The report includes eight points of convergence and I thought it might be interesting to consider them one by one.
Convergence 7
The unity of the Church also requires both conciliar fellowship and mutual reception of conciliar decisions by the churches. There need to be structures that allow us to receive and reflect together on ecumenical texts, including the challenges outlined in the previous points of convergence.
Again there are a mass of assumptions in this text. The phrase 'mutual reception of conciliar decisions' gives the game away. What it means is that the councils of the churches make their decisions and then the rest of us will need to be persuaded or cajoled into following them.
Wouldn't it be better all round if local churches, that's the churches that are working towards unity (or picking up shards of past failures) were a part of the decision making, rather than meekly receiving what has already been decided by academics and power politicians?
We really need to get away from the idea that there is a band of courageous theologians who can sort out the problems facing the churches. They are part of the problem. We need a new generation who understand unity as a task for the whole people of God.
The aim is not to safeguard the interests of the hierarchies but to bring to birth something new and unexpected. Many of us no longer share the interests of those who lead the churches. But we're also fed up with growth through schism. There has to be a way of ordering our lives so that we can choose which tradition we belong to, whilst making a contribution to the life of the whole of the church.
This is the thirteenth post in a sequence about ecumenical formation.
There are then, two movements in ecumenical formation. I came across a slogan at a conference about Arminianism last year, 'Roots Down, Walls Down'.
Logically roots down comes first, although in time the two movements will interact with one another. As we explore our own tradition (even before we think of it as our own), we drill down into it. We learn of the distinctive insights, shared by those who belong to it. This is not to claim traditions are unchanging. Compare the agendas of Methodist Conference in the 1930s and today. The concerns about the sabbath and temperance have almost vanished, replaced by political issues such as racism, poverty and the environment. And yet it is still the same tradition.
Drill deeper still and we begin to tap into more that is shared with other traditions. Methodism's history means it shares some of its heritage with the Church of England for example. But the point is we approach this material through the Methodist doctrine and church structures that make Methodists different from Anglicans.
At this stage encounters with other traditions make sense. We can challenge each other to go deeper, confident we are drilling into the same bedrock. We should not need to defend our differences because in discovering them, we help those of other traditions see their own from a new perspective. This approach is known as receptive ecumenism. We discover as our roots go down, so too the walls between us come down.
In following this path, we steer a course between two unwelcome extremes. First, the desire to tidy up and bring everything into a single structure. The challenge is to love and support one another despite our differences. To convert someone would be to lose their insights from the conversation.
The other is the desire to fly apart, to abolish the traditions and go it alone. Ultimately, I don't think this is possible. To choose no tradition, is failure to acknowledge what influences you. Ultimately it displays spiritual ignorance, lack of awareness of one's own roots.
This is the twelfth post in the sequence about Christian formation.
Last time, I suggested formation is familiarity with a library of texts associated with a particular tradition. It is further supported through encounters with other traditions, which cause us to draw upon experience of our own tradition and make it conscious. Indeed formation takes place not only through ecumenical encounters or interfaith work but in any missionary situation where we talk about God.
This leads me to ask whether, through a formational lens, we see more clearly the case for reconciled diversity.
Full visible unity strongly implies structural unity. This requires analytical theological negotiation. So step by step, as each difference is dealt with, theologians move on to the next problem.
With a focus on formation however, equiping all church members with insights from their own tradition and conversations between traditions, we are in a very different place. There is still a need for theologians but their focus changes to what helps communication between Christians rather than debate between scholars. This does not downplay scholarship but re-frames its energies.
A major problem with formal conversations is their lack of reception by church members. To see theological work as primarily one of formation, brings the urgent need for reception into focus.
This approach brings another debate into focus. Many claim to have abandoned the traditions and seek a Christians Together approach. The free-spirited nature of this is of great value but it tends to call into question the value of formation. We urgently need conversations between them and traditional ecumenists.
So, what is formation? In this fourth in this series, I will tease out some strands.
First a few things to clear the ground. Formation is not the sole responsibility for the ordained. They may have a formal obligation to see to the formation of those over whose care they have some reponsibility. However, the reponsibility is everyone's and we are all responsible for each others' formation.
Formation is something everyone experiences. Some may be gifted and some not even know what the word means but in principle it is accessible to all. The Methodist publication, Time to Talk of God, a few years ago, made this point. Anyone can talk about God.
Formation is a mutual activity. It is something people can share in. It is not about someone who knows, pouring insights into the minds of others. It is mutual learning. Christian traditions are not programmes of belief to be systematically worked through; they are guides, resources, help, something to draw upon.
Consequently, sharing between Christians of different traditions makes a valuable contribution to mutual formation because it enables sharing of insights from different parts of the tradition. This is sometimes called receptive ecumenism.
Furthermore, without mutual sharing, there is a danger that a tradition will go out on a limb. If we are to engage with others from outside the faith, we must learn from each other something of what our faith is.
Contextual theology considers every tradition to be formed through a conversation between a particular time and place and the Christian faith. It does not cover solely those faith traditions, eg black, feminist, liberation, Asian, etc that differ from those of Western Europe. The growth of new traditions is natural for a living faith. Faith is not just words on paper but lives lived in many contexts and the insights shared are a small part of what is experienced on the ground.
Given this natural diversity, catholicity is essential for Christian unity. However, it does not imply all traditions are equally valid. The point is (1) all traditions are lacking, and (2) no-one knows for certain the frailties of either their own or anyone else's tradition. Receptive ecumenism addresses this in its exploration of exchanges of gifts between traditions, where each tradition seeks from others what is lacking from its own.
The mainstream traditions are compromises between a variety of traditions who determine to collaborate despite their differences. Their purpose is threefold (at least) - mission and unity, of course, and also spiritual direction. In the Roman Catholic traditions this is known as formation; in the Wesleyan traditions as sanctification.
John Wesley was not only the greatest evangelist since St Paul but also a skilled spiritual director. He saw the need for spiritual direction amongst the new urban poor and he set up the structures (Methodist societies) whereby the poor could be spiritual directors for each other. Formation was at the core of the early Methodist movement.
And I would maintain it is just as essential today as it ever was. When the evangelicals of the 1970s found Methodism wanting, they took the wrong road. They separated themselves into purist groups and focused on evangelism. It had disappointing results because it failed to form its converts. It failed to form its converts because it did not trust the wider Methodist Church. Today, Methodism's evangelicals seem to have recognised the importance of formation within the church.
Evidence of the importance of formation can be seen in the work of Father Christopher Jamieson of Worth Abbey. I have written before of his BBC TV programme 'The Monastery' in 2005 and the book that followed it, 'Finding Sanctuary'. Recently, he has fronted another BBC programme, 'The Big Silence' which once again demonstrated the hunger people have for God, even some who do not recognise God exists.
We need therefore to recognise three legs to the churches' ministry; mission, unity and formation.
I wrote three posts about this era earlier this year and the first placed the Inter-church Process into its historical context. By 1985, the plans were advanced and the plan was to work through three phases.
Phase 1 was called Understandings of the Church and was to last throughout 1985 and until September 1986. It aimed:
To look closely at our understandings of the Church in the light of our common mission, from the point of view of the tradition and experience of each denomination, but also in the light of ecumenical experience and in relation to the existence of other denominations.
The objective was to find replies to a central question from local, national and international sources. The question was:
"In your tradition and experience, how do you understand the nature and purpose of your church, in relation to other Christian denominations and as together we share in God's mission to the world?"
At the local level, the aim was to engage local Christians to share their views together during Lent 1986. This would be 'nationally co-ordinated and locally devised'. This process would be supplemented by the views of those involved in local ecumenism and members of other local Christian Communities.
At national level, the national churches would be consulted and asked to produce a 2000 word response to the churches. This would be supplemented by the views of national bodies such as the Evangelical Alliance, other responsible secular, professional and non-Christian organisations, and major non-Christian faiths. This would be supplemented by work already completed.
At international level, the findings of multilateral and bilateral conversations would be collated and third world views obtained through church missionary organisations.
I summarised the results of this process in a recent post.
Phase II: Reflecting and Questioning Together, over the autumn and winter of 1986-7, aimed:
To promote prayer, reflection, and mutual questioning on the material produced in phase I in order to prepare for phase III.
This would be done at local, regional and national levels though meetings to discuss the material produced at phase 1. The expectation was ecumenical groups would make their own arrangements but the 'nature and purpose of the church' would also be the theme for the January 1987 Week of Prayer for Christian Unity.
Phase III was Evaluation and Proposals for Action between the Spring and Autumn of 1987. It aimed:
To evaluate and assess this process of prayer, study and discussion in order to discern the way forward and to make proposals for the practical and organisational aspects of the churches' mission and unity, including the shaping of the ecumenical instruments needed for the future.
This would take place through a series of meetings. (1) Three meetings took place in England, Scotland and Wales within 10 days of each other, (2) a conference of 500 - 1000 participants in September 1987, (3) after September proposals would be considered by churches and other ecumenical bodies.
The vision did not have a narrow Faith and Order focus. In terms of content and its commitment to engage with all interested parties locally, nationally and internationally, the process showed a real vision for the whole church in the context of the wider world.
There was a genuine commitment to engage with local churches. Given the technology of the time, they achieved something that would be unthinkable now. It is amazing they were able to do all this 25 years ago. With blogs and social networking today, it would seem easier to undertake these wide-ranging conversations. In reality, this vision seems to have deserted the ecumenical movement and such a broad conversation seems impossible.
The document, Inter-Church Programme Proposals, looks forward to the Inter-Church Process of Lent 1986. The key question they hoped to address was: What is the Church and what is it for? The aim was to consult widely with church leaders, church members and church related organisations. After some brief speculations about how this question might be asked in terms of mission, God's Kingdom and God's final purpose for all, they write on page 5:
We might go on to ask whether our Churches might recognise each other as "other provisional embodiments of God's purposes". However, our hope in tackling these questions is not just to produce new documents, but to enable action to follow to change our standing in one another's eyes and our relationship to each other within the fellowship of Christ, so that together we might follow our common calling "in and for the world". And we shall also need to ask: What is the world saying to us? What is the Kingdom asking of us as Christians? What is the meaning of the Church in a secular society which sees no purpose for it?
Note the aim of this process was not restricted to unity. It was not unity for the sake of unity but for the wider benefit of the world. There is an expectation that things would change as a result of this initiative.
Our Churches' 'confessions' to one another of what we believe we are as churches, given both our varying size and the doctrinal, social, cultural and historical context of our life, will be placed 'on the table' for further use in the process. These are not envisaged as final, but as provisional responses, incorporating the viewpoints of those concerned with the Church's mission, evangelism, ministry and social responsibility, as well as those concerned with Faith and Order and with Christian unity. But they will be something new, in that we shall be saying how we see our own church in our overall perspectives, which will be encouraged by existing or new co-operation between us. This will lead us on to ask ourselves together: On what basis, and on what understanding of the Church can we move forward? And, out of this process, what shape might emerge for the ecumenical instruments needed to serve the Churches' common mission to the world?
Again it is clear that a vision of churches collaborating in a common relationship with the world was foundational to the Inter-Church Process. It struck me, following the January 2009 conference about receptive ecumenism, that receptive ecumenism needed to be accompanied by ecumenical reception and a third process I called transformative reception. This is where the churches together allow the world to form their mission and ministry. It is unsettling to find it current 25 years ago, given I found it necessary to reinvent it following that conference.
Again, I am forced to ask why it is, given the undoubted success of the Inter-Church Process, modern ecumenism stepped back into Faith and Order debates, losing its sense of commitment to the world?
One of the strengths of Harmon's book, Ecumenism Means You, Too, is his emphasis on the importance of belonging to a tradition. In a recent post I showed how I see each of the mainstream traditions as embodying, in various ways, catholicity. All traditions are compromises between a variety of theological approaches and this can be thought of as the defining attribute of any Christian tradition. Adherence to a single defined set of beliefs stifles internal conversation and ultimately isolates the believers from the Body of Christ.
Harmon writes on page 61:
We can make progress towards unity when we make progress towards catholicity within the denominations, and we make progress towards unity when the denominations share their distinctive patterns of catholicity with one another. As individual Christians we must be shaped by a particular denominational tradition in order to help our own church toward unity and in order to help the rest of the church learn from our own church.
This is a good definition of receptive ecumenism, a topic touched upon by Harmon elsewhere in his book.
I have elsewhere argued there needs to be an intergenerational conversation about unity and that conversation is itself an exercise in ecumenical reception. To arrive at conclusions between church leaders with no awareness of what younger people are thinking, would be a recipe for stagnation. The point is, we have a generation that no longer looks to church leaders for leadership. This can be seen as a danger for the churches but it can also be seen as an opportunity.
It looks like Harmon is attempting to start intergenerational conversations along these lines in the States and it will be interesting to hear how he gets on. In the meantime, how about some similar conversations in Britain?
... ecumenism is not pluralism. Ecumenism is the quest for unity amongst Christians now divided by denomination. It is not the effort to find some generic essence of religion that might minimise conflicts between the religions. Interreligious dialogue that respects the real differences between the religions is necessary to clear up misunderstandings that Christians, Jews, Muslims and adherents of other religions may have of one another, and this too is an important task for the church's theologians. (Page 3)
Harmon argues, where 'younger Christians tend to attribute denominational divisions to human sinfulness' (Page 5) this is an encouraging sign. I would add, it was impossible a few decades ago and is a mark of the success of the ecumenism of the twentieth century. This is something I have referred to in earlier posts and is marked by the idea of Christians Together, as opposed to Churches Together.
Harmon goes on to suggest on page 6, 'Abandoning denominational commitment in the name of being "non-denominational" can actually undermine the quest for Christian unity in some unanticipated ways, and moving easily from a church of one denomination to a congregation of another can be a symptom of the consumer mentality that is endemic to American Christianity.'
Many younger people in my experience are proud of their ability to move between churches. I have expressed my doubts before. It can mean a Christian is unwilling to be formed by a single tradition and by refusing the detail of a single tradition, the possibility is that faith itself is superficial.
This is not in itself a reason for no movement between churches. Sometimes people need to change as their faith matures and this is fine, so long as the move is accompanied by a determination to grow roots in the new tradition. It is even helpful for some people to put down roots in two traditions, they can be interpreters between the two.
It is almost as if Christians Together and Churches Together inhabit different worlds. The problem is we don't recognise and encourage open debate about these two approaches and how they might be reconciled.
Reception is no longer a matter of persuading congregations to accept agreements between church leaders (if it ever was). Today, the task is a dialogue between generations moving, it seems in opposite directions.
It is difficult to find good books about ecumenism. Too many seek to report the Faith and Order debate in tedious detail or else extol the many treasures we have to offer one another. Too often the whole becomes a litany of denominations and what they have to offer each other.
I have avoided this approach and suggest we focus upon how we approach the ecumenical task rather than tedious dissection of issues of little consequence for many people.
I therefore welcome this little book, Ecumenism Means You, Too: Ordinary Christians and the Quest for Christian Unity by Steven R Harmon, which bucks the trend and offers a masterful summary of the case for ecumenism, does not ignore the Faith and Order debates but focuses on what is important to every Christian.
It is written for young people and, although from the context of America, it is remarkable how many of the issues identified are common to Britain. Indeed, many have already been visited several times on this blog.
Harmon is encouraged by the instinctive ecumenism of many younger people who no longer recognise denominational boundaries. But he questions the wisdom of this and quotes the Irish Rock Band U2, 'We're one, but we're not the same'.
He recognises the sense that the ecumenical tide is going out, that there is less interest in ecumenism amongst younger people despite the successes of the previous century.
The ecumenical leaders of the past few decades are retiring and passing away, and few younger leadersare ready to take up their mantle. The denominations that were once heavily invested in the quest for Christian unity have now turned their energies to their worsening internal divisions. Conflicts within denominations over biblical authority, gender, and sexuality have greatly complicated efforts to secure unity between the denominations.
I will in a few future posts touch upon some insights from this book but I recommend it in its entirety because it makes a straightforward case for younger people to pick up the baton.
I should add that despite being a short and clear read, this book does not hide its scholarship. This is no attempt to water down ecumenism. Indeed it is a brilliant example of ecumenical reception, the type of reception I have argued is needed between the generations.
Consultancy for Mission and Ministry This should take you to details of the Consultancy for Mission and Ministry course at the York Insititute. See my post about non-directive consuultancy around 9 September 2009.
Image via Wikipedia
Recent Comments