Bishops' Blog

Priestly Nation

Most every Sunday I lead a service in which the Baptismal Covenant figures prominently. Candidates for baptism and confirmation repeat (in the early church literally 'tradite') the creed, and then they renounce evil and affirm in public their commitment. These are ancient parts of the rite - I always liked how, in the early church, they would spit at Satan and then turn east toward the coming Christ. To these ancient elements have been added a series of promises, which are meant to comprise the Christian life.

 This section has given expression to a whole theology of the church, an 'ecclesiology.'  Baptism is the one and equal doorway to life with Christ. In fact it is significant that the Roman and mainline Reformation churches recognize one another’s baptism. The baptized are, as one, a 'priestly nation,' Peter tells us, for they mediate the good news about Christ to the world. On this foundation is placed the affirmation that ministry belongs to the whole people of God (Ephesians 4).  Ordained ministry orders, encourages, and reminds the body about who it is what it is called to do.

It would seem, however, that different branches or corners of the church grasp different aspects of this covenant. A lopsided account of Christian life can result. So, it is important to bear two things in mind. First, who Christ is (and did) precedes who we are. We have already heard the word of God. The creed recited then sums up His saving reality. Before the church does anything, it confesses its faith in Him.

Secondly, the account of the Christian life is intentionally varied and broad: worship, evangelism, repentance for sin, service to those in need, engagement with the social order. I bet one's style of Christian life makes each of us lean to one and away from another. It's good to give extra attention to those promises we find ourselves most recalcitrant to - they tell us the most about ourselves. And of course in the rite of confirmation follows - God's work matters supremely, but the church needs the confession of that faith as our own.

A baptismal church, and so a baptismal Anglicanism is Christocentric and Trinitarian, holistically evangelistic and diaconal, grace-oriented and 'confessional.'  It is insistently lay-oriented, though this makes the ministry of the ordained more important and distinct, not less.

Peace,

+GRS

Three Cheers for Oliver

This blog entry is quite simply a commendation of a recent argument by Oliver O’Donovan, the Regius Professor emeritus at Oxford, and more recently at Edinburgh. What isn’t simple is that the argument is in the midst of his critique of the case for same-sex marriage in the Scottish Episcopal Church. However the point he is making is not, strictly speaking, about that- in fact he makes it along the way.

One often hears that we Anglicans ply our theological trade according to the ‘three-legged stool’: Scripture, Tradition, and Reason. All count, and presumably, there would be case where, in the words of Meatloaf, ‘two outta three ain’t bad.’ But thinking of the triad as a checklist of separate items is a mistake, and O’Donovan offers us a better way to think of the matter. Forgive the extended quotations, but there are necessary to convey his point:

About scripture O’Donovan wrote, “The authority of the scripture is experienced through its capacity to give us a purchase on the world we inhabit. The whole point of thinking by reading Scripture (always in dialogue with tradition) is to understand our selves where we are).”

“There is a logical sequence in the two discernments, which canot be inverted, and yet we have to make them together and in parallel, for it is the discernment of Scripture that provides us with the categories and analogies we need for discerning ourselves.”

O’Donovan is making a point about how we as Christians think about things, and he is integrating the triad into his account. Scripture locates us, from that fullest of perspectives beginning with God. But this is not done ‘solo,’ but in relation to those who have preceded us, and who accompany us. Our questions are related to, confirm or challenge theirs. Where we are is in a ‘cloud of witnesses.’ And where we are informs who we are, and is inseparable from what we are to do, and so where we are headed. The joint between identity and action requires arguments. These latter two features of Christian understanding conform to what we call ‘tradition’ and ‘reason.’

On Tradition, O’Donovan said, “…subject to reasoned Scriptural critique, of responsible Christian action. The tradition of the undivided church was an ideal for Reformation to aspire to conform to. The claim of Tradition is a moral claim, because sums up what we owe the community that taught us how to believe and act. When we face new questions requiring new answers, we must seek to locate them within the horizon of questions that have been asked and answered before us.”

The implication is this: the triad are not items on a list, but conspire in a trajectory. They function precisely as they make sense together. They are a pointilistic version of proper Biblical interpretation itself. They answer different questions about it. As a result you cannot hive off two-thirds of them on their own.

About Reason, O’Donovan wrote, “The role of “reason” in the Anglican tripod is precisely to make our thinking practical. In any exercise of practical reasoning there are two distinct steps: a discernment of the situation we are in, and a discernment of a course of action open to us in that situation. If it is true of every decision we make for ourselves, it is doubley true of decisions we seek to make together, that we cannon settle on an action until we can envisage the situation in which we are to act.”

This insight is not the end of the matter. In the modern period there remain kinds of interpretation whose primary purpose is to undermine, and all interpretation needs to pay attention to the challenges of the culture of its time. But we do so while we listen to the Scriptures- there is no other activity which has the authority to offer the full account of where and whose, with whom and for what, and so who we really are.

Peace

+GRS