2006-11-30

In Search of the "Pure Church"

[Fr. Ahab sets to the seas to find the illusive "pure church"]

I want to confess that I don't really get it. I don't get theological "conservatives", even though I am one. In the unfolding soap-opera of church politics we are in right now, there are many "conservatives" who believe in the same Jesus and who trust the same Bible that I do, who say things like "my conscience just won't let me bring anyone else into the Episcopal Church because it is so corrupt". They are (rightly) embarrassed by some of the crazy revisions that the National Church is trying to ram down everyone's throat. But they (wrongly) think that this is a reason to keep people out of this church body. They (rightly) want the Church to be holy and orthodox like our Lord, our Scriptures, and our Great Tradition implores us to be. Yet they (wrongly) think that there is some version of the Church- whether past or present- that is wholly holy and overwhelmingly orthodox.
This is a bunch of incoherent babble to make us think hard about our incredible love affair with the God of the universe, our astounding infidelities against God, and God's incredible grace to heal and restore us through Christ. Everything on this site is copyright © 1996-2023 by Nathan L. Bostian so if you use it, please cite me. You can contact me at natebostian [at] gmail [dot] com