Exploring Ecumenism

The Goal of Ecumenism 4: Openness versus Effort

This is the fourth in a sequence of posts based upon Chris James' blog post  The Goal of Ecumenism: Why and how to be one , part V.  The first of these posts is  Why Are We Divided?, the second is  The Visibility of the Church and the third is Ecumenism and Ecclesiality .

I must confess to a degree of impatience with the idea that ecumenism is a some sort of eschatological truth.  Of course I understand that the fullness of God's plan for humanity will not be revealed until the end times.  But how practical is it to assert this truth?  It feels like a cop out: we can't do anything about it now because it is an eschatological truth.

Debt in the Gospels

In the story at the beginning of Mark chapter 2 a paralysed man is carried to Jesus but his four friends cannot negotiate the crowds.  He is taken onto the roof and lowered through it.  The picture, from sacred destinations, shows a golden mosaic of the healing of the paralytic in the Basilica di San Marco, Venice.   

Then things become a bit strange.  Seeing the faith of the friends, Jesus does not heal the paralysed man but forgives his sins.  This causes some of the scribes to question how Jesus has taken upon himself the authority to forgive sins.  To prove he has the authority, Jesus heals the man.

On Being Born Again

If we are to take a radical approach to ethics, we need to understand what Christians mean by conversion.  Let us start with the story of Nicodemus at John chapter 3:1.  The most significant thing about Nicodemus is that he comes by night.

Righteousness, Justification and Faith in Jesus

Today I want to follow up yesterday's post by asking how Paul understood faith and belief.  The photo, by Niall McAuley, is from SS Peter and Paul's church, Athlone, completed in 1937. This window is in the porch.  It shows Paul's letter to the Romans.  (His other letters are under his cloak.)

My argument is based upon a passage in John Dominic Crossan and Jonathan L Reed's In Search of Paul, page 381 onwards.  In this passage they discuss Romans 3:26:

... it was to prove at the present time that he himself is righteous and that he justifies the one who has faith in Jesus.  (NRSV)

The First Commandment is One Commandment not Three

I want to pick up on yesterday's post, with a small diversion into a piece if exegesis we looked at during a recent meeting of the Christian Praxis Group. 

The text is Mark 12:27-34.  This is the story of the scribe who asks 'which is the first commandment of all?' (v28)  Verse 27 picks up at the end of the previous story where Jesus tells the Sadducees, 'you are quite wrong'.

Contextual Readings of Scripture

Last night I watched the BBC's Did Darwin Kill God?, a programme presented by Conor Cunningham a theologian and Darwinian at Nottingham University.  The programme explored both fundamentalist and ultra-Darwinist views.  Cunningham's point was that Darwinism at the time Darwin published his theory was not seen as a problem by the church.  The real opposition started in the American Bible belt, with the Scopes trial in the thirties (where creationism was supported by socialists alarmed by social Darwinism) and creationism as we know it today did not appear until the 1960s.

The point is that the churches have always been aware of the contradictions in scripture and have always interpreted scripture allegorically.  Literal readings are a very modern approach and have no claim to historical precedent. 

 Liberation and contextual theologies, starting in the 1970s, were perhaps nothing new.  The idea that the Bible contains a single absolute truth is itself arbitrary.  Whose truth is the single truth in scripture?  Whilst by definition I cannot hold to be true anything I believe not to be true, it does not follow that what I believe is true.  To see the possibility of a spectrum of readings is to see scripture as it is.  To see only one possible reading is to make absolute your personal partial reading.

Anyone reading scripture brings their experience and context with them.  Indeed problems start when they do not do this and read through the lens of someone else's context.  We call this irrational.  The power of unaccountable church leaders lies in their ability to persuade as many people as possible to read scripture in their way.

On page 40, Kim asks the question: 'Whose voice does Paul side with among the various conflicting voices in the world?'

What happens when we bring the context of the marginalised to reading scripture? 

The Eschatological Rollercoaster

In my last post I promised to compare the passage in Philippians (2:5-11), believed to be an early hymn, with the U theory from Presence.  Before I attempt the comparison I thought it might be worth making a few points about the passage.  In the main these are from Crossan and Reed's In Search of Paul, chapter 5.  I have given the hymn my own name, the eschatological rollercoaster, (for those professional theologians who are not reading this blog, I apologise for the long words and explain that a rollercoaster is a fairground ride that goes up and down).

1. The hymn needs to be read within its context, especially verses 1 - 4 and 12 - 13.  The Philippians are invited, or commanded even, to 'be of the same mind, having the same love, being in full accord and of one mind'.  The hymn therefore does not simply tell a story, it is intended to be normative for the Christian community.  It is meant to be a template for Christian life.
2. This is a story told in retrospect, it is a story full of interpretation.  This is I think entirely legitimate, it offers us an insight into what the earliest Christians believed about Jesus.
3. The hymn describes a U shape.  This is what made the link for me with the Presence U model.  I will in future posts explore the similarities and differences.  For all sorts of reasons the downward motion is what is notable in the hymn.  This was not understood by Paul as a random act.  Could Jesus have died of leprosy, for example?  If he had, it would have been a slow, terrible and humiliating death on the margins of society.  Clearly, leprosy would have placed a barrier between Jesus and society and made his ministry almost impossible.  But the crucial point is the cross was an official, legal and formal death.  Religious and political authorities colluded to bring about his death.  This is what religious and political authorities do.  They do it because they have vested interests and perceive themselves as under threat.
4. We cannot have the exaltation of Christ in the second half of the hymn without the downward motion.  This downward motion, from God, to human, to slave, to death, to cross is an act of kenosis, of self-emptying.  To get hold of its significance, we have to make the comparison Paul and the other early Christians would have made, even without thinking about it.  That contrast is with the Roman Emperor.  The Roman Emperor was addressed as Lord, the same as the address given to Jesus in verse 11.  The reason Jesus Christ is confessed as Lord is because of what happens in the rest of the hymn.  The Roman Emperor was Lord all his life.  There was no downward motion, the Emperor was automatically exalted upon his death.  Jesus is exalted because of his humility, unlike the Emperor.  The Lordship of Jesus has nothing to do with aggrandisement and everything to do with humility.
5. Note that in the first half of the hymn, Jesus empties himself and in the second half it is God who highly exalts Jesus.  At the bottom of the U shape, something changes around, in a sense God takes over, when Jesus can go no further.  But we must also note that in doing so God affirms Jesus' humility.  So, through Jesus' humility we see something of the character of God.  God is seen as a God of Love who is prepared to give all for the love of his creation.

Revelation through Faith for Faith (Romans 1:17)

John Rogerson is (I think) Emeritus Professor of Biblical Studies at Sheffield University.  He has been retired for many years, most likely at least 11 years as he has been leading a more or less monthly Bible study for that long.  His main interest is in the Old Testament but this year we are looking at Romans. 

Last night we got as far as Romans 1: 16, 17.  John read from Karl Barth's 'The Epistle to the Romans', a passage which seems to be a response to verse 17 'the righteousness of God is revealed through faith for faith'.  The following indented paragraph is the gist of what Barth writes.  The original is in German and the only English translation isn't very good apparently.  Furthermore I've taken this from my notes of what John read out.  However far this text has strayed from the original, it is still interesting.

What is named God is not God.  This God affirms the world as it is.  A cry of revolt against such a God is nearer the truth.  All the time we think we know what God is like apart from Jesus.  But we must accept we don't know what God is like.  If we talk about God without Jesus we talk of this no-God who does not redeem creation.  The God we conjure up is no God.  The cry of revolt is nearer the truth.  In Christ God speaks as he is and punishes the no-God.  Christ condemns the no-God, affirming himself by denying us as we are and the world as it is. 

John also quoted from Paul Tillich - 'To argue that God exists is to deny him.  Accept the absurd as divine, the executed criminal.'  John said verse 17 is the willingness to accept that God is trying to put things right.

This reminded me of the atheist bus campaign.  Richard Dawkins and others have collected a huge sum of money to advertise on the sides of buses all over the country.  The advert reads, 'there is probably no God, so stop worrying and enjoy your life.'  The 'probably' is delightful and has caused at least one Christian group to make a contribution on the grounds that it will get people talking about God.  There is a paradox here because according to Barth the atheists are right to reject God but wrong to talk of God in the absence of Jesus.  By the same token the Christians who have contributed are also wrong.  Both, according to my interpretation of Barth have a false image of God (as have we all). 

This also reminds me of Wesley's 'Three Grand Scriptural Doctrines'.  How far does his rejection of doctrinal "opinions" share Barth's insight about the nature of what we call God?  But is he also in his three rather intellectualised doctrines making the mistake of moving too far from Jesus?

Christopher Jamieson in 'Finding Sanctuary' states we cannot know God.  God reveals himself to us by revealing to us the true nature of ourselves.  I think Wesley's doctrines of original sin, justification and sanctification are all about us learning of God through learning our own true nature.  It is the life and teaching of Jesus that helps us know ourselves.  We cannot compare ourselves to God, but we can compare ourselves to Jesus.

The People of the Way

The Christian Praxis Group met this weekend and we studied this week's lectionary reading Mark 1: 1 - 8 in the Greek.

Arche means beginning and indicates in verse 1 this is about Jesus.  But there are preliminaries before we get onto Jesus.  The story of Jesus begins with Isaiah (chapter 40) vv 2,3 and then John the Baptiser vv 4-8.  John in particular goes before Jesus calling attention to him.

Idou in v2 means behold, and is a word often used by Jesus in Mark - it means look here or get focused, pay attention. 

Prepare the way of the Lord - the word for way is hodos which means a paved way.  I had a couple of thoughts about this - first is the word an example of onomatopoeia?  For a paved route the remarkable thing would be the sound of horses' hooves.  This might be an allusion to the Roman occupiers as the straightening is not done to the hodos but to the paths - tribous.  Staying with hodos - the first Christians were known as 'the people of the way'. 

The Greek word translated as straight is eutheias which is derived from eutheos which is usually translated as immediately.  See verse 10 for the first use of this word in Mark and note the King James version translates it as straightway! 

Tribous means paths and its origins are with the verb 'to rub'.  In contrast to the paved route; these are the beaten paths.  And note the plural, make straight the paths, all paths are to be prepared not just the one paved road.  There is no equivalent to this in Isaiah 40.  This implies a wide range of people not just those who travel by the established route.

So, what can we make of all this?  The Good News that is to come is for all - not just those who travel on the main roads but by many small paths will come together (we were not sure whether tribous has any connection with tributary).  Attention is drawn to this at the outset as people familiar with Isaiah 40 would note the difference.  The people of the way are invited to recognise the many small paths onto the way.