Pilate, pitch perfect?

Wonderful, challenging article here, from First Things, on, well, Pilate, but more than Pilate, on all of us who deliberate and prognosticate on what is truth and what the truth is.

Another world

The reason why I was "incommunicado" this past week was a visit to the Chatham Islands.

Most of the Diocese of Christchurch is an easy drive from my home or the Anglican Centre. Only 3/58 parishes on this side of the Southern Alps are more than 2 hours drive away. 2/58 parishes on the West Coast side of the Alps are more than 3 hours drive away, with the furthest away church building being 5 hours drive. That is, 52/58 parishes are within 120 minutes of my home and most of that driving is on fairly straight roads.

Those doing the arithmetic as they read will want to know about the one remaining parish. That is the Chatham Islands, 2.25 hrs flying time from Christchurch (and longer, if, as Teresa and I did, the flights are via Wellington) - east, out into the Pacific, next stop Chile.

It was our privilege to spend a week on the main island (Chatham, also known as Rekohu to Moriori and as Wharekauri to Maori). We were generously hosted and visited most but not all sites of interest. I won't detain you with the general (and very interesting) history of these islands and their people - Wikipedia can do that job.

This was my first visit to this parish, so one essential job was to preach and preside at a eucharist last Sunday, in St Augustine's church, Te One. This photo includes the Vicarage where we stayed. (There is currently no resident vicar. Regular priestly ministry is supplied via an NZ-based priest.)

There used to be a second church, at another small settlement, St Barnabas', Owenga. Services were discontinued there about 14 years ago and the church was demolished a few years ago. Keen to preserve the memory of that church, however, parishioners have worked hard to organise the building of a memorial shelter on the site of the former church. So last Wednesday we dedicated this brand new "St Barnabas' Memorial."

We had a great meal after the dedication and it include important local foods: fish, crayfish, paua (=abalone), and weka (one of these native birds is pictured above). It is illegal to kill and eat weka in New Zealand, except in the Chatham Islands.

We visited two sites on which an 1840s Lutheran mission team established mission stations. The information panel above (if you can expand the photograph of it) tells a sad story. The mission only lasted a few years. It made no converts of local Maori or Moriori. The missionaries gave up being missionaries and decided, those who stayed, to simply make their living there. As one brought up on many missionary stories, some of which were tales of persistence, faithfulness and only after many years, eventual fruitfulness, this is the saddest missionary story I have come across. It is a salutary reminder that there is no guarantee of success simply because we set out to do God's work with godly intentions.

By contrast I am pleased to report that the Christians I came across on the island in 2019 have a lively faith in God, a deep commitment to the well-being of God's church and a care for community and for creation.

We had an amazing week - much of the landscape was unlike anything else I have seen on NZ's main islands; apart from a few i-moments, we had no internet connection to family, friends, and the world; we ate weka for the first time; we waved to everyone who drove a car and they waved back; we never locked the doors of the vicarage; we ate fresh, raw paua during a picnic; and saw ancient carvings on trees.

It was another world. And it was good.

Incommunicado

My diocese has some remote corners to it. Today I am heading to one of them. The likelihood of e-connection to the other corners of the Diocese, let alone “the world”, is so low, I have zero expectations of Tweeting up a storm. Silence is golden and internet silence is platinum! So, don’t post a comment, unless you want it to lie fallow until my return. I only ask one expression of sorrow for my connectiveless sojourn ... I am worried that I might not be able to follow NZ v England in the cricket World Cup final at Lord’s on Sunday evening (NZ time) ... :).

Apology, apologia, aggiornamento

Apology

A few posts ago, here,  a robust conversational thread included a claim that such and such was the view of another commenter. Within the thread I treated that as a difference in evaluation, an opinion, rather than as a true/false claim. I have now reviewed the thread and accept that the claim is unfounded. I have posted an apology on that thread. Over the years I have been a less than perfect moderator and I accept that in this instance I have been less than fair in moderating the claim made without evidence.

Apologia

That Topic continues to rumble on. In following a recent exchange on Twitter, I have had a bit of a revelation. It concerns slavery. Hitherto a line of thought has been expressed with a question such as "if the church changed its mind on slavery, why couldn't it change its mind on same sex partnerships?" But that has been a cue for discussions about what the church really thought of slavery, whether there was a trajectory within Scripture re slavery (towards abolishing slavery) which does not exist for homosexuality, etc.

My personal revelation is this: whatever the church (and Israel) was thinking about slavery in the New Testament (and in the Old Testament), by our standards today (slavery is anathema), the church/Israel accommodated slavery. It was wrong, it denied the full and equal dignity of all human beings, it was proleptically destroyed by the cross (which re-created all people as brothers and sisters, see Philemon). Nevertheless the church lived with slavery as part of the culture of its world - culture being the way we do things around here - and sought to make the best of it by asking slave-owners to treat their slaves well and urging slaves to serve in a manner bearing witness to Christ.

That is, the church in NT times was able to offer an apologia for slavery. No church would do that today. If there was a justification for the ancient church being accommodationist on slavery it was that to have attacked that institution would have been to provoke the fury of the socio-economic established order, in the process destroying the church as carrier of the gospel message.

On That Topic: could we ask ourselves whether we are sufficiently recognising the nature of culture and establishment in the West in respect of a sea change in attitude to homosexuality, and thus also ask whether we are in the process of destroying the church as carrier of the gospel message? (This, I suggest, is part or even the whole of the situation in Australia in respect of Israel Folau.) Why should we think we are smarter than St Paul?

Aggiornamento

I have been travelling recently - perhaps a full report when my travels are completed - but, as is often the case, travelling around the world and connection with the church in its various and varied parts, reminds me that the church is rarely if ever ahead of the world, which ever changes. Thus the question of "aggiornamento", of the updating of the church, impresses me yet again. Of course to move from this very general observation, without examples, to some specific observations would necessarily look like criticism of this (local) church and that (denominational) church, which I don't want to do!

Suffice to say that as we look around and within, observing our arcane disputes and our divisions, on the one hand it is possible (vaguely possible?) to discern that out of present disputes and divisions will come aggiornamento, that is, conclusions which means the church is more fruitful at expressing an "updated" gospel for the world today. On the other hand, it is possible (probable?) that out of these disputes and divisions, the gap between church and world will accelerate to such width that all churches will look like obscure sects. On the third hand, is it possible that we might all wake up one day and recognise that our disputes and divisions could be let go, in favour of a united effort at aggiornamento?

Focus on good (NZCMS) news?

Try as I might to not make this blog mostly about That Topic, the world (Anglican and otherwise) seems to conspire against me. Over the Ditch, in the West Island, the Folau saga continues and continues and continues. While it is now becoming quite a bit about freedom of speech and freedom of religious belief, it has not ceased to also be about whether the Christian gospel requires faithful Christians with a social media presence to spotlight gays and lesbians. Within the last week a troubling story has emerged in the evangelical section of the Church of England - you can catch it in  a recent Thinking Anglicans post. But, enough of that - I acknowledge these news stories but see no need at this time to add to the plethora of comment which circle around them.

Instead I want to link to a good news story here in Anglicanland Down Under. After earlier news that current NZCMS National Director, Steve Maina, is to be the next Bishop of Nelson, we now have news of his successor.

NZCMS announce here that Rosie Fyffe will be the next Director. Rosie will be the first female National Director (or General Secretary) of NZCMS. She will be based in Christchurch and most welcome in the Diocese of Christchurch.

Please continue to pray for Steve and Watiri Maina as they prepare for the their move to Nelson in August and for Steve’s consecration as the 11th Bishop of Nelson on Saturday 31 August 2019.

Lambeth 2020: "a remarkable, though fragile, gift--a sign of the Church catholic"?

The Living Church reports "Bishops Call for Lambeth Conference United in Faith and Charity" which is about a letter signed by "a group of influential and diverse Anglican bishops." These bishops are:
"The Rt. Rev. George R. Sumner, the Episcopal Diocese of Dallas
The Rt. Rev. Michael G. Smith, the Episcopal Diocese of Dallas
The Rt. Rev. Lloyd Emmanuel Allen, Honduras, the Episcopal Church of Honduras (Spanish) 

The Rt. Rev. Dr. Mouneer Hanna Anis, Diocese of Egypt with North Africa and the Horn of Africa (Arabic)
The Rt. Rev. Manuel Ernesto, Nampula, Mozambique (Portuguese)
The Most Reverend Martin Nyaboho, Primate of Burundi, Diocese of Nampula (French)
The Rt. Rev. Joel Waweru, ACK Nairobi Diocese, (Kiswahili)
The Rt. Rev. Emma Ineson, Bishop of Penrith, Church of England 
The Rt. Rev. Lydia Mamakwa, Mishamikoweesh, Anglican Church of Canada
The Most Rev. Daniel Sarfo, Primate of the Church of the Province of West Africa."

The Living Church also reports, "“We aim to express what a traditional, irenic center might look like,” said Bishop George Sumner of the Episcopal Diocese of Dallas, one of the authors. “I think the ground the letter is trying to articulate comprises a significant amount of the [Anglican] Communion.”"

The "irenic centre" may be of special interest here on ADU in view of some recent discussions here in blog comment threads.

The letter has been issued simultaneously on the diocesan websites of the bishops (21 June), in six different languages. Sumner, Waweru and Ineson are members of the Lambeth Design Group which is working on the design of the Lambeth Conference.

In other words this is a potentially important letter, offering a way forward for Lambeth attendance to be very large (including GAFCONites?) and for Lambeth to track the Communion towards the "irenic centre."

But what does the letter say? Its text in English is posted here and reads,

"Dear Brothers and Sisters,

Greetings in our crucified and risen Lord Jesus Christ. We believe that it is the ‘acceptable time’ to articulate a vision of what we hope for in the Lambeth Conference 2020.  While all are free to offer their views, harsh disagreement ought not to be the dominant note the world hears from us.  This multi-lingual letter lifts high those things held largely in common in order to build up and encourage.  We claim no special authority, and thus speak to our fellow bishops as their brothers and sisters. 

WE HOPE FOR A LAMBETH CONFERENCE BUILT ON COMMON FAITH

Though our provincial Books of Common Prayer show many variations, they all witness to the creedal center of our faith: the triune God, the divinity of Christ, His atoning death for the forgiveness of our sins, His bodily resurrection and ascension, and the Holy Spirit’s work in the Scriptures and the Church’s life.  There is agreement, furthermore, in most of the Communion about the received, traditional teaching concerning the nature of marriage, which is in accord with Scripture. It found expression at Lambeth 1998 in Resolution I.10.  Finally, we Anglicans share a common history, for example the See of Canterbury itself, which is a symbol of our apostolic roots and common life.  We hope for a Lambeth Conference where we take this common inheritance of truth seriously and seek to build upon it for the sake of witness and teaching. 

WE HOPE FOR A LAMBETH CONFERENCE MARKED BY CHARITY 

At Lambeth, though a fractious family, we ought still to think of our fellow Anglicans in the best light possible. For example, there have been many important movements of mission and renewal in our Anglican tradition (e.g. the Oxford Movement and the East African Revival), and we can likewise see GAFCON in this way.  We can also appreciate the role Global South Anglicans have played in strengthening the mission of Christ in their provinces. We commend the Primates’ view that only Churches aligned with Communion teaching should represent it in ‘doctrine and polity.’  But we are also willing to listen to our colleagues who hold in conscience dissenting views.  More generally, we all need in our hearts to lay aside old recriminations, as each of us hears these Gospel injunctions: ‘bear one another’s burdens,’ ‘speak the truth in love,’ ‘do not let the sun go down on your wrath’ (Galatians 6:2, Ephesians 4:15,26).

MAY LAMBETH BE AN OCCASION OF HOPE FOR OURSELVES AND FOR THE WORLD

We hope for a Lambeth that is ordered to prayer and the Bible, that nourishes our humility, that opens us to God’s conversion in the Spirit, and that encourages us to renewed forms of teaching and witness which will inspire and attract younger generations in our nations and our churches. It is also crucial that we reject all forms of cultural and racial pride, while listening and deliberating with one another with full respect.  I Peter, upon which Lambeth 2020 will meditate, says it best: ‘have unity of spirit, sympathy, love for one another, a tender heart, and a humble mind…always be ready to make your defense…for the hope that is in you’ (3:8,15).

United in faith, hope, and love, we can at Lambeth confront together the urgent problems in our Communion and in our world.  We all share a worry about what may lie ahead in our common future, for as a divided Church we will struggle to witness to a divided, broken world.  We hold in prayer those among us who face persecution and danger.  We need to be stewards of creation.  We hope for a conference which encourages us all to stand on the side of the poor and those who are maltreated, to call sinners to repentance and to offer forgiveness in the Lord’s name, to walk His way of love, and to seek reconciliation among ourselves and with our neighbors. 

As it did a century ago, we hope Lambeth 2020 will remind us of the ecumenical calling from our Lord to be one as He and the Father are one (John 17:22).  We do so by taking seriously the witness, gifts, and counsel of our brother and sister Christians in other churches.   Within the Communion itself, some have felt frustration with the ‘Instruments’ over the past two decades, as they have struggled to balance autonomy and mutual accountability.  We hope for a Conference that lays out a path ahead in the next decade, and we pray for the patience to walk it.  We hope for a Conference in which we deepen our sense of ‘mutual responsibility and interdependence in the Body of Christ’ (Anglican Congress 1963), both in the program and in personal friendships.

Throughout, may we be reminded that our truly global Communion is not primarily a problem but rather a remarkable, though fragile, gift--a sign of the Church catholic.

Veni Sancte Spiritus. 

Peace,
[signatories, as above]"

Thoughts?
I may comment myself on the letter in my next post.

Two evangelical roads diverged in a wood, and I, I took the road ...

... actually, I don't know if it will turn out to be the one less travelled by :)

A social media exchange during the week gave me a bit of a revelation - not the sort where one learns something for the first time, more the sort where something becomes much, much clearer.

It is something like this:

I think I am evangelical (more on that below**) but there are evangelicals who think I am a false teacher. Why do they think that (apart from the fact that we disagree on some matters)?

The social media exchange highlighted that there is an evangelical approach to Scripture which goes like this:

- Scripture, despite its varied genres, diverse contexts (of original writing and contemporary reading) and multiple authors, provides us with clear teaching which may be expressed propositionally.

- These propositions, once set out, on some agreed lines by authoritative evangelical teachers, construct a sound body of irrefutable, unchangeable, even unchallengeable teaching.

- Should one such proposition or set of propositions come under pressure, there is either staunch, unyielding defence [so, in some quarters, propositions re homosexuality]; or, there is deft logical footwork to slightly revise such proposition or set thereof [so, in some quarters, ordination of women; remarriage of divorcees].

- Interestingly, where there is such slight-but-acceptable revision, there is NEVER any determination (within that quarter of evangelicalism) that the un-revised are now "false teachers": there seems to be capacity within such an evangelical section to live with "two integrities" on the matter (e.g. on ordination of women; or remarriage of divorcees).

- Someone (e.g. me) who disagrees with one (let alone more) of certain propositions is, logically, a false teacher - a person posing as a teacher of the faith who, in fact, teaches a denial of the truth. [So, in certain quarters of Anglican evangelicalism, difference on propositions re homosexuality incurs the false teaching charge but difference on ordination of women or on remarriage of divorcees does not.]

- I suggest that this approach both builds an impressive body of interlocking propositions while seemingly lacking a "self-awareness" that these inter-locking propositions are a human construction which lacks the authority of Scripture (because Scripture does not set down a mandate to so construct; because such construction may contradict another, plausible construction from Scripture; because the NT in particular does not purport to be a set of materials for constructing a new body of law for God's new people; because an outcome of the construction seems at odds with the example of Jesus). [See below for elaborations*].

- Such construction may, however, have some other authority behind it: "this is the logical implication of what Calvin wrote" or "this is required by the canons of the Church of England" or "this is what the Diocese of Y has determined is the policy of Y."

I want to suggest another evangelical approach to Scripture. It goes like this:

- Despite its varied genres, diverse contexts (of original writing and contemporary reading) and multiple authors, Scripture provides us with clear teaching which may be expressed propositionally and in other ways (e.g. through familiar stories such as the Good Samaritan which challenges every hearer every time to not only think about the proposition, Love your neighbour, but also to develop new and renewed understanding of who our neighbour is);
- Teaching from Scripture is only "clear" when it is universally received; without universal reception it is "not yet" clear. If, within evangelicalism, there is agreement about "clear teaching", that agreement may be proposed to the wider church; but if the wider church does not receive it as "clear teaching," then evangelicals should carefully reflect on what it means to adhere to that teaching, to promote and attest to that teaching, and possibly to separate from the church which will not receive it. (Here "possibly" concerns what disputed teaching, if any, justifies separation, because there is no clear teaching in Scripture concerning which matters justify breaking the unity of the church.) It could be that a time will come when evangelical clear teaching will be universally received. It could be that evangelicals will be proved wrong. It could be that evangelicals will simply remain in an ongoing dispute with other parts of their churches - a critical question then being whether there is freedom for evangelicals to continue to teach what is not universally received.
- Scripture is unclear on many matters and evangelicals who treasure Scripture happily acknowledge this; and even apparent clarity can be shattered under new circumstances. John Stott and his teaching is a kind of "gold standard" for Anglican evangelicalism yet his personal conviction was that he should be a pacifist in the context of World War 2 - a war many other British evangelicals fought in. Who was right about what Scripture taught? Presumably both Stott and his non-pacifist evangelical colleagues both thought Scripture was clear on the matter. Logically, doesn't that mean that Scripture is unclear about such matters? Has such lack of clarity held back Anglican evangelicals since WW2 from teaching boldly, confidently, and with clarity what they believe Scripture teaches? No! On the shattering of apparent clarity under new circumstances, consider the impact of Darwin and evolutionary biology. The clear reading of Genesis 1 re a literal six day creation has had to take one of two pathways: continue as though no new circumstance affects that clear reading (so, Creationism) or adapt (so, much but not all evangelicalism, including, in my experience, nearly all Anglican evangelicalism). More divisive, of course, has been the shattering of clear understanding of 1 Timothy 2:12 as forbidding women teaching and exercising authority in congregational life - shattered by the rise of women as equal of men in social consciousness. Much of the evangelical world has given way on this matter, but vicious conflict still remains (e.g. within the Southern Baptist Convention: google the name "Beth Moore"), as well as quieter conflict (e.g. within Australian Anglican evangelicalism). We could continue with other examples such as the baptism of the Holy Spirit, the use of spiritual gifts such as speaking in tongues, schools of interpretation about the last days. The humility of evangelicals when asserting that this or that is "clear teaching" should be very evident; but is it?
- Scripture is a basis for conviction more than clarity. What evangelicalism has been pretty good at is respecting differing Scripture-based convictions. John Stott's pacifism (as I understand it) was respected by those who disagreed with him; and he respected those whose convictions were different. Is the great question before evangelicals in the 21st century whether we can set aside the pursuit of "clear teaching" with its consequential logic that those who disagree are "false teachers" and renew our acquaintance with conviction, respect for conviction, and a will to work with those who differ in conviction from our convictions? On which matter, a fellow Kiwi blogger, Trevor Morrison, offers a first post in an intriguing series, "Defending the Faithful," bringing to life a very old evangelical conflict from the 19th century! I hope it goes without saying that my argument for convictional teaching more than clear teaching does presume some evangelical clarity about shared orthodoxy: that we are credal Christians, and if Anglicans, then faithful to core elements of being Anglican. But on such bases we might stand together, despite our differing convictions.
- Scripture is our foundation and we keep returning to it so that our convictions are challenged and re-challenged, not least that any theological constructions we build on the basis of our convictions are challenged: is the edifice something Jesus requires of us? Is its character consistent with the character of Jesus Christ? I have run out of time this week to elaborate, though some of the elaboration is in the paragraphs above and some in the appendix below. But, relevant to such a point, I link you to a stirring essay by Wolfhart Pannenburg, "When everything is permitted" - an essay which I see as a challenge to my own convictions ... if not to yours!
- Perhaps putting this another way, evangelicals seek to live according to the authority of Scripture while being realistic and honest that Scripture in many of its parts requires interpretation which raises many challenges about method of interpretation and about securing agreement about interpretation, all of which invokes a sound understanding of church history (which is, effectively, a history of the interpretation of Scripture!) and of theology (for all readers of Scripture, including evangelicals, bring presuppositions to their reading).


ELABORATIONS RELATING TO ABOVE*

- As example of two human constructions, note the kind of evangelical construction I am observing above and the Roman Catholic construction on sexuality: both end in pretty much the same place on homosexuality but each disagrees with each other on remarriage after divorce (evangelicalism does not have the "annulment" pathway which the Catholic construction gets to), yet both constructions work with a strongly literal approach to reading the relevant texts of Scripture).

- Examples of human constructions ending at a point which seems at odds with the example of Jesus (even if it begins with the words of Jesus) include, with respect to evangelicalism, that construction which determines that because of differences over homosexuality, a church should split, despite everything about Jesus' example of inclusion and reaching out to excluded, marginalised people implying that Jesus does not support schism over homosexuality; with respect to Catholicism, whatever Jesus intended by his teaching on divorce, it seems at odds with the Jesus who breaks bread with Judas, and shares many meals with sinners, that a remarried divorcee should be excluded from communion.

**Am I an evangelical? Well, I continue to:
- bring matters of faith and practice to Scripture so that decisions about faith and practice conform to Scripture and are in some manner coherent with Scripture;
- bring matters deemed "tradition" to Scripture for assessment;
- accept without reservation that all things necessary for salvation are found in Scripture;
- preach and teach that Christ died on the cross for our sins, an atoning, once and for all, complete sacrifice, that we might be forgiven by God, and that Christ was raised to life, that we might be raised to eternal life in unmediated and unending fellowship with God;
- preach and teach that a personal relationship with God through Jesus Christ in the power of the Holy Spirit is both possible and a prayer of commitment away from beginning for each and every human being.