Cacophony or Communion

Exploring the Open Question of Identity, Authority, and Unity in Anglicanism
Copyright © 2007 Nathan L. Bostian

"[T]he Church exists for nothing else but to draw men into Christ, to make them little Christs. If they are not doing that, all the cathedrals, clergy, missions, sermons, even the Bible itself, are simply a waste of time. God became Man for no other purpose." -C.S. Lewis, "Mere Christianity", book IV, ch. 8

"However we judge the theological concept that the divine became human so that the human could become divine, it is a philosophical, even a metaphysical concept. It is not concrete and will not 'preach'… [It will not] cut the Gordian Knot of human bondage to guilt and stress." -Paul F.M. Zahl, "The Protestant Face of Anglicanism", p. 37

"[W]e do not believe that Jesus leads us to break our relationships… We proclaim the Gospel that in Christ all God's children… are full and equal participants in the life of Christ's Church… we proclaim a Gospel that welcomes diversity of thought and encourages free and open theological debate…" -Navasota Statement by the Episcopal House of Bishops, March 20, 2007

I. Introduction: Standard Anglican Typologies of Church.

DRAMA AND DOGMA

DRAMA AND DOGMA
A Sermon for Year C, Easter-3
By Nathan L. Bostian

I have to admit it: I love the 80's. One of the reasons why my wife and I got rid of cable TV, is because we wasted literally whole days of our lives watching the various VH-1 renditions of "I love the 80's" and mockumentaries of hair bands and all-time worst rap songs.

I am a child of the 80's, and in many ways I will always be stuck in the era of Reaganomics, female shoulder pads, Tom Cruise bomber jackets, acid washed jeans, and t-shirts for "The Cure". Sometimes I still listen to Synth Rock, Punk Rock, Hair Bands, and rap songs performed by guys who wore enormous clocks around their necks.

And, its not just me. It seems that everyone I know has a fascination with some era in history, whether it is the one they grew up in, or an era much earlier than that.

And that leads me to a question: Why do we have such a love-hate relationship with history? Because it seems like culture is schizophrenic on this subject (and a hundred others!)

SOME METAPHYSICAL CAUSES OF THE REFORMATION

In response to one of my posts, my buddy Matt asked a great question:

I have one question: You mentioned that if the Catholic Church would have listened to Aquinas, Augustine and others the Reformation may have been avoided. However, many Protestants believe that a major part of what sparked the Reformation was the scholastic synthesis of faith and reason achieved by Aquinas and exaggerated by Averroes and Ockam. Some believe that the problem of the Reformation was caused by Aquinas's "secularization" of faith. What would you say about that? Just curious.

In response to Matt:

Urban Myths, Educated Gullibility, and the Danger of Christianity

Do you like Urban myths? I do! Snopes.com, the premier urban myth debunking site on the internet, is a source of endless enjoyment for me. Have you heard the one about how internet users can receive a cash reward for forwarding messages to test a Microsoft/AOL e-mail tracking system? Myth. Or about how chewing gum takes seven years to pass through the human digestive system? Myth again. Or how about the fact that Finland once banned Donald Duck because he wears no pants? Myth. And then there is my favorite genre of myth: Christian scare tactic myths. Everything from "If you don't forward this email you are denying Christ!" to "Did you know that Atheist Madalyn Murray O'Hair is circulating a petition to have religious broadcasting banned from American airwaves?" All myths.

Just what was the philosophical justification of splitting the Church in the Reformation?

In response to my last post, Matt asks a great question:

I have one question: You mentioned that if the Catholic Church would have listened to Aquinas, Augustine and others the Reformation may have been avoided. However, many Protestants believe that a major part of what sparked the Reformation was the scholastic synthesis of faith and reason achieved by Aquinas and exaggerated by Averroes and Ockam. Some believe that the problem of the Reformation was caused by Aquinas's "secularization" of faith. What would you say about that? Just curious.

In response to Matt:

We fixed the wedding, now let's work on the marriage

Isaiah 62:5 ...As the bridegroom rejoices over the bride, so shall your God rejoice over you.

After a decade of self-study in historical and systematic theology, a year of graduate study of Christian history, and another year of graduate study in the history of doctrine, a thought has crystallized in my mind: The Protestant reformation largely fixed the problems of our "wedding" with Christ, but it is not sufficient to fix the marriage.  Let me explain...

An Open Letter to Those thinking of leaving their Christian Traditions

This is a letter primarily to some of my good friends (you know who you are) who have expressed severe disenchantment with their own Christian Traditions, and are currently thinking of moving over to the Anglican, Roman, or Orthodox Communions.  But this letter is also for everyone who may be thinking about "jumping ship".  I want to begin with a quote by St. Paul:

"To the Jews I became as a Jew, in order to win Jews. To those under the law I became as one under the law (though not being myself under the law) that I might win those under the law.  To those outside the law I became as one outside the law (not being outside the law of God but under the law of Christ) that I might win those outside the law.  To the weak I became weak, that I might win the weak. I have become all things to all people, that by all means I might save some.  I do it all for the sake of the gospel, that I may share with them in its blessings." (1 Corinthians 9:20-23)

Now let me tell a little story to illustrate the points I want to make:

Luther, Nominalism, and the Nature of the Church

This is an odd post, because it addresses a couple of issues raised by an email from a friend (Steve) in which he asked about some recent posts. Regarding my recent post on Martin Luther and Reformation Day, Steve asked "How can you not like and respect someone that said 'Whenever the devil harasses you, seek the company of men and drink more.....Sometimes we must drink more...and even sin a little to spite the devil....'".  Point taken Steve... I will address this below.

Also, Steve said that he is "very much leaning against the view that the Church somehow is the possessor and distributor of grace" (such as the Catholic view).  He is "much more now seeing that we are called to only be a Proclaimer, and especially a WITNESS as the Church... Anything else seems to me at present to somehow almost "interfere" with the work Christ". He also said that he is re-thinking the sacraments, and is very influenced by some views of Karl Barth regarding the Church and the sacraments.

So, I actually find all of these issues to be related.  In the following post I want to deal with Luther, then Karl Barth, and then the idea of whether or not the Church is a "Witness" to Christ (as Proclaimers), or the continuing "Incarnation" of Christ (as the Body of Christ).  

WWCSLD?

Most people who have known me for long know that I am a CS Lewis junkie. I don't really do the Catholic "patron saint" thing, but CS Lewis would probably be my patron saint if I did. I have almost everything he has ever published except for the really expensive three volume set of his collected letters (only have volume 1... Christmas presents anyone?). For me, his books are just below Scripture, and he is one of very few people who write books that I will read more than once. So, just below the Holy Trinity is CS Lewis... Father, Son, Spirit... and "Jack".

Just kiddin' on that last sentence... But everything else is pretty much true.

Happy Reformation Day

The following is a rant guaranteed to piss everyone off... It is mean, sarcastic, and over-simplified... and I'm not sure if I even believe it all... so read it with a grain of salt (and maybe a cold beer in hand):

Reformation day is a big day for me, because of the sheer magnitude of what Martin Luther was able to accomplish on the Cathedral Door of Wittenburg...

I mean, normally when I have pranked someone, we have put our feces in a paper bag and lit them on fire on someone's porch.  But, there was that one time the football team took up a "collection", and put everyone's feces in the cab of a guy's truck through the back windows.

But nailing feces to a cathedral door?  That is a great prank!  And 95 of them?  How was he able to do that without the vibration of the door causing them to fall of their nails?

Martin Luther is amazing, and will go down in the practical joke annals of all time!!!

Wait, what was that?

Theses, not feces???

Whatever... I guess never mind, nothing special about Reformation Day after all.  No, wait, I feel a rant coming on...

My theological history

When I get in discussions and debates with people, they often call me by a label that I think is completely off base.  Fundamentalists call me liberal.  Liberals have called me a fundamentalist.  Other times I get called a Catholic or an "Emerging Church" person.  So what am I?

I am like you.  I am embodied: I have a limited view of the world around me that is partially formed by my maleness, and I am a finite creation that has a hard time being "objective" about anything.  I am en-cultured: a product of a late 20th century Western consumerism that puts a whole lot of emphasis on personal choice and freedom, and still has a lot of hangovers from Post-Enlightenment modernism.  I am en-languaged: I have a way of thinking about things formed by speaking English, and reading Greek, Hebrew, and a smattering of Latin.  I am en-traditioned: I have come to view God and the world around me from certain traditions, namely the Evangelical, Pentecostal, and Anglican Traditions.  I am en-ritualed: I have certain rituals that I have developed and taken on myself from others that help me relate to my spouse, my child, my congregation, my friends, and my God.

Why I love to hate institutionalized religion

One of my youth asked me tonight about how we experience the Holy Spirit today in our world. That led me to tell a short version of how the Holy Spirit has been experienced in Christian history from the Apostles until now. The history went something like this:

Will Nate ever go Catholic?

A friend of a friend named Matt (check his blog here) sent me an email after reading my blog the other day. In it, he asked me a rather blunt question, but one worth answering and sharing with y'all:

"Can I ask you a question? Have you ever considered becoming Catholic?"

Given all the stuff I write on this blog in favor of Catholicism and Orthodoxy, I felt I needed to answer this publicly and not just privately. Here it goes:

SHORT ANSWER: Yes. I have considered becoming Catholic with a big "C" (i.e. Roman Catholic). I already consider myself catholic with a small "c".

LONG ANSWER: We have all seen Church "family trees" in our Church history classes. Usually the denomination / sect / tradition that you are (and I say this for any denomination) in winds up being the middle of the chart, and all other forms of Christianity are seen as deviations to the right or left, if not fallen off entirely. This makes your particular denomination the "truest" expression of the Church, the norm to judge all others.

Where have all the good heresies gone?

2018 UPDATE: I disagree with much of the content in this blog now, and am keeping it online only as evidence of how I have evolved and grown in Christ. 

The current situation in the Anglican Communion grieves me. As someone who has come to know and love the communion over the last six years (I was confirmed in the Episcopal Church in December of 2000), it is like watching the family you have just married into be ripped apart by adultery. As someone who is seeking ordination to the priesthood, it makes me worry about my future livelihood and calling. What, after all, am I getting myself into? I look at other communions / denominations and their relative lack of drama compared to us, and I often wonder if I should jump ship. But everytime I do, God whispers two things simultaneously in my spiritual ears: First, a line from "Mere Christianity" and the Gospel of St. John: "What is that to you? Follow thou me." Second, the grass always looks greener on the other side, but every lawn is crawling with pests, and chances are you will be more miserable with their pests than your own. Stay where you are at, where I have called you.

Scripture, Tradition, Experience, and Reason in Anglican Theology

So, how do Anglicans interpret all the Scripture we read? Anglicans are first and foremost a "Bible church", and that means that we cannot, and do not, deviate from the data we find in Scripture. Scripture is divinely given by God and is the constitutional document upon which all other tradition and meditation on God must be done. You cannot get to God without going through Jesus Christ (John 14.6 ff). And you cannot get to Christ without going through Scripture. 

We cannot go "over" Scripture by using forms of higher criticism, or "under" Scripture by removing its foundation in history and claiming it to be a mythical document, or by simply going "around" Scripture and saying that the content of Scripture is hopelessly tied to its time and place of composition, and can offer no enduring principals for 21st century humans. It is the only reliable data we have about who God is and how to live for Him. Yet, data does not interpret itself. Kind of like data on a computer disk. You could have the plans for a revolutionary invention on the disk, but if you do not have a computer to interpret it, it is useless. In the same way, the Bible is only useful when interpreted by God's family, the Church. We Anglicans believe that there are two or three tools God has given the Church to do this.

Brett Wells on Tradition and Scripture

The following is a conversation started by my friend Bret (http://bretwells.blogspot.com/) about a debate I posted between myself and Steve Rudd (see http://natebostian.blogspot.com/2005/06/debate-on-tradition-and-scriptural.html). Both Steve and Brett are from the Church of Christ, but, as you will shortly see... they are very, very different:

Debate on Tradition and Scriptural Interpretation

Here is a friendly debate between myself and Steven Rudd (of the Church of Christ) who runs the website http://www.bible.ca. The debate started over his postings that said that ALL tradition is bad in interpreting the Bible (see http://www.bible.ca/sola-scriptura-tradition.htm). Here is how it went down:

Irrelevant appeal to authority???

Rejecting the so-called "appeal to authority" is a tactic used by all kinds of "skeptics" to "debunk" ideas that they do not like. Most frequently I encounter this tactic in discussing God with people who claim not to believe in God. Usually, it turns out that I do not believe in the God they do not believe in either, because they are not actually discussing the Person whom I know as God, but that is another point entirely.

When someone appeals to authority, they usually put it in terms such as "Because [Person/Institution/Source X] supports [Truth Claim Y], then I support [Truth Claim Y]". Usually, in debates about God, it goes something like this "Because the Bible says [Y], I believe [Y]. God says it, I believe it, and that settles it." Nontheists rightly argue that this proves nothing, because the reliability of the Bible is still in question. It may say that Y is true, but how do we know it is accurate in what it says? I mean, there is the issue of who wrote the Bible and when, and whether these writings are authentic and accurate. Then there are the textual issues of how well the text has been preserved, even if the original text was accurate. And then there are issues of interpretation, linguistics, and historical-cultural context, not to mention genre and purpose, in considering how to understand the text. Then there is the question of what presuppositions we bring to the text, and if there are other legitimate ways of understanding the text. All of these must be considered before making an appeal to Scripture to support a certain truth claim.