Source: Covenant
We shared yesterday Ruth Gledhill’s story of how litigation involving Dr. Elaine Storkey, who is also the chair of Fulcrum, is broadening into a theological dispute that will be the subject of legal inquiry later this year. The backdrop of this legal battle is the division between conservative Anglicans exemplified by the global furor over the proposed GAFCON meeting, which many see as an effort to subvert this year’s Lambeth Conference.
It’s not unusual for Anglicans to be divided these days. But what’s tragic is that the division that is the context of both of these controversies is mostly between conservative and ‘open’ evangelicals, two groups who share a lot of common ground. In what follows, I hope to gesture towards what I believe is a major cause of the division. If I am correct, then the current controversies may portend a widening conflict in which human sexuality is no longer the presenting issue. For at the heart of these controversies is a dispute over the nature and implications of the Gospel itself for Christian ethical conduct and the ordering of the Church.
It seems that many conservatives confuse the concept of an “open” evangelical, as the term is used in England, with the way “open” is sometimes used in North America to refer to a pro-Gay stance. “Open evangelicalism” does not mean one is open on issues of human sexuality or any other matters of Christian ethics. I write to propose a way of understanding this concept that I believe is pertinent to the situation at Wycliffe Hall but also helps us to understand tensions between self-described ‘orthodox’ Christians who, were their disagreements not so passionate on this particular issue, would likely be fast friends.
Dale Rye has expressed wonderfully the complexity of legal issues that are apparently factors in the employment dispute between Elaine Storkey and her employers. However, the battle at Wycliffe Hall seems, based on what I can gather from the public record, to be at heart a battle between two different parties who self-identify as evangelicals, but who disagree fundamentally on how the Gospel calls us to behave in the encounter with our neighbors. The tensions between us evangelicals are similarly at heart a profound disagreement between two different parties who self-identify as evangelicals theologically (although most of us at Covenant also self-identify as ‘catholic’ theologically) about how Scripture calls us to behave in the encounter with our neighbors, particularly in the event that we believe them to be advocates of teachings established as heresy or apostasy.
Before going further, let me be quite clear about the nature of the Covenant writers since there seems to be some misinformation out there, and also to introduce an illustrative example of the fault line that is my concern. All but a few of us Covenanters, if I correctly understand the public confessions of my colleagues, have a conservative view of human sexuality as articulated in Lambeth 98 Resolution 1.10. That means, to quote partially from that conciliar resolution, that all but a few of us are on record as agreeing with the teaching that,
“rejecting homosexual practice as incompatible with Scripture, calls on all our people to minister pastorally and sensitively to all irrespective of sexual orientation and to condemn irrational fear of homosexuals, violence within marriage and any trivialisation and commercialisation of sex.”
The few among us who disagree with that particular clause are among the many of our Episcopal and Anglican brethren worldwide who in humility claim uncertainty about the truth of our human sexuality. I think a lot of the Windsor bishops share that humility. Indeed, I think that such uncertainty exists on a spectrum in every province of the Communion. On theological grounds, they see room for the possibility of an important Christian witness for those who self-identify as homosexuals, and they see a possible interpretation of Scripture that warrants such a witness. This locates them within the constellation of three of Anglicanism’s finest theologians, Oliver O’Donovan, Rowan Williams, and Stanley Hauerwas. O’Donovan is a fascinating example here, for one would be hard pressed to discredit him as anything other than an orthodox evangelical. But read his “Good News for Gay Christians” in which he articulates a point quite similar, albeit in his unique idiom, to the conclusions that our Covenant moderates have argued. But that is not the point, really. The point is that, in spite of their confessed uncertainty, each of these theologians and priests, insofar as I can tell, embrace the “mind of the Communion” on this matter and constrain their own teaching. in accordance with this consensus. That is what the Communion has asked of them and that is what they do.
Therefore, even though they personally have reservations about our understanding of what Scripture demands in the area of human sexuality, they, support “the Windsor and Covenant Processes,” as Archbishop Rowan Williams has asked all the bishops to commit to as they prepare for Lambeth next summer—that is, to continue working constructively with the Windsor Report and the Covenant draft as tools for the development of appropriate “structures” for our common life, and to accept the constraints on Christian behavior articulated in those documents “until a new consensus emerges.” That is a very important distinction. This means that at minimum, due to their understanding of how Anglicans resolve theological differences, they are not conducting or advocating same-sex blessings themselves and they are not seeking the ordination of non-celibate homosexuals. They are complying with Windsor at the local level.
Let’s be quite clear on this point: Covenant does not endorse or ally with those who, in spite of the Windsor Report’s constraints, continue to advocate same-sex blessings or ordination of gays in their public roles. Every one of the Covenant writers prays that the Lord will correct TEC of our errors and sustain us through the discipline that teaches us to walk in the ways of the Lord. We support the Windsor Report and the Covenant process as the way to order our common life.
Nonetheless some have challenged the wisdom of our including in our community a few writers who disagree with the rest on the issue of human sexuality. These interlocutors claim we “collaborate with heretics.” And this is where the tensions between us and our interlocutors intersect with Elaine Storkey’s dispute with Wycliffe Hall, and where the significance of the term “open evangelical” becomes clear. For the dispute is not at all about Scriptural authority - I believe we stand shoulder to shoulder on that - , but rather the dispute is about what Scripture teaches us about how we are to interact with our neighbor when we have profound differences over doctrine grounded in that authority. Do we avoid the differences by separating from our neighbor? Do we shun our neighbor? Is there a difference between the discipline mandated by Scripture in the encounter with heresy and apostasy and the path of permanent structural separation that terminates fellowship? And how does Scripture tell us to go about resolving these questions? The answers we give to these questions point to the distinction between an “open evangelical” and a “conservative evangelical.”
I introduce the example of the tensions between Covenanters and some of our conservative interlocutors because it is raises this question of discipline. They feel that it is wrong to collaborate with those who they feel are heretics. Suspending judgment on the question of whether or not someone complying with Windsor’s constraints can rightly be thought of as heretics, let us consider the question of what is meant by discipline in the encounter with heresy. Discipline is about ordering the life of the community of faith. The Covenant example presents a specific question: does discipline mean we are not to address our fellow baptized Christians on an Internet blog? Does addressing others on an Internet blog who you deem to be apostate really constitute “collaboration” with apostasy?
We at Covenant follow Augustine on this. Augustine argued fiercely with the Donatists he deemed to be heretics. Indeed, he met for lengthy debates with them in a public forum, arguing with them day after day, hearing their views and laying out his own in their dispute over critical issues of church ordering and sin. Unless we have a rarefied view of our blogs, we Covenanters believe - and I propose that this is fundamental to ‘open evangelicalism’ generally - that there is a distinction between discipline within the ordered community we call the church and the public forums like blogs and universities where we wrestle together with the questions life presents.
I think one of the points of divergence among self-described orthodox Anglicans - in our understanding of what constitutes this ordering for the good of the church - has to do with our understanding of what constitutes “theological integrity.” I suggest that an “open evangelical” will follow the teaching of our current Archbishop of Canterbury on this, when he says:
Having integrity, then, is being able to speak in a way that allows of answers. Honest discourse permits response and continuation; it invites collaboration by showing that it does not claim to be, in and of itself, final. It does not seek to prescribe the tone, the direction, or even the vocabulary of a response. And it does all this by showing in its own working a critical self-perception, displaying the axioms to which it believes itself accountable; that is to say, it makes it clear that it accepts, even within its own terms of reference, that there are ways in which it may be questioned and criticized….When it resists debate and transmutation, claiming that it may prescribe exactly what the learning of its skills should lead to, it is open to the suspicion that its workings are no longer answerable to what they claim to answer to: the further determinant has been added of the need to safeguard the power that licenses this kind of talk; and thus integrity disappears.
Rowan Williams’ conception of theological integrity, with which I suppose Oliver O’Donovan would agree, animates Covenant’s decision to include in our number writers who may disagree personally with us on theological grounds provided that they commit to the constraints that Rowan himself articulates in several of his letters, and that the primates commend to us in the Windsor Report as amended in the Primates Meeting. It is an act of theological integrity to have honest discourse with such theologians in order to remain answerable, to make clear that there are ways in which our understanding of what God intends in the gift of human sexuality is imperfect and may be questioned and criticized.
Moreover, we derive from this conception of theological integrity the principle that we cannot be ourselves without those who are different from us. Honest discourse with those to whom we remain answerable is part of our subjection to the community of faith’s judgment. Judgment is not to be avoided but sought after, for judgment is salvation. Judgment is the tool of the Sculptor, chipping away at that which is untrue in us so that the truth about us revealed in Christ emerges. Therefore, we don’t need to insist that all in our fellowship be like us. We can and should be ‘open’ to other witnesses to the triune God in our community - in the sense of being answerable to such witnesses - for the Church is that through which the Word generates the diversity we experience as Easter in our lives. It is not necessary that all in our community be conservative in order to be right thinking or to exhibit right worship or right living. Theological integrity demands being ‘open’ in this sense to other witnesses.
It seems that this same issue of theological integrity animates Elaine Storkey’s concerns with the changes at Wycliffe Hall, Oxford, insofar as one can tell from her words and those of the other (is it eight now?) scholars, including Alister McGrath, who have departed in recent months.
But that’s not all. An “open evangelical” also disagrees fundamentally with a so-called “conservative” evangelical in the understanding of how the Gospel calls us to relate to our neighbor, even when that neighbor is engaged in sin, confused by heresy, or lost in apostasy. There is no dispute regarding the necessity of discipline within the Church at such times. I think both ‘open” and “conservative” evangelicals agree that discipline is the means by which the Church maintains the life of integrity that enables her witness to the triune God. However there is a profound dispute over what the Gospel demands of us in our relationship with others at all times, including our encounters with sin, heresy, and apostasy.
An “open evangelical” is especially informed by Paul’s insistence that to be “in Christ” is to live the cruciform life (e.g. Gal 2:20 ff). The word “open” comes from this foundational claim of evangelicals. “Openness” describes how we are to relate to others in all cases, period. We are to practice the habit of “openness” (or, as Rowan Williams calls it, “relational receptivity”), a habit made possible by the gift of the Spirit but which can only be learned through participation in the community of persons pledged to Christ as Lord. This habit of openness thus begins with the triune God, and, in response to God’’s gifts to us of identity , freedom, and existence, strives to imitate God’s open reception of humankind on the Cross. Therefore, in the encounter with our neighbor, or, rather, prior to the encounter with our neighbor, we love. That is, we receive our neighbor with an openness to her that is undetermined by her, offering ourselves in benevolent relation to her. We strive to be that non-competitive, non-negotiating presence to her who cannot be threatened, before whom she need never defend herself, who actively receives and celebrates her as one unique and different from ourselves. And, in so doing, we give her, as Rowan says, “the space of freedom, which is existence.”
As the gifting of existence - that is, as the practice by which one gives the gift of relational space where another can simply be, evangelical openness also is the gift of space within which another can become. For, in offering ourselves as that relational space in which another can freely be, we give the gift of Christ to another. This is how Christians are to relate to their neighbors, for we are corporately and personally engaged, through the Spirit, (again quoting Rowan) “in constructing each other’s humanity, bringing one another into the inheritance of power and liberty whose form is defined by Jesus.”
Therefore, an “open evangelical” believes that faithfulness to the Gospel demands an “evangelical openness” to another person even in the encounter of sin, heresy, and apostasy. Conservatives evangelicals, it seems, confuse this evangelical openness to the neighbor with acceptance of the neighbor’s sin, heresy, or apostasy. But evangelical openness does not accept sin, heresy, or apostasy at all. Scripture demands that the community discipline such departures from the ways of the Lord so that the lost one can discover and rediscover the gospel truth that they are found. “Evangelical openness” means that, in spite of the requirement for such community-sanctioned, community-administered, and public discipline for the sake of the Church’s integrity, the relation of the evangelical to the lost is undetermined by the fact of their being lost. Because imitating Christ’s cruciform life means that we strive to be at all times that non-competitive, non-negotiating presence to our neighbors in analogy to the triune God’s relation to us. In other words, in advance, we commit ourselves to be those whose presence to our neighbor, subject to the public discipline necessary to preserve the holiness of our community and aimed always at reconciliation and reunion with our neighbor, is never dependent on our neighbor.
That, I suggest, is what is meant by the term “open evangelical” as it is used in England. And the understanding that the Gospel mandates this evangelical openness, this cruciform witness that defines the very meaning and purpose of the community-sanctioned and public discipline necessary for the Church’s witness to the triune God, is the foundation of Covenant. I infer the same is true of Fulcrum and the ACI, as well. This is where we differ profoundly from our conservative evangelical interlocutors. And, as far as I can tell from the public record, that has a lot to do with the theological difference that generates the tension at Wycliffe Hall, Oxford, at least in the case of the renowned Elaine Storkey.
And I imagine it is the heart of the division that is now so painful and visible among evangelicals who, in most times, would be kindred spirits.
13 January 2008 at 6:48 am
For my own part, I felt that this was somewhat lacking as an analysis. I posted the comments below on the Covenant website, but they received only a rather cursory response from Craig, who mainly argued he was not trying to tell the English what their situation really was. I think the comments from Graham Kings here rather suggest it could nevertheless (and I believe was intended to) be read that way. My comments follow, and stand here also:
I’m sorry to say that Craig’s article, whilst an honest effort, fails to bridge the double distance both geographically between America and England and theologically between his own and English Conservative evangelicalism. The resulting attempt to characterise the dispute thus becomes a bit of a caricature.
The question Craig fails to answer is the why the relationship between ‘Open’ and Conservative evangelicalism in England is currently so bitter. One reason may be a misperception of how ‘openness’ operates. He suggests, on the issue of sexuality ‘we cannot be ourselves without those who are different from us’ and the constituency is thus ‘open’ to those who do not believe Lambeth 1.10 got it right — a good thing, in his view.
But such generosity of ‘openness’ is not seen, to give a crucial example, with regard to those (such as Conservative Evangelicals) who believe the Church of England got it wrong when it agreed to ordain women as presbyters — despite the fact that the Church itself agreed at the time that this was not (and still is not!) a certain and assured conclusion.
The question, though, is not who is right or wrong on this particular issue, but where the claimed ‘openness’ has gone. This is an issue not of theology but of psychology. It is a matter of ‘gut’ reaction, which I think ‘Open’ Evangelicals need to address if the present tensions are to be resolved, for there seems to be an instinctive tendency on the part of ‘Open’ Evangelicals to ‘shoot first, talk later’ when it comes to Conservative Evangelicals.
On the specific issue of evangelism, I think Craig’s enthusiasm for the ‘open’ position blinds him to his own faults. He writes, ‘in the encounter with our neighbor … we’ — meaning ‘Open’ Evangelicals — ‘love’. Did he really mean ‘we, and not Conservative Evangelicals’? I hope not.
The critical problem, though, remains one of distance — and perhaps haste. Craig refers approvingly to Dale Rye’s analysis which is that ‘the real cause of [Elaine Storkey’s] dismissal was being an Open Evangelical.’ Yet that is denied by Wycliffe Hall, and is indeed precisely the question — the matter is sub judice, in fact, if not perhaps in law (given that this is going to an industrial tribunal not a court).
Finally, then, when Craig concludes that all this ‘is what is meant by the term “open evangelical” as it is used in England’, my own response is, ‘And that just shows you’re not from round here.’
For my own very different, though already rather dated, analysis, readers might like to look an article on my own blog: a href=“http://ugleyvicar.blogspot.com/2007/05/why-open-means-closed-and-conservative.html”
Why “Open” means closed and “Conservative” means radical. This also has a link to my own critique of English Conservative Evangelicalism.
13 January 2008 at 5:46 pm
I read John’s explanation as to why he changed the designation a couple of days ago, and I assume if you refer to it, you too have seen it Graham.
You know I hate this .. this sort of semi veiled confrontation. It’s not enough that you do it on your English blogs, but now you have to come here and repeat it. I respect you both, I listen to you both. I read you both. You are both ‘brothers in Christ’ .. although that’s hard to believe sometimes. But there are others of us out in this wide world who could do with you burying the hatchet and giving us a hand. How about making a LOT of noise about the New Zealand response to the Covenant, it’ a declaration of independence if ever I heard one. Were we only united in opposition? Has that gone now? Sometimes I long to go home to glory.
13 January 2008 at 9:26 pm
Dear Graham, I’d be happy to explain in more detail about the change of the link on the Chelmsford Anglican Mainstream website, and also to talk through the issues regarding Wycliffe Hall and evangelical psychology. However, I doubt this is the forum for it - unless I see a lot of posts saying, “Please do!”
I think now is the time for less blogging, more talking, so my phone number (UK) is 01279 813703. If you want to talk, I’d be happy to.
13 January 2008 at 10:51 pm
Mr. Richardson describes my response to him as “rather cursory,” a description that must reflect the fact that we Anglicans are many peoples separated by a common language. Our exchange actually was lengthy, multiple, and courteous, which I infer must be a connotation of “cursory” in Mr.Richardson’s local community.
I repeat here that I hoped that it was clear that, when I say “we love”, that I am in that context referring to what we Christians - all of us - are taught by Jesus. So I am not describing the actions of one party or the other at all, but rather pointing to the imperative for us all. And, as far as explaining ‘open evangelicals’, please note that I am adopting the term and applying it beyond the shores of England, and especially here in the U.S. to explain the divisions between evangelicals. I am certainly a qualified observer of that larger group. It’s an interpretive mistake to infer that I am a Yank trying to tell the Brits how to run their business, for the logic goes the other way. I am observing a few controversies that are specific and moving from them to general observations about what I see as a global battle over the very nature and implications of the Gospel.
If not for the context of my article, I perhaps could have chosen Andrew Goddard’s superior nomenclature on our different ecclesiological and sexual morality perspectives. Readers may find that schema at http://www.fulcrum-anglican.org.uk/page.cfm?ID=250. Open evangelicalism, as I am using it, correlates with “Communion catholicism”, while conservative evangelicalism correlates with “connectional confessionalism.” On sexual issues, open evangelicalism correlates with “reasserters” whereas conservative evangelicalism correlates with Goddard’s “Rejectionist” position. Since the “rejectionist” nomenclature is discomfiting to some, though Goddard does not intend it to be, one might substitute the description “separatist.” The key feature of that position is to lead others to separate structurally from the fellowship of those they judge to be sinners, heretics, or apostate to reflect their rejection of what Scripture describes as an abomination. A reasserting/Communion Catholic, as Rowan put it so well, sees that such behavior may well be “a refusal of the cross – and so of the resurrection.”
I don’t believe we should pretend that these differences are innocent or that a both/and approach to them is adequate. I suggest that the foundation of both positions is deeply theological.
Note that the context of my discussion is the question of what behavior our commitment to Christ as Lord demands of us in the encounter with those with whom we have profound differences. In the article my point is that evangelical openness means that our relation to others is ideally based on an effort for there to be an analogy between the way we relate to others and the way Christ relates to us. This I call the cruciform life. And a feature of that life is that our relation to others is undetermined by them and especially by our differences with them. This is a classic teaching of Rowan Williams and Milbank about the nature of Christian life. I give an example of Augustine acting that out. Others have added the example of the Niceaen controversies.
I reiterate the caution needed in using these labels ‘conservative’ and ‘open’ and though they are monolothic. I am sure we agree on this but I want to reiterate that we are using them for convenience while recognizing this limitation.
That said, in my response to Mr. Richardson, I made clear that I see these theological differences in terms of Paul’s concern with the Teachers at Galatia. In my view, the rejectionist position is based on a false teaching of the meaning of Easter and is thus a teaching that the community of faith must challenge and correct. Note that I am also saying that an important reason we move together as a community bound in Christ is to correct such errors that arise from time to time as we seek to know God. Honest discourse is necessary so that we can correct one another and resolve our differences. I also invite your attention to the Covenant Mission statement, where we remind ourselves that Paul insists that there have to be factions (hairesis) among you, for only so will it become clear who among you are genuine. (I Cor 11.17-19). In spite of these differences, that result from our finitude and brokenness, we come together, which is the very meaning of “covenantus”. I think Paul is telling us that correcting each other’s errors is both part of our common life in the New Covenant and also made possible by the New Covenant.
I note that it is very difficult to see the separatist behavior as prophetic in the sense that Scripture reveals the true vocation of the prophet. The instructive case, given the fact that we live in an era of denominational division, is that of Israel and Judah. One never sees the prophets of either parts of the divided kingdom leading others to form a new kingdom separate from the one in which destiny placed them. No,they remained a part of the community to whom God’s words of wrath were directed, embracing their role as those destined to live amongst the people who had turned their backs on God, recognizing their own participation in their people’s sin. The separatist position is not the way of the Cross. And, to the extent that they lead others down a path that is not the way of the Cross, those who do so must be seen as false prophets.
13 January 2008 at 11:12 pm
Wow, Craig, this is a big response raising major issues. You see, I think to lump someone in the category of ‘false prophet’, even with the caveat “to the extent that they lead others down a path that is not the way of the Cross” (as you understand it) is far too serious a statement to be sustained against brothers and sisters whose commitment is clearly to the same Christ as those from whom you think they should not separate. This is not the language of dialogue, nor that of a shared Evangelical heritage, whether American or English.
False prophets, in the Old Testament were to be stoned to death. False teachers in the New, the equivalent of false prophets in the Old (2 Pet 2:1), are destined for divine destruction. Is this really your conclusion about Peter Akinola, San Joaquin Diocese etc? I’m sure it is not!
In the Conservative camp, I come across people who want to call others ‘false teachers’, but sometimes I caution them that there is a difference between ‘false teachers’ and ‘teachers of what is false’ - the distinction matters, as I’m sure all teachers in the church will acknowledge.
I know you don’t like the fact that I described your response as ‘rather cursory’. I used that phrase because I felt there were a number of issues about your analysis of the situation at Wycliffe which I raised but to which you did not respond. We may simply have to differ on this.
May I just say that we must not rest too much weight on 1 Corinthians 11:19. It is not necessarily the case that Paul is saying this is how it ought to be (any more than he is in 1 Cor 14:26). Remember, this is a church which is divided over personal loyalties, where Christians are suing one another in the courts, where others are going to prostitutes, where some are denying the value of sex within marriage, where a man is living with his mother-in-law, and where there is arrogance over spiritual gifts. No wonder Paul says there have to be divisions amongst this lot! He is not commending divisions (in my view), nor commending ‘all sitting in fellowship together’, but urging them to sort it out before he does.
I am moving to the view, however, that the phone is mightier than the blog. If you can ever work out the time difference, I’d be happy to talk on the UK number given above for Graham.
Otherwise, I fear Rosemary is going to bang our heads together - which is probably what we deserve.
14 January 2008 at 1:28 am
Just to let the world know, Graham phoned. (The world breathes a collective sigh of relief.) I think we should try this more often.
14 January 2008 at 4:43 am
John,
I regret my use of the phrase, “false prophets,” if it is indeed received as you say. As you know, I think it important that the community continue honest discourse regarding what it means to be the Easter people within a instantiation of the Church that is broken, divided, and troubled by heresy and sinfulness. So if my language has the effect you suggest, then I regret it and will happily substitute the terms you suggest. I think you get my point about the seriousness of this issue. It is not simply an issue of the best strategy to respond to false teachings on sexuality and other issues; it is a dispute about the nature of the the gospel and in particular the meaning of Easter.
The issue is also not whether or not Peter Akinola or Bp Schofield are good persons with good intentions. I have no doubt about that. So their intentions are not relevant to the issue of discipline you raise. It’s ironic that you raise the issue of the death penalty. I remind you that porneia is also in the category for which the penalty was death in ancient Israel. In 1 Cor 1 Paul makes it clear that he sees that church as continuous with Israel, but also makes it clear that the radical discontinuity of the new creation changes the nature of how the community is to respond to such sin in their midst. My exegetical account of 1 Cor 5 explores this in detail (see http://covenant-communion.com/?page_id=89). Judgment within the community is necessary, Paul says. But that judgment is judgment of the entire community and takes the form of a community ritual by which the unrepentant individual is set outside the fellowship marked by the blood of Christ with the hope - perhaps eschatological - of their reconciliation. So stoning is replaced by a different form of the death penalty, for, to be set outside the fellowship marked by the blood is to be vulnerable to the Destroyer. That community sanctioned and community administered discipline is the right response to unrepentant pornia, and also the right discipline of those unrepentant persons prophets who seek to lead others away from that fellowship or who lead others down a path that is not the way of the Cross.
With regard to the points you make above about 1 Cor 11, I think we are using the same language. Here I quote from the Covenant mission statement referenced above:
14 January 2008 at 5:03 am
Hi Craig. Can I ask for a clarification? You write, “It is not simply an issue of the best strategy to respond to false teachings on sexuality and other issues; it is a dispute about the nature of the the gospel and in particular the meaning of Easter.”
Does the dispute about the nature of the gospel/meaning of Easter affect the whole church in the present crisis about sexuality, and if so, along what lines of demarcation?
If I can (crudely) divide the protagonists into Conservative Evangelicals, Open Evangelicals and ‘Sexuality Revisionists’ (plus a rag-bag ‘Everyone Else’, whom we’ll ignore for the moment), what I am seeking to discover is this: is the division [Gospel/Easter right understanders] - [Gospel/Easter wrong understanders], and if so does the category [Gospel/Easter wrong understanders] consist of [Conservative Evangelicals and ‘Sexuality Revisionists’], or alternatively does the category of [Gospel/Easter right understanders] consist of [Open Evangelicals and ‘Sexuality Revisionists’]? I hope you’ll realize why I’m confused!
Also, if “the right response to unrepentant pornia, and also the right discipline of those unrepentant persons prophets who seek to lead others away from that fellowship or who lead others down a path that is not the way of the Cross” is excommunication leading to Gehenna if the individual remains unrepentant, doesn’t this mean that exclusion (of unrepentant TEC in particular, though not necessarily only them) is the right approach?
14 January 2008 at 5:43 am
John,
I don’t want to go too far astray from the original post, but it is my opinion that the dispute to which I am pointing is not unique to our Communion. I can’t speak for the whole Church, but only the portion of it I know well, which is the mainstream Protestant group in the U.S. and Roman Catholics in the southern U.S. I don’t think I can sketch the lines of demarcation on a blog without too great a risk of caricature. Perhaps I will draft something on this soon that can do the topic justice.
You seem to want to deal in binaries and thus locate the Revisionists in this discussion as either on one side or the other. But the presenting subject here is our behavior in the encounter with heresy and apostasy. I am not discussing Revisionists or Reinterpreters at all. The issue of Gospel/Easter has been made visible by the debate of how to respond to what we postulate is heresy and/or apostasy. As a result of that discussion, a group of leaders have claimed that the right response is to form a new denomination in order to separate itself from impurity. When one digs into the rationale for such claims, one discovers differences in the understanding of what the gospel actually is and what its implications are for Christian ethics, particularly in the denominationally divided world bequeathed us in the Reformation. Documenting these differences is not something one can do well in a comment on a blog, I think, so I will pass on the opportunity to do that now.
Your notion of exclusion is an ecclesiological problem for us, as the primates and many others have noted. We don’t have the structures that make public judgment in the form of discipline possible; as I appreciate it, that is one of the hopes we have for the Anglican Covenant. Such exclusion per 1 Cor 5 is received by us and practiced within Anglicanism as the discipline of the Eucharist, but it is the public act of the community of faith acting ritually. It is not the unilateral act of a few to separate themselves in a new structure, for, as I noted above, Scriptural discipline and prophecy follows the example of Israel and Judah: the prophet expresses the wrath of God but speaks as one within the community. The prophet does not lead others in flight from his own people, but, like Jeremiah, remains with his people to participate in the consequences of their communal sin.
14 January 2008 at 6:36 am
Craig and John,
To be honest, I haven’t followed this particular “open evangelical” vs. “rejectionist evangelical” debate in any depth because the issue seems not so much about psychology or theology, but purely about semantics.
Both of your desires to maintain a type of Anglican unity by finding just the right words is commendable, but is ultimately unworkable and completely devalues the Scriptural injunctions on what the Church’s responsibilities are when confronted with error.
Romans 16:17 “Now I beseech you, brethren, mark them which cause divisions and offenses contrary to the doctrine which ye have learned; and avoid them. [18] For they that are such serve not our Lord Jesus Christ, but their own belly; and by good words and fair speeches deceive the hearts of the simple.”
Philippians 3:17 “Brethren, be followers together of me, and mark them which walk so as ye have us for an example. [18] (For many walk, of whom I have told you often, and now tell you even weeping, that they are the enemies of the cross of Christ: [19] Whose end is destruction, whose God is their belly, and whose glory is in their shame, who mind earthly things.) “
Titus 1:7 “For a bishop must be blameless, as the steward of God; not self-willed, not soon angry, not given to wine, no striker, not given to filthy lucre; [8] But a lover of hospitality, a lover of good men, sober, just, holy, temperate; [9] Holding fast the faithful word as he hath been taught, that he may be able by sound doctrine both to exhort and to convince the gainsayers. [10] For there are many unruly and vain talkers and deceivers, especially they of the circumcision: ]11] whose mouths must be stopped, who subvert whole houses, teaching things which they ought not, for filthy lucre’s sake.”
Note closely verse 10 and 11. The “vain talkers and deceivers… mouths must be stopped, who subvert whole houses, teaching things which they ought not…” No continuous dialoging, no perpetual “jibber jabber”. Action is needed. If you are going to “talk the talk, you’d better walk the walk!”
Craig Uffman wrote:
“In my view, the rejectionist position is based on a false teaching of the meaning of Easter and is thus a teaching that the community of faith must challenge and correct. Note that I am also saying that an important reason we move together as a community bound in Christ is to correct such errors that arise from time to time as we seek to know God. Honest discourse is necessary so that we can correct one another and resolve our differences.”
Come on Craig! Where to begin with these statements. Three quick points.
First: No amount of spin or reinterpreting “the meaning of Easter” can justify or countenance homosexual practice. What God has declared to be an abomination is not a simple matter of “justice” (so-called); and as some pretend, “that based on current theological understandings we can dismiss as homophobic the epistles of Paul.” Surly Craig you don’t believe that.
Second: I can’t tell you how many times that this “equivalence” view has been stated, here as well as on other sites, as if it holds any value at all. Fundamentally, those in error have no ability to “correct” those who are not in error. Words have meaning and Craig, your argument simply has no merit. Believe it or not, there are absolutes. Right is right and wrong is wrong. All positions are not equally true simply based on one’s point of view.
Third: God did not “dialog” with Sodom and Gomorrah until there was sufficient agreement between themselves to maintain unity. The Sodomites did not, nor could they “correct” God’s narrow minded, bigoted and homophobic beliefs.
John Richardson wrote:
“In the Conservative camp, I come across people who want to call others ‘false teachers’, but sometimes I caution them that there is a difference between ‘false teachers’ and ‘teachers of what is false’ - the distinction matters…”
While I think I understand the point you are making, I am afraid that it is a distinction without a difference. It is true that no one has “squatter’s rights” on all doctrinal truth, and we all have theological blind spots; but, those who, in the face of clear Biblical teaching and godly correction, continue to “teach that which is false” can be identified as nothing less than “false teachers”.
Should both the revisionist liberals and squishy evangelicals (call them what they are) come to any agreement upon the wording of an instrument of unity, which allows both to maintain different interoperations or to continue in their current sinful lifestyles, that document, concordant, confession, or whatever name you give it, will accomplish nothing and mean even less.
Actually this goofy (but intellectual and academic) perpetual “dialoging” is exactly what has lead to the current problems within Anglicanism. For too long it has been “all talk and no action”. As the old saying goes… “If you’re not going to poop, get off the pot.”
Steven
14 January 2008 at 6:49 am
Oppps! I meant “interpretations” not “interoperations” in the next to the last paragraph. My fingers were moving a bit differently than my brain was commanding.
Steve
14 January 2008 at 6:52 am
Thanks for your comments, Steven. You say you have not followed the discussion, and that is clear from remarks addressed to me. For my comments about Easter have nothing to do with the justification of homosexual practice, an assumption that seems to be the foundation of all your comments. Indeed, I believe that John and I begin with strong agreement on that point. The question about the Gospel and Easter has to do with how we are to address it. God’s act against Sodom and Gomorrah is just that: God’s act. That has nothing to do with our conversation here about the nature of faithful discipline in the encounter of apostasy in a denominationally divided Church.
The question is not, as you seem to assume, whether or not discipline is necessary for the right ordering of the church. The question is how to do that faithfully.
I have no idea where you get your comments about “equivalence.” I made no such argument. We are talking about a dialogue here between two groups, both of whom recognize the others’ claims to be ‘orthodox.’ In the discussion arising within the community, the dispute about how faithful discipline has exposed the theological issues I have only mentioned. So your comments really seem to address something that was not said.
Perhaps it would help to re-read the thread with that background.
14 January 2008 at 7:10 am
Thank you Craig, I will do just that. However, when you posted:
“I think Paul is telling us that correcting each other’s errors is both part of our common life in the New Covenant and also made possible by the New Covenant.”
Is this not “equivalence”. If I understand you correctly, your statement leads me to conclude you to believe both to be right or both to be wrong.
In any case, my earlier observation stands.
All positions are not equally true simply based on one’s point of view.
Steve
14 January 2008 at 7:29 am
Thanks for the explanation, Steve. That was a reference to 1Cor and Paul’s comment about there always being factions (and he uses the root of our English word ‘heresy’ here) among you, and a discussion between John and me that may have occurred on the Covenant site. The point I am making is that, in our common life, we will regularly generate false teachings (for the human mind “is a factory of idols”, as Calvin reminds us), and so it is the community acting corporately that acts to correct such errors. I am making an inference that, though Paul does not commend divisions, he shows us that it will part of our common life, but that, in spite of that, we are to come together as one in Christ by virtue of our participation in the blood and body of Christ.
So I agree 100% with you that “all positions are not equally true”. But we need the community - we need to be answerable to one another out of our commitment to theological integrity, as described in my essay.
14 January 2008 at 11:13 am
Craig, ... no thank you. I went back and reread all the posts and the supported links. I humbly apologize for shooting then aiming.
Your thesis was proved my me… we need to correct and be humble enough to receive correction when we err.
Remember I stated “...that no one has “squatter’s rights” on all doctrinal truth, and we all have theological blind spots…” Let me add to that, that if we thought that we were in error and didn’t correct it, we would be the greatest of fools.
Now if we can just get certain of the leadership of TEC and ACC to receive correction, express true repentance, and demonstrate faithful obedience to God’s Word real Anglican unity becomes a possibility.
Please understand, that I do get weary of the endless talk, committees, research and study groups, and deadlines especially when they deal with the most basic of Biblical issues. Things just aren’t that difficult. Then when wordsmiths are turned loose to reinterpret ideas and concepts in such a way as to render their historical understanding irrelevant, I get more than a little frustrated.
I have much more to ask you on this issue, but for now let me have time to formulate my thoughts.
Until then, peace be unto you.
Steve
14 January 2008 at 12:46 pm
Craig,
I have two quick questions for you. You stated:
“On sexual issues, open evangelicalism correlates with “reasserters”…” The position, I take, that you align yourself with.
Now forgive me if I am in error, but if by Anglican “reasserters”, you mean those who advocate staying within a heretical National Church while opposing their errors for the sake of unity, then how do you respond to passages I originally sited?
Romans 16:17 “Now I beseech you, brethren, mark them which cause divisions and offenses contrary to the doctrine which ye have learned; and avoid them. [18] For they that are such serve not our Lord Jesus Christ, but their own belly; and by good words and fair speeches deceive the hearts of the simple.”
Philippians 3:17 “Brethren, be followers together of me, and mark them which walk so as ye have us for an example. [18] (For many walk, of whom I have told you often, and now tell you even weeping, that they are the enemies of the cross of Christ: [19] Whose end is destruction, whose God is their belly, and whose glory is in their shame, who mind earthly things.) “
Secondly, if you are in willing union with a heretical National Church, it presents a major Biblical problem. How are you not, as John says, a partaker of his evil deeds?
2 John 1:9 “Whosoever transgresseth, and abideth not in the doctrine of Christ, hath not God. He that abideth in the doctrine of Christ, he hath both the Father and the Son. [10] If there come any unto you, and bring not this doctrine, receive him not into your house, neither bid him Godspeed: [11] For he that biddeth him Godspeed is partaker of his evil deeds.”
Neither bid him God speed - και χαιρειν αυτω μη λεγετε - “and do not say to him, hail, or joy.”
Do not wish him joy; do not hail, or salute him. The word used is a common form of salutation frequently found in the NT, as when we wish one good health, prosperity, or success, (see Matthew 26:49; Acts 15:23; Acts 23:26; and James 1:1.)
As Matthew Henery wrote concerning 2 John 1:10-11: “Here, I. Upon due warning given concerning seducers, the apostle gives direction concerning the treatment of such. They are not to be entertained as the ministers of Christ. The Lord Christ will distinguish them from such, and so would he have his disciples…” “Bless not their enterprises: Neither bid him God speed. Attend not their service with your prayers and good wishes.” Bad work should not be consecrated or recommended to the divine benediction. God will be no patron of falsehood, seduction, and sin. We ought to bid God speed to evangelical ministration; but the propagation of fatal error, if we cannot prevent, we must not dare to countenance. Then, II. Here is the reason of such direction, forbidding the support and patronage of the deceiver: For he that biddeth him God speed is partaker of his evil deeds. Favour and affection partake of the sin. We may be sharers in the iniquities of others. How judicious and how cautious should the Christian be! There are many ways of sharing the guilt of other people’s transgressions; it may be done by culpable silence, indolence, unconcernedness, private contribution, public countenance and assistance, inward approbation, open apology and defence. The Lord pardon our guilt of other persons’ sins!”
Steve