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Ethical Blindness of Monism

Within Liberal Gnostic Christianity, it has become popular to dabble with Eastern Mysticism and modern neo-paganism (i.e., panentheism and pantheism). Many on that track seem to think that the underlying monism* will lead to greater peace on earth. And they bolster it by making a neophyte error by claiming it is more monotheistic than classical transcendent Judaeo-Christian theism.

*What is monism, you ask? It's the idea that there is only ONE. All differences we recognize are illusions, and thus the only truth is nonduality. That is, that all distinction, discrimination, differentiation is a lie. There is no difference between me & you, my good & your good, our good & the world's good. The reality of our interconnectedness is taken to an extreme form that collapses all distinction - within Hindu, this is known as seeing that all is Brahman (a monad); Buddhism sees this collapse of distinction as reaching enlightenment.

But there's a huge ethical problem that gets little to no thought - what of GOOD and EVIL? Does saying they are the same make it so? Or does it simply try to step beyond that distinctive?

If non-duality is the truth (and how this would be, I don't know - seeing as if it's TRUE it's also FALSE), then PEACE and WAR are also the same thing. Thus there is no meaningful distinction to be made in making war on your neighbor or helping them with aid. There is no difference between rape and marital love. There is no difference between a murderer with a knife and a surgeon with a scalpel - those would (under a monistic view) be false distinctions.

Your common sense buzzer should be ringing pretty loud now, but for these starry-eyed educated idiots it just doesn't. In most cases, they've divorced themselves from historic Christianity and thus are left floating in the failed experiments of heresies past rather than the tried-and-true character of orthodox Christianity. Thus they commit errors out of their novelty, thinking they've come upon a new truth which - in fact - is just an old error that's already been long- consigned to the ash-heap of divine-human relations.

A new study helps to show the dead end that is monism - and it focuses on the undeniable atrocities committed (and defended by) fervent Buddhist, Taoist, and Shintoist religious people. The horrors of the Japanese campaign in China were papered over by their religious inability to make any meaningful distinction between morality and immorality. Call it the Zen of violence. Will the "emergent church" wake up to the dead end of monism? Time will only tell. But the Church of Jesus Christ, indefectible and catholic, will continue - even if She is temporarily reduced in numbers while heretics occupy her territory.

Conversion of St. Paul

Lately, I've been dealing with some folks on another blog that, by their defense of a heresiarch and their own indifference to doctrine while holding office in a church, have become enemies of Christ and His gospel. My first, human reaction was to get angry. But God has been dealing with me - breaking my heart for those who find themselves breaking upon the Law of God.

And today, in my Daily Office recitation, I come upon the story of Paul's conversion on this its feast. And in singing the office hymn, God reminded me that I should never give up hope for those who are now enemies of the Gospel. God may yet make them His greatest messengers. That's hope and change you can believe in!

Lord God of our fathers, who in reconciling the world to yourself have made friends of your enemies, forgive me when I forget how I was your avowed enemy before you won my heart. Use me to reach those who are set against you, through the love and grace of Our Lord Jesus Christ, who lives and reigns with you and the Holy Spirit in everlasting unity. Amen.

	Clyde McLennan - We sing the glorious conquest .mp3
	Found at bee mp3 search engine

We sing the glorious conquest,
Before Damascus’ gate,
When Saul, the Church’s spoiler,
Came breathing threats and hate;
The rav’ning wolf rushed forward
Full early to the prey;
But lo! the Shepherd met him,
And bound him fast today.

O glory most excelling
That smote across his path!
O light that pierced and blinded
The zealot in his wrath!
O voice that spake within him
The calm, reproving word!
O love that sought and held him
The bondman of his Lord!

O Wisdom ord’ring all things
In order strong and sweet,
What nobler spoil was ever
Cast at the Victor’s feet?
What wiser master builder
E’er wrought at Thine employ
Than he, till now so furious
Thy building to destroy?

Lord, teach thy Church the lesson,
Still in her darkest hour
Of weakness and of danger,
To trust Thy hidden power;
Thy grace by ways mysterious
The wrath of man can bind,
And in Thy boldest foeman
Thy chosen saint can find.

Remembering Egypt

I've been interacting with my dear friend and sister in Christ, Viola Larson, at her blog. She broke the heart-wrenching news that heresiarch John Shuck has been named interim campus minister at ETSU's Presbyterian Student Fellowship (PSF).

It breaks my heart with the irony. PSF was an outgrowth of the college ministry that First Presbyterian Church undertook to college students way back when my mom was on campus (and it was called ETSC)! When I went to ETSU, I didn't even know that my parents had been Presbyterians! (Dad wanted to go to the Methodist church of his boyhood, and that's what was happening by the time I came on the scene.)

Later, it was at PSF that my sense of Christian community had been restored. (After wandering in the wilderness, I was trying to have a go at "lone ranger" self-styled Christianity - which was a mess!) There, I experienced a call to gospel ministry. There, I participated in faith-community leadership. There, I met my wife and made friends. There, I learned and taught the faith found in the Scriptures and articulated in the Creeds and Catechisms and Confessions of the Reformed Churches.

The irony comes because it was my presbytery's impotence (juridically and personally with the elders) to act when faced with someone who is undeniably a heretic in the ministerial office that drove me out of the PCUSA. At that moment, I recognized that my presbytery was not a true local expression of the Christian Church - even if there were true individual churches within it. (Ordination is granted by the presbytery, and ministers are members of the presbytery - not an individual church.) That left me with two options: moving to another presbytery for relief of conscience, or leaving the PCUSA for a true Church. I opted for the latter, as there are virtually no presbyteries that take an interest in doctrinal rigor (even the so-called conservative ones, who year after year feign ignorance or disinterest in what happens around them).

I'm glad to be out of Egypt, though her fleshpots are still remembered. I'm also glad that there are still people like Viola, Toby, Dave, and many others who soldier on in enemy territory. God speed to them. We are united by something far deeper than a denomination or distinctive. We share the faith once delivered in the Scriptures and expressed in the catholic creeds and definitions.

And that makes all the difference in this world, and the next.

St Basil on indifference to doctrine

The following words of Saint Basil the Great apply to all of us, but especially to clergywho are indifferent to matters of Faith, to the struggle for the Faith “once delivered.” One of the reasons I left the Presbyterian Church USA was that it had slid into functional congregationalism, such that I could no longer uphold my ordination vows. National standards for ordination were ignored in many churches so that they could "ordain" non-celibate LGBT folks as deacons & elders. And the conservatives (notice I didn't say evangelicals) were often so afraid of being pegged as mean or meddling that they would ignore problems of lapsed discipline & doctrine unless it showed up vociferously in their own presbytery or congregation. I opted for revived Anglicanism because there is still a healthy sense that the bishop is the defender of the faith and a sure link to the historic faith - and thus has to meddle when people tamper with catholic doctrine or practice. Similarly, all ordained persons are seen as clergy and held accountable to the bishop - so there's no hiding behind "he's just a deacon / elder" (in the mainline "reformed" churches, deacons & elders are often seen as little more than congregational officers). And because our sacramental unity is at stake, there's no problem with an Anglican - laic or cleric - raising concerns to their bishop / archbishop concerning the teaching of a particular individual.

Saint Basil was writing to men who were far less blinded by the god of this world, but who nonetheless exhibited indifference to the fate of churches outside their diocese. May we all take the Saint’s words to heart and lend a helping hand to all of our brethren who are outside of our diocese or local church but in urgent need of our support and encouragement.

“We stand in the arena to fight for our common heritage, for the treasure of the sound faith, derived from our Fathers. Grieve with us, all you who love the brethren, at the shutting of the mouths of our men of true faith, and at the opening of the bold and blasphemous lips of all who utter unrighteousness against God. The pillars and foundation of the truth are scattered abroad. We, whose insignificance has allowed of our being overlooked, are deprived of our right and free speech. Enter into the struggle for the people’s sake. Do not think only of your being yourselves moored in a safe haven, where the grace of God gives you shelter from the tempest of the winds of wickedness. Reach out a helping hand to the churches that are being buffeted by the storm, lest if they are abandoned, they suffer complete shipwreck of the faith. Lament for us, in that the Only-Begotten is being blasphemed, and there is none to offer contradiction.”

--- Letter CCXLIII to the Bishops of Italy and Gaul

Today, there is hardly a church which is not being buffeted by the spirit of secularization. The faithful of the churches everywhere are being abandoned by thieves (John 10:1) to the wolves of this world and are in need of a helping hand, lest they suffer “complete shipwreck.” The Son of God and His Body are being blasphemed, so let us all “offer contradiction.”

Comprehensiveness vs Liberalism

Here are some lightly edited extracts from J. I. Packer's Latimer Studies booklet "A Kind of Noah's Ark? The Anglican Commitment to Comprehensiveness."

Although this booklet reflects on the theological situation in the Church of England, and that at a particular time, some of the following observations hold good for more contemporary movements. For although there have been several historic forms of liberal theology there is also a liberal mood or mindset:

First, the basis of all forms of this position is the hypothesis that no universally right way of thinking about God is given in Christianity.

Unable to accept what might be called a Chalcedonian view of Scripture (i.e. that it is fully human as well as fully divine, and fully divine as well as fully human), they have doubted both the reality of the Chalcedonian Christ to whom the New Testament witnesses and the propriety of reading Scripture as more than a rag-bag of traditions, intuitions, fancies and mythology whereby good men celebrated and shared their sense of being in touch with God - a contact occasioned for New Testament writers by a uniquely godly man named Jesus.

That prophets and apostles no less than creeds and churches can all be wrong on questions of reality and truth, is plank one in the liberal platform. Scripture and the Christian literary heritage are certainly stimulating, inspiring and effective in communicating God, but that does not make them true.

So the constant endeavour of the liberal fraternity from the start has been to go behind and beyond biblical witness to reformulate the faith in terms which to them, as modern men, seem truer, clearer and less inadequate (whether evolutionist, idealist, panentheist, deist, existentialist, Marxist; sociological, psychological, syncretistic; or whatever).

Certainly, for today’s liberals there are no fixed fundamentals; everything, not excluding the doctrine of God - indeed, some say, that first - is regarded as in principle open to review and change.

...liberals have no united platform or policy, for they hold in common only...negations...plus the sifting, reshaping methodology which these negations entail. They agree only in what they are against; beyond this it is every man for himself.

Sykes notes that ‘a “liberal” theological proposal is always in the form of a challenge to an established authority, and thus necessarily implies a dispute about the appropriate norms or criteria for any theology whatsoever.’ He notes too that ‘it is impossible to be merely a “liberal” in theology one’s theology … will be liberal in as much as it is a modification of an already existing type’ - liberal catholic, liberal evangelical, or even liberal latitudinarian.

And he rightly stresses that any church in which liberals do their thing, querying the traditional and jettisoning the conventional, will have to endure real divergences of belief as some negate what others affirm and affirm what others cannot but negate.

[A]ll forms of liberalism are unstable. Being developed in each case by taking some secular fashion of thought as the fixed point (evolutionary optimism, historical scepticism, Marxist sociology, or whatever), and remodelling the Christian tradition to fit it, they are all doomed to die as soon as the fashion changes, according to Dean Inge’ s true saying that he who marries the spirit of the age today will be a widower tomorrow.

It is not always realised that the history of the past century and a half is littered with the wreckage of dead liberalisms. Though liberalism as an attitude of mind (going back at least to the Renaissance, if not indeed to the temptation of Eve) has persisted, and persists still, particular liberalisms have so far been relatively short-lived, and can be expected to continue so. Some liberals cheerfully acknowledge this and never treat their current opinions as more than provisional, anticipating that they may think differently next week.

h/t Against Heresies

Spong is Wrong

Recently, John Shelby Spong has shot his most recent salvo across the noses of those who continue to hold the catholic faith and ethic. He calls us the "b" word (bigot) and lumps us in with flat-earthers and slavery defenders (nice strawman). Just as he won't hold dialogue with flat-earthers or slavery defenders (which are where, again?) - so he won't discuss the ethics of same-sex erotic relationships with those who take the opposite side.

I have been part of this debate for years, but things do get settled and this issue is now settled for me. I do not debate any longer with members of the "Flat Earth Society" either.

In the Episcopal Church - of which he remains some sort of high-ranking ecclesial officer in good standing - this is called "openness" and indaba. (In other words, you need to be open to our innovations on the faith and discipline of the Church, and then listen while we tell you you're an oppressive, morally bankrupt simpleton.) Here are some more excerpts:

I have made a decision. I will no longer debate the issue of homosexuality in the church with anyone. I will no longer engage the biblical ignorance that emanates from so many right-wing Christians about how the Bible condemns homosexuality, as if that point of view still has any credibility....I have been part of this debate for years, but things do get settled and this issue is now settled for me. I do not debate any longer with members of the "Flat Earth Society" either.

Even advocates of the revisionist position* admit that the biblical evidence is on the side of the historic faith. But Mr. Spong cares little about the evidence, and even less about the authority of the Scriptures. (In spite of any vows he made to defend them as - some sort of high-ranking ecclesial officer in good standing.) Spong has already admitted that Scripture condemns homosexuality. You can watch it, but here's what he says:

Spong: But let me say that I do not disagree that homosexuality is condemned in Scripture. I do not agree with that.

Ankerberg: Yes, you’ve said that before.

Spong: I think that is obvious. It’s in Leviticus; it’s in the Sodom and Gomorrah story; it’s in the Pauline corpus at least, and probably some other places…

Ankerberg: All right, we’re…

Spong: The issue in my mind is not that. The issue is whether or not the people who lived at the time of the Bible and who wrote about homosexuality understood the scientific meaning of homosexuality.

But, as Jude warned us:

¹⁰ But these people blaspheme all that they do not understand, and they are destroyed by all that they, like unreasoning animals, understand instinctively. ¹¹Woe to them! For they walked in the way of Cain and abandoned themselves for the sake of gain to Balaam’s error and perished in Korah’s rebellion. ¹²These are hidden reefs at your love feasts, as they feast with you without fear, shepherds feeding themselves; waterless clouds, swept along by winds; fruitless trees in late autumn, twice dead, uprooted; ¹³ wild waves of the sea, casting up the foam of their own shame; wandering stars, for whom the gloom of utter darkness has been reserved forever.

Speaking of casting up foam to their own shame...

I will no longer temper my understanding of truth in order to pretend that I have even a tiny smidgen of respect for the appalling negativity that continues to emanate from religious circles where the church has for centuries conveniently perfumed its ongoing prejudices against blacks, Jews, women and homosexual persons with what it assumes is "high-sounding, pious rhetoric."

Yeah...we conservative types are the sort that keep condemning the Jews with "high-sounding, pious rhetoric." Oh wait...that's the TEC revisionistas.

He even takes on Abp. Duncan, who has already responded to Mr. Spong's errors (begining with his 1998 12 Feces...er, Theses).**

I will dismiss as unworthy of any more of my attention the wild, false and uninformed opinions of such would-be religious leaders as Pat Robertson, James Dobson, Jerry Falwell, Jimmy Swaggart, Albert Mohler, and Robert Duncan.

Yeah...real nuanced. All of those guys are so practically alike as to make no distinction possible, much less desirable.

To be honest, Spong's problems go much deeper than his disregard for the Scripture's teaching on homosexual behavior. His big problem is with God Almighty. Spong casts scorn on the whole notion of theism, and has such an unnuanced fundamentalist materialist bent to his mindset that he's incapable of making any sense of the Resurrection or Ascension (much less the Incarnation).

And because of that, he is to be pitied. Because, one thing is sure - the striving is over. The battle is won, and there's no need to argue about it. Rather, it's time to simply proclaim the dogma and live into that truth. So here's some help to do just that.

	Woodley Ensemble - The Strife is O'er (Palestrina)
	Found at bee mp3 search engine

* Bailey, Homosexuality and the Western Christian Tradition, p. 30, and Spong himself during the “Martin/Spong Debate on Sexual Ethics,” transcript from The John Ankerberg Show.
cf. J. Gordon Melton, The Churches Speak On: Homosexuality; Official Statements from Religious Bodies and Ecumenical Organizations (Detroit: Gale Research, 1991), xxii.

** John Spong: An apostle no longer

Beloved in the Lord,

It was with the most profound sorrow that I received and read the twelve theses of John Spong, recently published. At point after point these few sentences contain an explicit denial of the Christian faith. The incarnation and atoning sacrifice of Jesus Christ are denied; the efficacy of prayer and the work of the Holy Spirit are declared null; scripture and creeds are no longer trustworthy guides.

The man set aside as Bishop of Newark for the last twenty years has placed his theses before the Christian world and called for debate. The debate will be between those who profess the Christian faith and one who offers some other religion.

As I travel about our diocese, I see the pain and confusion which this shepherd-become-wolf is causing my people, not to mention that wider fellowship which is all the baptized in Christ Jesus. What this errant brother is doing must be named for what it is, not apostolate but apostasy.

What John Spong proposes as a reformed Christianity abandons every revealed essential. It is not Christianity. It is a counterfeit.

Everything I promised to do at my ordination requires that I speak clearly at this moment. Most especially pastoral compassion and gospel witness require a timely word both to the people of God and to the world at large.

We in the Episcopal Diocese of Pittsburgh -- like Christians in every age -- have our disagreements about how the boundaries of Christian response to the cultures and peoples among which we minister are to be shaped. When we disagree here, it is because of our deep conviction for and experience of the One God -- both transcendent and immanent -- revealed in Scripture, Tradition and Reason as Father, Son, and Holy Spirit. This is not the circumstance with which John Spong confronts us. We are confronted now by one who has become an outsider, one who by his philosophical, intellectual and credal shifts no longer reasons out of that bedrock of Christian faith that always shapes our local debates.

Pray for the Episcopal Church and for our Anglican Communion as the bishops prepare to gather at Lambeth. We are a worldwide fellowship of immense missionary faithfulness and of magnificent local diversity. Nevertheless, we must also be a communion that can recognize when an apostle is one no longer, or when a teaching must be declared utterly false

Faithfully your bishop,

+Robert VII Pittsburgh

Bp. Ackerman and Suspicion of Deposition

Everytime I see this picture I'm more and more convinced that she's cackling "I'll get you my pretty! You and your little dog, too!"

Episcopal News Service reports that Dr. Katharine Jefferts Schori notified Bp. Keith Ackerman by mail and email October 16 that she has accepted the former Bishop of Quincy's voluntary renunciation of ordained ministry in the Episcopal Church.

In a statement released by the Presiding Bishop's office October 16, JeffertsSchori cited Title III, Section 7 of the Canons: "I have accepted the renunciation of the Ordained Ministry of this Church, made in writing to me in July 2009 by the Rt. Rev. Keith L. Ackerman, Bishop of Quincy, Resigned who is, therefore, removed from the Ordained Ministry of this Church and released from the obligations of all Ministerial offices, and is deprived of the right to exercise the gifts and spiritual authority as a Minister of God's Word and Sacraments conferred on him in Ordinations.”

According to the statement, Jefferts Schori had thanked Ackerman in an October 7 letter "for your follow up note regarding your plans to function as a bishop in the Diocese of Bolivia in the Province of the Southern Cone. As you know, there is no provision for transferring a bishop to another Province. I am therefore releasing you from the obligations of ordained ministry in this Church.”

The full text of the her October 7 letter may be read here.

From an Anglo-Catholic perspective, I've got to chuckle a bit. Since his firm conviction is that Dr. Schori cannot be a presbyter, much less a bishop in the Church of God, what effect can this possibly have? The only thing it means is that if someone catches him confirming or ordaining or otherwise acting episcopally or sacerdotally in a TEC-affiliated building, he might be escorted out by police (should locals be inclined to report it).

He had maintained his position as a retired TEC bishop specifically so that he could continue to provide confirmations, dedications, chrism masses, etc. for FiF churches in TEC (only at the invitation of the ordinary, of course). In case Dr. Schori isn't familiar with these functions, this is what bishops do in the church.

I think the most that can be said about her unilateral action is that Bp. Keith is no longer under any obligation to advocate for the Millenium Developmental Goals. Now he can get back to praying for God's reign, rather than trying to pretend.

Can I get this signed by Joel Osteen?

h/t NakedPastor

Cutting Down Arguments

How do you deal with people that disagree with you theologically?

There seem to be several avenues people take in trying to find a basis of authority on which they stake their beliefs.

1) Me & “the Spirit”: Basically, I'm so illumined by the Spirit (of what?) that I can sense the great truths of the faith. We should notice that there are at least two varieties of this epistemological stance: a) the gnosticizing liberal thinks that they've got an inside track to what God has to say, normally in such a way as to overthrow what the Bible plainly says or what the Church has confessed for nearly 2000 years; b) the charismatic literalist thinks that they don't need to hear what other people have said about the Scriptures (whether that be Christian scholars or - dare I say it - the Church catholic in her creeds and confessions)...think the Oneness Pentecostal movement. The tie that binds is that this person believes that they can pierce the darkness that has kept the Church of Jesus Christ from seeing the truth (for as much as 2000 years); all they need is to meditate and read their Bible and God will reveal to them everything that's needed. They'll get a new revelation, or having felt a sense of connectedness to all world religions.

This isn't a new phenomenon. Martin Luther said that there were a certain group of preachers of his day who confuse their own spirit with the Holy Spirit: “they think they have swallowed the Holy Ghost feathers and all.” John Calvin warned “the fanaticism which discards the scripture, under the pretense of resorting to immediate revelations is subversive of every principle in Christianity. For when they boast extravagantly of the Spirit the tendency is always to bury the word of God so they can make room for their own falsehood.” Archetypes: John Spong, Joseph Smith and just about any neo-montanist on TBN.

2) Me & the Pro: I've been taught by this pastor, or read these books, or gone to this seminary, or earned this degree so I really know what it's all about. I'm not denigrating sitting under good preaching (I've benefited from it, and I hope others will benefit from my preaching). Anyone that's been to my home knows I have a library numbering in the low thousands. I did go to cemetery seminary and earned a degree there. But to think that the insights of the latest generation trump the illumination that the Spirit has given in the Church for thousands of years is a denial of Jesus' promises regarding the Church. The Reformers consistently pointed back to the Scriptures, the early Church Fathers, the ecumenical councils, and more recent scholastic thought to prove their continuity with the Apostolic deposit of the faith.

These approaches can be combined, and I would dare say that all of us do that very thing - inconsistently shuffling the bases of our belief.

I think the right track is to take a Me and the Church approach. When Jesus called his apostles to himself, he didn't just bring one - he brought twelve. He established a community in which his power, his authority, his doctrine would continue. We do well to read our Bibles with the whole Church catholic. The Word gives life to the Community, and the Community reiterates the Word in the World.

Without this necessary balance, we fall to the idols of self or society, and are not conformed to the Saviour.

Image h/t Naked Pastor

How gallant.

h/t SacredSandwhich

Felix III on Error and Truth

“Not to oppose error is to approve it; and not to defend truth is to suppress it, and, indeed, to neglect to confound evil men - when we can do it - is no less a sin than to encourage them”

St. Felix III
Bishop of Rome, 483-492

Myopia

Does your church make long-term mistakes in doctrine & practice for short-term payoff?


Don't expect them to be around much longer. Especially when they call killing off the next generation 'a blessing'!!!

Remembering John Donne

“The Scriptures are God's Voice, The Church is His echo.”

John Donne 17th C, commemorated this past Tuesday.

Almighty God, the root and fountain of all being: Open our eyes to see, with your servant John Donne, that whatever has any being is a mirror in which we may behold you; through Jesus Christ our Lord, who lives and reigns with you and the Holy Spirit, one God, for ever and ever. Amen.

Fundamental to serving God in the Church is an acceptance of the authority of Holy Scripture. Perhaps the choice of the opening word “fundamental” seems ill advised, but I am not talking about biblical literalism - which is opposed to the Reformational hermeneutic of grammatico-historical analysis - but about the fundamentals of our faith. Without a firm foundation on God’s self-revelation in Holy Scripture; in God’s word, and in the Word made flesh, Christ Jesus Himself, there are no fundamentals and no place to stand. The two are linked together in my mind, because they are linked together in the mind of Jesus who came “not to abolish the Law or the Prophets; …but to fulfill them” (Matthew 5:17).

Neither am I talking about simplistic proof texting, yet the texts are indeed important. There is such a thing as biblical theology, and both Jesus and Paul, and the other New Testament writers model that for us in their treatment of the Old Testament. From a classic Anglican position we also go back to the biblical theology of the Early Church Fathers. The Lord warns us in Isaiah that if we are not firm in our faith, we will not be firm at all (Isaiah 7:9b). There is no firm foothold, no possibility of establishing “fundamentals” if you take your stand on the quick sand of the world and human philosophy.

The fundamentals of the faith are first of all reflected in Holy Scripture itself, and then secondarily, in the writings of the Fathers. There is no argument there over what the fundamentals are. True, much of the writing of the Fathers was a defense of the faith against heretical opinions that were springing up everywhere. That is the point. There is a difference between what is theologically true, and what is a lie. The lie was always characterized as heresy, or apostasy. You either believe Holy Scripture, or you don’t. There is no valid half-way point.

You either believe the creeds, or you don’t. You can''s say you affirm them as true, only in so far as you can modify their plain (and historic) sense. You either believe...or you do not.

You either believe and respond to God’s call to personal holiness, or you don’t. Thus says the Lord, “You shall be holy, for I am holy” (1 Peter 1:16). If you don’t understand holiness as Scripture and the Fathers understand holiness, you don’t understand holiness at all. There is no real question in the Church today regarding what Scripture, the Fathers, or the Church catholic has always taught, and teaches still, about the fundamentals, or about sexual morality. Morality is after all an essential part of our walk before the Living God.

The question before mainline churches today is simply this: The text says what it says; no-one is really disagreeing, there are no varying interpretations, no one is really disagreeing over what Holy Scripture actually says. The disagreement is over whether or not the texts, Holy Scripture itself, and the ongoing teaching of the Church, are relevant at all. From the viewpoint of the tradition of the Church we believe what has been believed everywhere, always, and by all (The Vincentian Canon - more about that in 3 weeks). What is being said in some quarters today is that those fundamentals, and those moral teaching are no longer relevant in modern society.

Over the last several years bishops and high-placed leaders in the Church have disavowed specific fundamentals. They tell us that the physical resurrection did not happen, that Christ did not die for our sins, and that he is no longer the way, the truth and the life and that it is not true that no man comes to the Father except through him (John 14:6). According to them, it doesn’t matter what Jesus said in John 14:6, because he probably didn’t say it anyway.

Unfortunately there is no common ground between our small group revisionists and the Church catholic. For them, there is nothing that can be discussed on the basis of Holy Scripture. They tell us that the moral teachings of the Sermon on the Mount, the teachings of Paul and Peter on holiness, and the teachings of the Law and the Prophets on these issues, are no longer relevant in modern society. They reject the teaching of both Scripture and the Church and take their stand on sinking sand, on an antique humanism that is already going out of fashion in this post-modern age.

You either build your house on the Rock, or you build your house on the sand. They prefer the sand, probably because in their mind it is closer to the water. “The waters that you saw, where the prostitute is seated, are the peoples and multitudes and nations and languages” (Revelation 17:15). I should probably apologize for the use of that text because certainly in the minds of some The Book of Revelation is almost the very last place we ought to look for a word from God.

The truly relevant question is not what they believe, or don’t believe. The truly relevant question is: What do you believe? Do you stand on solid ground, or do you stand on sinking sand? These questions are not a matter of airy-fairy theological debate. They are in fact questions about life and death. A seminary professor of mine taught that miracles didn’t happen, that the physical resurrection of Christ did not happen. So what!?

The so what happens when their students go to a parish and undermine faith in the resurrection, and in so doing destroy the faith of a woman who was dying of cancer.

The so what happens when we hear teaching on “Situation Ethics” - that it doesn’t matter what you do as long as you do it lovingly - and see it lived out. Clergy begin to say that premarital sex is perfectly O.K. (which happened in the 1960s). That attitude was a contributing factor to the free-love movement of the late sixties and early seventies and has laid countless young people in America vulnerable to a variety of venereal diseases, including HIV/AIDS - not to mention the broken hearts, shattered lives, and destroyed families left in the path! Paul calls sex before marriage, “fornication.” Why? There are after all several very valid reasons.

As Christians we believe that “The Scriptures are God’s Voice, The Church is His echo.” We believe it, in part for some very practical reasons. The teachings of Scripture guide us on our journey preserving our mental and physical health, preserving the integrity of our families, and leading us to the Door to Eternal Life, Christ Himself, The Living Word. Jesus Himself was well aware of the antipathy people had towards His teaching and asked “Do you take offense at this? … The words that I have spoken to you are spirit and life. But there are some of you who do not believe” (John 6:61-64). The direct result was that many of his disciples turned away and no longer walked with Him. The question is: Will you walk with Him? Peter’s response was this, “Lord, to whom shall we go? You have the words of eternal life” (John 6:68).

Who ya gonna call (upon)?

Okay...I can be sacrilegious sometimes. And when I saw this, I snickered pretty hard.

Then I started theologizing and realized that there was a deeper point to be grasped. They got the wrong person of the Trinity.

For you non pop-culture mavens, the guys at the bottom are the Ghostbusters.

Does your church equivocate on the Trinity? Is worship offered to the Father, in the name of the Son, in the power of the Holy Spirit? Or do they take modalist language like "Creator, Redeemer, Sustainer"? Is it worth losing the covenant-keeping God revealed in the Scriptures and Christ Jesus for the non-gendered bland deity of "God"* or "Holy One"*?

*(Biblical names, no doubt - but reflective of a paucity of uses of Scripturally shaped - and even mandated, in the Baptismal Formula from Christ & the Apostles - language used in the Bible.)

Why I'm not in the PCUSA

Some people still don't understand why I set aside over a decade of preparation for ministry and official status in the high-paying PCUSA. It is fundamentally this: the PCUSA refuses to provide basic care to the people in the pew, especially when it comes to giving pulpits to false-shepherds who actively undermine the confidence God's people should have in God's Word. While I should have seen it long before I did, it took the flagrant scorn towards the Scriptures evidenced by an ordained clergyman in my (now former) presbytery of care to show me that even the best presbyteries were unwilling to do anything about the spreading cancer.

I am so sick and tired of these people pretending to have some sort of humility while also standing up, shaking their fists at the heavens and saying: "My God wouldn't do X or Y or Z like the God of the Old Testament does, so obviously the Bible is wrong!!!"

The best part is when these pretenders to the pastorate claim that an orthodox view of Scriptures is - at best - juvenile and naive. Of course, it doesn't take long for them to jump on the "okay...it's just a white male heterosexualist power trip in disguise, you meanie!"

To them, I'll say this: I've been deeply wounded by the words of Scripture. But those wounds were for my good. My pride has been pommeled. My lust has been lambasted. My sloth has been slapped. My avarice assailed and my gluttony gored. My wrath routed and my envy immolated.

Yes...Scripture hurts us. Scripture wounds people.

If it didn't, we couldn't be healed.

“Lord, to whom shall we go? You have the words of eternal life, and we have believed, and have come to know, that you are the Holy One of God.” John 6

Born-Again Baptized Buddhist Bishop?

Stand Firm and The Living Church are reporting that an ordained priest in the ECUSA, who has described himself as having undergone Buddhist 'lay ordination,' is now positioned to run for bishop of the diocese in an unusual election. The others have covered both sides of the issue well enough. All that's left for me is small-minded snark...so here goes.

If you meet the bishop, kill him.

Oh wait…that’s not a Koan from Buddhism. It’s the Koran and Islam.

PRAY IT AIN'T SO!

Modern Seminarians’ Dictionary

I saw this once back when I was in college and have regretted not keeping a copy ever since. I have sought it high and low and have finally had it come across my desk again. It is both hilarious and stunningly accurate. Read them all, you’ll recognize some of them especially if you’re a frequent visitor here.

A MODERN SEMINARIANS’ DICTIONARY
Published in “Fidelity”, September 1987, pp. 23-25.
Brother seminarians! Are you troubled by the non-judgmental expectations of the seminary? Are you confused by their concerns? Fear not. Before your eyes you have the key to ordination in this person’s seminary. Add these terms to your theological lexicon and believe me, you could well be ordained one or two years early!

PASTORAL: Effeminate; an attribute lacking in a man who demonstrates overt masculine attributes of clarity, decisiveness, and orthodoxy: G.K. Chesterton was not pastoral.

RIGID: Your view is not my view; normally, the rigid person has a simplistic view of Catholic doctrine (see SIMPLISTIC); for example, a rigid person holds that the ordination of women is not possible; a flexible person holds that to fail to ordain women is an example of sexism. Evelyn Waugh was rigid: “It is better to be narrow-minded than to have no mind, to hold limited and rigid principles than to have none at all. That is the danger which faces so many people today ‚ to have no considered opinions on any subject, to put up with what is wasteful and harmful with the excuse that there ‘is good in everything’ ‚ which in most cases means an inability to distinguish between good and bad.”

VISION: The quality of agreeing with me.

JUDGMENTAL: A person who judges the sin but not the sinner. A non-judgmental person utters not a word on the morality of the usual sexual sins, but tries to determine “where a person’s at” so that the person’s motives can be judged accordingly; a non-judgmental person judges the sinner but not the sin.

SIMPLISTIC: Having to do with common sense.

CATHOLIC FUNDAMENTALIST: A simplistic person who tries to live the Faith in a docile and pious way; also a Catholic who frequently prays the Rosary.

FLEXIBLE: You agree with me; a flexible person is open and dialogues on any issue, smiles knowingly and does precisely what he started out to do.

CHALLENGE: To recognize that my views are better than your views.

GROWTH: For you to assimilate my way of thinking into your life.

ENABLE: An essential attribute of a priest whereby he is able to convince others to do things his way without parishioners catching on to the deception.

NETWORKING: Allowing nuns to run parishes.

I HEAR YOU: A clever way of telling you that I don’t agree with you but I don†t want to sound dogmatic, rigid or inflexible.

WE HAVE NO RIGHT ANSWERS/WE DON’T HAVE MANY ANSWERS: Except this one (cf. Archbishop Rembert Weakland on homosexuality: “...I would like to state that I do not have all the answers on this highly complex issue…” (The Catholic Herald, July19, 1980.)

YOU’RE NOT LISTENING: The way a flexible, non-judgmental person expresses disappointment that a rigid, dogmatic person doesn’t agree with him; example: the Pope is “not listening” to the American Church.

OPEN AND HONEST: Telling religious superiors what they want to hear.

WOUNDED HEALER: The term used to convince a person who doesn’t “feel good about himself” to feel good about himself without Confession.

WHERE YOU’RE AT: Your psychological condition when you’re in the state of mortal sin calling for acceptance and a non-judgmental attitude.

WHERE ARE THOSE TEARS COMING FROM?: The standard question to ask troubled or sick persons when you have nothing else to fill up the unnerving silence.

COMPLEX TECHNOLOGICAL WORLD: The reason for resisting one’s conscience when opposing the teaching of the Catholic Church; also, the standard response a flexible person uses when a rigid person seems to be winning an argument.

VALUING YOUR SEXUALITY: Obsession with the usual adolescent preoccupations.

WE ARE ALL SEXUAL BEINGS: The reason to overlook sexual misbehavior in seminaries.

CELIBACY: Refraining from heterosexual genital activity.

PROCESS: The spontaneous movement in the dialogue of group therapy sessions never to be disrupted by thinking.

FEELING: The highest faculty of the human person left fully untouched by original sin.

ORIGINAL SIN: See SEXISM.

LOVE: A nice feeling.

THINKING: The most dangerous activity in a seminary; cause for psychological counseling; those who think “disrupt the process”; see PROCESS.

TOUCH, MINISTRY OF: Physical contact to demonstrate that one has the capacity of intimacy; does not necessarily involve an exchange of bodily fluids.

IN TOUCH WITH FEELINGS: Using the intellect to explicitly identify what one is feeling so that speech patterns can be altered to communicate one’s sensitivity and compassion; not to be confused with “intellectualizing your feelings.”

INTELLECTUALIZING YOUR FEELINGS: Controlling one’s temper.

COMPASSION: The warm feeling one has for oneself at any given time; one who has compassion needs to tell others he/she has compassion, otherwise compassion isn’t present; see also IN TOUCH WITH FEELINGS.

COMPASSION BURNOUT: The loss of the warm feeling one has for oneself when charitable works become wearisome or otherwise costly.

SENSITIVITY: The ability to identify and agree with the conventional wisdom of left-wing political issues such as feminism, gay rights, dissent,etc. Tim Unsworth of the National Catholic Reporter describes a sensitive priest: “But Vince Connery also cries a lot. He cries openly and
unashamedly in private conversation and in public. He doesn’t cover his face or hide it in the crook of his elbow. He simply stands there and cries, letting the tears flow and the voice break; and if someone reaches out even slightly, Connery will share an embrace while he cries some more. It soon becomes clear that this is an emotionally healthy priest in an emotionally unhealthy church” (NCR April, 1987).

TOTAL COMMITMENT: The intensity of involvement in charitable works until one finds that one “doesn’t feel good” about oneself; total commitments usually last six months to a year.

LEGALISM: Accepting at face value and obediently implementing what a document, law, or guideline reads.

OBEDIENCE: A word which doesn’t exist.

RULES: A word that once was operative but was done away with by the Second Vatican Council.

EXPECTATIONS: Flexible guidelines which change as frequently as the feelings of the Rector; not to be confused with RULES or LEGALISM.

REPRESSED ANGER: If detected, a cause for dismissal from the seminary; probable cause of both world wars, the Holocaust, and the election of Ronald Reagan [and George H.W. Bush and George W. Bush]; a technique absolutely essential for an orthodox seminarian to get ordained.

FORMATION: Kindergarten.

AFFIRMATION: The flattery due to someone who is in a position of authority.

AUTHORITY: Cannot exist or be invoked unless vested in a sensitive, flexible, non-judgmental and compassionate person (see SENSITIVE, FLEXIBLE, and JUDGMENTAL).

SEXISM: The sin associated with being male.

MALE DOMINATION: The irritating interest men have in sports, cigars, and male-bonding, especially in the hierarchy of the Church; the only mortal personal sin.

FEMININITY: A word created by a sexist, male-dominated society to subjugate women in the maternal role; the presence of femininity in women religious is a cause to recommend psychological counseling.

GETTING IN TOUCH WITH ONE’S FEMININE SIDE: An essential requirement for ordination to the priesthood.

NEGATIVE: The bad attitude having to do with the recognition of personal sin; also, any disposition which is not happy with the policies and views of sensitive, flexible and non-judgmental people.

CHANGE: Mandated by the Second Vatican Council; must be open to all change unless instituted recently; see WE HAVE NO RIGHT ANSWERS.

CONCERN: The response that a sensitive, flexible, non-judgmental and compassionate people in authority have when someone doesn’t agree with them.

HUMANKIND: The human race free of sexism (see SEXISM).

PARENTING: The activity of humankind in begetting children (see HUMANKIND).

SPIRIT OF VATICAN II: Church activities and programs which have absolutely no relationship to the letter of the documents of Vatican II.

ONGOING: The period of time between the Second Vatican Council and the implementation of the Spirit of Vatican II (see SPIRIT OF VATICAN II).

RELEVANT: Anything to do with dissent from Church teaching.

PAIN: The focus of Church dissent; felt by the editors of the National Catholic Reporter and inflicted by the editors of The Wanderer.

REDEFINING THE CHURCH: Defining the Church according to the Spirit of Vatican II (see SPIRIT OF VATICAN II).

LIBERATION: The replacement of existing structures of constraint with new and improved structures of constraint.

CONSCIENCE: The final arbiter of the correctness of one†s action always to be guided by the latest in Church dissent.

PRE-VATICAN II: A person who accepts at face value the teaching of the Church and who reads the documents of the Second Vatican Council without reference to a commentary.

CHURCH: Me.

MACROCHURCH: The male-dominated, sexist, oppressive, authoritarian hierarchical Church.

MICROCHURCH: The pastoral, flexible, open and honest, compassionate, open-to-change, local Christian community.

COLLEGIALITY: The doctrine defined by the Spirit of Vatican II stating that bishops have exactly the same authority as the Bishop of Rome.

BISHOP OF ROME: The local ordinary of an obscure diocese in Italy.

RADICALLY CONSERVATIVE: Reason to ignore the current discipline of the Church.

THE FUTURE: The last and enduring hope of Church dissenters.

WE CAN’T GO BACK: An absolutely efficacious and disarming argument.

HUMANAE VITAE: The biggest mistake the Church has made since the Council of Trent.

COUNCIL OF TRENT: A convenient summary of medieval myths and superstitions.

ECUMENISM: The process of transforming the liturgical rites of the mainline Christian denominations into a single rite of coffee, donuts and dialogue.

TRADITION: A practice established before the Middle Ages or after the Second Vatican Council.

THE LAITY: The future of the Church; cannot be ignored unless associated with ultra-conservative groups.

ULTRA-CONSERVATIVE: Anyone who disagrees with the National Catholic Reporter.

TRADITIONAL NUN: Irrelevant; an embarrassment to women religious.

WOMEN RELIGIOUS: Feminist nun; an oxymoron.

SOCIAL JUSTICE: The realignment of social structures according to the platform of the Democratic Party.

PROGRESSIVE: Pouring the wine of old heresies into new wineskins.

CONSCIOUSNESS RAISING: The method of argumentation used by radical feminists moving adult males to action: “Better to live in a corner of the house-top than have a nagging wife and a brawling household” (Prov.21:9).

EXPERIENCE: The only valid way to substantiate one’s opinions and beliefs; there’s no such thing as a “bad experience.”

SPEAKOUT: The activity springing from the virtue of Social Justice whereby sensitive and compassionate persons, with great emotion, promote the platform of the Democratic Party.

SHRILL: The nasty habit rigid and judgmental people have when they dare to disagree with the demands of Social Justice (see SOCIAL JUSTICE).

PREFERENTIAL OPTION FOR THE POOR: Socialism.

MINISTRY: All human activity.

COMFORT, COMFORTABLE: The final cause and proper object of ministry.

PLURALISM: The acceptance of all points of view except those with a point of view which doesn’t accept all points of view.

CLERICALISM: The attitude of priests who knowingly and willingly practice the sacramental aspects of the priesthood with diligence, reverence and joy.

HOMOPHOBIC: The psychological condition of those who witness and report acts of homosexuality to seminary authorities.

GAY: Deeply sensitive person who naturally possesses the skills for effective pastoral ministry; oppressed minority; in no way connected with pederasty: cf. Fr. James L. Arimond: “Don’t confuse homosexual orientation with other sexual minorities: transexual; pederasty; bafoonery; etc.” from an Archdiocese of Milwaukee workshop in Gay Ministry.

SEXUAL PREFERENCE: Feeling good about some or all objects of desire whether animal, vegetable or mineral.

MISSION STATEMENT: A written objective or goal of a pastoral program upon which the success of the Gospel of Jesus Christ depends.

INTERFACE: A term, borrowed from computer technology, where sensitive and compassionate people dialogue among themselves; similar to the dialogue that the farmers and pigs engaged in in George Orwell’s Animal Farm.

ORDINATION: An archaic celebration in the Church still useful to mark the beginning of full-time ministry.

SEMINARY: School where men and women are prepared for full-time ministry.

OUTREACH: Any program for whatever reasons; also known as reach out; usually involves fundraising.

VOCATIONS CRISIS: Refers to the Church†s failure to relax the rules on celibacy and failure to ordain women.

SHARE: The practice of discussing the deepest intimacies of one’s life in front of complete strangers.

WORKSHOP: A church-sponsored meeting to ensure that the issues of optional celibacy, women’s ordination, the Sandinistas and leisure suits are still being addressed.

SELF-ACTUALIZATION: Salvation; no longer a mortal sin.

DIALOGUE: The deft use of banal clichés in conversation.

PROPHETIC/PROPHET: One who has the courage to speak out on one’s behalf; e.g., Charlie Curran.

CURRAN, CHARLIE: Twentieth century saint; went into debt defending his faith.

EMPOWER: To encourage others to think for themselves; cf., Evelyn Waugh: “Every effort was made to encourage the children at the public schools to think for themselves. When they should have been whipped and taught Greek paradigms, they were set arguing about birth control and nationalization. Their crude little opinions were treated with respect. Preachers in the school chapel week after week entrusted the future to their hands. It is hardly surprising that they were Bolshevik at 18 and bored at 20.”

POWERFUL: A spontaneous exclamation from hearing one†s own views restated in a more banal fashion.

LITURGISTS: “A society of men among us, bred from their youth in the art of proving by words multiplied for the purpose, that white is black, and black is white, according as they are paid” (Swift, Gulliver’s Travels).

EASTER DUTY: Annual sacrilege.

PSYCHOLOGIST: Infallible teaching authority in the Church.

OFFICIAL CHURCH TEACHING: “I don’t expect it to change anybody’s mind one way or another. Catholics today have learned what it means to be selectively obedient to the Church†s teaching” (Father Richard McBrien, Washington Post, December16,1981).

CHASTITY: Safe sex.

SAFE SEX: Taking appropriate precautions during high risk sexual activity; not to be confused with responsible love.

RESPONSIBLE LOVE: Sexual relations only within marriage with a spouse; an ideal impossible to sustain in a complex technological world.

HIGH RISK SEXUAL ACTIVITY: Sodomy; the term neo-Victorian Catholics use when referring to the kinds of sexual activity St. Paul warned against.

CLOWN MASS: Liturgical innovation comparable to the innovation of Gregorian chant; relevant: “A clown liturgy may sound sacrilegious but those who attended a special Mass at St. Agnes Church described it as moving, uplifting, spirited and colorful” (Catholic Herald, Milwaukee, February 16, 1984).

LITURGICAL DANCE: Liturgical innovation comparable to the innovation of Gregorian chant: “Today’s procession into the altar by the priest and some members of the laity was a dance in the early church” (Sister Barbara Linke); relevant: “For me, my body is my instrument - it’s my way of expressing myself,” she said, gesturing frequently with hand to convey her thoughts. “I feel free when I dance; it’s a natural expression.” (Sister Barbara Linke, quoted in the Milwaukee Sentinel, August 3, 1985).

O Rahm, O Rahm, Emmanuel

Though I really haven't the time, I'm suspecting that by next Advent this won't be as funny. Necessity is the mother of ADvention

(C'mon....you know the tune.)

Oh Rahm, Oh Rahm E-mman-u-el
I hope you have a senate seat to sell!
Chicago politics written large,
Now that Obama has been put in charge.

Refrain

Rejoice, pro-choice! Emmanuel
has cabinet and judges seats to sell.

O come, desire of nations, blind
Us with your soaring rhetoric, sublime.
Bid rising waters hasty retreat,
And be the presidential Prince of Peace.

Refrain

Rejoice, pro-choice! Emmanuel
has cabinet and judges seats to sell.

Heresy Helper

Yeah...I know. It's not really a meaty "Theology Thursday" post. But I'm low on time and have surgery coming up next week. Whattayawant?

Thanks, Sacred Sandwich!