felix hominum

Canadian Anglican House of Bishops - "letter to the Church"

October 30, 2007 - London, Ont. -- The following is a message to the people of the Anglican Church of Canada from the House of Bishops, who met this week in London, Ontario:
Brothers and Sisters in Christ

For our first full meeting since last summer's General Synod, we were hosted by the Diocese of Huron, currently celebrating its sesquicentennial and we attended a special Sunday service at the John Labatt Centre in London, Ont. at which it appeared the entire Anglican diocese turned out to mark the occasion. The theme of the celebration was Years of Light and Life. Light, life and fellowship were also the theme of the sermon preached by our Primate, Archbishop Fred Hiltz.

Several segments of our gathering were in the company of our brother and sister bishops from the Evangelical Lutheran Church in Canada and in furtherance of the Waterloo Declaration on Full Communion, we commended for occasional use the new Evangelical Lutheran Worship resource in Anglican churches, where authorized by the local bishop.

This meeting of the House of Bishops was also a House and Spouse gathering. Once every triennium we come together with our spouses in this way to talk about issues relating to Episcopal ministry that touch in a special way our lives with our families. One particularly useful session of the House and Spouse gathering was a facilitated discussion on Wellness in the Episcopal Household.

Much of our gathering as a House was spent describing and reflecting on the different journeys different ecclesiastical provinces and dioceses have travelled since General Synod. We heard reports from several bishops who spoke of the effects of General Synod's resolutions on same-sex blessings and these reflections ranged from parts of the country where this issue is paramount in the life of the church to others areas where it is only a very small part of the church's life or scarcely considered at all. We heard from the bishops of Ottawa and Montreal about the adoption of motions by their respective synods that call upon them to authorize the blessing of civil same-sex marriages, and both bishops described the debate around these motions as courteous and respectful of divergent views. We had a discussion about the April 2007 Statement from the House of Bishops to Members of General Synod and heard from several bishops about how the Statement is being understood. It was agreed that the statement continues to have the same status as it did originally.

We were reminded by our Primate that contrary to impressions created by much of the Canadian media that covered General Synod, the gathering was anything but a one-issue synod. Motions adopted in support of ministry in the North, conversations around issues of governance and the primacy, support for the Companion Dioceses program, support for the Millennium Development Goals, the day spent with our Lutheran brothers and sisters, the success of the publication of the Anglican Journal Daily, were all evidence of things that bring us together and manifestations of the General Synod theme Draw the Circle Wide – Draw it wider still, Archbishop Hiltz reminded us. "It's time," the Primate said, "for this church of ours to celebrate the things that are holding us together and that continue to hold the Communion together."

In regular business we dealt with a number of issues which we feel are of interest to the church:

We heard a detailed report on the status of the implementation of the renegotiated Residential Schools Agreement and on the church's progress in the next stage of this healing journey, as well as the establishment by the federal government of a Truth and Reconciliation Commission. There was a presentation and discussion of the many aspects of the ongoing work of healing and reconciliation in our dioceses and at the national level.

We spent time discussing a response to the Anglican Communion's Joint Standing Committee report dealing with the responses of The Episcopal Church to the requests made of that church by the Windsor Report and the Primates' Meeting earlier this year. Our discussions touched on things to affirm in the report, things that alarm us, and things that give us hope. The Council of General Synod, when it meets in a few weeks, will have a similar discussion. The Primate will then respond to the Archbishop of Canterbury.

We discussed communications and the presence of the media at our meetings, striving to achieve a balance between the transparency and accountability to the wider church which is fostered by allowing media to cover our proceedings, with the necessity of providing a safe space in which bishops may speak openly among themselves about the challenges of their ministry. This is a discussion to which we will return.

Lastly, we bade farewell to three members of the House: Bishops Ralph Spence of Niagara, Michael Bedford-Jones of Toronto and Victoria Matthews of Edmonton.

We ended our time together with a Eucharist celebrated with our brother and sister bishops from ELCIC.

(from ACC national site)

world's easiest Hallowe'en costume

You get a pair of one dollar loonie coins.

You tape one to the bottom of each ear lobe.

Voila, you are now

"a buck an ear".

Annual Festival of Lessons & Carols

Tickets for the Festival of Nine Lessons and Carols for Advent and Christmas are now on sale at the Winspear Box Office.  With the musical talent of the U of A Mixed Chorus, Robert de Frece, the Faculty of Education Handbell Ringers, Marnie Giesbrecht and Joachim Segger the evening is always enjoyable.  It will take place Monday, Nov. 26th at 7:30pm at the Winspear Center.  Tickets are $10 and can be purchased by calling the Winspear Center Box Office at 428-1414 or online at http://tickets.winspearcentre.com

This is always a great event.  It is sponsored by the Christian campus ministries at the U of A and is a major fundraiser for the campus food bank.  And it is a traditional festival of lessons & carols:  the theme is the birth of the Christ, in Scripture and song.

ps - you could ask this person for more details, and I hear that she also has some sort of free meal deal for students in town...

Annual Canadian Down Syndrome Society "Buddy Walk"

The Edmonton Down Syndrome Society (EDSS) 3rd Annual Buddy Walk, November 4, 2007 at Hawrelak Park.

Every participant helps promote the importance of understanding, acceptance and awareness of people with Down syndrome.

Pledges collected will help fund the Down Syndrome Medical Clinic at the new Edmonton Clinic. This clinic will provide dedicated services to people with Down syndrome of all ages.

Walk information:

9:30 am: Check-in/Late Registration
11:00 am: Walk Begins (2.5km), Followed by Lunch and Prizes

Further info:  Edmonton Down Syndrome Society

Budziszewski on Carl FH Henry, Evangelical Politics and The Uneasy Conscience

Coffee and a book...

The influence of Carl FH Henry on contemporary evangelicalism is undisputed.  He was a founder and first editor of Christianity Today, and one of the first faculty members of Fuller Theological Seminary,   He authored more than 30 books, and is, in the words of Budziszewski,“if not the father of the new evangelical movement – for it had no single originator – at least one of its uncles.”  [40] 

In 1947 Henry published “The Uneasy Conscience of Modern Fundamentalism”, a book which is his “most influential contribution to evangelical political reflection”.  [40]  Budziszewski devotes the first part of Evangelicals in the Public Square to critiquing both the book and its legacy.  What Henry saw in his own day was a movement away from the Fundamentalists to the “new evangelicals”, and with it Henry framed his lament over a misguided and hopeless modernity, and a challenge that Fundamentalists had ignored the social imperatives of the redemptive Gospel.

Henry argued broadly that redemption (like sin) is not only individual, but is also social [Henry, Conscience, 32, 37, 51-52].  He sought to correct the pendulum swing of the Fundamentalists, who in their reaction to a social gospel movement which seemed to downplay the divinity of Christ, had “seemed to revolt against the social imperative of the gospel itself” [41].  The underlying doctrine to drive this was the Incarnation, which has implications for wider social involvement and responsibility. Budziszewski summarizes Henry’s implications of the Incarnation for a redemptive social evangelicalism: “[Christians] should withdraw only from movements whose means or goals are explicitly anti-evangelical” [42].  What this means is that Henry was calling evangelicals and Fundamentalists to a wider engagement with the range of institutions – social, political, educational, economic. 

As Budziszewski points out, Henry’s strategy for engaging these institutions is not a developed Christian theory of education, politics, sociology or economics.  Rather, it is by populating these institutions with Christian individuals that the institutions will be transformed and redeemed. Here, I think, is the first question to be leveled in relation to contemporary “evangelical politics”:  Is it only through populating the institution with individual Christians that the institutions can be “redemptive”?  On one level, we see this played out in the elect-ability of candidates whose personal faith is agreeable to a set standard.  Fill the parliament, or congress, with individual Christians, and the rest will look after itself.  But is this the case?  Arguing from natural law, Bud holds that such an approach is short – it fails to call us to the task of thinking through a Christian economic and social philosophy, a Christian jurisprudence, a Christian philosophy of state and governance.  Christians need to have a notion of how the institutions can function redemptively.  For example, can we understand and enact just laws even if we do not have “Christians” in government? And conversely, will electing "Christians" lead to more just public institutions?

Another point to be considered in the (non) development of evangelical political philosophy is eschatology.   Budziszewski looks at three streams of eschatology in evangelical circles – streams which are still with us today.  Think of the “Left Behind” series which has populated Christian bookstore shelves and fattened publishers’ bank accounts.  Henry lamented the state of division and the amount of energy devoted to eschatology in his day, and Budziszewski looks at the legacy of these streams [44ff].  There is a large section of evangelical political thought which does not seek to transform the surrounding culture, but merely is content to be protected from it.  It is an escapist ideology which becomes merely defensive.  With shades of Kuyper, such evangelicals are happy as long as their own spheres are protected:  “we don’t think we will change the direction of public education, but don’t try to force that stuff on MY children.”  Budziszewski astutely observes that the “rise in fundamentalist political activity therefore reflects not a shift from a protective goal to a redemptive goal, but an increase in the perceived level of threat.” [46ff]

What Henry called evangelicals to do was engage the wider culture with the redemptive Gospel.  But what he failed to do was articulate a way in which evangelical Christians can think about those institutions apart from simply populating them with Christian individuals.  As Budziszewski points out, “Surely it would be naïve to think that better laws eliminate the need for God’s grace.  But it is equally unrealistic to suppose that conversion cancels out the need for better laws.” [47]

This whole area is a fascinating one.  One of the biggest charges brought against Henry and other evangelicals is that they failed to provide a “cultural apologetic”.  That is, they failed to explore if there is any basis on which to engage and cooperate with non-Christians in the pursuit of the public good.  This is a question which will have different answers from different quarters.  Is there any commerce between the City of God and the city of man?  Can there be a common notion of public “justice” among Christians and non-Christians?  Budziszewski argues that a great failing of evangelicalism is the absence of natural law as a bridge to a non-Christian culture.  This is the flip side of the Incarnation – all humans are made in the image of God, and as such, there are points of contact between all.  In their zeal for special revelation, they have neglected the tools of general revelation.

An interesting read so far.  Think I’ll have to pull out the Meno again…

related post:  J. Budziszewski: Evangelicals in the Public Square

sermon notes Pentecost 22: Luke 18: 9-14

Some preliminary thoughts:

(BTW, we do a study on the upcoming lectionary readings every Wednesday at 12:15 pm at St Tim's; anyone is welcome to drop in.)

Luke 18:9-14

He also told this parable to some who trusted in themselves that they were righteous and regarded others with contempt: [10] "Two men went up to the temple to pray, one a Pharisee and the other a tax collector. 

[11] The Pharisee, standing by himself, was praying thus, 'God, I thank you that I am not like other people: thieves, rogues, adulterers, or even like this tax collector.  [12] I fast twice a week; I give a tenth of all my income.'

[13] But the tax collector, standing far off, would not even look up to heaven, but was beating his breast and saying, 'God, be merciful to me, a sinner!'  [14] I tell you, this man went down to his home justified rather than the other; for all who exalt themselves will be humbled, but all who humble themselves will be exalted."

Jesus loved to tell parables with striking contrasts, and he loved to tell them to a particular audience.

He tells this parable for the benefit of a particular audience - "some who trusted in themselves that they were righteous, and regarded others with contempt.”  Let’s just start with his intended audience.  Who is Jesus talking to?  Is it a particular audience within earshot, or a more general whoever-happens-to-hear?

The description given is two part - it has to do with their view of themselves, and their subsequent attitude toward others. In the Christian Gospel, these two are connected - my view of my own religious virtues, and my contempt for the failings of others. 

Jesus gives us contrasting studies in this parable.  It is a simple story of two men.  He says they both went up to the temple to pray.  So far so good.  Going up to the temple is a good thing, and going up in order to pray is an even better thing.  So far the two men are on equal footing.

Then Jesus gives us the cast of characters.  We have seen enough type cast movies to know that as soon as they are introduced, the bad guy and the good guy are easily identified.  “One was a Pharisee and the other was a tax collector”  From our vantage point we can see where this is going.  Jesus is going to give us an example of something to avoid, and an example of something to imitate.

Enter the Pharisee with sinister background music. 

“The Pharisee, standing by himself, was praying thus, 'God, I thank you that I am not like other people: thieves, rogues, adulterers, or even like this tax collector. I fast twice a week; I give a tenth of all my income.”

We know we are supposed to avoid the behaviour of the Pharisee, but what exactly is wrong with his prayer?

First, we note that he is “standing by himself” - he comes to the temple and has no desire to be part of the fellowship of the people of God.  His time at the temple, his prayer, his religion, is a matter for himself alone.  He neither needs nor is interested in needing, the rest of the community of believers.

Then we have his prayer.  He begins well enough: his first word is “God.”  But although God is the addressee of his prayer, God is not the center of his prayer.  God is mentioned once, and the Pharisee uses the word “I”,  4 times.   The prayer of the Pharisee is more concerned with what “I have done”, than what “God has done”.  “I thank you that I am not like other people: thieves, rogues, adulterers, or even like this tax collector.  I fast twice a week, I give a tenth of all my income.”

The prayer of the Pharisee highlights what his good character is, rather than what God’s good character is.  The Pharisee’s spiritual focus is all on himself, and because of this he thinks that he himself is the standard and measure of what righteousness is.  He trusts in himself that he has accomplished all that is necessary to be right with God, and if God is not convinced by the fact that the Pharisee has made a few religious observances and tithed a few cheques into the temple collection plate, then God should just look around at some the awful people who come to church.  God, you should be grateful to have someone like me in your congregation to raise the moral average up a few notches!  I also find it interesting that the Pharisee, who is supposed to be praying, has one eye on the rest of the people present.  How else would he have noticed that the tax collector is hanging around?

It is not a big stretch to see that the Pharisee “trusts in himself” that he is righteous, and from that beginning we can guess who the Pharisee’ real object of worship is going to be.

Enter the tax collector.

“But the tax collector, standing far off, would not even look up to heaven, but was beating his breast and saying, 'God, be merciful to me, a sinner!'”

The tax collector is a picture of humility before God.  The tax collector knows that he is a sinner - he is at least this honest with God.  He also knows that his hope lies not in his own actions, but in God’s actions:  “God, be merciful”.  The Pharisee drew attention to his own character - the tax collector draws attention to God’s character - merciful.  And as such, the prayer of the tax collector tells us more about God than the prayer of the Pharisee.

The tax collector shows that the standard of goodness and righteousness and love is not how well I do compared to my neighbours, but how well I do compared to Jesus.  And we know that we all fall short of the ideal.  We do not love God with all our hearts, and we do not love all of our neighbours as ourselves.  If I think that I have “made it” spiritually, I am guilty of pride.  If I know I still have a ways to go, then God can help me get there. 

The Pharisee is content, even pleased, with his spiritual status - he thinks he has spiritually arrived.  The tax collector is not satisfied - he wants to be a different person, and he knows that only God can help him become what he is meant to be as a human being. 

Then come the uncomfortable words:

"I tell you, this man went down to his home justified rather than the other; for all who exalt themselves will be humbled, but all who humble themselves will be exalted."

I was rather hoping that Jesus would provide a third option.  You see, I can look at both of them and say “thank you Lord that I am neither like the Pharisee nor like the tax-collector”.  I am aware of all the faults of the Pharisee. We know all about churchy self righteousness and how often Jesus condemns that sort of thing in the Gospel.

But really, am I supposed to be like this tax collector? Surely I am not really supposed to be like this fellow.  I would much rather put myself somewhere in between on the “holiness scale” - I are not self righteous like the Pharisee, but surely I am not nearly as bad as the tax collector, with all of his unhealthy self-image and defeatist attitudes - the stuff that therapies are made of and self help publishing.  Send this man to Dr Phil.    

So I get caught in the very subtle net which Jesus has laid out.  Your see, we naturally abhor the Pharisee, because somehow we know that we are not supposed to be like him. But in our haste to avoid and condemn the Pharisee, we overlook the second half of Jesus’ point:  We are supposed to emulate, imitate, the tax collector, and if we say no to this option, we are no different from the Pharisee - we look at the tax collector and we thank God that we don’t need to be like him.

If we simply condemn the Pharisee, then we are no different. - It is just a bit of a cycle.  The Pharisee judges the tax collector, and we judge the Pharisee.  Somewhere in teh back of my mind I can hear the voice which says "I thank you Lord, that I am not like the Pharisee in this parable..."  Which just proves Jesus point:  as the Pharisee knows who to condemn, so do we.  If we see the Pharisee only as an object of condemnation, then we become like him. 

Is Jesus holding up the tax collector as the true model?  What does the tax collector do? Jesus says:  “But the tax collector, standing far off, would not even look up to heaven, but was beating his breast and saying, 'God, be merciful to me, a sinner!”

What is it to have the humility of the tax collector?  It is an attitude of dependence upon God for all we are and all we have.  It is a recognition that our lives are a gift - that we are not self-made, and that if we are to become the kind of people Jesus calls us to be, we will not do it by our own efforts, we will do it by acknowledging who God is, and calling upon God for help in becoming what we are meant to be.

Anglican Bishop of Montreal: charge to Synod

From The Right Reverend Barry B. Clarke, Bishop of Montreal:

As I have been preparing for this Synod in prayer, meditation and study, three discussion topics from this Synod stand out; we seem to be about money, sex and power, and not necessarily in that order! These subjects will engage us through our discussions around canonical changes and motions, as well as financial presentations.

The Rev. Wesley Granberg-Michaelson, in his book “Leadership from Inside Out – Spirituality and Organizational Change”, writes “We know all the vocabulary about the responsible use of power, and responsible sex, and being responsible as good stewards, all to create what one ethicist has called the “responsible society”. But let us not be naive about the dangers they pose to us. Money, sex, and power have a subtle but persistent ability, especially in contemporary society, to cloud our judgment, to corrode our values, and to capture our will, in the end, leading us to behave in ways that are flagrantly irresponsible.”

Interesting thoughts from the Anglican Bishop of Montreal in his charge to Synod (available here on the Dio-Montreal website).  Also of note in his charge:

A mere twenty years ago – not even a generation, our diocese could count on over 33,000 Anglicans; that number had gone down to 23,000 in 1997. This year, we can count 13,000 Anglicans on the parish roles of the diocese – a decrease of close to 60%.

I believe they also passed a resolution or two at the synod.

As always, our first task is to keep our leaders in our prayers.

holy land pics & pilgrimage

Just a few shots and a reminder for those interested in the Spring 2008 Pilgrimages: itineraries & registration forms are available here.

inside the Church of the Holy Sepulcher, Jerusalem

Bedouin shelter, Sinai desert, near the Spring of Moses

Qumran

The gates of Jerusalem

J. Budziszewski: Evangelicals in the Public Square

The weekend's reading will be Evangelicals in the Public Square.  It is a series of essays looking at the work and influence of four voices who, though not all what we would call "evangelical", have had influence on American evangelical political thought.  Budziszewski & company look at Carl F.H. Henry, Abraham Kuyper, Francis Schaeffer and John Howard Yoder, examining their most important works, and asking how each has contributed to contemporary political theory and practice in evangelical circles.

The problem for evangelical political thinkers is not that the Bible contains no political teachings (for it does) but that the Bible does not provide enough by itself for an adequate political theory... The Bible assumes that [] large truths are known before we come to the Bible.  Unless Abraham had already known something of justice, he could not have debated God about it. [33]

Right away you can get a sense of where Budziszewski will take his critique of evangelical political thought:  the separation of scriptural revelation and natural law needs to be addressed if evangelicals are to develop a better political theory.

related post:  Budziszewski on Carl FH Henry, Evangelical Politics and The Uneasy Conscience

Ottawa bishop: how welcoming are we?

A few notes from the anglican diocese of ottawa synod:

Opening speeches are usually eminently skippable. Not John Chapman’s. Ottawa’s new Anglican bishop got his how-do-you-do’s out the way and launched straight into his marching orders for the 300 or so clergy and laity assembled inthe sleek NAV CANADA facility on the banks of the Saint Lawerence River.

This bishop really charged.

He reminded the group that the point of the whole exercise is to spread the word of God, not to simply remain comfortable within each parish.  He wants each church to audit its leadership structure, its mission, its resources, both human and financial, and really look at how welcoming it is to strangers. And he means audit, not talk about it for an hour or so. Clergy will get annual performance reviews.

For Bishop Chapman, welcoming newcomers to churches with dwindling attendance is crucial.

“We pride ourselves on being friendly churches. … in fact, we are not.”

He said later that the most successful churches are always monitoring how welcoming they really are. "That took some soul searching too, because it took awhile to realize that, we say we welcome the newcomer, but in our hearts we kind of like being in our own little group. It takes some very honest reflection to come to the point that we realize, 'maybe I’m just happier with my friends.'

"That defeats the mission of the church."

from Jennifer Green's blog at the Ottawa Citizen

Perhaps we should focus on our strengths.  Instead of having attempts at "welcome sunday", we could stick with the tried and true "go away sunday".  I envision the clergy beginning by noting that newcomers are actually sitting in someone else's pew, and would they kindly get up and move before the service starts.  It could then be pointed out to young families that there are no facilities for changing the baby, and if the baby cries, would you please move to the porch, or better yet, go back and stay in your car until baby settles down.  The bulletin should have only abbreviations, with no text of anything, and page numbers from last week's service.  All announcements about parish life and groups should assume that everyone knows who to contact for more information, so don't give any.

One or two members, including clergy, who are practiced in "the look", would then be in charge of  shooting glares at parents whose children are between the ages of 5-15.  This glare would not need to be in response to anything, but merely serve as a warning.   The service should stop with the slightest interruption. 

Those are just a few ideas for "go away sunday".  I'll continue my research and post a full liturgy later...

related posts:  Liturgy for the Blessing of a Mini Van

sermon notes Penetecost 20: Luke 17:11-19

Luke 17:11-19

[11] On the way to Jerusalem Jesus was going through the region between Samaria and Galilee.

So here we have Jesus going on his way from the northern, Jewish area  toward Jerusalem, with a pleasant meander through the rather unclean Samaritan area.

[12] As he entered a village, ten lepers approached him. Keeping their distance, [13] they called out, saying, "Jesus, Master, have mercy on us!"

What strikes me most about these verses is the dual posture of both approaching Jesus and yet keeping distance.  On the first level, this is understandable.  Perhaps the lepers are merely keeping up their duty not to get too close to anyone, lest they spread their infection.  They know their place in the order of things. There are no explicit reasons given in the text, although some can reasonably be assumed. They are content just to get within “shouting distance” of Jesus, whom they call “Master”.  As long as he can hear their cry for mercy, that is close enough.

And yet this dual posture strikes me as something which we can all engage in.  Approaching Jesus, and yet keeping our distance at the same time.  Just get close enough to be within “shouting distance” when we need something.  Or perhaps we are so used to our position, feeling ourselves far from him and others, that we dare not get too close.  Whatever the reason, it is a tendency of human hearts to draw close and then withdraw.  Maybe we suffer from a bit of Christophobia – we don’t want to get too close to Jesus.  There is something of this sentiment in Jesus’ plea as he completes his journey to Jerusalem:  How I long to gather you under my wings, and you would not.”  Jesus is always approachable, but it is we who decide to pull back, lest we encounter the real Jesus, who as Paul says, “was raised from the dead, a descendant of David” – the Messiah.

[14] When he saw them, he said to them, "Go and  show yourselves to the priests." And as they went, they were made clean.

No healing touch or magic words come out of Jesus.  He simply gives them something to do.  The priest was rather like the public health officer of the day:  if the priest said you were cured, then you could be restored to your family, you could be restored to your community.  “As they went, they were made clean” – it is in the journey of obedience to Christ that we are healed.

[15] Then one of them, when he saw that he was healed, turned back, praising God with a loud voice. [16] He prostrated himself at Jesus' feet and thanked him.

This fellow doesn’t quite follow the rules here:  it appears that he did not makes it to the priest to get his official clean bill of health (and all the rituals associated with that process).  Maybe he would not have gotten very far in the process, being a Samaritan and all...  The gift from Jesus evokes in him a more immediate response: praise of God and thanks to Jesus.

And he was a Samaritan.
Then Jesus asked, "Were not ten made clean? But the other nine, where are they?
Was none of them found to return and give praise to God except this foreigner?"
Then he said to him, "Get up and go on your way; your faith has made you well."

As an aside, Jesus does not revoke the healing of the other “ungrateful” nine (“if we are faithless, he remains faithful-- for he cannot deny himself”) which tells us something of the nature of mercy.  There is certainly a tie in to the epistle on this point.  The Samaritan is now made well, or whole.  The gift of Jesus has cured him, but it is faith that has made him well.

the life of eliot, storyteller

Eliot lived 99 days. 
He was born with Trisomy 18.

Eugene Peterson says it this way:
“Everytime someone tells a story well, the gospel is served”

All we have done is tell a story. The story of our son... I have purposely made strides to downplay the God-card. This was simply because all I could do was get in the way with my feeble attempts. God was in the story. He did not need to be exposed.  If you have found yourself drawn to this story and not really knowing why, I humbly propose that my son is only a vehicle to proclaim a story greater than his own.

from 99 balloons

(How shall we learn this unconditional love,

if we do not allow them to be born who ask it of us?)

ht sheepcat

prayers for the Diocese of Ottawa

as they enter their Diocesan Synod, where a good many things will be discussed and deliberated.

Jerusalem syndrome strikes again

Joseph Matthew Dolan never imagined he would be pounced on and arrested by heavily-armed anti-terror policemen for carrying a large cross around Jerusalem.

Joseph Matthew Dolan, 33, a Christian from New York, was arrested at last week's Jerusalem March when he tried to join the parade carrying a large cross.  Dolan crafted the 50-kilogram, two-meter-long cross himself after gathering the wooden planks in a remote forest in New York state five years ago.  Last week, while attending the Jerusalem March - the annual Feast of Tabernacles event that hosts thousands of evangelical pilgrims - Dolan, two of his friends, his 21-year-old fiancé and their puppy were detained for questioning after they joined the march with the cross.

"Jerusalem Syndrome," as experts have classified this phenomenon, refers to a psychosis involving obsessive, religiously-themed ideas, delusions or experiences triggered by or leading to a visit to the Israeli capital.

Prof. Eliezer Witztum, a psychiatrist who studied this phenomenon with his colleague Prof. Moshe Klein and researched the behavior of 82 sufferers, said the syndrome was not unique to one religion or denomination, but has affected Jews and Christians of many different backgrounds.

"Most of the people who suffer from this ancient syndrome have previous mental problems. When these people come to Jerusalem - which constitutes the trigger, not the reason, for their outbursts - they have certain expectations and religious visions, and when they don't come true, some of them fall apart, some are hospitalized and others create provocations," said Witztum.

from J'lem Post

Speaking of world religions and such, there's a new letter (pdf) out to the Pope from a collection of Muslim clerics and scholars.  From the BBC.  This latest letter comes almost on the anniversary of another letter, published last year by Islamica magazine, (see here), which I blogged about last October.

In an unprecedented move, an Open Letter signed by 38 leading Muslim religious scholars and leaders around the world will be sent to Pope Benedict XVI on Oct. 15, 2006. The letter, which is the first of its kind in several centuries, was a collaborative effort signed by such prominent figures as the Grand Muftis of Egypt, Russia, Bosnia, Croatia, Kosovo, Istanbul, Uzbekistan and Oman, as well as leading figures from the Shia community such as Ayatollah Muhammad Ali Taskhiri of Iran. The letter was also signed by HRH Prince Ghazi bin Muhammad bin Talal, the Personal Envoy and Special Advisor to King Abdullah II of Jordan...

I have not had a chance to peruse the new letter yet, but if you have, let me know what you think.

 

Anglican Evangelicals slaughter Anglo Catholics

Eschewing the recent Anglican custom of addressing their differences by public denunciation and excommunication, the clergy of the Diocese of Saskatchewan last week took to mortal combat on an open field.

In a match characterized by taunting, insults, brazen cheating, psychological tricks, and physical abuse, the annual Evangelical vs. Anglo Catholic soccer game was won by the Evangelical team in a result that was, as usual, disputed bitterly by the losing side...

Must read story and must see pictures here,

All I can say is "brilliant".

Happy Harvest Thanksgiving

the youngest member of the felix clan, enjoying the bounty

"open thy mouth wide, and I will fill it" (psalm 81:10)

Q, Walter Bauer, & more Bock and the missing gospels

A bit of continual meandering around some themes introduced by Darrell Bock, with previous posts here and here...  Tonight's stroll looks at some questions raised by Bock in chapters 4 & 5 of this book.

So we have a variety of viewpoints all claiming to lead us to the roots of the true Jesus, and the true teaching or faith which he left to his followers.  Was the variety of viewpoints found in the the 2nd C also present in the 1st C?  Or was this variety a novelty, a subsequent development?

There are a few things to consider as we look at competing claims.  One is the nature of the claims.  So someone might say, “Jesus was just a first C wisdom teacher, nothing more and nothing less”.  Now anyone can hold such a view.  The question is rather do the sources hold out evidence for such a view.  I might hold that Napoleon was an 18th Century watchmaker.  But do historical records point me in that direction?

If one is using only the alternative texts (such as the Gospel of Thomas), is there evidence to support such a claim?  Elaine Pagels is persuaded that Thomas is old, at least as old as John’s Gospel, and that it presents us with a non-divine, non-exalted Jesus.  But looking at things like saying 77, where Jesus claims he is “above all”, tells us that these texts do not simply provide a us with a picture of Jesus as a simple wisdom teacher. And people in the pews or in the news who claim that Jesus was a mere teacher also tend not to: a] be familiar with such texts; b] quote such texts if they know of them. 

Whatever happened to Q?

A lot of weight has been placed on “Q”. Q is thought to be a source for some of the material in both Luke and Matthew.  Think of it this way:  my brother and I are both writing family histories.  We each draw on a collection of notes which came from our great uncle.  And we also include our own observations, first hand accounts, and stories from other family members.   So parts of our stories would be quite similar (drawing from the same source) and other parts would be unique to each of our writings. 

New Testament scholars have looked at Luke and Matthew and said “It looks like these writers have, at some point, been drawing from the same pool of material – either something written down, or particular stories handed on orally.  That is why the two gospels share similar stories at certain points.”  And so they hypothesized that there must be a source from which Luke and matthew both draw.  The name for this source is Q.  Now a few points are in order.  First is that “Q” has never been found.  That in itself presents a bit of a difficulty for historical accuracy, doesn’t it?  Second, accepting or rejecting the idea of Q does not put one inside or outside any circle of orthodoxy or heresy.  After all, Luke says that he used sources. 

The difficulty comes when you try to reconstruct Q, and then come up with a reason for its “disappearance”.  First, you have to assume that it was a thing in existence.  Second, you have to come up with a description of it.  Was it merely a collection of handed on teaching which was then incorporated into the gospels as authentic?  Or, as some suggest, was it a larger body of material which was suppressed because it gave an alternative picture of Jesus?  So someone like Ehrman makes the claim that it presented a different picture of Jesus, and so it was suppressed by the powers that be.  Perhaps there was an early tradition which told the truth about Jesus – that he was a wisdom teacher and nothing more, that all the things and teachings we now associate with the word orthodoxy were later additions, that “we have missed the truth about Christianity” (cf NT Wright in this book).  The key question about Q has to do with what one thinks was in Q.  Was it a body of sayings and material that was circulated in the tradition, and because of its authenticity (and hence orthodoxy) was simply absorbed into the writing of the evangelists?  Or did it have a lot of other things which contradicted the traditional gospels on certain points, and so it was “disappeared” by the orthodox religious mafia of the day?

In chapter 5 Bock gives us a brief tour of the influence of Walter Bauer.  Bauer published a work in 1934, which was republished 30 years later in 1964.  The English title of his work is “Orthodoxy and Heresy in Earliest Christianity”.  Bock helpfully points out both positive and negative in Bauer’s work.  First, Bauer introduced some methodological considerations:  how far can one trust the church fathers in assessing the views of those they were writing against?  True enough, yet when one looks at Irenaeus against the sources there is great consistency:  he represented the views of his opponents quite well. (Bock 48).  A second insight had to do with geography:  as Bock states, ideas travel across time and place at different speeds. (49)

So what was Bauer’s thesis?  It basically had two pillars:  [1] there was a variety of views as to what the original form of the Christian faith was, which could be seen if one looked across the geography at the time;  what we call orthodoxy was a later construct;  [2] Rome was in control and imposed its version of orthodoxy across the church, that’s how and why “orthodoxy” came into being.

Bock devotes a good deal of energy (see Bock 48-55) referencing subsequent scholarship debunking Bauer’s thesis, although he notes that Bauer’s contribution to method are important.

Child Sacrifice in Ancient Canaanite Religion

probably occurred right around their bedtime.

I'm just saying.

some bloggers on and in burma

a short list of links here

a number of the bloggers have posted videos of the current events

Timeonline with stories from bloggers inside Burma

Bock & the Missing Gospels: an intro to the questions

Picking up from here.

For a number of years I’ve had an interest in older things.  Probably explains why I ended up in Classics.  Old texts, old thoughts, old ways of looking at things – all of these capture imagination, both mine and those of others.  Over the past number of years we’ve seen the publication of things like the Qumran scrolls, the discovery of the Nag Hammadi material, and if you recall, the most recent “discovery” of the Gospel of Judas.

Often what one encounters is a sound bite of such ancient texts, in the form of an interpretive summary.  Sort of “I’ve looked at the material and can now say X about the historical Jesus/ the early Church/ Judaism/ Paul/ insert item here.”  I’ve encountered many people in bible studies, discussion groups and in conversation who have heard of these kinds of documents and about a particular interpretive school of thought.  One hears about these texts and their interpretation, significance or meaning from religious studies courses, local study groups and lectures, and from the more popularized works of theologians and would-be theologians.

I was an undergraduate in Classics a few years after Elaine Pagels published  “The Gnostic Gospels” (Princeton, 1979).  The book was an instant success.  Bock introduces his work with a quote from the back cover of Pagels’ work: 

…to illuminate the world of the first Christians and to examine the different ways in which both Gnostics and the orthodox Christians constructed God, Christ, and the church.  Did Jesus really rise from the dead?

Whether you have studied or read in this area, or simply picked up a newspaper around Easter every year, you will have heard names like Bart Ehrman, Crossan and the Jesus Seminar.  The inside jacket of Ehrman’s “Lost Christianities:  The Battles for Scripture and the Faiths We Never Knew” (Oxford: 2003) makes the claim that:  “…these spectacular discoveries reveal religious diversity that says much about the ways in which history gets written by the winners.”  Bock looks at the announcements surrounding the more recent work by Marvin Meyer (The Gnostic Gospels of Jesus):  “an image of Jesus as the ultimate wisdom teacher.”  Students and laypeople alike will recognize (and have differing opinions of) what Bock refers to as the “new school”.

So where do we start?  In a sense we are starting ahead of ourselves:  we really need to look at what we understand by revelation and Scripture.  But for the time being, I want to take a walk through Bock’s work – looking at the Nag Hammadi texts at some depth.  This is really the most fruitful way of discovering any ancient way of thinking.  Read the text.  The same principle is true of the gospel of John and the letters of Seneca:  read the text.  It is great and helpful to read commentaries and interpretive materials, but they are no substitute for immersing yourself in the text.

Bock calls himself a “tour guide” for the reader.  No doubt he has his positions and beliefs, as we all do, and so one might be skeptical as to whether or not he will simply point out his favourite portraits of Jesus and early Christianity.  Yet I think overall he does a fair job of presenting the texts, the various interpretations, and giving the reader enough context to draw conclusions.  He limits his study to

“the period before Irenaeus, that controversial church father of the late second century.  The new school claims that Irenaeus ‘won’ and was the key architect of orthodoxy.  The claim is that this orthodoxy … emerged even more clearly in the third and fourth centuries.  So the new school argues that the Christianity we know has roots that do not really go back to the time of Jesus or even to the apostles in a way that precludes other alternative views of Christianity.” (xxv)

In chapter one, Bock gives the reader some basic historical background to the time period of the second and third centuries.  The first context of “Christianity” is the Jewish setting in which it arose, with the Jewish beliefs about God, and the broad category of the covenant and the promises to Israel.

It is helpful to think about some rough timeline in early Christianity, although one should remember that there are not abrupt jumps from one time period to the next.  Bock gives a brief overview of three:

1]  The time Jesus and the Apostolic period – up to the end of the first century.  This is the period in which Jesus and his immediate followers (apostles) would have been active.  The latest date for New Testament writing puts us in the 90’s AD, so with the death of the Apostles comes the end of the Apostolic age.

2]  The age of the “Apostolic fathers” covers the time the time of the first few generations after the first period, roughly up to 150 AD.  The Apostolic fathers were those “who had contact with the apostles or fit in the period just after them.” (9)  In this period you will encounter texts like 1 Clement, the letters of Ignatius (a bishop of Antioch), the “Martyrdom of Polycarp”, the Didache, the “Shepherd of Hermas”.  It is in this time period that one can certainly see the rise of “alternative” views of Christianity, particularly some Gnostic texts.  We will talk about the Gnostics below.

3]  The age of the Apologists goes from the previous period through to Nicea (325) and beyond. (10)  In case you are confused by the term “apologist”, it isn’t someone who is sorry for Christianity, it is one who writes a defense of Christianity, or makes an argument in its favour.  Apologists often wrote with specific “opponents” in mind.  In this time period you will see names like Justin Martyr (100-165; who, by the way, predates Irenaeus), Tertullian, Clement of Alexandria and Origin.

So why is the history important?  Well, it is argued by the new school that these later apologists are the ones responsible for forming what we might call orthodox Christianity.  It is claimed that earlier on, there were:   [A] competing views and interpretations, or [B] an entirely different understanding of Jesus and Christianity, and that [C] these later apologists pushed out the other views and imposed ‘orthodoxy’ on the church.  Some questions which come to mind:  did these “orthodox’ beliefs exist in the early Christian communities?;  was there suppression of such beliefs?  Or, as NT Wright asks in his work, have we missed the truth about Christianity?

A word about the Gnostics.  While Bock gives us a brief overview, I would also point you to part one of Jaroslav Pelikan’s work, “The Emergence of the Catholic Tradition” from his five volumes on the history of Christian doctrine.  It is a more thorough and presents the reader with the “next step up” in terms of indepth history of the period.  It is worth getting.  But back to Bock’s overview.

When we think of possible “alternatives” to orthodox Christianity in ancient times, the term “Gnostic” always rises to the surface.  The term comes from the Greek words for knowing or knowledge.  In modern scholarship, Gnostic or Gnosticism is used to refer to those who held that belief was rooted in a “special knowledge”.  As Bock summarizes, “those in the know are called Gnostics”.(15)  In chapter two Bock looks at some of the discussion and difficulties around the term.  It is a term, which was used both positively and negatively in early Christian circles.  We can see both uses as we read the scriptures:  many Christians will be able to quote a text like “you shall know the truth…” and yet we have Paul writing “knowledge puffs up, but love builds up.”

Bock points us to the work of Kurt Rudolph, who has listed five traits of Gnosticism (19ff):
1]  Dualism – the belief that creation and humanity are a mix of good and evil, based upon the view that there is a distinction between the true “God” who is above all, and a lesser “God” who created the material world.  Often the “true God and the Creator God of Genesis are not the same thing.”
2]  Cosmogony, or how the universe is set up.  There is a contrast between light and dark, soul (or spirit) and body or flesh, knowledge and ignorance – things exist in pairs of opposites.  If point one shows us a dualism in God, then this point shows us a dualism in the created world and how we live in this dualism.
3]  Soteriology, or what we mean by salvation, and how it is brought about.  Salvation is by knowledge of the true state of things, and it is salvation of the non-material part of humanity.  There is a saving of the mind/ soul or spirit, but not of the body.  Because the body and flesh belong to the darkness, there is generally no resurrection of the body.
4]  Eschatology, or what the end-times of all things will be like.  Think “Left Behind”, but with panache.  There is a restoration of the spiritual to the Spiritual, and not much interest in having a re-newed creation.
5]  Cult and community, in which cult means not the people who sell peanut brittle at the airport and live on a commune, but the way the believers or adherents practice their faith in worship and liturgy and ritual.  For instance, the Gnostics had practices like baptism, and other liturgical ceremonies.

So Gnosticism and Orthodoxy – which came first?  Did Gnosticism give birth (by opposition) to what we call orthodoxy, or was it a derivative set of beliefs, a parasite upon orthodox belief and practice?

That’s it for tonight.

Is this what is meant by "Christian freedom"?

Inmate escapes during Bible study

SPOKANE, Wash. (AP) — An inmate facing assault, gun and drug charges escaped from Geiger Corrections Center after being let out of a small building to get some fresh air during his Bible study, officials said...

from here