Near Emmaus

Category Archives: Eastern Orthodoxy


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A Dialogue between a Catholic and an Evangelical: Why I am a Catholic (Pt.1b)

[For "A Few Reasons Why I am a Catholic," see here.]
[For "A Few Reasons I am No Longer a Oneness Pentecostal," see here.]
[For why Brian is an E/evangelical, see here.] | [For the Introduction to this series, see here.]

Like Brian, I begin my portion of the series with Why I am a Catholic. A couple of years back, I laid out a few reasons why I am Catholic, which was a follow up to why I am no longer a Oneness Pentecostal (see links above) . This post seeks to expound on and augment that post. I do not intend in this post to respond necessarily to anything in Brian’s first post (see link above).

I should probably begin with some background. As I have mentioned elsewhere, I began my life in Christ as a charismatic Catholic; partly because of influences from friends, I became Oneness Pentecostal for a number of years and studied at a Oneness Bible college where Brian and I first became acquainted. I am thankful for my time as a Oneness Pentecostal. Through conversations and experiences with other Christians I had throughout those years, I began to question some of the tenets of Oneness theology and see their shortcomings. I began to move toward non-denominational groups and finally swung back full circle to Catholicism. I will now turn to why I moved that direction. As a disclaimer, the following is my perception of my Catholic faith—influenced by my studies, limited reading, and personal experiences—and might at times be expressed differently than usual; I think, however, that I arrive at the same place. I consider myself a charismatic Catholic with an evangelical slant, which I think is the direction Vatican II takes.

Ignatius of Antioch was martyred in the Colosseum

Ignatius of Antioch, who was martyred in the Colosseum.

My  journey back to Catholicism began as I studied early church history. As I began to read Ignatius of Antioch, a church father valued by some Oneness which got me interested in reading him, I read of concepts like the Eucharist being the medicine of immortality. In the line of the pastoral epistles, I found a continuing dialogue concerning the role of bishops and deacons in the early church fathers. In my own studies apart from class, I learned that worship in the early church consisted of hearing the Scripture, an expounding of or exhortation on it, and a celebration of the Eucharist. There was emphasis on the importance of baptism as Christian initiation. All of these sounded to me like what goes on in the Catholic church.

Next I encountered theosis: “God became human so that humanity might become as God” (St. Athanasius). Our church history class took a field trip to the local Byzantine Orthodox church. What I appreciated most about Orthodoxy was that theology was built into the liturgy. At that point, I had very little understanding of the Latin Catholic liturgy, but even now I think that the Byzantine churches meld theology and worship together in a unique way. What struck me was the theology of the icon where the icon was a window into the divine reality signified by what was portrayed. I began to attend Thursday evening vespers at the church and found Byzantine liturgy to have the quality of reverence that I had not before encountered.

One of the icons I own: Christ, the Light Giver

One of the icons I own: Christ, the Light Giver.

I noticed that the walls of the Byzantine Orthodox church had many icons. At the local Byzantine Catholic church that I attend every so often, the walls themselves are as icons. I learned that this pointed back to the concept of the cloud of witnesses found in Hebrews 12:1. While from the standpoint of exegesis, I would agree that the cloud of witnesses refers to those mentioned in Hebrews 11, the imagery still represents a living assembly such as that found in crowds at a stadium. In other words, the Catholic and Orthodox church’s adoption of the imagery of heavenly living assemblies in Hebrews and Revelation was not bad hermeneutics.

I turned to this cloud of witnesses for understanding theosis, and in the Spirituality and the Mystics class that I took the year following the church history classes, I found those like St. John of the Cross, St. Teresa of Avila, St. Faustina Kowalska, Brother Lawrence, St. Gregory of Nazianzus, and others. The underlying of the emphasis of the saints have always been holiness as progress in love: love of God and love of neighbor for God’s sake. The saints spoke of the divine union with God and of partaking of the life of the Trinity. Believers can by grace fight sin and live out the life of the Trinity. This was the treasure of the Catholic church for me.

I kept searching and reading and found that the union with God and living in and living out the life of the Trinity was not something that saints of old wrote. I found that people in this day were experiencing it. An excerpt from someone’s account of her understanding of what she understood is divine union is as so:

There were a lot of experiences that I think led up to the infused contemplation, but the time where I really mark it where I start calling it that in my mind is an experience where I felt a definite “this is the presence of God,” and what happened was I started experiencing intense bliss, and it happened in different ways, but the first time I felt this all-consuming bliss was in the spring of 1990 or 1991. I was working at the time, and the bliss grew over a period of about 4 or 5 days, and it became so intense that I really became a little bit overwhelmed by it, and I prayed to have it reduced a little bit. I really liked it, but it was overwhelming and a little frightening, I think. Not that there was anything in it that felt bad, but it was such an intense experience that it was a little frightening. But after I prayed, it went away entirely, and that made me very sad.

. . . .

Then it was early in October that the bliss came back. I felt it day and night, and was going on while I was going to work and relating to people, and going to lunch, doing the normal things that I did, but it kept getting stronger and stronger. I was a little disconcerted again, but remembering what had happened the last time, I made a conscious choice that I wasn’t going to allow myself to close the door to it because of how much I had regretted when it went away the time before. I let it happen, and there came a point where in the course of my job I became aware that the Lord was inside me, looking out of my eyes. It wasn’t like I became the Lord. It wasn’t like that at all. It was like the Lord was at the center of this blissful experience, and was at that moment inside me looking out to the world through my eyes, and the way that I became aware of that was that I was reading a letter (I answered correspondence from consumers in those days), and the name of the person who had written was “Finchpaw” or something like that. Of course, this bliss had been building for days, and I read that name, and for some reason was delighted by that name, but at the same moment became just emphatically aware of how the Lord was utterly delighted with that name. But it was more than just a name. It was like the Lord was delighted in our ability to name, and that we had made up this wonderful name that was so delightful.

. . . .

It was very shortly after that that it was my lunch time. I went out into the city and still had this sense of union with God looking out at the world through my eyes, and everything that I saw was different than I had ever seen it. The physical reality looked exactly the same, but things that to me had been ugly before, or incongruent together, were absolutely gorgeous, and the reason that they were gorgeous was because the Lord was absolutely in love with us for being able to make things, and to have ideas, and to put things in places, so whereas before I might have looked at “oh, here’s a Spanish-style building, why did they put that modern atrocity next to it? ” but the way the Lord looked at everything was: This is what they have made, and I love them, and I love this because they made it. It was such a sense of the Lord being just absolutely, utterly, emphatically in love with us, and in love with what we make and do. It completely changed the way that I looked at things.

(entire account here)

I learned that the people with these types of experiences are Catholics and so I concluded that if saints throughout the ages had been experiencing and moderns today were still experiencing this today then the Catholic church was a safe place to enter into this journey.

A traditional Latin Mass. Also known as the Extraordinary Form or the Mass of the Ages.

Consecration of the bread at a traditional Latin Mass.

From all this, the Mass and sacraments became important to me. For one, the Mass and sacraments are what unites the diverse expressions of the Catholic church; one can find the Roman rite, the Dominican rite, the Byzantine rite, the Maronite rite, the Melkite rite, etc.—in fact, at one point the Catholic church had as many as twenty-two distinct expressions. I also highly value the Catholic church’s teaching that God communicates His grace through the material realm. So grace is conferred in baptism through the water, in confirmation through the chrismation, in confession through the priesthood, in marriage through the joining of two separate lives into one, in the hierarchical priesthood through the priests, and in the Eucharist the very presence of Jesus through the bread and wine. The Mass involves all the senses: sight, sound, touch and bodily movements like kneeling and standing, scent (incense), and taste. I tend toward the traditional (i.e., Latin) forms of the Mass and sacraments because I value the tradition throughout the centuries of that particular Mass. Of course, as a charismatic, I also believe that God confers grace through the supranatural; the Catholic church’s acceptance of the charismatic is another bonus for me.

If I could summarize why I am a Catholic, I would say that I find the Catholic church to be a place that fosters progress and growth in love of God and love of neighbor. Such love has always been the tradition of the church and it is therefore my tradition as well. Some might point to all the atrocities committed by the Catholic church and I say yes there have been and it is unfortunate that the Catholic church has at times strayed from its ultimate tradition. However, I have found that in delving deeper into the Catholic church, the very center is the God who is the Father, the Son Jesus Christ, and the Holy Spirit, who loves humanity and creation with a love so deep that He gave His life so that whoever believes in Him can avail of His very own life, be loved by Him, and empowered by His love and grace, live His life out as a witness to the world of this God.

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Wrestling with the ecclesiology of Ignatius of Antioch (or, do I need a Bishop?!)

ignace

Bishop Ignatius of Antioch

I’ve been a low church evangelical for many years now. I entered Christianity through a sectarian Pentecostal group (some doubted we should celebrate Christmas because it was of “pagan origin”, so you imagine the type of ecumenism I was taught). I have thought about the teachings of Roman Catholicism, Orthodoxy, and Anglicanism/Episcopalianism and there are times when I find these groups quite attractive and other times when I find these groups to be concerning. Currently, I worship with a (modern, not Amish-like) Mennonite church, which I like because of their commitment to serious discipleship, and their emphasis on the Kingdom of God and the reconciling hope of their eschatology. Yet I worry at times that Mennonites are similar in some ways to my Pentecostal friends in that there is a lack of catholicity with little emphasis on the Lord’s Supper/Communion/Eucharist tradition that has enriched the church for hundreds of years.

As I have mentioned (see here) I have decided to participate in a group called “Read the Fathers”. One figure whose writings are listed early is Ignatius of Antioch (CE 35/50-98/117), a Bishop in the early church who is said to have been one of the more immediate successors of the Apostle Peter and a student of the Apostle John. I haven’t studied this figure enough to have an opinion on such claims, but that he was writing not too long after documents like the Gospel of John and the Book of Revelation were composed demands attention.

Is this gathering of U.S. Catholic Bishops the assembling of "the church"?

Is this gathering of U.S. Catholic Bishops the assembling of “the church”?

There have been several statements made in his epistle that seem to foreshadow the teachings of the more developed church, the ecclesiology to which aforementioned groups like Roman Catholics, Orthodox, and Anglicans appeal. As someone who is worshipping with Mennonites, who has been educated by Baptists and Reformed thinkers, who has taught in churches with roots in Lutheranism and Pentecostalism, and who (admittedly) prefers “low church” Christianity (though I have grown fond of some form of liturgy and practices such as following a form of the liturgical calendar), I thought I’d post some excerpts here for conversation.

The first to grab my attention is from Ignatius’ Epistle to the Ephesians (V) where he writes:

“Let no man deceive himself: if any one be not within the altar, he is deprived of the bread of God. For if the prayer of one or two possesses such power, how much more that of the bishop and the whole Church! He, therefore, that does not assemble with the Church, has even by this manifested his pride, and condemned himself. For it is written, “God resists the proud.” Let us be careful, then, not to set ourselves in opposition to the bishop, in order that we may be subject to God.”

This seems Eucharistic (though I am trying to avoid anachronism). The Bishop performs the rite at the alter providing the bread to the people, and to deny the assembly is of grave concern. He writes later (XIII):

“For when ye assemble frequently in the same place, the powers of Satan are destroyed, and the destruction at which he aims is prevented by the unity of your faith. Nothing is more precious than peace, by which all war, both in heaven and earth, is brought to an end.”

And then (XX):

“…breaking one and the same bread, which is the medicine of immortality, and the antidote to prevent us from dying, but [which causes] that we should live for ever in Jesus Christ.”

What we have in this epistle is the need to gather with the church, the importance of the Bishop, and the centrality of the Eucharist in worship. I struggled even more with a statement he made in his Epistle to the Magnesians (II):

“Since therefore I have been permitted to see you in the person of Damas, your godly bishop, and the worthy presbyters, Bassus and Apollonius, and my fellow-servant, the deacon Zotion, of whom may I have joy, because he is subject unto the bishop as unto the grace of God, and to the presbytery as unto the law of Jesus Christ.”

The Bishop of one church represents the whole local church to the other church through that local church’s Bishop. Later in the epistle he writes (XII):

“…that in everything which you do, you may be prospered in flesh and spirit, by faith and love, in the Son and Father and in the Spirit, in the beginning and in the end, along with your bishop who is worthy of all honor, and the fitly-woven spiritual coronal of your presbytery, and the deacons who are according to the mind of God.  Submit yourselves to the bishop and to one another, as Jesus Christ [was subject] to the Father [after the flesh], and the Apostles to Christ and the Father, that there may be union both of flesh and spirit.”

Submitting to the Bishop brings unity, and it models Jesus’ submission to the Father, and the Apostles to Christ and the Father. He writes in his Epistle to the Trallians (II), “For, since you are subject to the bishop as to Jesus Christ, you appear to me to live not after the manner of men, but according to Jesus Christ, who died for us, in order, by believing in His death, you may escape from death.”

Subject to the Bishop as to Jesus Christ? 

Submit to the Bishop as to Christ? Always?

Submit to the Bishop as to Christ? Always? What if my Bishop was John Shelby Spong?

Now, as I said, I want to avoid anachronism. I realize that a “Bishop” doesn’t seem to be as authoritative as it might come to be later. There doesn’t seem to be Archbishops. It could be argued that at this stage in the history of the church a Bishop was like the “Sr. Pastor” over the church in a city. There was no acknowledgement of anything like denominations, so you wouldn’t have a Lutheran pastor, a Presbyterian pastor, and so forth and so on. You’d have one, single pastor (Bishop) who oversees other leaders (Presbyters and Deacons). We know from the emergence of groups like the various gnostic sects that this idea is challenged, and that catholicity is “in flux” for the perspective of historicism, but for those of us who affirm that Spirit’s guidance in developing the church to become what most of us would consider “orthodox” (e.g., Trinity, deity of Christ, nature of Christology, function of canonical books) what do we say to this (and other statements by Ignatius in other epistles)?

Also, for pragmatic purposes, in light of Ignatius’ words, what do you think he would have said if someone said, “My ‘Bishop’ is John Shelby Spong! Should I remain under his authority?” How would Ignatius have advised people under the episcopal rule of Spong? or Bishop Katharine Jefferts Schori? or an Arian Bishop or a gnostic Bishop?

Your thoughts on this subject are welcome, whether you be of a tradition with Bishops or without Bishops. What do you think of the need for Bishops today? What do we do if we think Bishop lead churches have strayed from the Gospel? 


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A coming evangelical collapse?

In the last week I have read three interesting blog posts that mention people exiling from evangelicalism (or Reformed thinking) that I have found interesting:

- Jason Stellman discusses his controversial departure from the Presbyterian Church of America to the Roman Catholic Church in “I Fought the Church, and the Church Won”–a guest post for the blog Called to Communion. He says that Catholicism was not alluring to him, but that he found it to be “the truth,” especially when he began to doubt the reformational language regarding Sola Scriptura and Sola Fide. Remember, this is the man who lead the trial against Peter Leithart for the Pacific Northwest Presbytery because Leithart was suspected of teachings that were close to those of Rome.

- Roman Catholics are not alone in anticipating more people to flee evangelical and reformed community. The Orthodox Church is asking themselves if they are ready for the “coming evangelical collapse.” Kevin Allen provides a self-diagnosis for this communion in “Are We Ready for the Coming Evangelical Collapse?” He believes that the Orthodox will be “short-term beneficiaries, but that there are many hinderances to people joining their ranks as well.

- Peter Enns has written many blog posts providing an “in-house” critique of evangelicalism’s shrinking boarders warning that there are many who no longer feel at home in evangelicalism as it is self-defined currently. In “Outgrowing Evangelicalism: It’s Not Just for Scholars Anymore” he shows that it isn’t academics alone who are feeling marginalized within evangelical circles. Of course, the so-called “emerging church” has been saying this for sometime now. I think evangelicals seeking to realign and redefine evangelicalism may have a harder time than Roman Catholics and Orthodox because there has yet to “emerge” an alternative to evangelicalism than doesn’t have the feel of evangelicalism run amok with individualism or the type of church that seeks to be “ancient-future” in practice while being liberal-progressive Protestant in theology (something that may lack staying power).

Pentecostalism continues to expand globally and domestically (I think the Assemblies of God are one of the few larger denominations in this country that have seen growth over recent years). There remain many problems there as well. When the energy declines and the emotionalism dries many “thinkers” in Pentecostal ranks wonder what they are doing with their time. At least that was my experience.

Do you foresee a “coming evangelical collapse?” If so, where will evangelicals go? If not, what reforms do you think need to be made?

 


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A Few Reasons Why I Am a Catholic

To balance out my post on why I am not a Oneness Pentecostal (here), I will give some reasons as to why I am Catholic. First some background. I was born into the Catholic church, baptized as an infant only a few months old. I was never catechized in my youth, and sporadically practiced my faith. Yet, I was always intrigued by God. In my teen years, I fell into the world until I was 22 years old, when I decided I needed to get right with God. At that time, I was part of a charismatic Catholic group in the Philippines (Bukas Loob sa Diyos [Open in Spirit to God]). On June 30, 2002, I received what Pentecostals would call the baptism of the Holy Spirit.

When I returned to the Seattle area, the only people I knew were Oneness Pentecostals (teen friends with whose church I had experience). Because of the similarities in beliefs about the Holy Spirit, I easily made the transition. I will not recount my Oneness experience here since I have done so briefly in aforementioned post. Because of my studies in seminary, I decided to investigate and eventually return to the Catholic church. Below are a few reasons I am now Catholic. Once again, this is not an exhaustive list, but it highlights some of the more influential factors on my decision to come home to Rome.

Church Fathers. As I read some of the church fathers for church history, I began to realize that of which the church spoke sounded much like the Catholic church. For example, St. Ignatius’s reference to the Eucharist as the “medicine of immortality” accorded well with the Church’s teaching on the Eucharist as a sacrament. The recitation of the Nicene Creed (and the Apostles’ Creed during such devotions like the rosary) during Mass harkens back to that ecumenical council, which the Fathers defended.

Mystics Tradition. The Catholic church (as well as the Orthodox) have a strong line of mystics, those who are greatly in touch with and live out the love of God. At George Fox Evangelical Seminary, I learned about contemplative prayer, and found myself wired to this way of praying. In my exploration of contemplative prayer, I found that the most in-depth works on it were by St. John of the Cross and St. Teresa of Avila. I also took a class called Spirituality and the Writings of the Mystics where I noticed that most of the writings on contemplative prayer came from Catholic mystics. Many of those whom I have read and who have experienced genuine contemplation today are Catholics (here). The Catholic church seems to be a good place for one who is inclined toward mysticism, such as myself.

The View of Some Jews. A woman with whom I attended the same Rite of Christian Initiation for Adults is Jewish. When she told her parents of her decision to become Catholic, they were quite happy for her, saying that the Catholic church is the closest in Christianity to Judaism. I have also heard from other Jews that if they were to become Christian, they would become Catholics.

The Charismatic Movement. As I mentioned above, I came back to God through a charismatic Catholic group. When I was thinking of returning to Catholicism again, I began to research the charismatic movement in the Catholic church. I came to find that, the Catholic church has embraced the charismatic work and acknowledged its validity. Pentecostal spirituality has many important aspects, and many of them can be found in the charismatic Catholic movement. The “fullness of the Spirit” that some (sectarian) Pentecostal groups want to claim is not exclusively theirs.

The Connection to Eastern Christianity. Before coming back to Catholicism, I was looking into the Orthodox church. I had attended Vespers for months until my work on my thesis prevented me from attending often. Through some Catholic forums, I found out about the Eastern Catholic churches and how Blessed John Paul II, when he was pope, encouraged the Eastern churches to de-Latinize and retain their culture. After some research, I found that some Eastern churches in the area and I attended a Byzantine Catholic church Vesper and Divine Liturgy this month (June 2011). It was virtually like the Orthodox: the entire Liturgy was chanted, it had the iconostasis, communion was administered in the same way, there was the antidoron bread (bread that is blessed but is not used as Eucharist), and so forth. What was awesome to me was that there were prayers for Pope Benedict during the Liturgy and that I could receive the Eucharist because I am Catholic. The Eastern and Western aspects to Catholicism make it a truly universal church.


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Walk On: A Guide to Exiting from Oneness Pentecostalism (Pt. 5)

[If you haven’t read the previous posts in this series you can find them here: Pt. 1 here; Pt. 2 here; Pt. 3 here; Pt. 4 here.]

The other day someone commented on one of the posts in this series saying that my arguments against Oneness Pentecostalism were not very good. He said that I was creating a “straw man” while negatively painting the movement with a “broad brush”. He has misunderstood what I am trying to do.

I said this in the introductory post:

Let me provide a disclaimer from the very beginning. I am not writing this post and the next few in order to try to apologetically disprove Oneness Pentecostal dogma. In fact, I will be ignoring comments that try to bait me into such debates. I have written plenty elsewhere saying openly why I disagree with their teachings.

Likewise, I have no illusions that these posts will “convert” anyone. I have met some people who have told me that my story gave them the strength to leave, but I know that there are many others whom I have failed to convince, including some family. If you are happy where you are as a Oneness Pentecostal, or if you are needing to be “convinced”, then this is a dead end.

So if you are an apologist for Oneness Pentecostalism you will find these writings frustrating because I am not trying to show that Oneness Pentecostalism is misguided. I’ve written elsewhere in an attempt to do that very thing. What I am writing here presupposes a level of agreement between me and my readers. No, you don’t have to be fully convinced that it is time for you to exit Oneness Pentecostalism, but I assume that you, the reader, already have thought about it for a while and that you are seriously weighing your options. Whether or not you leave is between you and God. I am writing for those who either have made the choice to reintegrate into the broader Christian family or who will in the near future.

That being said, let me get to the main subject of this post. One thing that Oneness Pentecostalism does share with most every other “type” of Christianity is a underlying tribalism. We all want to be “in” and not “out”. We want to belong. Sadly, this means that we are often forced to choose another group so that we do not have to feel like Lone Rangers.

There is nothing wrong with finding a place to belong. There is nothing wrong with affirming a creed or confession. Two bloggers that write here have recently aligned themselves with large groups holding very historic confessions. JohnDave Medina has returned to Roman Catholicism and Josh Smith has entered into the Anglican fellowship. They are both former Oneness Pentecostals.

I have remained unaffiliated though I have had times where I was drawn to Roman Catholicism, Orthodoxy, Anglicanism, and I even thought ever so briefly about the Reformed. I once considered becoming part of the Assemblies of God so I could retain a Pentecostal identity. I have been going to a seminary that has Baptist roots, so I thought I may become a Baptist (probably wouldn’t be too hard to make this transition now). I discovered that for the time being I was happy committing as deep as a local independent church would ask of me. Unlike my fellow bloggers I am not part of a larger group.

What I do fear is that while some people can be removed from the sectarianism of Oneness Pentecostalism, some cannot have the sectarianism removed from within them. So they are suddenly as militantly for this group or that group as they were for Oneness Pentecostals a few months earlier. While this may be my committed ecumenism speaking, I ask you to be careful not to chose a group merely to belong.

I say this because your identity must be grounded in Christ. You must see yourself first and foremost as a Christian before you say you are a Roman Catholic, a Presbyterian, or a Methodist. You need to learn to love the people of God broadly before aligning with a group for pragmatic or polemical reasons.

There is a purging that must occur. While not all Oneness Pentecostal congregations are suspicious of other Christians a great many are. There is a good chance that if you fellowshipped with the church down the street it was through minimal interaction. Whatever you do, don’t leave where you are only to go somewhere similar.

Also, there are many Oneness Pentecostals who had to accept what their pastor taught lest they be isolated. You had to affirm particular views on particular passages. You didn’t study these things to see if they were true because in part you feared your conclusions. If you did study it was only to learn how to “defend” yourself against Trinitarians.

If you pray and study and one day realize you belong amongst the Southern Baptist then so be it. But don’t choose to be Southern Baptist because you need a “team”. Don’t choose to be Southern Baptist because you need an “us” to oppose “them”. Do not choose to be Southern Baptist simply to belong. Why? Because one day you will wake up and realize you are in a place that is vaguely familiar. You have doubts, you need answers, and you aren’t sure what to do. Too much could be at stake to ask the questions floating through your mind, so you will shut up and live with the tension. Tension it will be.

This is all I have to say on this subject. In my next post I will address something a bit more concerning. I will be writing on the pendulum swing that I have experienced and seen experienced by other former Oneness Pentecostals in the area of morals and convictions.


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Lenten Prayer of St. Ephrem

I hope that all that are observing the season of lent are finding the journey spiritually purifying. I thought that I would share a prayer that has been very beneficial to during this time. The Prayer of St. Ephraim is thought to be the perfect encapsulation and summation of the Lent season. I agree wholeheartedly!

O Lord and Master of my life, give me not a spirit of idleness, despondency, ambition, or vain talking. (cross yourself and make a prostration)

But rather a spirit of purity, humility, patience, and love bestow on me thy servant. (cross yourself and make a prostration)

Yes, O Lord and King, grant me to see my own faults, and not to judge my brother, for blessed art Thou unto ages of ages,

Amen. (cross yourself and make a prostration)

O God, cleanse me a sinner. (x12, crossing and bowing)

O Lord and Master of my life, give me not a spirit of idleness, despondency, ambition, or vain talking. But rather a spirit of purity, humility, patience, and love bestow on me thy servant.

Yes, O Lord and King, grant me to see my own faults, and not to judge my brother, for blessed art Thou unto ages of ages, Amen.

(cross yourself and make a prostration)

 


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What is Wrong with “Ecclesiastical Communities”?

Pope Benedict XVI and the Archbishop of Canterbury, Rowan Williams

Yesterday, I wrote on this blog about my effort to be catholic though I am not Catholic. It turned into an interesting conversation and I am thankful for the participation of all those who had something to say. I want to continue from another angle.

Through the discussion it was made evident that non-Catholics are considered to be something called “ecclesiastical communities”. I found this phrase a bit odd since it seems to indicated Protestant/Reformed/Anglican, et al., are legitimate “churches”, yet different (subordinate) to the Catholic church. Esteban Vazquez noted that this is because we do not have the authority of an episcopate, therefore holy orders, therefore actual standing as a church because we are not under a bishop (does this apply to Anglicans or are Anglican episcopates legitimate?). This made me wonder what the actual downside would be for a non-Catholic, non-Orthodox Christian.

When I asked this question Nick Norelli suggested that it is likely we are considered heretical. This bothered me since I had heard that Vatican II pulled back such language. As I read through Vatican II, Unitatis Redintegratio (here), it was a bit vague. There is a section of chapter III titled “Separated Churches and Ecclesiastical Communities in the West” which would apply to all of us Christians who derive from the Reformation in one way or another. The document does not make a general statement regarding all of these churches for the following reason:

“However, since these Churches and ecclesial Communities, on account of their different origins, and different teachings in matters of doctrine on the spiritual life, vary considerably not only with us, but also among themselves, the task of describing them at all adequately is extremely difficult; and we have no intention of making such an attempt here.”

Rather, the document list several areas of commonality that can serve as a starting place for dialog: (1) the confession of Jesus Christ as God; (2) the Trinity; (3) love and reverence of the Sacred Scriptures; (4) baptism; (5) our taking of communion; and (6) other pieties such as hearing and obeying the Word, prayer, et al. If these things are in place the move toward “eccumenical action” can occur. I couldn’t determine whether or not this means simply that Catholics have common ground with which to bring the rest of us back to Rome or if the common ground meant the reality of some sort of fellowship, as is.

So, in gist, what does it mean, from the perspectives of Catholics (and we could even include Orthodox if they would like to speak to this), for the rest of us to be “ecclesiastical communities”? What is the actual downside to this standing in your opinion? Do we not participate in the fullness of salvation in some sort of way? Do you foresee eschatological consequences for our perceived separation? Your feedback is welcome.