an eerie prescience to that statement, which would play out in full in General Conventions and similar gatherings of the “mainstream” denominations of our time. Indeed, these are places where
…discipline is not regarded as a duty demanded by the authority of its divine Head, and the purity of its sacred character, but as dictated merely by those considerations of policy which influence secular associations, and as left entirely to human discretion. Its discipline is thus relaxed; or, when exercised agreeably to established provisions, is secretly assailed, or openly opposed and disregarded.There are also erroneous opinions prevalent with respect to the constitution of the Christian ministry, arising from the tendency to extremes to which Bp. Hobart refers.
On the question of primacy, the “Church from which Protestants separated” claims for its visible Head “prerogatives as unfounded in Scripture as they are dangerous in the exercise.” Bp. Hobart acknowledges the confession of St. Peter-“Thou art Christ, the Son of the living God”-by the distinguishing declaration “On this rock I will build my Church —and unto thee will I give the keys of the kingdom of heaven; and whatsoever thou shalt bind on earth, shall be bound in heaven; and whatsoever thou shalt loose on earth, shall be loosed in heaven.” However, without entering into the discussion, whether the rock meant was the confession or the personal authority of St. Peter, Bp. Hobart poses the “Eastern Question”: “what evidence is there that the Church was not established on the other Apostles, and that the power of the keys, or of remission of sins in the administration of the sacraments and ordinances, and of discipline, was not conferred on them?” He goes on to ask twin rhetorical questions:
Are we not told that the Church is founded on all the Apostles? Were not all the Apostles equally with St. Peter, and with no marks of distinction, commissioned to establish the Church, constituted its governors, vested with all its spiritual powers, and commanded to provide for the continued exercise of those powers in the persons of their successors ‘alway, even unto the end of the world?’Finally, there is the “remarkable fact so subversive of the alleged supremacy of St. Peter”, St. James, Bishop of Jerusalem, in the first council that settled the disputes of the church, even in the presence of St. Peter, enjoyed that precedence, and exercised that power, which are claimed as of divine origin for St. Peter.
Upon Which Rock?
Even if one admits that St. Peter was distinguished by Christ with some marks of superiority over the rest of the Apostles, Bp. Hobart goes on to question whether that distinction was unique to the person, and demands proof that the distinctions descended to the Bishop of Rome. He finds no warrant for the titles “vicar of Jesus Christ” and “universal Bishop” which involve the “lofty prerogatives” assumed by the papal pontiff.
Hobart appeals to both Scripture and tradition noting that there is no record set forth in the apostolic history recorded in the Acts to support the papal claim. As well, Clement, Bishop of Rome, the next in succession to that see from the Apostles advanced no similar claims in his epistle. Moreover, the martyr St. Ignatius, disciple of St. John, delineated with the greatest minuteness the Christian hierarchy and the duty of submission to it, yet said nothing about the supremacy of the Bishop of Rome. Indeed, in the Ravenna Document of 13 October 2007, theologians chosen by the Roman Catholic and the Eastern Orthodox Churches stated:
41. Both sides agree ... that Rome, as the Church that 'presides in love' according to the phrase of St Ignatius of Antioch (To the Romans, Prologue), occupied the first place in the taxis, and that the bishop of Rome was therefore the protos among the patriarchs. They disagree, however, on the interpretation of the historical evidence from this era regarding the prerogatives of the Bishop of Rome as protos, a matter that was already understood in different ways in the first millennium.On the other hand, if every doctrine and institution was thoroughly corrupted by “passing through a Papal channel,” how does it happen that those who appear to act upon this principle retain any doctrine or institution which is taught or practiced by this church they deem anti-Christian Church? For example, is the divinity of Christ to be rejected because, in the midst of other corruptions, this truth shone conspicuously as an article of the faith of the Church of Rome? Further, is Christ’s atonement diminished in its redeeming efficacy, because of its connection to the intercession and merits of created beings? Does the Bible cease to be the charter of salvation, because its sacred books must be traced through the Roman Church to the age of inspiration? And does Episcopacy lose its claims to a divine origin, because on its simple and apostolic foundation has been reared the structure of the Papal hierarchy?
Bp. Hobart asks that
if one extreme approves its opposite, if the abuse of an institution renders necessary the rejection of it, if usurped prerogative justifies resistance to legitimate power—what is there in religion—what is there in civil polity—what is there in the departments of science—what is there in social life, that would remain sacred?Keeping One’s Confidence
The crux of Bp. Hobart’s exhortation is to avoid loss of confidence in the primitive institutions of our Church, and to not be intimidated from avowing and defending the scriptural and primitive claims of the Anglican Episcopacy. “The Episcopacy which it is the privilege of our Church to enjoy, was the glory of martyrs and confessors, centuries before Papal domination established itself on the depression of Episcopal prerogatives.” When we appeal to the Epistles of Timothy and Titus as proof of the succession of an order of men to the Apostles, in their powers of ordination and supremacy in government, we do not have to accede to claims of the supremacy of the supposed successor of St. Peter. When we appeal to a succession of Fathers, in proof of a fact which appears prominent in every Ecclesiastical record, that, as is expressed by the “judicious Hooker” (the “outward being of a Church consisted in the having of a Bishop”) must we adhere to a very different dogma of which the ancient Fathers knew nothing-that the Pope is the visible head of the Church on earth, and that subjection to his supremacy is a necessary evidence of membership in the Catholic or Universal Church?
As Anglicans, our Church (and note, please, that I have begun to capitalize Church) holds a most important station in the Christian world. Amidst the various forms which modern innovators have given to the Christian ministry; some relinquishing entirely its divine origin; others confounding its distinct orders, and altering their original powers; some denying the transmission of its commission from the Head of the Church; others changing the channel of conveyance; some seeming to think it necessary to retreat as far as possible from the precincts of the Roman Catholic Church; our Church, not awed by Papal claims and unmoved by the unjust reproaches of some of her Protestant kindred, takes her stand where Apostles and Martyrs stood. Her Apostolic Episcopacy shines forth to the wandering members of the Christian family, as that city “set on an hill,” where they may find repose from the tumults of schism and the wreckage of modernism and materialism, and enter communion with their Redeemer, in those ministrations and ordinances which he has established as the channels of his grace, and the pledges of his love.
And, now comes the same rebuke that Bp. Charles Grafton would repeat nearly a hundred years on. We must be weak in our attachment to our Church, and indifferent must we be to the vows which we made when we received her ministry, and insensible to the promises of succor and support from that Master whose commission we sustain, and whose cause we advocate-and little must we have of that undaunted spirit of the Fathers if, awed by popular reproaches, or seduced by the promise of resources and prominent place, we should fail in the high calling to bear the faith which we have received from the Apostles, Martyrs, and Saints and transmitting it in its original purity and beauty.
Unity in Christ’s Mystical Body
The Roman Catholic opinion of Church unity, that it consists solely in communion with the Bishop of Rome as the visible head of the Catholic Church, has so little foundation in Scripture and in primitive practice that it could not stand the test of that spirit of free inquiry which the Reformation excited. But, here’s the rub: many bodies of reformed Christians who renounced the Church of Rome, were not so happy as to carry with them that primitive Episcopacy which subsisted in the Church from which they separated. We “moderns” can agree that the natural course of the human mind, through gradations of error, could justify a departure from Episcopacy at first exercised on the plea of necessity and, later, justified on the ground of right.
The difference of English Church reformers with a Church which imposed and continues to impose extraordinary terms of communion teased out into the claim of individual ministers and individual Christians, to establish communions as their judgment may dictate. Thus, Bp. Hobart noted that the Protestant world would increasingly divide into sects, “the numbers or the tenets of which it is almost impossible to enumerate.”
And so, there is the introduction of the vagueness that those who seek the “safety” of Rome want to escape. Yet, the unity of the Church is an obvious and fundamental doctrine of Scripture; and visible unity is entirely incompatible with distinct communions. Hence, the tenet of an invisible Church, of which all are covenanted members who exercise faith, threatens to subvert the doctrine, professed in the ancient creeds, of a visible Church, “one, Catholic, and Apostolic.”
Again, Bp. Hobart is quick with a barrage of questions to challenge us. Was it an “invisible Church” which our Saviour designated as “a city,” “a kingdom,” “a body?” Was it an invisible society, over which he set his Apostles as the instructors, the priests, and rulers, and of which they were to constitute officers, with similar powers, to the end of the world? Was it an invisible society, of which the Apostle declares, “Ye were all baptised by one spirit into one body?” Was it to an invisible Church that they were united, of whom it is said in the Acts of the Apostles, “the Lord added to the Church daily such as should be saved?” Was it a union only of faith and charity which distinguished those of whom, in the same inspired book, it is said, “they continued steadfastly in the Apostles; doctrine and fellowship, and in breaking of bread, and in prayers?” Was it an internal and invisible unity which the Apostle enjoined, when he said, “there should be no schism in the body?” Was it to the officers of an invisible Church that he commanded obedience-“Obey them that have the rule over you, and submit yourselves; for they watch for your souls, as they that must give account?” Was it an infraction only of an invisible unity which he reproved, when he said, "mark them which cause divisions"-“because there are divisions among you, ye are carnal—one saying, I am of Paul; and another, I am of Apollos?” Were mutual love and soundness in the faith the only bond of unity in those ages, when the Church universal was indeed one fold, under the government of Bishops? Was this the unity of Ignatius, of Cyprian, of a host of Fathers, who, in almost every page of their writings, enforce a visible unity, maintained by the communion of Christians with the authorized orders of the ministry, Bishops, Priests, and Deacons? Was it for an invisible unity, that Jerome, the reputed champion of this modern error, contended, when, in the celebrated passage which is adduced in proof of it, he asserts, that at the very time when it was said, I am of Paul, and I am of Apollos, which was, undoubtedly, in the time of the Apostles, Bishops were constituted as superior to Presbyters, in order to be the bond of the visible order and unity of Christ's Church? When, indeed, was there any other bond, until, centuries after the first age of Christianity, the usurped precedence of the Bishop of Rome was constituted the principle of Church unity; and until the divisions of Protestants made this unity to consist solely in mutual affection and soundness in the faith, and, of course, compatible with any, and, indeed, with no form of the Christian ministry?
An Exhortation
Under great and, perhaps, increasing rancor and hysteria, these prevalent errors have induced the writers of The Continuum to reiterate the positions of Bp. Hobart and other giants of the Anglican patrimony in an effort to expose and refute; and in maintaining an authentically Anglican view of the constitution of the Christian Church, and of the principles of Church unity. Like Hobart and those to whom we owe an immeasurable debt, we must be sustained by the consideration that we are maintaining the principles of the saints of the primitive ages, and for which, sooner than relinquish them, they would have shed their blood. And what of claims that we are but a small bit of Christendom-the supposed tail attempting to wag the dogs of the Protestant denominations and the Roman Church? What though it may be said, that these principles would limit the communion of the Church to a small portion of professing Christians, and place in a state of schism a large number of the Christian family?
Dear readers, if these principles that men such as Bp. Hobart articulated are true, their obligation cannot be diluted, nor their importance diminished by the number, the claimed piety, or the overblown zeal of their opponents. The general prevalence of error into which man is capable of falling is a trial of our faith, but ought not to weaken or subvert it.
Again in the rhetorical style of Bp. Hobart,
Was not the revelation of God’s will confined from the beginning to a small number of the human race, in the plains of Shinar, and in the fields of Jordan? Are not large portions of the globe still under the dominion of the prince and powers of darkness? It is not for man to arraign the dominion of the Most High. For purposes wise and good, but inscrutable by us, did he not permit heresies early to stain the purity of the faith? Was there not a period when the divinity of his blessed Son was doubted and denied by a large portion of the Christian world; and when a venerable defender of this fundamental truth was hunted by his persecutors throughout the earth? …And need we wonder then, that for purposes equally wise and good, but equally inscrutable, the Sovereign of the universe still permits heresies to corrupt, and schisms to distract the Christian family?“We are assured that God will set His Church and His creation to right. He searches out, knows and mercifully judges the purposes of the heart; and, it is certain that honest purity of intention, and zealous endeavour to know and to do his will, will not fail of a reward from him, who is no respecter of persons, but is the equal and kind Parent of all the human race.” Still charity, though it should always soften the rigid features of truth, cannot change her divine character, nor dispense with her sacred obligations.
And here is a particular cautionary note for this Lent and for the years to come. Never “let us be guilty of worse than folly in separating the means from the end—in placing the Church, which is to preserve and to spread the truth, superior to the truth itself—in advocating the ministry, which was constituted for the salvation of the sheep of Christ, whom he bought with his death, and for whom he shed his blood, solely for the sake of the powers with which it vests us, and not for the infinitely important objects which are the end of all its functions and its duties.” Let us then, avoid those party names by which the enemy disguised in sheep’s clothing, indulges his malicious purpose of sowing division in the fold of Christ.
Others may do what they wish and go in whatever direction they wish. Such is the nature of human will. However, let us sharpen our apologetic and support one another to greater fidelity in proclaiming to corrupt and sinful men, salvation through the merits, and sanctification through the grace, of a Divine Redeemer. There is a broken world full of Christ’s sheep. So that they may hear the voice of their heavenly Shepherd, and be led by his grace beside the still waters of salvation and into the pastures of life, and, let us renew our commitment to gather them, as Christ has commanded us, into his fold. They are “the congregation of Christ”-let us unite them in His body to Him their Divine Head.
Bp. Hobart sounds a Jeremiah-like warning: in maintaining the outward defenses of the fold, the good order of the house, the apostolic constitution of Christ’s mystical body (the authentic apostolic constitution, I would add), we must be driven by the thought that, not only we are discharging a duty which Apostles and Martyrs have performed before us, but also that we are guarding the fold, the household, the body of Christ. The day of account must come-especially for those in Holy Orders. And how forcibly should we be reminded of the uncertainty of the event that may close our own stewardship.
In that spirit let us labor, worrying not over numbers or claims or mocking. Our Lord did not, even on the Cross. Let us simply be counted with Him, bearing the Cross and witnessing to the faith once-delivered to the Apostles.
Ash Wednesday
Joel 2:12-17
Matt. 6:16-21
Matt. 6:16-21
We should be uncomfortable if we hear, in connection with Lent, only concerns about the many things from which we abstain. Yes, we intend to fast and we intend to abstain, and in our outward acts we ought also to place special emphasis on works of mercy. But, these are to aid us in redirecting our hearts to God. The main issue is not simply the rules of Lent, but the purpose those rules are meant to serve. The Gospel reading for this day speaks of that above all else- where the heart is. What we fuss over and care most about is our treasure, that is to say, what we treasure. If, as our Lord tells us to do, we pray, fast and give alms in secret, caring only that the Lord sees, then it is all for the right reason, the reason of a heart of gratitude to God for His mercy. The severe disciplines of Lent are in substance a penance, that is, an opportunity to redirect our focus on God. It is this same chapter of Matthew in which the Lord Jesus goes on to say, "But seek ye first the kingdom of God, and his righteousness; and all these things shall be added unto you." (v.33)
So, in all your Lenten disciplines, pray that the Holy Spirit will so work in you that your heart is turned to God.
The ashes you wear on your foreheads are not in accord with all that is trendy and stylish in religion; for they are not about healing, prosperity and self-improvement. They are about the one thing in life that you cannot avoid, that one thing that ruins all your hopes and dreams, the one thing that brings the rich man down to the level of the most poor, and that reduces man to the level even of the beasts, until God saves us in our helpless and hopeless weakness from the fate of all flesh. "Remember O Man that thou art dust, and to dust shalt thou return."
Perhaps the women wonder why we say the same words to each person. No, I have not mistaken you for men. But, we are all of the race named Adam, we all belong to the species named Man after its first father whose Fall into sin has unleashed death upon everyone. It is in your first father Adam, the head of Fallen humanity, that you inherited mortality. The words were spoken to Adam in the third chapter of Genesis, where we see clearly to whom God spoke them: "And unto Adam he said, Because thou hast hearkened unto the voice of thy wife, and hast eaten of the tree, of which I commanded thee, saying, Thou shalt not eat of it: cursed is the ground for thy sake; in sorrow shalt thou eat of it all the days of thy life; Thorns also and thistles shall it bring forth to thee; and thou shalt eat the herb of the field; In the sweat of thy face shalt thou eat bread, till thou return unto the ground; for out of it wast thou taken: for dust thou art, and unto dust shalt thou return." (Gen. 3:17-19)
I thought our religion blamed Eve, for isn't that what all the revisionists are telling us? It seems they are wrong. The Bible lays the responsibility on Adam, which means "Man." This, Adam, is the name God gave to the human race before the Fall, in the day He made them and blessed them. (Gen. 5:2) This has great meaning, as we shall see.
A movie made in 1951, starring Kirk Douglas, named Detective Story, takes place in a major American city. It is about police and criminals on the surface, but seems to be about sin and redemption under the surface. The detective played by Kirk Douglas hates criminals, and feels very righteous. But, his father was a criminal. As the story unfolds, the detective, Jim McLeod, becomes increasingly aware that, even though he is no criminal, he is not the good and righteous man of his own delusions and self-deception. He learns, quite painfully, that he is sinful and capable of hurting the one person he loves most, his wife. In one scene, he tells how he always wanted to be different from his father, but now discovers that his father, the worst part of what his father was, lives inside him. This movie was made long ago, before the current unhealthy trend in Hollywood always to paint everyone's father as a bad guy, and all father-son relationships as full of strife. But, in 1951 the lines Kirk Douglas spoke were probably shocking. The father that lived inside him seems to have been written with a symbolic and theological meaning. The father, whose evil the hitherto self-righteous detective could not escape, spoke really of Adam. That is, he was a fallen child of a sinful race called Man.
You were born subject to death because you were conceived in iniquity (as Psalm 51 says). The revisionists are quite wrong in thinking our Bible lays the blame on Eve, for St. Paul takes it up in these words when writing to the Church in Rome:
"Wherefore, as by one man sin entered into the world, and death by sin; and so death passed upon all men, for that all have sinned...For as by one man's disobedience many were made sinners, so by the obedience of one shall many be made righteous. Moreover the law entered, that the offence might abound. But where sin abounded, grace did much more abound: That as sin hath reigned unto death, even so might grace reign through righteousness unto eternal life by Jesus Christ our Lord." (see Rom. 5:12-21)
And writing to the Church in Corinth he said,
"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." (I Cor. 15:21,22)
Someone may think I am getting ahead of the season by mentioning our hope and our salvation in Jesus Christ. Not so, for, in fact, that is the message; in fact it is always the message. In Easter, yes, then we shall concentrate on our other father, our everlasting father (Isaiah 9:6,7) by whose obedience we can, indeed, have treasure in heaven, and therefore a good and sound heart. In that season we will dwell on the Second Man, the Last Adam (I Cor. 15: 45-47).
But, in Lent we concentrate on penance. That is, seeing our hopelessness, we treat our bodies with severity of disciplines in order to focus our attention on that heaven where we ought to have our treasure. In the Law of Moses, when a man died his brother would raise up a child to be named as the son of his dead brother. Such a man had two fathers, one natural and one legal. We have two fathers. "For as in Adam all die, even so in Christ shall all be made alive." In Adam we die; in Adam we are hopeless; in Adam we are helpless; In Adam we are sinners. But, when we were baptized our life began again, and if we have a lively faith, then we know our other father. That other father, the Father of the new humanity, died to make us, by adoption, children of His Father. In Christ the Everlasting Father of the new and redeemed human race, God saves us from sin and death; for that we could not do ourselves.
For now, like Det. Jim McLeod in Detective Story, we must face with honesty the simple truth that we cannot keep ourselves alive. The evil we might think we hate, especially when it takes forms we are able to despise as beneath us, is really in us. Our Fallen father Adam is in us with all his sinfulness, and we are not free. We shall all return to the dust; No truer words have been spoken than these: "thou shalt surely die." Just as we must pass through this time of mortality and weakness, while living with the sorrowful reality of death, we do so with the sure and certain hope of the resurrection on the Last Day. So, we pass through this penitential season of Lent aware that Easter lies ahead. We do have faith in the coming resurrection; and so, at this time, having our treasure in heaven rather than in the things of this world that passes away, we follow Christ to his cross. This is the season that teaches us to face our helpless and sinful condition, and to make war upon it, so that we may truly become ever more thankful for His salvation.
So, in all your Lenten disciplines, pray that the Holy Spirit will so work in you that your heart is turned to God.
The ashes you wear on your foreheads are not in accord with all that is trendy and stylish in religion; for they are not about healing, prosperity and self-improvement. They are about the one thing in life that you cannot avoid, that one thing that ruins all your hopes and dreams, the one thing that brings the rich man down to the level of the most poor, and that reduces man to the level even of the beasts, until God saves us in our helpless and hopeless weakness from the fate of all flesh. "Remember O Man that thou art dust, and to dust shalt thou return."
Perhaps the women wonder why we say the same words to each person. No, I have not mistaken you for men. But, we are all of the race named Adam, we all belong to the species named Man after its first father whose Fall into sin has unleashed death upon everyone. It is in your first father Adam, the head of Fallen humanity, that you inherited mortality. The words were spoken to Adam in the third chapter of Genesis, where we see clearly to whom God spoke them: "And unto Adam he said, Because thou hast hearkened unto the voice of thy wife, and hast eaten of the tree, of which I commanded thee, saying, Thou shalt not eat of it: cursed is the ground for thy sake; in sorrow shalt thou eat of it all the days of thy life; Thorns also and thistles shall it bring forth to thee; and thou shalt eat the herb of the field; In the sweat of thy face shalt thou eat bread, till thou return unto the ground; for out of it wast thou taken: for dust thou art, and unto dust shalt thou return." (Gen. 3:17-19)
I thought our religion blamed Eve, for isn't that what all the revisionists are telling us? It seems they are wrong. The Bible lays the responsibility on Adam, which means "Man." This, Adam, is the name God gave to the human race before the Fall, in the day He made them and blessed them. (Gen. 5:2) This has great meaning, as we shall see.
A movie made in 1951, starring Kirk Douglas, named Detective Story, takes place in a major American city. It is about police and criminals on the surface, but seems to be about sin and redemption under the surface. The detective played by Kirk Douglas hates criminals, and feels very righteous. But, his father was a criminal. As the story unfolds, the detective, Jim McLeod, becomes increasingly aware that, even though he is no criminal, he is not the good and righteous man of his own delusions and self-deception. He learns, quite painfully, that he is sinful and capable of hurting the one person he loves most, his wife. In one scene, he tells how he always wanted to be different from his father, but now discovers that his father, the worst part of what his father was, lives inside him. This movie was made long ago, before the current unhealthy trend in Hollywood always to paint everyone's father as a bad guy, and all father-son relationships as full of strife. But, in 1951 the lines Kirk Douglas spoke were probably shocking. The father that lived inside him seems to have been written with a symbolic and theological meaning. The father, whose evil the hitherto self-righteous detective could not escape, spoke really of Adam. That is, he was a fallen child of a sinful race called Man.
You were born subject to death because you were conceived in iniquity (as Psalm 51 says). The revisionists are quite wrong in thinking our Bible lays the blame on Eve, for St. Paul takes it up in these words when writing to the Church in Rome:
"Wherefore, as by one man sin entered into the world, and death by sin; and so death passed upon all men, for that all have sinned...For as by one man's disobedience many were made sinners, so by the obedience of one shall many be made righteous. Moreover the law entered, that the offence might abound. But where sin abounded, grace did much more abound: That as sin hath reigned unto death, even so might grace reign through righteousness unto eternal life by Jesus Christ our Lord." (see Rom. 5:12-21)
And writing to the Church in Corinth he said,
"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." (I Cor. 15:21,22)
Someone may think I am getting ahead of the season by mentioning our hope and our salvation in Jesus Christ. Not so, for, in fact, that is the message; in fact it is always the message. In Easter, yes, then we shall concentrate on our other father, our everlasting father (Isaiah 9:6,7) by whose obedience we can, indeed, have treasure in heaven, and therefore a good and sound heart. In that season we will dwell on the Second Man, the Last Adam (I Cor. 15: 45-47).
But, in Lent we concentrate on penance. That is, seeing our hopelessness, we treat our bodies with severity of disciplines in order to focus our attention on that heaven where we ought to have our treasure. In the Law of Moses, when a man died his brother would raise up a child to be named as the son of his dead brother. Such a man had two fathers, one natural and one legal. We have two fathers. "For as in Adam all die, even so in Christ shall all be made alive." In Adam we die; in Adam we are hopeless; in Adam we are helpless; In Adam we are sinners. But, when we were baptized our life began again, and if we have a lively faith, then we know our other father. That other father, the Father of the new humanity, died to make us, by adoption, children of His Father. In Christ the Everlasting Father of the new and redeemed human race, God saves us from sin and death; for that we could not do ourselves.
For now, like Det. Jim McLeod in Detective Story, we must face with honesty the simple truth that we cannot keep ourselves alive. The evil we might think we hate, especially when it takes forms we are able to despise as beneath us, is really in us. Our Fallen father Adam is in us with all his sinfulness, and we are not free. We shall all return to the dust; No truer words have been spoken than these: "thou shalt surely die." Just as we must pass through this time of mortality and weakness, while living with the sorrowful reality of death, we do so with the sure and certain hope of the resurrection on the Last Day. So, we pass through this penitential season of Lent aware that Easter lies ahead. We do have faith in the coming resurrection; and so, at this time, having our treasure in heaven rather than in the things of this world that passes away, we follow Christ to his cross. This is the season that teaches us to face our helpless and sinful condition, and to make war upon it, so that we may truly become ever more thankful for His salvation.
Tuesday, February 16, 2010
Welcome Bishop Peter Robinson
Having taken at least a couple of weeks to pray and consider, the Bishop of the Missionary Diocese of the West, United Episcopal Church North America (UECNA), has accepted our invitation to join us here at The Continuum. The Right Rev. Peter Robinson also serves as Rector of St. Paul's Anglican Church, Prescott, Arizona. Bishop Robinson has been writing very sound educational articles on his own blog for quite some time, The Old High Churchman. We trust he will bring that same wisdom to our pages.
You may read about Bishop Robinson by reading his blogger profile, and that may be done by clicking his picture on the right of this page. In addition, the website for St. Paul's says this:
After leaving High School, the future Bishop Robinson read history and theology at the College of Ripon and York St. John, North Yorkshire, graduating Bachelor of Arts (Honours) of the University of Leeds in June 1991. He grew up in a moderately High Church parish that had had a long succesion of "Prayer Book Catholic" vicars. After graduating from College, he served as a lay pastoral assistant in a liberal Evangelical Church of England parish in London, which he describes as being "an interesting experience, in that it taught me just how deep seated theological liberalism had become in the Church of England." He also discovered that his conservative views on the Authority of Scripture, the Creeds and the Liturgy - a discovery that led to barriers being erected by "the powers that be" in his home diocese to his being ordained there.
Following the vote to ordain women in the General Synod (11/11/1992), Peter left the Church of England worried by the exclusively "liberal catholic" outlook of the leadership of his home diocese, and skeptical of theological validity of the "two integrities" theory being propounded to keep Traditionalists in the Church of England...
Bishop Robinson first became interested in the United Episcopal Church in 2001 when leading his former parish in California. He rapidly concluded that the UECNA "was the old (Anglican or Episcopal) Church without the heresy" because of its retention of the 1928 Prayer Book and old Episcopal Church Constitution. However, in 2001 circumstances did not allow him to join the UECNA. Eventually, in 2007, both Fr. Peter and St Paul's Anglican Church were able to join the United Episcopal Church in North America. On 29th October 2008, the Rev. Peter Robinson was elected as a bishop-suffragan in the United Episcopal Church on 29th October 2008, and was consecrated 10th January 2009 by the Most Rev. Stephen Reber, Presiding Bishop of the UECNA, assisted by the Right Rev. D. Presley Hutchens of the ACC Diocese of New Orleans, and the Right Rev. William Wiygul of the APCK Diocese of the Southern States. The consecration was held at Trinity Lutheran Church, St Louis, MO.
You may read about Bishop Robinson by reading his blogger profile, and that may be done by clicking his picture on the right of this page. In addition, the website for St. Paul's says this:
After leaving High School, the future Bishop Robinson read history and theology at the College of Ripon and York St. John, North Yorkshire, graduating Bachelor of Arts (Honours) of the University of Leeds in June 1991. He grew up in a moderately High Church parish that had had a long succesion of "Prayer Book Catholic" vicars. After graduating from College, he served as a lay pastoral assistant in a liberal Evangelical Church of England parish in London, which he describes as being "an interesting experience, in that it taught me just how deep seated theological liberalism had become in the Church of England." He also discovered that his conservative views on the Authority of Scripture, the Creeds and the Liturgy - a discovery that led to barriers being erected by "the powers that be" in his home diocese to his being ordained there.
Following the vote to ordain women in the General Synod (11/11/1992), Peter left the Church of England worried by the exclusively "liberal catholic" outlook of the leadership of his home diocese, and skeptical of theological validity of the "two integrities" theory being propounded to keep Traditionalists in the Church of England...
Bishop Robinson first became interested in the United Episcopal Church in 2001 when leading his former parish in California. He rapidly concluded that the UECNA "was the old (Anglican or Episcopal) Church without the heresy" because of its retention of the 1928 Prayer Book and old Episcopal Church Constitution. However, in 2001 circumstances did not allow him to join the UECNA. Eventually, in 2007, both Fr. Peter and St Paul's Anglican Church were able to join the United Episcopal Church in North America. On 29th October 2008, the Rev. Peter Robinson was elected as a bishop-suffragan in the United Episcopal Church on 29th October 2008, and was consecrated 10th January 2009 by the Most Rev. Stephen Reber, Presiding Bishop of the UECNA, assisted by the Right Rev. D. Presley Hutchens of the ACC Diocese of New Orleans, and the Right Rev. William Wiygul of the APCK Diocese of the Southern States. The consecration was held at Trinity Lutheran Church, St Louis, MO.
My Favourite Things (spelling indicates a Brit author)
The following came from someone as a comment to the Shrove Tuesday Ritual Notes post. Inasmuch as you better had get all the laughs and Alleluias out of your system now, I though it best to post it separately today. It was written by one of my favorite writers, a prolific fellow who has been at it for centuries trying his hand quite successfully at both lyrics and music.
A Few of My Favourite Things
to the tune from the Sound of Music song of the same name by Rogers and Hammerstein.
(in honour of Shrove Tuesday)
Sackcloth and ashes,
and days without eating,
Mortification and wailing and weeping,
A hair shirt that scratches,
a nettle that stings,
These are a few of my favorite things.
Penitence, flagellants, memento mori,
Spending nights sleeping on rocks in a quarry,
The sound of a cloak'd solemn cantor who sings,
These are still more of my favorite things.
Tossing and turning and yearning I'm spurning,
Passions aflame like an ember day burning,
Corpus and carnis and wild drunken flings,
Forsaken are they for my favorite things!
When it's Christmas,
When the tree's lit,
When the cards are sent,
I simply remember my favorite things,
And then I can't wa-a-a-a-it till Lent.
-Anonymous
A Few of My Favourite Things
to the tune from the Sound of Music song of the same name by Rogers and Hammerstein.
(in honour of Shrove Tuesday)
Sackcloth and ashes,
and days without eating,
Mortification and wailing and weeping,
A hair shirt that scratches,
a nettle that stings,
These are a few of my favorite things.
Penitence, flagellants, memento mori,
Spending nights sleeping on rocks in a quarry,
The sound of a cloak'd solemn cantor who sings,
These are still more of my favorite things.
Tossing and turning and yearning I'm spurning,
Passions aflame like an ember day burning,
Corpus and carnis and wild drunken flings,
Forsaken are they for my favorite things!
When it's Christmas,
When the tree's lit,
When the cards are sent,
I simply remember my favorite things,
And then I can't wa-a-a-a-it till Lent.
-Anonymous
A couple of odds and ends
Proof reading
I rejected a comment because it was written to pick on a typographical error, belittling someone. The worst proof reader in the world is the writer of any given piece or comment, seeing what he meant to write rather than what he typed. It happens to the bbessttt of uss.
In light of a recent essay that has been posted to the internet, I find it wise to post a link to one of our earlier pages, from Sept of 2008. It concerns the thinking of Eric Lionel Mascall, and what he actually wrote about the papacy.
I will quote two portions:
I rejected a comment because it was written to pick on a typographical error, belittling someone. The worst proof reader in the world is the writer of any given piece or comment, seeing what he meant to write rather than what he typed. It happens to the bbessttt of uss.
In light of a recent essay that has been posted to the internet, I find it wise to post a link to one of our earlier pages, from Sept of 2008. It concerns the thinking of Eric Lionel Mascall, and what he actually wrote about the papacy.
I will quote two portions:
From Father Eric L. Mascall. Corpus Christi: Essays on the Church and Eucharist. London: Longmans, 1965. 2nd ed. Pages 17f.
"...the Church, as a visible and tangible society, living in the historic process, needs a visible and tangible organ of its unity, though that union is, as I have emphasised, an interior and mystical unity and not a moral or political one. The Church is a visible and tangible society, but it is a sacramental one, and the organ of its unity will be a sacramental organ. This is why, as I see it, the apostolic Episcopate precisely fulfils the requirements for such an organ, for the episcopal character is conferred by a sacramental act. And this is why it seems to me impossible to locate the organ of the Church’s unity in the Papacy, for the papal character is not conferred by a sacramental act at all, but by the purely administrative and organisational process of election. Whether the Papacy has, by divine providence, a unique status in the Church and, if so, what are the functions which rightly attach to it are, of course, important questions, but by its very constitution the Papacy does not, so far as I can see, possess the nature which is required in the organ of the Church’s unity."
The second quotation is:
The second quotation is:
"As for Eric Mascall, he was greatly troubled by the idea that the Church of England might eventually 'ordain' women, and he expressed his anguish to Dr. William Tighe in private conversation. Nonetheless, he died a Church of England priest. In his book The Recovery of Unity, he wrote at length his apologetic for the Anglican position, and with respect argued against the Roman teaching on the papacy as it has developed (the above statement is from a separate work, and summarizes part of the more detailed argument in the book). The same is true of the Dogmatic Theology series by Francis Hall, in which a defense of the Anglican position was skillfully written in light of theology and history."
I will add that Francis Hall also wrote his own criticism of the modern Roman teaching about the papacy in Dogmatic Theology.*
It is useful also to quote a comment from that thread by Fr. Laurence Wells:
"Professor Tighe's information is always helpful and certainly accurate. But he omits one fact: whatever their views on this or that, Lewis, Dix and Mascall all died as Anglicans. Whatever Dix thought about the papacy, it was not enough to push him into the Tiber."
I suggest reading it all; it is not long. I assure you, mysterious as it may be, posting this is timely. "Though this be madness, yet there is method in it." Hamlet Act 2, scene 2,
* Included in the evidence for his position, Hall mentioned an 1850 Roman Catholic catechism in which the question was asked, is the pope infallible? The answer was "no." The Church, it taught, is infallible, but not the pope. After 1870, when the pope became infallible retroactively, those old catechisms were rounded up and destroyed. Hall's copy escaped.
Monday, February 15, 2010
Works of mercy
Here is the part of Lent we forget all too easily. We know how to fast and pray, and how to give things up; but, we also need to remember the fast God has chosen:
"Wherefore have we fasted, say they, and thou seest not? wherefore have we afflicted our soul, and thou takest no knowledge? Behold, in the day of your fast ye find pleasure, and exact all your labours. Behold, ye fast for strife and debate, and to smite with the fist of wickedness: ye shall not fast as ye do this day, to make your voice to be heard on high. Is it such a fast that I have chosen? a day for a man to afflict his soul? is it to bow down his head as a bulrush, and to spread sackcloth and ashes under him? wilt thou call this a fast, and an acceptable day to the LORD? Is not this the fast that I have chosen? to loose the bands of wickedness, to undo the heavy burdens, and to let the oppressed go free, and that ye break every yoke? Is it not to deal thy bread to the hungry, and that thou bring the poor that are cast out to thy house? when thou seest the naked, that thou cover him; and that thou hide not thyself from thine own flesh? Then shall thy light break forth as the morning, and thine health shall spring forth speedily: and thy righteousness shall go before thee; the glory of the LORD shall be thy rereward." Isaiah 58:3-8
Fasting without any effort to help the needy is an incomplete practice. To assist our thinking in the season of Lent, here is more wisdom from the late Rev. Dr. Louis Tarsitano. Fr. Tarsitano probably wrote this with Lent in mind; and, with Lent around the corner-beginning this Wednesday-this is a good time to revive this article. -Fr. Hart
“Living by Mercy” first appeared in the January/February, 1999 issue of Touchstone.
"Wherefore have we fasted, say they, and thou seest not? wherefore have we afflicted our soul, and thou takest no knowledge? Behold, in the day of your fast ye find pleasure, and exact all your labours. Behold, ye fast for strife and debate, and to smite with the fist of wickedness: ye shall not fast as ye do this day, to make your voice to be heard on high. Is it such a fast that I have chosen? a day for a man to afflict his soul? is it to bow down his head as a bulrush, and to spread sackcloth and ashes under him? wilt thou call this a fast, and an acceptable day to the LORD? Is not this the fast that I have chosen? to loose the bands of wickedness, to undo the heavy burdens, and to let the oppressed go free, and that ye break every yoke? Is it not to deal thy bread to the hungry, and that thou bring the poor that are cast out to thy house? when thou seest the naked, that thou cover him; and that thou hide not thyself from thine own flesh? Then shall thy light break forth as the morning, and thine health shall spring forth speedily: and thy righteousness shall go before thee; the glory of the LORD shall be thy rereward." Isaiah 58:3-8
Fasting without any effort to help the needy is an incomplete practice. To assist our thinking in the season of Lent, here is more wisdom from the late Rev. Dr. Louis Tarsitano. Fr. Tarsitano probably wrote this with Lent in mind; and, with Lent around the corner-beginning this Wednesday-this is a good time to revive this article. -Fr. Hart
“Living by Mercy” first appeared in the January/February, 1999 issue of Touchstone.
Living by Mercy
Louis R. Tarsitano on Christian “Self-Help”
Christian bookstores are filled today with “how-to” books. These are, more or less, the religious equivalent of the “self-help” books sold in competing secular establishments.
In both kinds of stores, one can find books for fathers, mothers, children, students, doctors, lawyers, housewives, businessmen, and almost every other sort of person, promising to teach them how to be better at whatever they are doing and how to live happier lives while doing it.
It would be good to be able to say that what sets the Christian books apart from their non-Christian counterparts is the consistent theme that we should live to please God and not ourselves. But this is only occasionally the case. Americans are attracted by the idea of “self-help,” even when we are dealing with God. We like to think that we can do well by doing good, which is a concept that would come as a surprise to the great martyrs, confessors, and missionaries.
One also rarely encounters in contemporary Christian how-to books any sense of our sanctification empowered by grace in a struggle against ourselves. Too often, the fulfillment of our own aspirations, bereft of any sense of the possibility of an unexpected or undesired divine vocation, is presented as our highest possible spiritual achievement. We will be happy, we are told, when we are what we truly want to be, so that God has an absolute duty to assist us in our self-fulfillment.
Often, as well, we are told by famous evangelical pastors to embrace a works righteousness that would have made a Roman Catholic parochial school teacher of the 1950s blush. What goes unexplained is why God should owe us anything at all for doing the good works we were created to do, let alone those “good works” we have defined and chosen for ourselves. It is not, after all, what we do that saves us, but what Jesus Christ has done for us, to the glory of his Father.
We might profit by considering a time when there were fewer books but more good sense about God, and about life in communion with him. If we return to the English Reformation, for example, we find this sound advice about good works in the XIIth Article of Religion:
Albeit that Good Works, which are the fruits of Faith, and follow after Justification, cannot put away our sins, and endure the severity of God’s judgment; yet are they pleasing and acceptable to God in Christ, and do spring out necessarily of a true and lively Faith; insomuch that by them a lively Faith may be as evidently known as a tree discerned by the fruit.
Good works, it turns out, are God’s gifts to us. They are his blessing in our lives, making evident that we have received the gifts of a living Faith and justification in Jesus Christ. They are his demonstration that we are his own and his promise that he will be pleased by all that we do in the name of his Son and in imitation of him. God works in us, and he enables us to work in communion with him, through Jesus Christ, and by the Holy Ghost.
There may be worship, adoration, and obedience in true good works, but no self-help, at least not in the sense that we and our welfare are the focus of our actions. Grace liberates us from ourselves for new life in Jesus Christ, and that life is lived to the glory of the Father alone.
Moving even further back in time, we encounter two handy lists that might prove far more helpful to our Christian living than an entire rack of today’s books. These lists were developed before most Christians could read and before there was paper or ink to spare for today’s over-specialization. They are the lists of the Corporal and the Spiritual Works of Mercy.
The genius of the Works of Mercy is that they are intended as a response to the mercy of God, and not primarily as a means of obtaining it. Our Lord did say, “Blessed are the merciful, for they shall receive mercy” (Matt. 5:7); but he also said, “Be ye therefore merciful, as your Father also is merciful” (Luke 6:36). It is this second admonition that the Works of Mercy seek to apply, and a look at them will demonstrate that they direct the Christian to an unselfish worship of God through mercy towards others.
The Corporal Works of Mercy:
1. To feed the hungry
2. To give drink to the thirsty
3. To clothe the naked
4. To shelter the stranger
5. To visit the sick
6. To visit and minister to prisoners
7. To bury the dead
The Spiritual Works of Mercy:
1. To convert the sinner
2. To instruct the ignorant
3. To counsel the doubtful
4. To comfort the sorrowful
5. To bear injuries patiently
6. To forgive those who harm us
7. To pray for the living and to commend the dead into the hands of a merciful Lord
These are not the sorts of things that happen by accident, and while opportunities to do them abound, they tend to be rather inconvenient. Studying to perform these Works of Mercy to the honor of our Father in heaven cannot help but draw our attention away from our own plans and direct it to his plans and purposes.
Most of all, the ancient discipline of the Works of Mercy moves us to beseech God for the grace to submit to him in all things, a prayer that most contemporary wisdom and most contemporary churches will not incline us to make.
We can, of course, read whatever books we like. But before we follow them, we might find it useful to evaluate their advice in the light of the Works of Mercy. Whatever leads us away from being merciful to others, as our Father is merciful to us, is bad advice indeed. Most of us don’t need more help in being self-absorbed. We do need all the help we can get, however, in living to please Almighty God.
Louis R. Tarsitano (d. 2005), a former associate editor of Touchstone, was rector of St. Andrew's Church in Savannah, Georgia. He also was the co-author, with Peter Toon, of Neither Archaic Nor Obsolete: The Language of Common Prayer & Public Worship (Brynmill Press, Ltd., 2003).
Sunday, February 14, 2010
Ritual Notes for Shrove Tuesday
I searched for this and found it. The following was posted on a blog called Anglo-Catholic Ruminations in 2006, but it is older than that. I remember almost falling off my chair laughing the first time I read this. - Fr. Hart
In certain neighborhoods, the solemn pancake
procession will of necessity pass by a restaurant
whose specialty is pancakes, flapjacks, or crepes.
Extraordinary means are not to be taken to avoid this
situation, unless a detour would add dignity and not
unreasonable length to the route. Traditional
ceremonies are to be observed while passing before
such an establishment.
procession will of necessity pass by a restaurant
whose specialty is pancakes, flapjacks, or crepes.
Extraordinary means are not to be taken to avoid this
situation, unless a detour would add dignity and not
unreasonable length to the route. Traditional
ceremonies are to be observed while passing before
such an establishment.
Following the Shrove Tuesday Solemn High Choral Sung
Mass, the solemn procession forms at the head of the
aisle, and the sacred ministers are supplied with
their birettas. The celebrant also receives a large
platter of steaming-hot buttermilk pancakes; the
deacon and subdeacon take up large pitchers of maple
syrup. Acolytes with large forks and spatulas attend
the sacred ministers. Following the deacon's versicle
and the people's response, the thurifer leads the
procession through the nave and narthex and out to the
street.
The choir accompany the procession with appropriate
antiphons, responsories, and plainsong hymns, such as
the Corpus Christi introit, Cibavit eos: "He fed them
also with the finest wheat flour, and with honey from
the rock."
The thurifer with his censer will lead the solemn
outdoor procession. Two bacon strips are draped over
the thurible. When the restaurant is sighted by the
verger, he shall signal to the acolyte, who shall ring
the bell thrice. The procession shall continue, but
the serving of pancakes shall cease until the
restaurant has been passed by. On hearing the bell,
the clergy and lay ministers in procession shall turn
their heads so as to face the establishment directly
whilst they continue forward. Upon a single stroke of
the bell, all shall stop and turn to face the
restaurant. The sacred ministers shall remove their
birettas, taking care not to drop the syrup pitcher as
they do so. The sacred ministers shall then
double-genuflect, first bringing the right knee to the
ground and then the left knee to join the right one on
the ground. The celebrant shall then incense the
restaurant with three double swings. All others shall
bow low. The celebrant shall chant the collect for
Shrove Tuesday. This completed, all shall rise, and
the celebrant shall cover with the biretta and resume
the pitcher. A single stroke of the bell shall signal
the resumption of the procession, all resuming
birettas.
After the station at the restaurant, the procession
turns left, encircling the Unitarian-Universalist
Church next door, as a gesture of hospitality and
ecumenism. Traditionally, the UU minister joins the
procession dressed in a simple cassock-alb and bearing
a large bowl of flower petals gathered by UU
parishioners; these are added to the pancake plates as
a lovely garnish and a reminder of the oneness of
creation with Creator. (A secondary but salutary
effect of the procession in the early years was the
reconciliation of the neighboring Episcopal and UU
churches following the previous year's Trinity Sunday
outdoor solemn procession, which had encircled the UU
church three times to the increasing outrage of the UU
minister and congregation.)
The procession moves south from the UU church down
past the rectory, where a station is made and the
antiphon Sacerdotes Domini chanted.
Finally, having given up the pancake-serving utensils,
the sacred ministers, vergers, acolytes, and servers
proceed to the church and all enter for the Solemn Te
Deum and Benediction. After Solemn Benediction of the
Blessed Sacrament, pancakes are served in the church hall.
Quinquagesima Sermon Notes
Gen. 9:8-17
1 Cor. 13
Lu. 18:31-end
“Jesus, son of David, have mercy on me” +
The three readings this morning may seem disconnected. But there is an underlying thread that connects them. It is mercy. In the reading from Genesis we have God’s promise not to again bring a cataclysmic flood which destroys the world of men and their environment, as long as the earth remains (Gen. 8:22). In the Epistle, we learn of that highest, all-encompassing virtue, Charity or Disinterested Love, which we are told is patient, kind and “is not easily provoked” or, as other translations put it, keeps no record of wrongs. And then we have the blind man in the Gospel who asks that Jesus “have mercy on” him, and receives it in the form of healing. So, the OT reading shows us God’s mercy to sinful man, the Epistle reveals our high calling to mercy as redeemed human beings, and the Gospel shows the God-Man leading the way by example.
There is much scepticism about the Flood of Noah due to the fact that there is no geological evidence for a global flood, due to the problems of fitting all the kinds of animals into the Ark, and for other reasons. What we do know is that the vast majority of ethnic groups have ancient traditions of a great Flood, often with similarities to the biblical account, right across the inhabited world, right across the enormous range of cultures. And there is geological evidence for some enormous regional floods in the deep human past, including in the regions near where human civilisation began. So, there is reason to believe, even apart from the Scriptural record, that there is a historical event or set of events underlying the story. Exactly what the literary genre of the account in Genesis is, is unclear. There are aspects of the language of the account itself and certain hesitancies in the patristic Tradition that combine to cast doubt on the global extent of the Flood, which means one or more of the huge regional floods just referred to may be Noah’s Flood.
Nevertheless, however these difficulties should be resolved, God’s word and message to us stands firm. The Scriptures teach us that God has permitted our corruption to lead to our destruction in the past. Indeed, the Hebrew word for “corrupted”, which is how Genesis describes the pre-Flood humanity and earth, is directly related to the word for “destroy” used to describe what God would do through the Flood in the next verse (6: 12, 13). People destroy themselves and their environment. We are also told twice in the same chapter that violence filled the earth: and so the violence is completed and turned upon itself. Yet, despite the fact that this fully deserved judgement will not lead to a moral reform of the human race, but continuation of the rebellion, as the following chapters of the Bible make very clear (e.g., 11:1-9), God binds Himself to a promise not to permit himself such a wholesale judgement again, until the very end has come. The rainbow in the sky, a beautiful and pleasant sight, is now a sign of this undeserved favour, a sign of grace. It is as if the Divine Warrior against evil has laid aside this weapon, this battle-bow.
This theme of judgement mitigated by mercy is common in Genesis. Adam and Eve are condemned but clothed by God, Cain is punished but protected from vigilante persecution, and so on. But we also find this theme throughout the Bible. I am thinking of that prayer of Habakkuk (3:2), “in wrath remember mercy” and those heart-piercing words of Job 5:18, “he wounds, but he binds up, he smites, but his hands heal.” St James reminds us that “mercy triumphs over judgement”.
Some cultures (or sub-cultures) have focussed only on justice and payed lip-service at best to mercy. This leads to rampant cruelty and hypocrisy as those with less public or overt sin condemn hatefully those with more public or overt sin. The problem with the modern Western world is that it often tends to think that mercy annihilates judgement. That mercy stands alone. But the truth is that mercy is meaningless except in the context of a judgement that is prior and understood. Much of the confusion about how we should treat wrongdoing stems from this error. If all we have is mercy, then we have not mercy but careless, lazy sentimentalism and laxity. In general, then, the world cannot understand either God’s justice or his mercy, and is offended equally by both. It is as if they say: “What business does God have judging ordinary people, decent citizens, as condemned?” “How can God promise heaven to the murderer or rapist who repents in his last days and refuse it to the ordinary man with his ordinary flaws, just because he feels no need for repentance or religion?”
The highest integration of mercy and justice is in the Cross, predicted at the beginning of today’s Gospel, and predictably opaque to the disciples, who, at this point in their development, share the world’s ignorance. But the astonishing truth will soon dawn upon them, as they see the Son of God voluntarily taking upon himself the Judgement in order that we might receive Mercy. Potentially, all the condemnation, all the just punishment of Mankind has been dealt with, absorbed by Christ. His infinite fountain of mercy is freely available to all, through a new covenant more beautiful than the rainbow, if we will only reach out with the desire and trust of the blind man, and pray with him, “Jesus, … have mercy on me.” (To ask for mercy is, of course, also to admit our sinfulness.) Then, in response to the mercy received, we will be able to participate in the mercy given, reaching out to others with a love that neither excuses the sin nor despises the sinner. +
Saturday, February 13, 2010
Fr. Wells' Bulletin Inserts
QUINQUAGESIMA
In today's Gospel, our dear Lord invites us to join Him on a journey, a journey which will end at the foot of His cross. This is an invitation to join Him once again for the forty day pilgrimage which we make together in His church in the holy season of Lent. As the Twelve “understood none of these things,” we might not understand the purpose or value of any special Lenten observance. When Lenten rules are outlined each Quinquagesima Sunday, for many of us “this saying was hid from them, neither knew they the things which were spoken.”
We find ourselves in today's Gospel as the blind man. His physical blindness echoes the spiritual blindness of the Twelve. He came to Jesus begging for a miracle: “And he said, Lord, that I may receive my sight.” Remember that Baptism, which in ancient times was the climax and conclusion of Lent, is presented in the NT and in the Church Fathers as an “enlightenment,” the gift of spiritual sight. Lent can be for us, if we use it holy season properly, a rescue and healing from spiritual blindness.
Here are some specific suggestions for things to do in Lent.
Be in church for every service, Wednesday and Friday.
Observe all Wednesdays and Fridays as days of abstinence (in plain language, keep all meals meatless those two days.)
Remember that Lent is no time for parties, concerts, movie-going, unnecessary restaurant meals and the like.
Make an extra effort to be diligent in private prayer, Bible reading, and cultivation of a deeper spiritual life.
Special almsgiving and works of corporal mercy. Like Advent,
Lent is a fine time for a parish food drive.
Lent is not, emphatically not, a “religious emphasis season” when we do things we can leave behind at the end of Holy Week. It is always sad to see the drop in attendance which seems inevitable after Easter Day. Lent is a time to develop new habits of spiritual discipline. It is a time to learn the value of keeping every Friday of the year (save those in Christmastide) meatless, as a weekly memorial of our Lord's death. The habits of Bible reading and keeping a personal prayer life should take root in our lives for the remainder of the year.
In our own spiritual poverty and blindness, we must come before Crucified and Risen Saviour and cry out, “Thou Son of David, have mercy upon me.” In keeping a good and holy Lent, we also may receive our sight. That's what He wants for each of us. LKW
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In our study of today's Epistle, we have been re-reading a fine little book by D. A. Carson with an unusual title: The Difficult Doctrine of the Love of God. The author points out the necessity for calling the love of God a “difficult” topic. Had he written “the difficult doctrine of the Trinity,” or “the difficult doctrine of predestination,” it would have caused no surprise, since everyone agrees those are challenging or controversial topics. But what is “difficult” about the love of God? Everyone assumes that God's love is an easy and self-explanatory matter.
Today's Epistle is St. Paul's great hymn on charity, an unusual poetic outburst on his part. Practically every modern translation replaces the grand old King James Version's word “charity” with the modern word “love.” While the term “charity” has its drawbacks, the word “love” has been so debased that it is almost misleading.
Whereas our English word “love” is used for a wide variety of things, ranging from God's mercy toward sinners to a child's delight in ice-cream, the language of the New Testament had a fairly large number of words for love. It is remarkable that the NT writers did not use any of the words familiar to their readers. They went out of their way to find an unusual word. This is the word agape, pronounced ah-gah-pay.
Agape refers to the unparalleled, unequaled, undeserved and unexpected love which God has for sinners. This is the word which the King James Version translates as “charity” in I Corinthians 13. In spite of our efforts to tame this word through slobbering sentimentality, it remains a unique kind of love, love like the world had never seen, love made visible in the cross of Jesus.
As we begin once again our annual journey “up to Jerusalem” to be with Jesus on Good Friday and Easter Day, today's Epistle reminds us that the whole purpose of keeping Lent is our personal renewal and increase in “faith hope, and charity, and the greatest of these is charity.” Lent, with its discipline and self-denial, should teach us that the charity of God is to be shown forth in the “love and charity with your neighbours” of “all who profess and call themselves Christians.”
The Christian life has no place for spitefulness, mean-spiritedness, unkindness, especially toward those who have wronged us. As we read I Corinthians 13, we see Paul's portrait of Jesus (“charity suffereth long, and is kind...”), the world's first truly charitable Man. But Paul's point, and the point of Lent, is that charity is the greatest of virtues, which we must implore God to pour into our hearts. LKW
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