Saturday, October 26, 2013

GAFCON statement will send alarm bells through Communion

My immediate response to a very quick read of the GAFCON communique, here, is that it will send alarm bells throughout those parts of the Communion, a. not aligned with GAFCON, b. not intent on upholding historic Anglican theology and sexual ethics.

Please comment here if you have time to read, mark, inwardly digest. Otherwise I am not going to get back to this for a day or two.

Addendum: fascinating account here, of changes to the statement as it was being drafted (H/T Stand Firm). (If that link does not work, or, in any case, head here for further reflection on the process of drafting the communique).

KEY QUESTION FOR GAFCON: How come GAFCON can live with difference over women in leadership, "We recognize that we have differing views over the roles of men and women in church leadership," but not live with difference over partnered gay people in church?

(OK. I know answers to the question can be given ... but it is striking that GAFCON can be boldly Anglican=diverse on this matter but not on another ...).

PS For Liturgy's GAFCON reflection, head here.

95 comments:

Father Ron Smith said...

" We believe we have acted as an important and effective instrument of Communion during a period in which other instruments of Communion have failed both to uphold gospel priorities in the Church, and to heal the divisions among us." - gafcon -

I would have thought that, by their self-distancing from the rest of us in the Anglican Communion, these people were doing exactly the opposite: - acting as a schismatic stirrer of disaffection within the Communion.

This pontifical homily, from the prelates who have set up their own church plants in North America, in direct opposition to the local Anglican Churches, ought instead to have been directed towards a real commitment to bring political and social improvement to the condition of the poor and disenfranchised in their own backyards - a surer sign of the Good News of the Gospel that speaks louder than a communique of self-satisfied congratulation.

Zane Elliott said...

Ron, you again speak of GAFCON moving away from the rest of the Communion. Can I remind you that is was TEC who pretty much said "to hell with Lambeth Resolution 1:10, we are doing our own autonomous thing" thus moving away from the rest of the Communion. Canada has done the same thing and it looks as if the ACANZP will follow suit. These three provinces hardly constitue any kind of majority of the Communion, so I assert again it is they who have moved, not those who uphold the BCP, 39 Articles and Ordinal.

GAFCON, from what I have seen this week is about providing ways of remaining together for those who are unprepared to be moved by those who abandon Anglican doctrine but assert that Anglican institution is the most important factor for unity.

EPH 5:7 might give some insight into how many GAFCON attendants are feeling when it comes to mission within Church structures which stand opposed to the Anglican church's traditional understanding of Scripture and the work, death, resurrection and ascension of Jesus Christ.

carl jacobs said...

By the rude bridge that arched the flood
Their flag to April's breeze unfurled
Here once the embattled farmers stood
And fired the shot heard round the world

Are you paying attention, Justin Welby? You won't need your spectacles to read the signatures at the bottom of the page of this declaration.

carl

Father Ron Smith said...

Today's Gospel Reading: LUKE 1*: 9-14

"...I tell you, this man (the sinner) went down to his home justifed, rather than the other; for all who exalt themselves will be humbled, but all who humble themselves willbe exalted!"

Quite timely - in the wake of gafcon

Tim Chesterton said...

'We repudiate all violence...'

As a pacifist who believes that nonviolence is an essential part of Christian living, I'm very pleased to see that categorical statement! I look forward to seeing how the FOCA members plan to apply that repudiation in their daily lives.

Peter Carrell said...

Dear Ron,
I agree with your comment above that today's gospel reading is timely in the light of GAFCON. But it is not for the reason you give in another - not to be published - comment which is both unworthy of you and of GAFCON. No one at GAFCON thinks they are better than others. They read and observe the gospel as you do.

The timeliness of today's reading concerns whether what we say and write show sufficient regard for God's mercy, God's work in the church, and of our standing in need of that mercy and work. There is an element in my (so far) quick read of the statement which suggests GAFCON has too much regard for its own sense of what is right and what is wrong, and too little regard for the possibility that others might be right. But there is not a straight line from that to (say) the Pharisee in the gospel story who has a moral superiority to the tax collector rather than a theological superiority to (say) a Sadducee.

Your comment involves a put down of good people at GAFCON. Whether or not we agree with the statement which has come from the conference, there are good people there and I am not publishing a comment which puts them down.

Chris Spark said...

personally on the whole I am encouraged by this - I would have liked to have heard a slightly gentler statement and stronger affirmation that those who are engaged in homosexual activity are also welcome in the church, just as are those who cohabit or are caught up in greed or any number of other things, and yet we still affirm traditional Christian sexual ethics and call people to it as they come in to the freedom of submission to Christ. Just to make the call to all of us as sinners still in the process of regeneration clear.
And perhaps I share a little of your concern Peter as far as the need to remember, and make clear in our words, the fact that we are always ready to revise our position if it does indeed turn out we are wrong.
But on the whole very encouraged.

And one little thing - with regards the comment above suggesting they needed to focus more on the 'condition of the poor and disenfranchised in their own backyards' - I know little of the North American brothers and sisters involved, but the African bishops and other clergy and laity who make up the majority of the GAFCON crew are committed to widows and orphans in their own backyard - indeed bringing them into their own homes to a degree that leaves most of us in the dust of our own self-interest - they are committed to this with the result that it is indeed a very fine witness to the Good News - a fine adornment indeed to their (admittedly imperfect like the rest of us, yet largely very faithful) proclamation of that Good News. They seem to manage to do both/and, and I genuinely hope that is an inspiration to more of to do the same.

Peter Carrell said...

Hi Bryden
I think I might just redact out a name and make your comment more issues focused:

"Leaving aside for the moment the actual communique (either draft; I too caught the earlier version - fascinating redacting ...!) please [any commenter here so tempted] might you resist throwing your stones in your own glass house. From my own direct experience of some of African church life, CS above is absolutely correct: we need to learn from their BOTH/AND. Absolutely!!! "

Father Ron Smith said...

" Whether or not we agree with the statement which has come from the conference, there are good people there and I am not publishing a comment which puts them down."
- Dr. Peter Carrell -

I have no doubt, Peter, that there were 'good people' at the Gafcon conference (The Pharisee in the parable from Luke was also 'good' - exemplary, in fact).

I am not saying that every member of Gafcon is 'not good'. What I am saying is that anyone who takes a stand 'against' the other Churches in the Anglican Communion - on account of 'their false Gospel' is going to be compared with the one in today's parable, who accounts himself 'worthy before God, and accounts other 'sinners' (for that is what we all are) to be less worthy. And this seems to be the thrust of the Gafcon statement.

Anonymous said...

"KEY QUESTION FOR GAFCON: How come GAFCON can live with difference over women in leadership, "We recognize that we have differing views over the roles of men and women in church leadership," but not live with difference over partnered gay people in church?"

Is your question serious and sincere or obligatory agitprop? Do you not think the people in Gafcon haven't long discussed these questions and have concluded it is NOT a *salvation issue* but one to do with the right ordering of the Church in God's will? I've never been enthusiastic about women's ordination but could never consider it intrinsically sinful. It's for exactly the same issue that I would consent to see properly authorised so-called 'lay presidency or administration' just as Anglicanism has long had properly authorised 'lay preaching'. Not a word in the NT speaks against this, and a lot can be read in favour. How strange it is to come across people who think sodomy is fine but are horrified at a 'lay person' saying a communion prayer.

Martin

Andrew Reid said...

Hi Peter,
If I was trying to sum up the statement, I would say that they are putting flesh on the GFCA bones and giving it some teeth as well. They are staffing it and calling for financial support instead of or in addition to existing structures. For some groups, this would mean withdrawal from official bodies if they withold their participation fees. So, this may push some groups into a decisive choice between GFCA and their diocese/national church.

The question I was left with was what practical support will the FCA provide that isn't already being done by mission agencies, evangelical Bible colleges and similar institutions? I realise they will provide episcopal support and act as a host to churches and dioceses who decide they can no longer remain within official Anglican bodies. But are more resources on evangelism, discipleship, theological education going to offer anything significantly new to the church? They have to be really careful they provide kingdom building support to churches, not build an alternate Anglican bureaucracy.

The most powerful theological theme in the communique was that of repentance - especially the emphasis that it is God and not the world who sets the standard for what we need to repent of.

I thought what was missing was some intentions about their relations with the rest of the Communion. They expressed support for orthodox churches and dioceses who wanted to leave official bodies, but they didn't mention their intentions re participation in the Communion or what steps they would take to reform/replace current structures. Will they continue to absent themselves from ACC, Primates' Meetings and Lambeth? How will they encourage recognition of new entities like ACNA or AMiE (which I'm still not convinced is a good idea - unlike TEC the CofE is not a lost cause)? How will they convince other dioceses and national churches to join the movement? Some dioceses like Singapore and Egypt/North Africa are sympathetic theologically but need reassuring that they will not separate from the Communion, whose membership they value highly/

Regards,
Andrew

Peter Carrell said...

Hi Martin
It is not obligatory agitprop!
I understand your response and consider it standard fare (!!).
The question I am raising, enlarged, is, if one a matter X a group of Anglicans accepts that there are differing understandings of Scripture on whether X is the right thing to do or not, then why not on Y also?

Much as you and I might think sodomy is wrong and that is clearly taught by Scripture, there is a group of Anglicans (not confined, by the way, to those who are horrified by a lay person saying a communion prayer) who do not think Scripture teaches that (e.g. do not think Scripture teaches it is wrong in the context of a permanent partnership). I am not interested in communing with people who promote sin, but I am interested in communing with those who read the Bible and yet come to different answers to me. Though sometimes 'tis hard ...

Peter Carrell said...

Hi Andrew
That is a very fine reflection. Thank you.
One question I have concerns the intellectual and political (within ecclesiastical spheres) the GAFCON leadership has. You rightly put your finger on shortcomings in the statement which one could reasonably expect to be sorted out by now in a body which was making serious claims to be an alt.Communion.

To make such critique is not to question the spiritual commitment and strength of desire for gospel renewal of Anglicanism of the GAFCON participants and leaders.

Father Ron Smith said...

" How strange it is to come across people who think sodomy is fine but are horrified at a 'lay person' saying a communion prayer."
- Martin, of Course -

Tell me Martin. Is sodomy a uniquely
homosexual pursuit, do you know? And if not, why are you making a special case of this for homosexuals?

Oh, yes, Martin. And do you think that all homosexuals engage in sodomy? How do you know?

Father Ron Smith said...

Thank you Andrew and Peter for your pertinent remarks about the enduring relevance of the Gafcon communique.

The sheer practicality of Gafcon offering world Anglicans a new, alternative, Communion, based on the 39 Articles and the 1662 (or other, original) Prayer Book plus the strict biblical 'sola scriptura' ethic is perhaps hoping for too much. Fellow Communion members do not like to be called purveyors of 'an alternative Gospel'.

This being the case, what do the Gafcon Primates propose to do about any sort of continuing relationship with those Churches whose theology and praxis it refuses to recognise?

Short of cutting off relationships entirely, there seems little hope in 'going it alone'.

Frankly, I cannot see the Gafcon resolutions being helpful in any way - to ACANZP - in our mission to show the love of God in our area.

MichaelA said...

"What I am saying is that anyone who takes a stand 'against' the other Churches in the Anglican Communion - on account of 'their false Gospel' is going to be compared with the one in today's parable..."

Right Fr Ron, so anyone who takes a stand against another's wrongful action is being a Pharisee?

And so, if I see another person carrying out murder, I may not criticise that person or else I will be a Pharisee?

++Desmond Tutu, for example, was like the Pharisee when he criticised the South African government over apartheid?

This might seem an extreme retort, but it actually isn't: Rather, the absolute way in which you have expressed your point leaves no room for any other conclusion. We simply may not decry another person's actions as sinful, lest we be like the Pharisee.

Interesting way to put it, Fr Ron.

MichaelA said...





Hi Andrew, in response to various points in your post:

"For some groups, this would mean withdrawal from official bodies if they withold their participation fees."

I doubt it. That part was probably aimed at England, and there are already several churches in the CofE that withhold discretionary spend from their diocese and province. As far as I know, they still pay the administrative costs if they occupy a CofE building (many rent their own premises). But other payments are put into a trust fund and used for ministry purposes over which the liberal bishop and hierarchy have no control. The point is that these churches remain part of the CofE - they can't be shifted. In that respect, the ecclesiastical situation in England is markedly different from e.g. the USA.

"Will they continue to absent themselves from ACC, Primates' Meetings and Lambeth?"

Firstly, note that it is not just Gafcon primates that do this. More than half of those who declined to attend the last Primates meeting in Dublin in 2011 were not members of Gafcon. And the primate who publicly resigned from the ACC in 2010 (combined with an open letter to the Anglican Communion stating that his presence there was accomplishing nothing) was ++Anis of the Middle East - he is not a member of Gafcon.

But in so far as your question is directed to the Gafcon primates, since they haven't said anything, the obvious conclusion is that they haven't made any final decision about future meetings. Which makes sense - if I were in their shoes I would make such decisions on a case-by-case basis. Its not as though any of those decisions were precipitate - ample discussion and warning took place beforehand, over many months. We can expect the same to happen next time.

"How will they encourage recognition of new entities like ACNA..."

Recognition by whom? I don't see any sign that Gafcon cares whether ACNA is put on some list in a desk drawer at the Anglican Communion Office.

And the Global South (which comprises more than half the provinces in the Anglican Communion) has already given the maximum possible recognition to ACNA by asking ++Duncan to preside over Holy Communion at the GS Primates meeting in 2010. So its already got recognition.

"or AMiE (which I'm still not convinced is a good idea - unlike TEC the CofE is not a lost cause)?"

I am not convinced that TEC is a lost cause either. But in any case, that is not the reason for existence of ACNA or AMiE. If there are orthodox Christians who cannot get orthodox oversight, then Gafcon will step in to provide it.

"How will they convince other dioceses and national churches to join the movement?"

Do they need to? The Global South is a distinct (and larger) movement, but much of what it says and does is aligned with Gafcon already.

"Some dioceses like Singapore and Egypt/North Africa are sympathetic theologically but need reassuring that they will not separate from the Communion, whose membership they value highly"

Many people assume (for no reason that I can fathom) that Gafcon:

(a) does not highly value its Communion memberships; and

(b) intends to separate from the Anglican Communion.

I think Gafcon had made it very clear that it has no intention of leaving the AC.

carl jacobs said...

Peter Carrell

The question I am raising, enlarged, is, if one a matter X a group of Anglicans accepts that there are differing understandings of Scripture on whether X is the right thing to do or not, then why not on Y also?

At one level, the answer to your question is "Well people don't really accept differences over WO." As the current travails of the CoE demonstrate, a church cannot remain half-complementarian and half-egalitarian on this issue. One side must dominate the practice of the church, and the other side is displaced thereby. Claims to the contrary are so much eyewash.

Practically speaking, the issue of WO is being sidelined for much the same reason that slavery was sidelined during the formation of the US Constitution. There is no practical way to solve the problem, and there are greater issues at stake. The unresolved issue of slavery was left as a poison in the US foundation and eventually lead to civil war. A similar problem has been laid up for churches that avoid this problem. The greater issues will eventually give way and this conflict will still remain. But that doesn't really answer our question.

Despite the fact that WO is wrong, and scripturally prohibited, and The Leading Predictor of the onset of liberal infection of a church, I will admit that its proponents can at least try to make a Scriptural case. In other words, I don't judge proponents to be faithless to Scripture. They are being faithful if wrong-headed. And that makes all the difference in the world.

Because there is no faithful approach to Scripture that justifies homosexuality. None. At all. Anywhere. Female eldership did not cause God to destroy Sodom to the last man and woman. Sodom was judged for chasing after strange flesh. Female eldership was not called toevah and cited as a reason for the judgment of Canaan. Homosexuality was so cited. Female eldership was not presented as a physical picture of man's idolatry, rebellion, and suppression of the truth. Homosexuality was so presented. Words have meaning. Meanings can be understood. There is no way to read the Scripture and come to any other understanding of homosexuality as anything but sin.

Now, many homosexual apologists understand this. They assert that Paul was wrong. They assert that Paul had no authority. They will say Pual didn't have the benefit of modern understanding. They will assert that Paul was only speaking to the first century. They talk about 'purity laws.' They talk about how the imperatives of child birth were so different in 2000 BC. They talk about temple cult prostitution. All of it is intended to supplant the scripture as the norm and rule of faith. That is why homosexuality is such a touchstone issue. To accept the modern understanding of homosexuality is to displace the Scripture as the norm and rule of faith.

You see this in liberal argumentation all the time. You will see charges of 'bibliolatry.' (As if receiving God's revelation and obeying it constitutes idolatry.) You will read assertions that we must take the bible 'seriously but not literally.' (Which is a red herring based upon a false claim of of 'literal', and is really targeted at scriptural authority.) You will see claims that "Jesus is the Word and not the Scripture." (Which is true but irrelevant since we only know Jesus through the Scripture. Subjective experience doesn't count as 'knowing.') All of these arguments are designed to remove men from the authority of Scripture. They are intended to create room for some other authority to become the norm and rule of faith.

This doesn't just happen with homosexuality. But homosexuality is the modern issue that has driven the conflict. That's why there is no compromise. That is why there is no coexistence.

carl

Tim Chesterton said...

Peter, thanks for this:

'Much as you and I might think sodomy is wrong and that is clearly taught by Scripture, there is a group of Anglicans...who do not think Scripture teaches that (e.g. do not think Scripture teaches it is wrong in the context of a permanent partnership). I am not interested in communing with people who promote sin, but I am interested in communing with those who read the Bible and yet come to different answers to me....'

That is my position too. And as the father of a much-loved daughter who has come to a different answer to the question than me, and is in a same-sex marriage, but still wants to grow in her faith and follow Christ, I'm grateful that there are some who are willing to speak a word to her other than condemnation.

I'm not convinced that argument is of any use whatsoever on this issue. People who have made their minds up have made their minds up. All I know is that years and years of agitating on the conservative side absolutely did not prepare me for the day when my daughter bravely told me that she was a lesbian. I was totally shattered, and realized that I just did not have anything to say to her that made sense to her in her context. Nothing.

C.S. Lewis says in the introduction to 'Mere Christianity' that one of the differences between Christians is the relative importance of their differences. "That's not important!" says one. "Not important?" cries the other; "Why, it's fundamental!" So I understand that when I say that I no longer see this issue as of major importance, I understand that others will disagree. But for me, when I notice that it gets about as much attention in the Bible as the condemnation of usury (which is universal, though universally ignored by Bible-believing Christians today), then I've come to the conclusion that I've got bigger fish to fry. People like Carl can go on fulminating against homosexuals if they like. I don't have the stomach for it any more. In fact, it makes me sick to my stomach.

Peter Carrell said...

Thanks Tim.
It has long been my position that I want an approach to homosexuality that I can live with even if one of my children (other family, bestest friends) should 'come out' as your daughter has done. Just for the record: I am not convinced that I am there yet!

The other day I was talking with a colleague who pointed out what a famous (conservative) theologian has said recently (I won't give a name until I have checked this for myself): homosexuality is not a first order or second order or even third order issue, it is simply a matter of opinion.

I am not sure that I would go that far myself, but I get one aspect of what he is saying: we can make too much of something.

Carl: if you are reading this: I see what you are saying. But I am still left with the question, if Scriptural Christians living in the real world of fallen people and broken relationships are prepared to work with Scripture towards a position in which divorcees are remarried under a variety of circumstances broader than Jesus or Paul allowed, are some of us not able to argue with integrity that Scripture can be worked with towards the blessing of committed same sex partnerships on the basis that this is a way to deal with the sexual drive towards intimacy which Paul himself allowed was so strong that it is 'better to marry than burn.' Though this is not my own approach, I ask myself whether I can rule out of communion those who take this approach.

Of course if they think Paul a worthless bigot of a theologian then all bets are off!

Anonymous said...

"Though this is not my own approach, I ask myself whether I can rule out of communion those who take this approach."

Keep going, Peter, you'll be there in 3 years. The progress from WO to same-sex relations that you have previously resisted has its own impelling logic - just as marriage is now defined as what the state says it is, not the word of Christ. No speech marks around same-sex "marriage" any more. There are lesbian bishops in Sweden as well as the US - there's just nobody in church in Sweden, that's all. A hollow victory for 'progress'.
Will the last person to leave western Anglicanism please blow out the candles.
Martin

Peter Carrell said...

It may take longer than three years, then, Martin, as I take seriously the decline of the church in the West and do not want to be part of promoting a theology of ecclesial death. But in the meantime there are real lives of real people in the church to work with ...

carl jacobs said...

Peter

You act like 'working with Scripture' to achieve a more lenient outcome is a good thing. The answer to inconsistency between divorce and Scripture is to stop being inconsistent. You don't 'work with Scripture.' You conform to it. But you don't want to do that because it means saying hard things that people don't want to be hear. Like 'You can't get married again.' Or 'Your relationship is structurally immoral and can never be otherwise.'

Which sins are you willing to coexist with? Which sins will you seek to drive out root and branch? How do you discern the difference?

carl

Tim Chesterton said...

Peter said, 'Just for the record: I am not convinced that I am there yet!'

Nor am I, Peter, in the sense that I have not yet been persuaded by the advocates of same-sex marriage (or "marriage", if Martin prefers); I do not find their reading of the scriptures persuasive.

But then, there are many readings of scripture that I do not find persuasive. For example, I have been told in the comments section of this blog that lying, which I find universally condemned in the Bible, is in fact permissible in cases of military intelligence and espionage. In that case the appeal has been, not to 'the authority of scripture', but to what you have referred to as 'the real lives of real people'. Sometimes, we're told, in times of war, lying can save lives. Therefore it is surely a right and proper thing for a Christian to do. Well, okay - except that you can find no scriptural justification for it whatsoever.

Well, I'm not about to refuse to take communion with a Christian espionage agent who routinely lies and misleads the enemy, although personally I think he's living in disobedience to Christ. Nor am I going to try to set up a 'pure' church that tells those Christian espionage agents that unless they repent and leave their jobs, they can't be members. What I'm going to accept is that we don't all understand the Bible in exactly the same way, and in fact we're all selectively literalist in our reading of it.

Peter Carrell said...

Hi Ron
This is your comment minus the bits which, if not ad hominem, look awfully like it:

""Despite the fact that WO is wrong, and scripturally prohibited, and The Leading Predictor of the onset of liberal infection of a church, I will admit that its proponents can at least try to make a Scriptural case. In other words, I don't judge proponents to be faithless to Scripture. They are being faithful if wrong-headed. And that makes all the difference in the world."
- Carl Jacobs -

On this issue (WO)alone, it is easy to see why Mr. Jacobs is not what I might call a 'typical Anglican'.

His 'sola-acriptura' assertion that 'being faithful to Scripture' might be more important than 'being faithful to the Good News of Jesus Christ' - which is more incarnated, and therefore materially and spiritually relevant than dogmatic 'faithfulness to the scriptures' -
seems rather excessive & contrary, certainly, to the other two legs of the Anglican stool:- Tradition and Sweet Reason.

Also, [not] to consider that homosexuality is a given state within the order of God's creation, is another sign of [not] understand[ing] a biological phenomenon - amongst others in the universe.

I have no patience with such [] a culture that sees God as vindictive judge, rather than loving, redeeming Saviour.
Kyrie eleison, Christe eleison!
"

Peter Carrell said...

Hi Carl
It is not a good thing if 'working with Scripture' leads us to heresy, immorality,and apostasy. I know I run a grave risk of that.

However I see myself living in a somewhat complex universe. If only (to give one example) every divorcee who might one day consider remarriage asked my advice first. More likely they are already in church and when I get to know them I will find out they are well into their second marriage. What to do? Tell them to get another divorce? Ban them from holding any office in the church?

Perhaps the answer in both cases is 'Yes.' Well, if so, I wish that was as clear to you and me as to all my colleagues who do not see it that way, including those at GAFCON!

Peter Carrell said...

Hi Tim
If you know you have a spy in your congregation then clearly he or she has not been lying well enough to you about what they do for a living :)

carl jacobs said...

FRS

Thank you for establishing the major point of my post - that your purpose is to remove Scripture as the norm and rule of faith.

As for your 'incarnated Good News' I don't know what that means. I am confident beyond reasonable doubt that you could not explain it in any operation terms. I suspect you could not separate it from a Buddhist chanting 'Ohmmmmm.' As I said, your subjective experience is not revelation. It does not count as knowing anything. Neither is it in any sense an authority. It is simply your subjective experience.

You and I see the world in very different ways. That is why there is no unity between us and never will be. At root we present two very different (and mutually exclusive) Theologies to the World. We are a metaphor for GAFCON and the wider Communion. GAFCON is moving on. It will no longer strive with liberalism. It is going to separate from it, and those who choose may come along with it. But this unholy union of light and darkness is being brought to an end. It won't be long before you will have a nice cozy Liberal Communion all to yourself. Of course, that is the extent of whom you will be talking to. Because no one else will be listening. A collection of dying dessicated liberal churches congratulating themselves on their Modernity.

There is an appropriate epitaph in there somewhere.

carl

Father Ron Smith said...

"++Desmond Tutu, for example, was like the Pharisee when he criticised the South African government over apartheid?" - MichaelA -

In this comment - on my statement about the Pharisee in Sunday's parable - I believe, Michael, that you are sadly mistaken. The difference here is that Archbishop Desmond Tutu was opposing a real wrong on the apartheid issue - as I believe he is doing today, on the issues of gender and sexuality.

Whereas the Gafcon people (to whom I compared the Pharisee) are opposing an adiaphoral issue as though it were Anglican dogma set in stone.

MichaelA said...

"People like Carl can go on fulminating against homosexuals if they like"

But Carl is not doing that.

Tim, the thing I find frustrating about your posts is that it appears that you persistently refuse to acknowledge what this debate is about.

It is not about homosexuality being sinful.

It is about the desire of revisionists (using that word to keep Peter happy!) to have the church accept into ordained ministry those who are openly in homosexual relationships.

The church accepts all sorts of sinners. In fact, every single person that the church accepts is a sinner, including you and I. The church over centuries has practiced Christ's command: "Neither do I condemn you; but go and sin no more".

But there has always been a separate issue about who may be an ordained minister of the church. That is what this debate is about.

MichaelA said...

"However I see myself living in a somewhat complex universe. If only (to give one example) every divorcee who might one day consider remarriage asked my advice first. More likely they are already in church and when I get to know them I will find out they are well into their second marriage. What to do? Tell them to get another divorce? Ban them from holding any office in the church?"

Peter, how is this relevant? Christians face hard choices and difficult matters of applying the scriptures every day. Not just on this issue.

In particular, what does it have to do with the issue of whether those living in openly homosexual relationships should be permitted ordination in the church?

Joshua Bovis said...

Peter,

.How come GAFCON can live with difference over women in leadership, but not live with difference over partnered gay people in church?

The reason Peter is that the former is to do with church order and is a secondary issue, whereas the latter is pertaining to the very essence and definition of the Gospel and what it is to be a Christian.

Going back through your blog Peter, this has come up so many times on various posts, I am at a loss as to why you ask the question, you already know the answer.

Peter Carrell said...

Hi Michael,
We might be talking at cross-purposes. If the issue is only about who may be ordained then I agree, it is pretty simple re marriage/celibacy. I had been thinking of the greater complexity of working with all God's people, including, say, one's own children in same sex partnerships (when not seeking ordination).

Peter Carrell said...

Hi Joshua
It might be helpful to me as well as to others if you could point us to where the gospel is defined in terms of our sexual relationships, particularly same sex relationships. (Cf. your particularly clear statement that these things have to do with the 'very essence and definition of the Gospel and what it means to be a Christian.')

Stanza said...

For I know the 'Gafconers' have all the resources and influence to sustain themselves as another separate denomination if they happen to split from The Communion.

There must a legitimate reason as to why they won't split. In my opinion things will only get messy further down the line.

liturgy said...

Greetings

I did wonder, as I read the communique, with its admission of disagreement about women, and it's open acknowledgement of the issue of polygamy, but its loud silence on an issue you mention above, Peter, and the (obvious) parallels you draw from it, whether divorce and "remarriage" (respecting those who want to put scare quotes on things) ("remarried under a variety of circumstances broader than Jesus or Paul allowed") is the elephant in that Namibian room.

Blessings

Bosco

Peter Carrell said...

"Nairobian room"?

Tim Chesterton said...

Because there is no faithful approach to Scripture that justifies homosexuality. None. At all. Anywhere. Female eldership did not cause God to destroy
Michael A, you claim that Carl is not fulminating against homosexuals, but that the debate is about who may or may not be ordained.

I quote:
'Sodom was judged for chasing after strange flesh. Female eldership was not called toevah and cited as a reason for the judgment of Canaan. Homosexuality was so cited. Female eldership was not presented as a physical picture of man's idolatry, rebellion, and suppression of the truth. Homosexuality was so presented. Words have meaning. Meanings can be understood. There is no way to read the Scripture and come to any other understanding of homosexuality as anything but sin.'

With all due respect, that's not just about who gets ordained. That's claiming that the faithful, committed gay relationships that I know (including my daughter's 'marriage') are in the same category as the attempted homosexual gang rape in Sodom.

Joshua Bovis said...

Peter,

Firstly: Reformed Evangelicals are not obsessed with sexuality, they are obsessed with the Apostolic Gospel of the Lord Jesus Christ. The reason that homosexuality is on view is because this battle lies in the context of the greater war, which is in fact the white elephant in the room – the very essence and definition of the Gospel, the Lordship of Christ and the authority of the Scriptures.

Secondly: The sort of unity promoted by revisionists is a fudge. It cannot be maintained by hunting enthusiastically for the lowest common theological denominator amongst all those who profess to be Christians within the Anglican communion. (For example, an ecumenical group can invite everyone of different traditions and say “what unites us is our shared faith in God/being Anglican/our baptism”. It sounds lovely, but it is so vague and this unity is not the gospel unity). The only way it will be maintained is by no-one saying anything about anything because the moment they do, they offend and the organisational unity is destroyed. This is not the unity that Scripture commands us to maintain. True unity is achieved when God’s people give their faithful allegiance and submission to the Lord Jesus Christ, and live lives consistent with the new humanity that Christ’s death on the cross has called them to live.

Thirdly: This sort of unity promoted by revisionists is a lie. Once their gospel of ‘ inclusion’ takes root, those who disagree with their gospel are called pharisaic, bigotted, homophobic, legalistic homophobes, judgmental, (just look at Ron's posts).

Joshua Bovis said...

Fourthly: The logic that says “God accepts homosexual relationships that are in the context of a faithful, loving and committed relationship” reveals a tragic and wrong understanding of the gospel. An example of this thinking is below:

“The heart of the Gospel”is God’s gracious unconditional gift of communion and we embrace this gospel when we take hold of the key New Testament understanding of unconditional acceptance so evident in the encounters with Jesus in the gospels”.

The problem with this statement is that it is a half-truth presented as the whole truth, which in reality is an untruth. It is not the gospel as it is an incomplete gospel – it has no repentance.

“The heart of the Gospel is God’s gracious unconditional gift of communion and we embrace this gospel when we take hold of the key New Testament understanding of unconditional acceptance so evident in the encounters with Jesus in the gospels” but that is not the whole truth. The whole truth is that God’s gracious gift of communion is conditional on our belief AND our repentance.

God’s acceptance of me is unconditional in that it is not dependent on my own good works but it is conditional on my belief and repentance.

This is why the homosexual debate within the Anglican communion is not about sex, but is about the very nature of the gospel. Allow me to express it another way to show why the issue is about the very nature of the Gospel.

For us to say that:

1: the non Christian fornicator can become a Christian and keep on fornicating, as long as the person they are fornicating with is in the context of a ‘loving, committed, faithful relationship’

or:

2.the non Christian alcoholic can keep getting drunk as long as they do it in the context of a faithful, loving and safe environment

or

3:the non-Christian thief can keep on stealing as long as they steal in a faithful and safe and harmless environment

or

4: the non Christian adulterer can keep on being unfaithful to his wife as long as the relationship he has with his mistress is in the context of a faithful and committed relationship

is completely unthinkable and totally antithetical to Scripture.

Yes of course the fornicator,alcoholic, thief and adulterer can become Christians but they cannot stay that way nor define themselves as being fornicators,alcoholics, thieves and adulterers. Why? Because they have repented. I have met people who used to be these things before they came to a saving faith in the Lord Jesus,and they are a wonderful testimony to God’s power to save those who believe but they would never (and have never said to me) “I am now a Christian thief, or a Christian fornicator, a Christian alcoholic or a Christian adulterer.
They are new creations.

Here is the rub – Those who are arguing for same sex marriage within the church, the blessing of homosexual relationships, are teaching that homosexuality is good in God’s eyes and are saying that the homosexual can keep on engaging in homosexuality as long as they are in a committed, faithful homosexual relationship, are in practice and in essence believing a different and wrong gospel, because there is no repentance.

Can a homosexual become Christians?

Of course they can!!! But there must be repentance; and a demonstration of that repentance is that they no longer define themselves as homosexual and no longer engage in homosexual sexual expression. This is why a person who says “I am a gay Christian” is a contradiction.

If we promoted a gospel that says that fornicators,alcoholics, thieves and adulterers could stay as they are and engage in activities and the lifestyle indicative of being a fornicator,alcoholic,and maintain fidelity to Christ, it would be extremely disingenuous on our part. With homosexuality is it no different even though our culture says it is.

Bryden Black said...

Dear Bosco,

I really must lend you my copy of this CoE publication:
http://www.chpublishing.co.uk/books/9780715138335/marriage-in-church-after-divorce
For after you have read it, we might not see you trot out this non sequitur ever again, trying to extrapolate from allowing the remarriage of divorced persons in church to allowing same-sex relations within Christ's Spouse the Church (which you have inferred and stated again and again).

Bryden Black said...

Yes; Andrew has helpfully nailed a few key points with this communiqué, both re what has been said and what omitted. Just as you too Peter have thrown down a relevant challenge to those who don’t particularly ‘like’ GAFCON.

My one point to add is just this. CS Lewis, one of the most faithful and so successful proponents of the Christian Faith in the last century, entitled his key apologetic work, Mere Christianity precisely because he sat light to every institutional form of the Faith - even though he well knew one had to belong to the local Christian Community. In other words, there is nothing absolutely in either Scripture or the Great Tradition (unless one is RC; and Lewis saw the RCC as rather “imperialist” in its claims) that ‘ensures’ the survival of the AC. This too needs to be factored into your Venns (now on another thread), I suggest.

liturgy said...

No wonder no one mentioned that elephant! It was in the wrong room!

Peter Carrell said...

Hi Joshua
I am all for defining the gospel clearly, faithful to Scripture, and all for taking care in doing so about interrelated issues, etc. But what you say does not answer my question.

However that doesn't matter too much: what you are saying (in my view) is that the church's machinations over homosexuality have potential in some places, already revealed in other places, to affect out commitment to clear definition of the gospel. I agree.

What I am saying is that homosexuality in terms of respectful pastoral care and response to homosexuals should not deflect us in appreciation of the gospel treasure. To do otherwise is to participate in scapegoating of homosexuals which is unfair and unjust.

Yes, we worry about activists infiltrating the church intent on idolatrous agendas disrupting the fabric of the household of faith and so on. But, honestly, in my experience in NZ, I do not see signs of such 'entryism.' Is it a problem in Australia?

Peter Carrell said...

Hi Joshua
My 8.17 was a response to your 7.10.
I now see a 7.11 to respond to!

Briefly: If you frame the issue in the way you do then it is a no brainer, the gospel is a call to repentance from wrong-doing and to make out wrong which is wrong is not wrong obviates the call to repentance.

I would be surprised if any commenter here thought the gospel was consistent with blessing the fornicating fornicating, the drunkard drinking and so forth.

So why might some argue for an exception re a same sex (faithful, stable, loving) partnership and refuse to equate this with fornication or drunkenness?

I think a clue lies in the nature of our own marriages for those of us fortunate to be so blessed. We appreciate the sociality of marriage, the way in which both God and society blesses a domestic arrangement in which intimacy and love is bound together in one household.

Thus the church in the 20th century, finding itself with the utmost reluctance confronting the magnitude of divorce in our society, has sought to find a way 'beyond' our Lord's teaching that divorce/remarriage, except for a few reasons, is 'adultery.' (And, as you rightly point out, the church should not be saying that the gospel permits ongoing adultery).

Now at this point there is great debate (and has been on this blog) and I see Bryden pointing to a particular resource which denies the link between remarriage after divorce and same sex partnerships. I am not myself convinced that same sex partnerships are okay, and my reasons (I suspect) are similar to those in the resource Bryden points to. So I am on one side of this debate. But I do recognise when people point out the grave charge which Jesus brings, that adultery is involved in certain circumstances when a divorcee remarries, my grounds for not respecting arguments for same sex partnerships are on weak ground. Particularly if all proponents of the possibility of remarriage after divorce and of same sex partnerships are recognising the frailty and fragility of human life which is immeasurably strengthened through the sociality of marriage or marriage like arrangements.

I remain puzzled why Jesus, preaching the gospel to the Samaritan woman in Jn 4, even naming her domestic situation, did not demand that she sort it out.

Father Ron Smith said...

"Of course they can!!! But there must be repentance; and a demonstration of that repentance is that they no longer define themselves as homosexual and no longer engage in homosexual sexual expression. This is why a person who says “I am a gay Christian” is a contradiction."
- Joshua Bovis -

It's just this sort of twaddle that almost makes me despair. I give up on Mr Bovis.

liturgy said...

Dear Bryden

You are addressing the wrong person.
It was Peter who introduced on this thread what you regard as a non sequitur, and now is pressing the point further in another comment.
It is Martin who introduced what you must surely regard as a non sequitur that you do not address, that the “progress from ordaining women to same-sex relations that you have previously resisted has its own impelling logic”.
Have fun keeping everyone on your correct track of allowing women to be ordained, accepting those who are divorced can remarry, but homosexuals can only be celibate.
And not mixing up who holds which incorrect position :-)
Blessings

Bosco

Bryden Black said...

I think I'd better lend the Church House publication to you too Peter. It does not extrapolate or link or even talk about as Bosco often infers at all ... Wrong dots joined on a blog I'm afraid!

Bryden Black said...

Sorry Bosoc I must demur: you have most often addressed the topic of same sex relations in the same breath as matters of divorce in the church on this site of ADU, trying to view the two as if they followed the same 'logic'. Please check out the archives if necessary!

Joshua Bovis said...

Peter,



Exactly!

The reason is those who argue for this exception is this: under all the obfuscation, all the smoke and mirrors and all the nonsense fudge terminology that revisionists use such as ' inclusion'; ' tolerance' , conversation' and listening, the heart is that they don't like what Scripture says about homosexual behaviour being sin and they show their enmity towards God and his Word by calling those who uphold Scripture to be 'prejudice, bigoted, and any other pejorative one can think of.

Take Ron for example. His hostility towards myself, the Sydney Diocese (which ironically I am not a Sydney Anglican), Peter Jensen is clearly evident, yet not once as he ever shown from Scripture how those who disagree with him are wrong and/or how his view is Biblically tenable. He has not once ever engaged with me except to use ad homs. How many times has he been warned on this blog and edited or banned?

Ron, if you honestly think I am so misguided (or any other Reformed Evangelical Anglican) it would really helpful if you had the fortitude to correct me from the Scriptures. How about you stop with the put downs about my age, lack of experience, not understanding homosexuals, and show me where I am wrong.

As clergy we are dealing with peoples lives here, we are going to be judged more strictly by God for what we teach, the Scriptures and the ordinal make it clear. Since you love to tell me how green I am (for the record I am 39) use your experience and tell me where I am mistaken.

Peter, Sorry for the calling Ron out on this. I expect you to edit this or possibly delete it. But I am really tired of the poison that Ron dishes out and have had enough! So if this goes against the rules of your blog I understand.



Peter Carrell said...

Hi Joshua
Ron called something(s) you previously wrote 'twaddle' so I think you more than deserve the right of reply exercised in your comment!

Joshua Bovis said...

Peter,

:)

Of course! Though in his words, he has given up on me.

He never engages with what I say to him, nor the answers I give to him anyway.

Anonymous said...

Joshua writes: "But I am really tired of the poison that Ron dishes out and have had enough!"

So are the rest of us. This has gone on for more than 3 years now. At a rough estimate, about 80% of Peter's interventions are to censor or reprimand Mr Smith. Other people like Kurt or Bosco can disagree with evangelical theology without getting ad hominem or accusing their opponents of being Pharisees, judgmental etc. But Peter never has the backbone to tell Mr Smith (who sincerely believes he embodies kindness and grace) to depart and tend his own blogyard where he can say what he likes with impunity. That's why we visit less and less, and this blog is only a shadow of what it could have been.
Martin

MichaelA said...

"Michael A, you claim that Carl is not fulminating against homosexuals, but that the debate is about who may or may not be ordained."

Correct, as to both points.

"Carl: 'There is no way to read the Scripture and come to any other understanding of homosexuality as anything but sin.'
Tim: 'With all due respect, that's not just about who gets ordained. That's claiming that the faithful, committed gay relationships that I know (including my daughter's 'marriage') are in the same category as the attempted homosexual gang rape in Sodom.'"

In one respect, yes. Carl calls them both sin. Lying is sin. Hating is sin. Ripping off your neighbour for 10 cents is sin. Unkind or thoughtless words are sin. [Consider 1 John 3:15 and Matt 5:28] We are all sinners before God, every one of us.

However, so far I haven't seen Carl write that consensual homosexual relations are of the same degree as rape, which is another matter altogether.

Note that Carl's comment about "strange flesh" is a reference to "sarkos heteras" in Jude 1:7 - Jude doesn't say anything about rape. Actually even Genesis doesn't say anyone was raped, although they were certainly thinking of it. But the apostle Jude's point is that Sodom was judged because of two things - sexual immorality and "chasing different flesh". Make of it what you will, but what you are reading into Carl's post appears to go beyond the point he made.

carl jacobs said...

Tim Chesterton

I get it. I get that you have a daughter that self-identifies as a Lesbian. I get that this gives you a personal stake in the outcome of this argument. But your personal situation does not change the underlying morality of the acts in question. You can't by force of will change truth into falsehood simply because falsehood removes a conflict in your life. Neither does your personal situation give you greater standing or authority or insight to speak of this matter. It gives you a bias that makes you prefer a particular outcome. This is a dangerous way to handle Scripture.

I did not fulminate. I gave Scriptural reasons for why homosexuality may be differentiated from WO. Everything I said was true. I accurately represented the Scriptural position on the subject. Indeed FRS consistently testifies to the truth of this assertion every time he harangue me about Sola Scripture. He knows that it leads inevitably to the exact conclusions I made. That's why he attacks it. To justify his position he must remove Scripture as an authority.

Now you may choose to conform to Scripture or not depending on how you select priorities in your life. What you cannot do is conform the Scripture for the convenience of your own personal situation. I understand that creates difficulty for you. But I am not the author of those difficulties. I am only herald.

carl



Tim Chesterton said...

Carl:

Everything you have said to me about homosexuality in your last comment also applies to your justification of lying in the context of war and military espionage in our previous discussions on this site.

carl jacobs said...

Tim Chesterton

At the time I gave you at least five examples of willful deception and asked you how they fit with your argument. You chose not to answer.

Anyways. I am sure that if you lived in (say) Holland in (say) 1944 and some guys in black uniforms knocked on your door and said "Do you have any Jews living in your attic?" that you would have responded with "I cannot tell a lie. I do have Jews living in my attic."

carl

Tim Chesterton said...

Carl, I have a great deal of sympathy with that argument. And the fact that you do as well means that there are times when you are prepared to disobey a literal reading of scripture on the basis of - what shall we call it - sanctified common sense? Because, let's face it, there is no scriptural justification for lying. Jesus tells us that the devil is the father of lies. The only way we can justify it is to depart from the actual words of the texts and appeal to some vague higher principle which we like to think is in accord with the Spirit of Jesus.

Now, as I've said on this website many times, I am not at the point in my life that I'm ready to embrace gay marriage - or even monogamous committed gay relationships. But I think if a gay Christian tells me that they've struggled hard all their lives - and have prayed many times to be delivered and have not been delivered - and it's better to marry than to burn, and they are burning, that's for sure - and they've come to the conclusion that the reason God isn't delivering them is because he made them this way, and they just want to be with someone they love for the rest of their lives - well, that makes sense to them, just as lying to the stormtroopers to save the Jewish refugees makes sense to you (and me), even though it is patently unbiblical. Do I agree with them? No. Do I understand why they've come to that conclusion? You bet I do. Do I call them my Christian brothers and sisters? Absolutely.

So I think you could be a little less vociferous in your condemnation of committed gay and lesbian relationships, given that you are prepared to part company with strict adherence to the biblical text yourself, given the right set of circumstances.

By the way, I apologise for not responding to the five situational examples you gave (I don't remember exactly what they were). However, in this instance I don't think they would help your argument, because I do remember thinking at the time 'This is situational ethics, pure and simple'. And if you are willing to embrace situational ethics in one area of your life, I don't think you have a leg to stand on when it comes to committed gay relationships being against the 'plain teaching of scripture'.

Anonymous said...

Tim, think through the logic of the argument and apply the different strands of God's wisdom, which are not about bloodless 'categorical imperatives' but our recreation in the image of Jesus Christ. Your vision of Christian morality, I have to say, is just too small, too Anabaptist,and possibly too Kantian. Kant was brilliant in his own narrow way - brilliant but myopic and certainly not a Christian. He has sat like an incubus on Protestant theology. (And yes, Kant did say you had a duty - Pflicht - to tell an axe murderer [read: men in black coats] where his victim was hiding [read: Jews in attic] - proof if we needed it of the utter sterility of his Prussian morality.)

Loneliness is tough - though there are many kinds of loneliness, and people can be lonely even in marriage. It's not a panacea for human ills.
Sexual desire is strong as well -though not as strong in women as in men, who are more interested in love than orgasms, and not the driving desire of men our age.
Many people, not just homosexuals, have to live single lives. You would not tell them, would you, to have recourse to casual sex when they feel strong drives or temptation? What is the Gospel message here?
Sexual desires do not constitute our identity, but we can build our lives around them if we so choose. The Bible calls us to a larger vision of newness in Christ.

Martin Niemoeller

(couldn't resist that last one, having not long ago visited his cell in Sachsenhausen)

liturgy said...

Good idea #374A:

Peter, you could read the Church House document Bryden uses as a refrain on this blog but never summarises or critiques (check out the archives if necessary).

This could provide you material for up to three blog posts for our discussion here or on H&HD (alerting us here): a summary of the argument; a review and critique; whether it changes your position.

Blessings

Bosco

Peter Carrell said...

Bosco
I am only up to Good Idea No 2. I will let you know, in 2059, when I am approaching Good Idea No 373.

Anonymous said...

To amplify my reply to Tim:
1. Is there a Christian obligation to tell the truth to a person wishing to use that information for a criminal purpose? Certainly not.
2. Is it permissible to lie to and mislead a would-be killer to protect innocent life? Probably yes (Elisha and the Syrians before Dothan)
3. Is it permissible to lie and mislead to protect yourself or loved ones from the consequences of your or their own actions? A no-brainer. A loyalty (like self-preservation) is a fine instinct and sometimes a virtue (do you commend the SS for their 'Treue'?) but not the acme of either. Do you see why we find Anabaptist ethics historically deficient?

Martin

Peter Carrell said...

Yet, Martin, I recall a moving and wonderful story of Corrie Ten Boom, intent on not lying to the Germans about airmen or was it Jews, hiding under her kitchen floor. (As I recollect) she told the truth but the Germans did not believe her.

I mention this to remind you that Christians from different persuasions can believe differing things about important ethical issues. As I recall, Corrie Ten Boom was not an Anabaptist, just a Christian convicted of the importance of always telling the truth.

Anonymous said...

Well, I did think that was what this string was about. As I recall, Corrie Ten Boom wasn't a moral philosopher. The Laws of Logic (#2, the law of non-contradiction) do remind us that a statement cannot be simultaneously and non-equivocally true and false.

Martin

Tim Chesterton said...

Martin:

Sorry, mate, but you are making my argument for me. You are giving shining examples of how it is sometimes biblical (in your view) to break specific biblical commands (i.e. not to bear false witness, 'do not lie to one another' etc.) in order to follow a higher principle. In other words, literal obedience to the letter of scripture is not always the Christian thing to do.

I get that you come down on a different side of the gay issue than those who are in favour of gay marriage. I just don't get why you think it's okay, when the situation demands it, to disobey the ten commandments and many other plain commands of scripture not to lie, but then you turn around and say to a gay person who wants to live in a committed relationship with a person they love "Sorry, there is no biblical argument for what you're doing".

As for the accusation that I am 'too Anabaptist' - well, I take that as a badge of honour. Thank you.

Tim Chesterton said...

I would also like to respond to Carl's charge that I cannot reconcile gay marriage (or same-sex blessings, if you prefer that terminology) with the Scriptures.

He is of course correct. I cannot reconcile gay and lesbian marriage with strict adherence to the letter of scripture.

Here is a short list of some other things that I cannot reconcile with strict adherence to the letter of scripture:

1. Lending money at interest.

2. Refusing help to beggars on the streets when they ask for money.

3. Inviting friends and family over for a dinner party rather than the poor and needy.

4. Taking oaths in court.

5. Christians serving in the military (approved for believers in the OT, but NT Christians commanded not to resist an evildoer and to love their enemies).

6. The inerrancy of every detail and command of scripture (given that in the Old Testament God's people were told that they had to be circumcised and keep all the food laws on pain of being cut off, but in the New Testament Jesus and Paul swept all that away - 'thus he declared all foods clean').

7. Christians having possessions ('None of you can be my disciple unless he gives up all he has').

8. Unanswered prayer (we all experience it, but it doesn't jive with the words of Jesus, especially Matthew 7:7-11 and Mark 11:24).

9. The fact that death had existed in the world for millions of years before the emergence of human beings (contra. Romans 5:12).

Please - I love the scriptures, I study them daily, to preach from them week by week is one of the greatest joys of my life. But submitting to 'the authority of Scripture' (a phrase, funnily enough, not found in the scriptures) is not a simple thing, in my view.

Peter Carrell said...

Hi Tim
There is an egregious omission from your list: paying good ministers twice the normal stipend!!

Anonymous said...

Tim: no, your response falls at the first hurdle because I simply do not accept that truth-telling is an exceptionless command (at all times, to all persons, on all matters) in Scripture. I have already cited the example of Elisha at Dothan - make of that what you will. I do not see how 'bearing false witness against my neighbor' (perjury in a court case) can be equated with lying to protect an innocent person from an evil murderer - Kant's famous/notorious example of what he imagined to be a categorical imperative. You have to operate within a framework of right and justice - which murderers and Nazis don't. Kant's ethical reasoning was excessively limited and rationalistic, rather like your own wooden biblical literalism - which you set up as an Aunty Sally in order to reject.
Further, I don't accept that 'gay marriage' ontologically exists in the eyes of Christ. It's a human, legal invention, conjured into existence by human wills, not God's word. It's something we must live with in the secular city, under pain of civil punishment, just as slavery had the sanction of law.
From one point of view, I am happy for people to form such associations if it spares them from suffering in destructive ways - just as I would give heroin addicts methadone if it stops them stealing. It's the old lesser of two evils argument. Have Anabaptists heard of that? A lesser evil is still not a positive good.
People are relatively free to form such associations as they like in the modern post-Christian west. Adultery and polyamory are no longer punished by the criminal law - which they once were. Will you condemn people who find their happiness this way?
I reject Anabaptist exegesis because I think it is insufficiently biblical and historically naïve. But of course, the Christian Church ceased to exist some time around AD 80 and wasn't reconstituted until the 1520s!

Martin

Peter Carrell said...

Is any commandment exceptionless, Martin?

Is 'justifiable exception' why polygamy and wars against nations are justified in the OT?

Does the church live in other ways (apart from same sex partnerships) with the lesser of two evils? Could remarriage of divorcees come into that category? Church trust funds earning interest?

Loneliness for gay persons appears to be a contributory factor in suicide. Would not a blessed same sex partnership constitute the lesser of two evils?

In a comment above (29/10, 8.46) you effectively say to gay people in the church without the prospect of an ecclesially supported partnership with another person, "Toughen up." Again, I ask, why did Jesus not give advice consistent with that approach to the woman at the well (John 4).

Anonymous said...

‘Is any commandment exceptionless, Martin?’
Yes: You shall love the Lord your God with all your heart; and your neighbour as yourself.

‘Is 'justifiable exception' why polygamy and wars against nations are justified in the OT?’
‘justified’? or tolerated as a concession to life in a fallen world?

“Does the church live in other ways (apart from same sex partnerships) with the lesser of two evils?”
All the time. Are you being descriptive or prescriptive?
“Could remarriage of divorcees come into that category? Church trust funds earning interest?”
If you could show me that a prohibition of the remarriage of divorced persons or charging interest is a categorical, exceptionless imperative, you might have a case. But neither you nor Bosco can.

“Loneliness for gay persons appears to be a contributory factor in suicide. Would not a blessed same sex partnership constitute the lesser of two evils?”
Plenty of heterosexual people are lonely too, with no prospect of marriage. How would you counsel them?

“In a comment above (29/10, 8.46) you effectively say to gay people in the church without the prospect of an ecclesially supported partnership with another person, "Toughen up." Again, I ask, why did Jesus not give advice consistent with that approach to the woman at the well (John 4).”
Who was the hard-hearted man who said: ‘Not all can receive this teaching’? As for the woman of Samaria, neither you nor I know all that the Lord had to say to her. Argumenta a silentio are not much of a basis for doctrine or ethics.
Martin

Peter Carrell said...

Hi Martin
Can you show me and others here that prohibition of a faithful, stable, committed, loving same sex partnership is a categorical exceptionless imperative?

Tim Chesterton said...

Martin:

Well, now I'm falling about laughing!

So the commands of God only operate where the other party is operating within a framework of right and justice? Whatever happened to 'love your enemy, pray for those who hate you, turn the other cheek' etc.? These commands are manifestly given in a context that assumes the other party is not 'operating within a framework of right and justice'. And if we're going to appeal to the authority of things that Elisha did (and not just to specific commands of God), are we then going to say it's okay to curse children who attack you so that bears come out of the forest and maul 42 of them? I mean, honestly, it's not hard to find Old Testament heroes who have broken the commandments!

And I am being accused of a wooden biblical literalism? Excuse me - I'm the one who's saying that there are circumstances where I can't make wooden biblical literalism fit with life as I know it (and as my gay friends know it). The whole point of my list is that we all know, and assume, that there are numerous examples of biblical texts that we don't take literally. Even strong evangelicals who say they believe in the authority of scripture do not, in practice, submit to the authority of every single text of scripture. They just don't!

Look, let's take this statement that 'gay marriage' doesn't exist in the mind of Christ. Well, Christ doesn't actually address the subject of gay marriage; he addresses the subject of divorce, and in that context says that 'from the beginning it was not so', going on to define monogamous heterosexual marriage as God's creation intent. But we all know that some of the greatest heroes of the Old Testament did not follow that norm. It was assumed for most of the history of Israel that polygamy was okay. How did those folks read (or, more likely, hear) the texts from Genesis that Jesus quotes? Were the marriages of David and Solomon 'in his mind' when he said what he did?

Finally, your last sentence is a straw man and you know it. Can you cite me one responsible Anabaptist scholar who believes that the Christian Church ceased to exist in AD 80 and was only started up again in the 1520s? (when I say 'responsible', I mean people who are higher up the totem pole than the Hal Lindsay school of biblical interpretation). And you accuse me of setting up an 'Aunt Sally' in order to reject it! Have you read Denny Weaver, Thomas Finger, Willard Swartley, Alan Kreider (who has done an extensive study of the catechumenate in the early church, very much post-80 AD!), Perry Yoder, Tom Yoder Neufeld, or David Augsburger - to name just a few excellent contemporary Anabaptist scholars?

Anonymous said...

Peter, can you explain quantum mechanics to me?
Maybe you can, but there's no guarantee I can understand it.
Anyway, you should know a regenerate Christian asks a different kind of question: 'What does God will for me? How shall I grow into Christlikeness? And how do I access His grace to do His will?'
If you think a homosexual relationship will help someone become more Christlike, then I really have overstayed my welcome on your blog.
Good luck in the world of situationist revisionist Anglicanism!
That didn't take long, did it?

Martin

Peter Carrell said...

Hi Martin
You have not given an answer to my question. You are not required to give an answer to my question and you are free to post the response you have given. But I remain keenly interested in a direct answer to the question I have asked of you, on the basis of a statement you have made.

Bryden Black said...

G’day Bosco!

... because I assume you may read - just as I’ve taken you up on a couple of recommendations of yours and read them for myself: viz. Myers & Scanzoni, and Haller. See https://dl.dropboxusercontent.com/u/40623476/A%20very%20select%20annotated%20bibliography%20re%20marriage%20and.pdf for my conclusions.

Enjoy!

Father Ron Smith said...

Martin, despite your obvious great learning - both in the Scriptures and in other, more esoteric, disciplines - not forgetting your linguistic abilities, which are a great source of amusement to me at least on this site; you appear to be out-pointed here - by both Peter and Tim. I think you should just take a deep breath, and acknowledge when you are beaten. But: God loves you!

"Where are you wise men.......your philosophers, now?"

Peter Carrell said...

Interesting possibility, Ron!

To be clear as to my own estimation: if I have 'beaten' Martin into a corner (I don't think he will agree with me for a second!) then it would be a corner named, 'Yes, Christian ethics are complex.' Not a corner named, 'Gay Marriage is OK.'

Father Ron Smith said...

Naturally, Peter, What might encourage me to think anything less?
Agape, Ron

Anonymous said...

No, Peter, you haven't "beaten me", you have simply talked yourself into liberal revisionist ethics, which is where I know you have been reluctantly headed for about 3 years. There is a remorseless logic at work when you focus first (as you do) on 'pastoral' responses rather than epistemological questions of identifying God's will (which you find impossibly problematized), and it ratchets in only one direction. You graciously avoid Ron Smith's jejune jibing, but you are ending up in the same place ethically. As for your question: 'Can you show me and others here that prohibition of a faithful, stable, committed, loving same sex partnership is a categorical exceptionless imperative?', you should know that a linguistic pedant like me can understand this question in at least three different ways, and that, as well, contingent on 1. my ability to explain; 2. your ability to understand.
A deficit in either area doesn't disprove the statement, any more than my unsuccessful struggle to understand quantum mechanics (and I have tried) means its paradoxical assertions about particles and energy are nonsense.
You should also know that in my references to categorical imperatives, I was tilting at Kantian ethics, a bloodless and joyless substitute for real Christian ethics, which is first and foremost about pleasing the Lord as one who had been born again by the Spirit yet still struggles with the flesh. A mature, regenerate Christian doesn't ask himself or herself: 'What are the exceptions to a rule?, i.e., what can I get away with?' (what teenage boys used to ask when sex before marriage was still 'frowned upon' by bourgeois people) but rather: 'What is the best and holiest way I can please the Lord?'
Regenerate Christians don't ask: 'What is the lesser of two evils?' Politicians do, and rightly so, because their concern is with the City of Man. Thus we have laws that seek to control prostitution; but in the City of God, the word to prostitutes is entirely different.
You need to phrase your question (to yourself) positively, in keeping with the ethics of the Kingdom of God, to wit: 'Can I (Peter) show - from the Bible and Christian tradition and reasoning correctly - that a homosexual relationship is a holy thing, willed by God for some people?' That is how NT ethics actually works (say I, a mere Alttestamentler to you, a Neutestamentler). I submit that the Teacher who spoke those stern words in Matthew 19.11-12 has already answered your question, if you can accept it. In ethics, as in everything else, it is better to follow the Emmanuel of Bethlehem than the Immanuel of Koenigsberg.

Martin

Anonymous said...

Tim, I am glad I have been able to spread the joy to the prairie or the tundra, or wherever your corner of the Lord's vineyard is. Many are cold but few are frozen.
I may (or may not) get round to essaying a reply - this is just to say I am pleased you are reading and puzzling over OT ethics. I suggest a good read of Calvin's OT commentaries - he could teach the Anabaptists a thing or two!

Happy Reformationstag!

Martin Strohmann

Peter Carrell said...

Hi Martin
Thank you for your reply which is an answer to my question!
I agree entirely, the question Christians should be asking is, What is God's will? Not 'What can I get away with?'

carl jacobs said...

I have spent the last three days dealing with airports and buses and traveling and one of my least favorite spots on Earth - O'Hare Int'l Airport. I have some things to add to this thread but at present only have access to my phone. It's just not feasible to respond adequately with this medium.

Please be patient.

carl

Tim Chesterton said...

Martin/Ron:

I live in Edmonton, Martin, which is I believe usually thought of as being on the prairies! Victoria Matthews, who is now Peter and Ron's bishop, appointed me as rector of my current parish, St. Margaret's, in the year 2000, and she was my bishop for the next seven years until she resigned near the end of 2007. I like to think I did not drive her to it!

Now, Ron, I am not really interested in beating Martin or anyone else! I simply want us all to have a corner in our minds that says "I can be wrong". Me too, by the way.

Martin, I am not a scholar and would never pretend to be. I have read Calvin's Institutes (many many years ago) and found them hard work, and I have read parts of his commentary on John. I have never read any of his Old Testament commentaries. Which Anabaptist commentators do you think he could teach a thing or two? I have also read very little philosophy, being a simple parish grunt who spends most of my time being a pastor and a preacher, so while I know a tiny bit about Kant from what others have told me, I have never read him.

So, acknowledging my scholarly limitations, I would be very interested to hear how Peter's 'liberal revisionist ethics' differ from your own rather liberal situation-ethics-type protest against my supposed biblical literalist straw man, and your apparent belief that the only biblical commands you identify as 'exceptionless' are to love the Lord with all your heart and to love your neighbour as yourself.

I honestly can't tell the difference between that position and Peter's supposed 'liberal revisionist ethics'.

Peter Carrell said...

Commiserations, Carl!

PS your phone may not be secure :)

Tim Chesterton said...

Oh heck! Praying for travelling mercies for you, Carl.

carl jacobs said...

Tim Chesterton

Thank you. For a while this morning I thought I had a daughter stranded in a foreign airport. Her host family did not arrive to pick her up and her European Bank Card was suddenly not readable at any ATM. So she had very little money. Stressful to say the least. We were able to get her money and she figured out the taxi system. It eventually worked itself out. :)

Anyways. I am home now but she who must be obeyed is on the computer. How then can I post my pearls of wisdom? Perhaps I should exercise my patriarchal authority and boot her off...

Yes, that's a good plan.

carl

Anonymous said...

Tim, it is evident that you love your daughter and you seek to support her to the best of your ability. As a father I feel exactly the same. You have also been very open and honest about the circumstances you face, and I deeply respect this as well.
I should mention as well (because my last posts had more the flavour of vinegar than honey) that I have the highest regard for the Christian life and character of modern-day Amish, Hutterite and related fellowships, and could only wish more Christians would emulate their evangelical simplicity and peaceable ways. Like you, I feel dismay and perplexity at the way some wealthy Christians I know seem to be leading lives of self-indulgence, taking yet another holiday (on their own honestly gotten money, it must be said) while the church struggles to raise money for a girls' school in South Sudan. Of course, I couldn't say so out loud, for fear of alienating friends and provoking the response I was motivated by jealousy (which probably has an element of truth).
I do not claim to be an expert on Calvin's OT commentaries, but have dipped into some of them (which are different in feel from his Institutes). There, in a patient and careful salvation-historical manner of exegesis, Calvin does deal with many of the ethical conundra you listed above. Calvin knew that the Law was our paiadagogos to Christ, and while he knew that for Christians it could not be used naively or in many cases at all (contra the modern day theonomists), he still helpfully insisted on the 'third use of the law' as a guide to Christian living. It is all about sensitive reading of Scripture, according to the analogy of faith (comparing passage with passage in a synthesizing, Christ-centered way). I do not think I have ever held a 'liberal situation-ethics position', though I do believe that the consequences of our actions are ethically significant (one of the things that makes most people intuitively suspicious of Kant's pure deontology). If I have anything resembling a worked out ethical theory (and I have nothing so clear in my mind), it is probably a combination of divine-command theory (a la Elizabeth Anscombe) and virtue ethics (a la Thomas Aquinas). The Sermon on the Mount is the absolute crown of NT ethics and remains central to personal ethics, but it must be read alongside what the rest of the NT (and the OT, Calvin would say) has to say on issues of statecraft, politics and public life.
Martin

carl jacobs said...

Tim Chesterton

I get the feeling that you would have trouble with that whole "It is always lawful to do good on the Sabbath" argument. But of course that argument wasn't over exceptions to the law. It was about proper understanding of the law. And that is where we must start. So let's talk about lying.

The first thing we must understand is that lying is not synonymous with communicating false information. A man once stopped in front of my house and asked me for directions to a nearby church. I confused churches in my mind and gave him wrong directions. I realized my mistake as soon as he disappeared over the hill but there was nothing I could do. Did I lie to him? No, I reflected my imperfection as a creature. I simply gave him false information. I regretted my mistake but I did not feel moral guilt. Lying then is a sin of intent. I must intend to deceive the other party.

So, may we therefore define the sin of lying as deception with intent? No, we may not. Assume Bob wants to throw a surprise party for his wife. He asks his wife's best friend to get his wife to the proper place at the proper without the wife knowing why. The best friend must invent some pretext in order to achieve this objective. The pretext will inevitably contain deception. Should the best friend therefore repent of this task lest she be guilty of lying? Should she instead spoil the surprise and ruin the wife's delight at her husband's thoughtfulness & attention? No. The deception contains no malignant intent. It instead seeks the best interest of the one deceived. It would indeed be a moral inversion to suggest that tricking Bob's wife into attending her own surprise party falls askance the imperative against lying. It is always lawful to do good. Helping Bob show love for his wife in a public manner is good.

This is what the Scripture prohibits - that a man act deceitfully with malignant intent towards another. If I had deliberately directed my inquirer to the wrong church simply to amuse myself at his frustration, then I would have sinned. That intent to harm another (especially that I might thereby to protect myself) is the essence of lying.

This is why I said you must understand the law. Did Jesus violate the Sabbath by healing on the Sabbath? He did not. It is always lawful to do good. The Law of the Sabbath was never intended to prevent people from doing good on the Sabbath. Jesus therefore did not create an exception to the law. He understood the law and acted within its proper boundaries.

These two (rather obvious) understandings sweep away most of the objections that you have raised about lying. What you have done is create an artificially broad scriptural definition so that you can find exceptions to it. You can claim "See, no reasonable person can disagree with this. There are exceptions to the commandment." And then you go one step further. You say "Because you allow yourself exceptions over here, then you must allow me exceptions over there." But then everything becomes a matter of exception. This mechanism eviscerates Christian morality at its core. The argument has no logical stopping point. If I can find exceptions to lying, then I can find exceptions to adultery. And exceptions to sleeping with my daughter. And exceptions to sacrificing my children to the god Molech (or Prosperity as we moderns call him.) And exceptions to idolatry. Anything that Scripture claims will die the death of a thousand exceptions. We are therefore forced onto some other authority to parse out how we should live. Which as I said at the beginning is the whole point of the exercise. The Scripture must be silenced before anything else can be heard.

So what would be that alternative authority? I ask this question all the time, but I have never received an answer.

carl

There is another aspect to this argument that I will deal with directly.

carl jacobs said...

Tim Chesterton

Many times you have juxtaposed rejection of homosexuality with rejection of lying in military service to the state. This argument depends directly upon your advocacy of pacifism, for if you once admit the moral legitimacy of military service then your whole argument collapses. I will be honest with you. I do not consider pacifism to be a serious moral position. Have you read the OT? The God who revealed Himself in the person of Jesus Christ was the same immutable God who killed the entire Assyrian army at the gates of Jerusalem. The same immutable God who destroyed the Egyptian Army in the waters of the Red Sea. The same immutable God who dispatched the nation of Israel to judge Canaan with the sword.

Now you will point me towards the Sermon on the Mount, and I will tell you that the sermon on the Mount is not a political treatise. The Christian is told to turn the other cheek. Is the Officer of the Law to do likewise? Does he watch a man beaten and robbed and do nothing else but pray for the persecutor? Does he as an Officer of the Law turn the other cheek? You can tell the moral bankruptcy of this position because it is never (and I mean never) applied to the Police. And for obvious reasons.

A man who acts in the service of the state has different responsibilities than the man who does not. I cannot as a private man imprison a man for his crimes. I cannot as a private man exact justice for his crimes. I cannot act as judge. I cannot be his executioner. But I can do all these things as an officer of the state. The "King" is given the authority to bear the sword and not in vain. He bears it to punish evil, and thus restrain it. So the officer of the law may act under cover of this authority and thus fulfill the divine responsibility that Paul says is given to those who govern.

The nations are beasts. They possess armies to restrain each other and by extension the evil they would otherwise commit. It is naive to assume that armies cause wars and that war can be eliminated by getting rid of armies. You might as well say that police cause crime. Men cause wars. Deliberate weakness would only create vulnerability and power imbalance and increase the very thing you hope to avoid. Now you might suggest that you would have faith that God would provide some compensating protection. Which is interesting because you would never think to apply this logic to police. It is also presumptuous because it amounts to a direct demand for miraculous intervention. It ignores the fact that God provides every day through the ordinary and commonplace means that he decrees in order to achieve his ends. Like the police officer who stands ready at risk of his own life to use lethal violence to defend you. Or the soldier who does the same.

carl

Anonymous said...

Carl,
I have copied and pasted your reply to Tim because it effectively and succinctly sums up both the strengths and the limitations of a narrowly-focused 'Christomonistic' ethic that seeks to derive Christian ethics exclusively from the Sermon on the Mount. It's just for that reason that good Christian folk like Amish and Hutterites are not only conscientious objectors to military service, but also don't participate in the police, tax collection and other coercive activities of the modern state - matters on which, on the surface, the Sermon on the Mount has apparently little to say, while the rest of the Scriptures (OT and NT) do. That was the point of my reference to Calvin and 'the third use of the Law'.
At its heart, the Sermon on the Mount is about the purification of our hearts ('Be holy as your heavenly Father is only) through the transformation of our vision and values ('Seek first His kingdom'). It is not and never was intended to be a charter for statecraft, which at best should be based on justice and order ('good government' as they modestly and wisely say in Canada, avoiding their neighbor's fatuous 'pursuit of happiness'), with the coercive powers of police, taxation, and judicial punishment to enforce the same.
'Death by a thousand exceptions' does sum up the way the revisionist argument goes. Christian ethics always seeks to understand the purpose of a generally stated law, then to obey God's purpose from the heart - the very opposite of bare legalism. It is difficult to equate lying to an SS death squad occupying your country with lying to a tax inspector investigating fraud.

Martin

Tim Chesterton said...

Carl and Martin:

Thank you for your very thoughtful replies. Today (Thursday in my hemisphere and Carl's - I don't know where you live, Martin) is sermon preparation day for me, so I don't expect to have time to give them the thorough attention they deserve. I did however want to let you know that I was not ignoring you or ducking out. I will get back to you Friday, or Saturday at the latest.

Meantime, in the spirit of loving your enemies and praying for them, you might pray that the good Lord would give me clarity of thought, not only with my sermon preparation but also as I mull over what you have said and ponder my response!

Yours in Christ,

Tim

Anonymous said...

Tim, you are not my enemy and I hope I'm not yours!
Every blessing for All Saints-tide.
It is always good to recall that vast throng of believers before us who struggled with the same and worse issues than we face, who didn't always get it right, and yet who were justified by the grace of Christ, and sanctified by the Holy Spirit, and ran the race that was before them. May we be marching in that number, too, looking unto Jesus, the author and perfecter of our faith.

Martin (simul justus et peccator)

Tim Chesterton said...

Hi Carl and Martin:

Thanks for your patience. Thursday (Sermon preparation day) was immediately followed by Friday (full day of work, followed by my 55th birthday party, family supper including adult children and grandson, followed by hours of playing music with friends).

It seems to me that the heart of Carl's argument is his plea for continuity of understanding between the Old Testament and the New Testament. I quote: 'The God who revealed Himself in the person of Jesus Christ was the same immutable God who killed the entire Assyrian army at the gates of Jerusalem. The same immutable God who destroyed the Egyptian Army in the waters of the Red Sea. The same immutable God who dispatched the nation of Israel to judge Canaan with the sword.'

In other words, we are bound by the authority of the OT to understand the words of Jesus (and the God he revealed) as being in complete harmony with what had already been revealed in the OT texts.

I find this an untenable position. First, because it fails to take seriously the Bible as an unfolding story of God's revelation. Surely progressive revelation means that the truth as revealed in Jesus is purer and clearer and more accurate than anything that has gone before? This is the whole point of the epistle to the Hebrews, that the New Covenant is a better covenant. Long ago and in various ways God spoke to our ancestors by the prophets, but in these last days he has spoken to us by his Son. 'He is the reflection of God's glory and bears the impress of God's own being'. The author goes on, of course, to argue that Jesus is far superior to angels - which was relevant, given the common Jewish understanding in the NT era that the Law was given by the mediation of angels. The clear implication is that Jesus' revelation is higher and better; indeed, some scholars think that Hebrews was written to dissuade persecuted Christians from reverting to Judaism.

Second, the balance between continuity and discontinuity in our understanding of the two testaments is always tricky. The Anabaptists perhaps erred a little too much in the side of discontinuity (and here I no doubt follow them). The magisterial reformation, I believed, erred too much on the side of continuity - to the point of denying that there was any discontinuity - and Carl has shown himself to be the heir of that tradition here.

But the discontinuity is not the invention of Tim Chesterton, Menno Simons or Michael Sattler - it is the invention of Jesus and the gospel writers. After all, it is Mark who says 'Thus he declared all foods clean' - thus sweeping away all the complicated OT dietary laws, which were laid down in great detail by the voice of God in the Pentateuch. Who does Jesus think he is, contradicting Yahweh and saying that it was no longer his will for people to avoid unclean foods? And it is Jesus, in the Sermon on the Mount, who says over and over again "You have heard that it was said...but I say to you..."

Imagine an argument similar to the one Carl makes, but on the subject of the food laws. 'The God who revealed himself in the person of Jesus Christ was the same immutable God who spent so long laying out in such detail the grounds on which certain animals could be eaten and certain were to be avoided'. Ergo, we are forbidden from understanding the gospel in any way that calls into question what came before, so when Jesus says that what makes a person unclean is not what goes into him, but what comes out of him, he can't possible mean that all foods are clean, because that would be to change the character of God in the OT. Except that Mark did, after all, say 'thus he declared all foods clean'

Continued...

Tim Chesterton said...

Continuing...

You have said that the Sermon on the Mount is not a political document. I would agree, and I would deny that the Gospel of Jesus Christ is compatible with any human political system. However, that does not mean that the Sermon on the Mount does not have political implications. For instance, when Jesus says "If someone compels you to go one mile, go with him two" he is referring to a political system in which a Roman soldier could compel a person to carry his pack for one mile. The 'enemy' in view here is definitely not just someone who I have a personal enmity for - he is a political enemy, a member of the army of occupation.

This makes nonsense of the idea that the command to love our enemies in Matthew 5 cannot possibly include the soldiers of the enemy army. The soldiers of the enemy army were exactly who Jesus had in mind in 5:41. The whole point of 38-48 is that there is no escape from the command to love - fellow-Israelite, fellow-Christian, wicked, opponent in lawsuit, enemy soldier, beggar on the street, those who love you and those who persecute you. It is helpfully paraphrased in the New Jerusalem Bible as 'You must therefore set no bounds to your love, just as your heavenly Father sets no bounds to his' (5:48).

Can nations be pacifist? Of course they can't! But the question Jesus is addressing in this part of the Sermon is not whether for not nations should go to war against each other - he obviously assumes that they will, because as you say, Carl (echoing Daniel and Revelation) the nations are beasts. No, the question is whether the multinational community which is the Christian Church should participate when the beasts go to war - or do we, in fact, have a different calling as followers of Jesus, to show love and forgiveness to good and bad alike?

Now, Carl, you have pushed me on the implications of pacifism, that it is never applied to the officer of the Law or to the police, and you are right to do so. Martin correctly points out the long-standing Anabaptist tradition of not participating in political office, lawmaking activities etc, and I note that in the apostolic tradition of Hippolytus one of the offices forbidden to catechumens was that of judge, because of the obligation to impose the death penalty.

I will freely admit that I have not yet worked out all the consequences of my (relatively new-found) pacifism in tho area, and the result is some tension and ambiguity. But I would submit that the ambiguity is not all on my side. The just war tradition has in the past been used to justify wars in which Christians kill their fellow-Christians, fellow-members of the Body of Christ, at the command of the state.Henry V (a pious Christian in his own eyes) ordered the slaughter of the French prisoners after the battle of Agincourt (all of whom would also have called themselves Christians); soldiers on both sides of WW1 believe themselves to be fighting for God and country, and it is well known that the atom bomb that fell on Hiroshima wiped out eight orders of Roman Catholic nuns. How can that possibly be consistent with the command for Christians to love their fellow-Christians? In the Bible we are told that children have a special place in God's heart and that in heaven their angels continually behold the face of God. And yet in WW2, pilots and bomb-aimers who had no count gone to church the week before and pledged themselves to follow Jesus dropped bombs on civilians which they were well aware would fall on non-combatant families, including children. How can that possibly be compatible with what Jesus has to say about the children being his representatives? ('Anyone who welcomes one such child in my name...')

To be continued...

Tim Chesterton said...

Continued...

Now, as for lying: I don't really see how you are contradicting my position. You have said, 'That intent to harm another (especially that I might thereby to protect myself) is the essence of lying'. Presumably you feel that lying in the context of espionage or wartime is justified for Christians, because it does not fall within the boundaries of this definition. But it seems to me that the intention to deceive the enemy, so that I may harm them and protect myself from harm, is precisely what lying in espionage or wartime is all about.

It seems to me that what your argument boils down to is simply this: 'We live in the real world, where human nature is fallen, people are evil, and if evil people threaten to do evil things to good people, good people have no choice but to come down off their high horse and confront evil with evil, so that the good will eventually triumph and not the evil'.

Well, that sounds like a common-sense argument to me (although the distinction between good and evil starts to get very murky when you're swimming in those waters). But I would argue that this is precisely the argument that some of our gay and lesbian sisters and brothers in Christ are making. Whether or not God's intent at creation was that a minority of human beings be gay and lesbian (or bi-, or trans-, or whatever), the fact is that today there are faithful Christians who find themselves wired in this way. And don't ever forget, as a dear lesbian friend of mine once said to me, "It's not just about sex, it's about who you're wired to love".

Well, this is the real world. Every pastor who is accessible knows this - sooner or later you're going to have conversations with people who will tell you a long story about all the years they've tried to deny it, have prayed that God would release them from it, have wondered whether they're going to go to hell because of it, etc. etc. And I would think that you, Carl, who are arguing that living in the real world means we can't pretend that the consequences of the Fall do not exist, would be the first to see that this has implications in other areas of Christian ethics as well.

Right - now I'm done! (I don't know that I have anything to add to what I've said here, and of course every argument by me is answerable by you (and vice-versa), so at some point we may decide that 'everything that can possibly be argued on either side of this subject has already been argued' - and that would be fine with me, too).