Monday, October 30, 2017

Celebrating the Reformation (1/2) UPDATED

Heaps across the internet about the 500th anniversary of the Reformation so not much need for me to offer more words so a self-restriction to two posts, one today and one tomorrow.

Today's one is courtesy of a lovely article by Archbishop Justin Welby, here.

Tomorrow - to tease your interest - will be the best one line description of the Reformation you will ever see/hear on mainstream television ...

H/T to Andrei who has sent a link in comments below to this rationale from Stanley Hauerwas for why he is a Protestant.

TBF (to be frank) I think I have more reasons for being Protestant than the great man does,* though I agree with him that the Roman Catholic church presides over a past and present rich theological heritage, which all should continue to mine deeply into.

I am not so sanguine as Hauerwas that the work of the Protestant-led Reformation is done within Roman Catholicism. Indulgences, for instance, still exist (even if they are no longer able to be purchased with coin). There remains, in my and others' view, a continuing lack of complete confidence in the mercy and grace of God, demonstrated, for instance, in prayers at a funeral which continue to seek mercy for the departed. And there is, of course, the matter, sometimes discussed here, of whether Vatican II will continue to be embraced by the upper echelons of Catholic leadership. Hauerwas sees Vatican II as part of the Protestant Reformation's influence on the aggiornamento of the church.

However, I wish to learn from the history of the last 500 hundred years and make the point of such criticisms not that the RCC should be better - no church is perfect - but that Protestantism need not be ashamed or feel (in a Catholic phrase I have heard re the Anglican church) like "the younger brother". The Reformation opened our eyes to the grace and mercy of God mediated through the one Mediator, Jesus Christ our Lord and Saviour. We must not close them.

AND Bosco Peters' has a fulsome post with key texts here.

38 comments:

Bryden Black said...

Yes Peter; a most helpful piece from the ABC. The ambiguities of the Reformation are just that, ambiguous. Though I sense myself the ink is in the black and not the red - with puns all round! And of course I say that having enjoyed a marriage with a still practising member of the RCC for the past 40 years. As B16 calls folk like us, we are "prophetic tokens". Happy Halloween!!

Peter Carrell said...

There is nothing token about you, Bryden :)

Of course "token" is a word which represents one unfortunate outcome of the Reformation, re a certain understanding of the body and blood of Christ ...

Bryden Black said...

Re token: From the mouth of some only Peter! From B16, I doubt we've an empty sign ...

Andrei said...

From the Washington Post: The Reformation is over. Protestants won. So why are we still here?

Peter Carrell said...

Thanks Andrei
Worth a link in the main body of the post ... slightly puzzling though Hauerwas is!

Anonymous said...

Hi Peter, you mention your doubts about Rome’s complete confidence in the mercy and grace of God; your example being the requiem mass. I’m not quite sure that I understand Protestants’ confidence either. Although there is a risk that we could very quickly get into an area where I am not academically qualified to answer, Roman teaching is at least clear to me. If you commit a mortal sin (a good guide is a 10C breach) and die without confessing that sin to God and the body of Christ (the latter is thankfully a priest not the whole congregation), then the Catechism really only has hot options. Purgatory is for those who confessed everything. Now, to be frank, I hope Protestants are right with justification by faith except I don’t understand what that means. Romans clearly says that I can’t go on sinning so that grace increases. So far so good, but what if I do go on sinning? If further sin does not affect my eternal state, what does it affect? Do I need to confess ( the bible says yes) but what for? Am I not once saved always saved with unconditional election? Then there are some Protestants who seem to agree with Catholics that you can lose your state of grace/salvation. It’s all a bit random, isn’t it?

Nick

Peter Carrell said...

Hi Nick
I suggest we distinguish between two situations:
(1) a person has entrusted their life to Christ and taken hold of the promise in 1 John 1:8 that if we confess our sins [e.g. through daily confession to God in prayer] we are forgiven: when they die, as I understand it, a Protestant funeral service expresses confidence that the grace of God revealed through Scripture gives confidence that God's grace is sure (Blessed assurance!) whereas a Roman funeral service (and, TBF, some versions of Anglican funeral services) involve prayers which continue to seek the mercy of God on the departed's soul. I remain firmly Protestant at this point.
(2) a person has been a Christian but has wandered from the straight and narrow, no one is sure whether or not, even in their last breath, they repented of unconfessed sin, etc (as per your above), then, in such situation, I accept, that between Protestant and Roman theologies of salvation there is what is technically known as "quite a bit of hand-wringing" in which mantras are said as hands are wrung, involving words such as "election," "perseverance," "purgatory," "hell," "heaven," "judgment," "unconfessed sin," etc, prefaced by detailed discussions about Romans 6 and Ephesians 1 and 2.

Nevertheless, I am confident, as I am sure you are, that, beyond the randomness of our human discussion of such matters, the God of righteousness will do the right thing by all the creatures God loves.

Father Ron Smith said...

"a Protestant funeral service expresses confidence that the grace of God revealed through Scripture gives confidence that God's grace is sure (Blessed assurance!) whereas a Roman funeral service (and, TBF, some versions of Anglican funeral services) involve prayers which continue to seek the mercy of God on the departed's soul. I remain firmly Protestant at this point." - P.C.

It's not very often I find myself agreeing with Nick on anything, Peter, but I do have to affirm his understanding of souls in paradise - the place where Jesus went to preach to the dead with the repentant thief.

Paul is quite explicit in his understanding that when Christ comes again "Those who have died in Christ will be raised first (they are not raised yet) and those who are left will be caught up with them in the air".

The catholic prayer for the dead, to "Requiescat in pace" is a perfectly normal expectation from those of us who have the understanding of a soul being perfected to meet its Maker - quite consistent with the catholic understanding of 'Life after Death'. Our understanding of the accredited Saints, is that they need no further purification, having died to sin in their earthly lifetime. Not a bad theology, I reckon, and one to be commended to Protestants. It is believed by the majority of Christians.

Anonymous said...

Hi Nick, try this--

https://confessingevangelical.wordpress.com/2008/01/04/why-justification-by-faith-is-not-quite-protestant/

And have a Merry Reformation Quincentennial!

BW

Anonymous said...

Postscript: And this--

http://www.ctsfw.net/media/pdfs/carysolafide.pdf

BW

Bryden Black said...

Re your last Bowman: I surely agree with the Lutheran depiction of sacraments as "visible words." Powerfully helpful

Bryden Black said...

This was an enlightening distinction which I was not aware of in quite this form. However, I'd also say that the NT uses of baptism are not quite the same as late medieval and therefore Lutheran ones.

See for example Rom 6, notably the reference to the NT Catechism at v.17 within all that talk of baptism - and its implications of not only "consider" but put off and put on as in Eph 4 and Col 3, which will be echoed two chapters later at Rom 8:13. And then compare these lines of Pauline theology with the likes of chapter 8 in my LDL, with its anti-Arian backlash setting of the medieval sacramental universe, which is the setting for understanding Luther - I hazard.

Anonymous said...

Hi Peter, re your (1) the CCC is clear that there are no second chances. Souls in purgatory are saved. We Catholics cannot pray for the unsaved dead. When we ask the dead to pray for us, they are saved.

Nick

Anonymous said...

Bowman, Carey’s argument is very attractive. Thanks for bringing it to my attention.

Nick

Anonymous said...

Fr Ron; I’m sure we agree on most things, we just don’t write about them. I wish you a blessed All Saints Day and pray for your faithful parish SMAA.

Nick

Anonymous said...

Peter, I forgot to address indulgences. Yes, we still have them (though only for temporal results of sin) and Francis incorporated them into the year of mercy. It’s probably fair to say that parishioner level Vatican 2 Catholics don’t know much about them. As for Rev Bosco Peters’ comment on Anglicans doing less than he expected to mark the 500 years, my parish has done a few things with local Lutherans. We never thought of you lot. Are you actually real protestants:)?

Anonymous said...

Nick, I leap at any chance to repay your many incisive comments here.

Coincidentally-- or not?-- my links yesterday have synergy.

Especially in the reading of the late Tomas Mannermaa (see Kirsi Stjerna's summary on the other Reformation thread), Luther's basic argument about the nature of divine love in the Heidelberg Disputation of 1518--

http://www.bookofconcord.org/heidelberg.php

--offers strong motivation for Cary's argument (NB all the theses culminate in the last one)--

https://confessingevangelical.wordpress.com/2008/01/04/why-justification-by-faith-is-not-quite-protestant/

http://www.ctsfw.net/media/pdfs/carysolafide.pdf

--and both inform what Douglas Campbell says about St Paul's views on participation and sin--

https://tinyurl.com/yab8tsj6

https://tinyurl.com/y8td6dkm

In other words, the conservative Reformation is probably best seen, not as a precursor to the Reformed faith that crystalised in the C17, but rather as an alternate summation of the medieval theology of the West for which the latter have no deep affinity. Indeed, Rome (eg B16), after engaging *nouvelle theologie* and Karl Barth at the 2VC is now closer to Luther than most of today's Protestants. Which explains why the Reformation continues in our time mostly as a high church and ecumenical critique of the kind of evangelicalism that is dilute Reformed, itself a dilution of Luther and even Calvin. But I should not ramble on since, on the blessed isles where everything is better, you surely do not know any Protestants like that, least of all among Anglicans.

Bowman Walton

Peter Carrell said...

Hi Nick
Thanks for your clarity around the CCC. I think a remaining question or two in my mind concerns how the CCC can be so clear re the fate of people according to categories of (unconfessed) sin, as well as the existence of purgatory is a place of sanctifying improvement, when Scripture (as best I can tell!) is reticent about things such as categories of sin and the existence of purgatory.

By contrast Scripture says a lot, with clarity, on the overwhelming power of the grace of God and yet, seemingly, in some Catholic (including Anglo-) approaches to death, prayers are prayed which seem less certain than Scripture of the mercy of God on sinners ...

Nevertheless the CCC is a mighty logically interlocking fortress of doctrine and ethics, so I don't suppose my few remarks will penetrate its thick walls!

Are Anglicans truly Protestant? Some of us are. Of course the really, truly, genuinely Protestant among us never celebrate special days. Not Christmas and not 500 years of Protestantism :)

Father Ron Smith said...

Thank you, Nick, for your kind remarks. We had a joyful Mass at SMAA, CHC., this morning for All The Saints, during which their numinous presence was felt. We will have 2 Celebration of The Faithful Departed tomorrow (2.Nov.) to thank God for their life with us on earth and commending them to the purifying grace of God while at Rest in Paradise - where they await Christ's Second Coming (cf St.Paul in the 1 Ephesians, Chapter 4: verses 13 - 18).

As you will have gathered from Peter's comments, not all Anglicans bother to commemorate the Faithful Departed in this way. That is why I retain my Anglo-Catholic heritage, as well as the best of the Reformed Tradition.

Rest eternal grant to them, O Lord and let light perpetual shine upon them!
May they rest now in peace and rise one day with Christ in glory. Amen.

Anonymous said...

Bryden, we may have an historical Luther in an anti-Arian backlash, or we may still be looking on him with a rather German post-Kantian lens that minimises the influence of the Rhineland mystics. Pieper (early C20, US) and Mannermaa (early C21, Finland) both find a *theosis* in Luther that the Book of Concord did not! But anyway doesn't Luther's *baptizatus sum!* make even more sense when the act is viewed as an event within the perichoresis of the Trinity? It would be interesting to track this forward from contemporary studies (eg Wright, Martyn, Gaventa, Campbell) of Romans 5-8 that take a clear position on assurance.

Bowman

Anonymous said...

"Of course the really, truly, genuinely Protestant among us never celebrate special days. Not Christmas and not 500 years of Protestantism :)

And those, Nick, are Anglicans who do not understand Luther at all and only half-understand Calvin. Only in a sociological sense can we say that they are Protestant.

BW

Anonymous said...

And Nick, you must promise not to let anyone in the pews in on the secret, but nearly all of the systematicians most respected at the close of the last century clearly were, or could be plausibly read as being, Mother-Teresa-sipping-tea-with-Adolf-Hitler universalists. And many Evangelicals unwilling to go that far have followed John Stott's exegesis to annihilationism-- the most wicked are raised just long enough to be judged and disappeared. But apart from that, anybody can go to Heaven and some say everybody will.

Nearly as striking is the fact that the remaining infernalists worth considering are nearly all of C. S. Lewis's view that the damned have intentionally opted out of Heaven. True, one of the medieval popes said that Dante had put all the right people in his Inferno. And +++ Francis has said that the Mafia have a strong case for admission to Hell. But even at that, though the location is horrible and the experience unpleasant, it is hard and maybe impossible to get in without a certain misguided determination. Which makes Hell sound like Yale.

So I wonder why we do not all celebrate All Saints as Father Ron does? It would at least have the advantage of reminding people of the New Testament's two-step eschatology-- not life after death, but life after life after death, as Tom Wright puts it. And it would even be an occasion for pointing out that the Bible does not hold out any hope of leaving the earth, our fragile island home. Rather, "heaven is in love with the productions of time," and the redeemed will walk the streets of the New Jerusalem.

Bowman Walton

Bryden Black said...

Now that Bowman sounds like a goodly agenda: That central theological section of Romans via the spectacles of various contemporary exegetes. And while "assurance" is one thread, I see 5:1-5 as setting that agenda.

As for 'Reading' Luther: years ago I read a book on Luther and the sacraments which emphasized his attributing their significance to the work of the Holy Spirit. And intriguingly Calvin too has quite a bit to say similarly in the Institutes. Attributable to the mystics ...? Indeed; perhaps.

Finally; yes, I've been following the Luther theosis discussion, but thought Pieper was a Thomist first and foremost. Shall have to follow that agenda too!

Anonymous said...

Hi Peter, I have just checked the CCC on hell. Paragraph 1037 seems to assume persistence in the mortal sin to the very end as a prerequisite. In that light, it may be that Bowman’s mischievous short guest list is a possibility worth exploring. The link to the CCC is here http://www.vatican.va/archive/ENG0015/__P2O.HTM
I must say that the Carey observations on Luther are the best thing I have read all year; not because I usually read terrible stuff, but because Carey is on to something, though I haven’t fully worked out what. As an aside, the CCC on justification and grace would seem unobjectionable to Anglicans. If anyone has time, it’s here http://www.vatican.va/archive/ENG0015/__P6Y.HTM
On mortal sin, Peter, as I understand it, they are sins that quench sanctifying grace. There is no definitive list though you can find them on the net. I agree that the label is not biblical, but the concept is in the 10Cs and the sermon on the mount. Purgatory is one of those things I put down to the very logical approach of the RC church. I was familiar with John Stott’s afterlife mentioned by Bowman. It's more palatable than purgatory but seems a bit politically correct twentieth century style.

Fr Ron, I’m mindful that you lost your parish priest earlier this year and you will no doubt pray for him tomorrow. Like you, I find praying for the faithful departed moving and appropriate.
Bowman, I did consider the links you provided. Thank you. As I have hinted above, I need to think a bit before I type.

Nick

Father Ron Smith said...

"As for 'Reading' Luther: years ago I read a book on Luther and the sacraments which emphasized his attributing their significance to the work of the Holy Spirit. And intriguingly Calvin too has quite a bit to say similarly in the Institutes. Attributable to the mystics ...? Indeed; perhaps. " - Bryden B. -

Indeed, Bryden. This is the heart of classical Catholic theology of the sacramental life of the Church. Jesus DID say: "When the Spirit comes...."
The epiclesis is an important feature, for instance, in the Eucharistic empowerment of the Real Presence of Christ. Some Protestants seem not to have understood this vital element of the Eucharistic Celebration. Also, in Baptism, the sacramental signs of water and chrism (anointing with oil) are the 'outward and visible' signs of the Holy Spirit's presence.

Peter Carrell said...

Hi Nick
That is indeed a most acceptable statement on justification by faith.
So acceptable that I think clause 1995 says what I am saying: that God the Spirit works in us the sanctification which is entailed by justification ... and no further prayers after death are required!

Bryden Black said...

Well Ron (Nov 2); your post displays some very curious mixtures:
1. When you conclude as you do, with "outward and visible", that's Western Augustinian sacramental traditional language, established from the 9th C onwards to handle the debate abt "communicating grace". Precisely because of the anti-Arian backlash that left a mediatorial vacuum. The climax of that tradition saw Lateran 4 in 1215 formulate "transubstantiation" as THE solution.
2. Meanwhile and all along, the East kept alive the Epiclesis. This did not enter Western purview until the Scottish Episcopalians fancied it and later the 1928 BCP revision tried to have officially formulated.
3. So; hardly Catholic.
4. As for the Johannine Upper Room references re the Paraclete: they are mostly to do with Jesus' words - if we follow the text carefully. That's what's significant re Jn 4 - the gift Messiah brings is both Spirit and Words of Revelation (following Proverbs), enabling true worship. Sure; the Holy Spirit does convey the glorified Jesus, in exactly the same way Jesus conveys the Father's Presence in words + deeds. So there's ample justification for the Epiclesis: not least the Early Church's trinitarian Thanksgiving Prayer of Father (creation and economy of salvation), Son (formal command to do this thing with bread and wine - and cheese and olives etc originally!) and Holy Spirit (invocation upon people's gathering, celebration and 'somehow', latterly, elements of bread and wine).

All in all Ron, I do think it's helpful to be careful to distinguish carefully all these elements (puns intended)! For that way we may better drive to the heart of what Jesus thought he was actually instituting. And which frankly the various churches have perhaps/probably rather muddled up ...

Anonymous said...

Clarification: My reference to Pieper (early C20, US) at 12:44 is not to Josef Pieper, the German Catholic author of many fine books of Thomist philosophy but to Franz Pieper, the German-American Lutheran theologian and churchman who wrote the multi-volume Christian Dogmatics that is still authoritative for Lutheran clergy and teachers in the Lutheran Church-Missouri Synod (LC-MS).

(1) Some say that his account of union with Christ in Luther is better-- closer to Luther's corpus as a whole; even less distorted by German post-Kantianism-- than Tomas Mannermaa's.

(2) I often wonder whether Anglican evangelicals, even on the most blessed isles, are more akin to LC-MS than to TEC or ACNA.

(3) In Pieper's day, one simply could not lead a major Lutheran church without theological credentials, and the major controversies of the time concerned *universal objective justification* which is close to what Anglicans know as *hypothetical universalism*.

(4) Although the similarity is complicated by German-Norwegian differences, Franz Pieper is the best exemplar of the sort of theology Robert Jenson encountered in figures like Herman Preus when he was a student at Luther College and Luther Seminary.

Speaking of whom--

http://www.christianitytoday.com/ct/2017/september-web-only/robert-w-jenson-tribute-because-god-is.html?start=2

BW

Father Ron Smith said...

Bryden, I find that in an economy of words, one can convey ideas so much more simply and effectively. No doubt your academic training has taught you to make an impressive word-count - merely to convey a simple truth: "Where are your wise men now...?", or:
"I bless you Father, Lord of heaven and of earth, for hiding these things from the learned and clever, and revealing them to the simple - for that is what it has pleased you to do" - Jesus. I guess, too, Bryden, that is an abiding work of the Holy Spirit - to free us from obfuscation about the things that really matter.

Bryden Black said...

Thank you Bowman for that living testimony to that glorious couple! Sadly, I only met them once, in 2009 at Otago where he gave the Burns Lectures which became Canon & Creed. I always felt it utterly providential to find Triune Identity in Harare of all places!!!

Anonymous said...

I wish that we had not had to read that.

BW

Peter Carrell said...

Hi Bowman
Does that comment by you refer to a comment above or to the 95 theses I linked to in today's (Thursday) post?

Peter Carrell said...

Hi Bowman
Does that comment by you refer to a comment above or to the 95 theses I linked to in today's (Thursday) post?

Anonymous said...

No, Peter, I wish that I had not had to read Fr Ron's attack on Bryden at 2:16.

BW

Bryden Black said...

Well Ron; next time you have koinonia in the elements of bread and wine, I trust you'll more richly know him in whom we have come to believe.

Father Ron Smith said...

This evening, Bryden, when, at SMAA, we commemorate the Faithful Departed "and those whose faith is know to God alone". Blessings!

Peter Carrell said...

Hi Bowman
Re your comment: "2) I often wonder whether Anglican evangelicals, even on the most blessed isles, are more akin to LC-MS than to TEC or ACNA."
I think the answer is "possibly."
But there are varieties of evangelicals.
In my experience some seem close to the Reformed Church; others to Grace Vineyard churches ...

Bryden Black said...

It began simply enough Ron with your Catechism class of Nov 2, at 11:51. Then you proffered a follow up at 2:16. But this time the mode had become somewhat hectoring. What was missed of course was the point: hence my own brief response at 5:55, Twitter style ... And now for something more robust.

Given your self-confessed delight in things Eucharistic and your tradition, it might be important to ask that classic question: what is the sacrament's res? And the question has become especially pertinent in light of the liturgical renewal movement of the last century. Old answers no longer quite cut it. Furthermore, in the context of celebrating the Reformation, it has even greater pertinence.

You would of course speak of meeting with Christ in and through the sacrament: you've said as much here on ADU. I would simply ask, which/what "Christ"? Behind that question is my staunch endorsement of Anglicanism's calling of an ordained ministry of word + sacrament. That very combination takes on a special focus also in light of the last century. What indeed might be the res of the sacrament now?!

My own trenchant summary in the diagram/chart of God's Address is, under "continuation" of our 'baptism' into Christ Jesus: New Passover rite celebrating koinonia in the Mediator of the New Exodus and the New Covenant, in the midst of the New Temple. Of course, any summary presupposes all the material in the previous bible study sessions, "reading, marking, learning, and inwardly digesting them." The material 'read' now through precisely the sorts of lenses honed by my earlier comment of 12:46. For it's frankly rather exciting to be able to sift through the vicissitudes of sacramental history, and, via that, read afresh the NT material in its 1st C Jewish context. Just so, my summary above. And what again might your own res be, in light of all this now? For the goal surely is worship in Spirit and in Truth - what a Glorious Presence!