Will the Pope's Pronouncement Set Ecumenism Back a Hundred Years? (Challenge to Apostolicity)

Progressive Theology ^ | July 07

[xzins]

Will the Pope's Pronouncement Set Ecumenism Back a Hundred Years?

Wednesday, 11 July 2007

Yesterday's Reuters headline: "The Vatican on Tuesday said Christian denominations outside the Roman Catholic Church were not full churches of Jesus Christ." The actual proclamation, posted on the official Vatican Web site, says that Protestant Churches are really "ecclesial communities" rather than Churches, because they lack apostolic succession, and therefore they "have not preserved the genuine and integral substance of the Eucharistic Mystery." Furthermore, not even the Eastern Orthodox Churches are real Churches, even though they were explicitly referred to as such in the Vatican document Unitatis Redintegratio (Decree on Ecumenism). The new document explains that they were only called Churches because "the Council wanted to adopt the traditional use of the term." This new clarification, issued officially by the Congregation for the Doctrine of the Faith, but in fact strongly supported by Pope Benedict XVI, manages to insult both Protestants and the Orthodox, and it may set ecumenism back a hundred years.

The new document, officially entitled "Responses to Some Questions Regarding Certain Aspects of the Doctrine on the Church," claims that the positions it takes do not reverse the intent of various Vatican II documents, especially Unitatis Redintegratio, but merely clarify them. In support of this contention, it cites other documents, all issued by the Congregation for the Doctrine of the Faith: Mysterium Ecclesiae (1973), Communionis notio (1992), and Dominus Iesus (2000). The last two of these documents were issued while the current pope, as Cardinal Ratzinger, was prefect of the Congregation. The Congregation for the Doctrine of the Faith was born in 1542 with the name Sacred Congregation of the Universal Inquisition, and for centuries it has operated as an extremely conservative force with the Roman Catholic Church, opposing innovation and modernizing tendencies, suppressing dissent, and sometimes, in its first few centuries, persecuting those who believed differently. More recently, the congregation has engaged in the suppression of some of Catholicism's most innovative and committed thinkers, such as Yves Congar, Hans Küng, Charles Curran, Matthew Fox, and Jon Sobrino and other liberation theologians. In light of the history of the Congregation of the Faith, such conservative statements as those released this week are hardly surprising, though they are quite unwelcome.

It is natural for members of various Christian Churches to believe that the institutions to which they belong are the best representatives of Christ's body on earth--otherwise, why wouldn't they join a different Church? It is disingenuous, however, for the leader of a Church that has committed itself "irrevocably" (to use Pope John Paul II's word in Ut Unum Sint [That They May Be One] 3, emphasis original) to ecumenism to claim to be interested in unity while at the same time declaring that all other Christians belong to Churches that are in some way deficient. How different was the attitude of Benedict's predecessors, who wrote, "In subsequent centuries much more serious dissensions appeared and large communities became separated from full communion with the [Roman] Catholic Church--for which, often enough, men of both sides were to blame" (Unitatis Redintegratio 3). In Benedict's view, at various times in history groups of Christians wandered from the original, pure Roman Catholic Church, and any notion of Christian unity today is predicated on the idea of those groups abandoning their errors and returning to the Roman Catholic fold. The pope's problem seems to be that he is a theologian rather than a historian. Otherwise he could not possibly make such outrageous statements and think that they were compatible with the spirit of ecumenism that his immediate predecessors promoted.

One of the pope's most strident arguments against the validity of other Churches is that they can't trace their bishops' lineages back to the original apostles, as the bishops in the Roman Catholic Church can. There are three problems with this idea.

First, many Protestants deny the importance of apostolic succession as a guarantor of legitimacy. They would argue that faithfulness to the Bible and/or the teachings of Christ is a better measure of authentic Christian faith than the ability to trace one's spiritual ancestry through an ecclesiastical bureaucracy. A peripheral knowledge of the lives of some of the medieval and early modern popes (e.g., Stephen VI, Sergius III, Innocent VIII, Alexander VI) is enough to call the insistence on apostolic succession into serious question. Moreover, the Avignon Papacy and the divided lines of papal claimants in subsequent decades calls into serious question the legitimacy of the whole approach. Perhaps the strongest argument against the necessity of apostolic succession comes from the Apostle Paul, who was an acknowledged apostle despite not having been ordained by one of Jesus' original twelve disciples. In fact, Paul makes much of the fact that his authority came directly from Jesus Christ rather than from one of the apostles (Gal 1:11-12). Apostolic succession was a useful tool for combating incipient heresy and establishing the antiquity of the churches in particular locales, but merely stating that apostolic succession is a necessary prerequisite for being a true church does not make it so.

The second problem with the new document's insistence upon apostolic succession is the fact that at least three other Christian communions have apostolic succession claims that are as valid as that of the Roman Catholic Church. The Eastern Orthodox Churches, which split from the Roman Catholic Church in 1054, can trace their lineages back to the same apostles that the Roman Catholic Church can, a fact acknowledged by Unitatis Redintegratio 14. The Oriental Orthodox Churches, such as the Coptic and Ethiopic Orthodox Churches, split from the Roman Catholic Church several centuries earlier, but they too can trace their episcopal lineages back to the same apostles claimed by the Roman Catholic Church as its founders. Finally, the Anglican Church, which broke away from the Roman Catholic Church during the reign of King Henry VIII, can likewise trace the lineage of every bishop back through the first archbishop of Canterbury, Augustine. In addition to these three collections of Christian Churches, the Old Catholics and some Methodists also see value in the idea of apostolic succession, and they can trace their episcopal lineages just as far back as Catholic bishops can.

The third problem with the idea of apostolic succession is that the earliest bishops in certain places are simply unknown, and the lists produced in the third and fourth centuries that purported to identify every bishop back to the founding of the church in a particular area were often historically unreliable. Who was the founding bishop of Byzantium? Who brought the gospel to Alexandria? To Edessa? To Antioch? There are lists that give names (e.g., http://www.friesian.com/popes.htm), such as the Apostles Mark (Alexandria), Andrew (Byzantium), and Thaddeus (Armenia), but the association of the apostles with the founding of these churches is legendary, not historical. The most obvious breakdown of historicity in the realm of apostolic succession involves none other than the see occupied by the pope, the bishop of Rome. It is certain that Peter did make his way to Rome before the time of Nero, where he perished, apparently in the Neronian persecution following the Great Fire of Rome, but it is equally certain that the church in Rome predates Peter, as it also predates Paul's arrival there (Paul also apparently died during the Neronian persecution). The Roman Catholic Church may legitimately claim a close association with both Peter and Paul, but it may not legitimately claim that either was the founder of the church there. The fact of the matter is that the gospel reached Rome, Alexandria, Antioch, Edessa, and other early centers of Christianity in the hands of unknown, faithful Christians, not apostles, and the legitimacy of the churches established there did not suffer in the least because of it.

All the talk in the new document about apostolic succession is merely a smokescreen, however, for the main point that the Congregation of the Faith and the pope wanted to drive home: recognition of the absolute primacy of the pope. After playing with the words "subsists in" (Lumen Gentium [Dogmatic Constitution on the Church] 8) and "church" (Unitatis Redintegratio 14) in an effort to make them mean something other than what they originally meant, the document gets down to the nitty-gritty. "Since communion with the Catholic Church, the visible head of which is the Bishop of Rome and the Successor of Peter, is not some external complement to a particular Church but rather one of its internal constitutive principles, these venerable Christian communities lack something in their condition as particular churches." From an ecumenical standpoint, this position is a non-starter. Communion with Rome and acknowledging the authority of the pope as bishop of Rome is a far different matter from recognizing the pope as the "visible head" of the entire church, without peer. The pope is an intelligent man, and he knows that discussions with other Churches will make no progress on the basis of this prerequisite, so the only conclusion that can be drawn is that the pope, despite his protestations, has no interest in pursuing ecumenism. Trying to persuade other Christians to become Roman Catholics, which is evidently the pope's approach to other Churches, is not ecumenism, it's proselytism.

Fortunately, this document does not represent the viewpoint of all Catholics, either laypeople or scholars. Many ordinary Catholics would scoff at the idea that other denominations were not legitimate Churches, which just happen to have different ideas about certain topics and different ways of expressing a common Christianity. Similarly, many Catholic scholars are doing impressive work in areas such as theology, history, biblical study, and ethics, work that interacts with ideas produced by non-Catholic scholars. In the classroom and in publications, Catholics and non-Catholics learn from each other, challenge one another, and, perhaps most importantly, respect one another.

How does one define the Church? Christians have many different understandings of the term, and Catholics are divided among themselves, as are non-Catholics. The ecumenical movement is engaged in addressing this issue in thoughtful, meaningful, and respectful ways. Will the narrow-minded view expressed in "Responses" be the death-knell of the ecumenical movement? Hardly. Unity among Christians is too important an idea to be set aside. Will the document set back ecumenical efforts? Perhaps, but Christians committed to Christian unity--Catholic, Orthodox, and Protestant alike--will get beyond it. The ecumenical movement is alive and well, and no intemperate pronouncement from the Congregation of the Faith, or the current pope, can restrain it for long. Even if ecumenism, at least as it involves the Roman Catholic Church's connection with other Churches, is temporarily set back a hundred years, that distance can be closed either by changes of heart or changes of leadership.

[D-fendr]

Yet over-riding this perception is the greater fact that...

I'm interested in how 'greater facts' are categorized - how they are determined to be both facts and greater.

[D-fendr]

That’s a very interesting listing that, as we see from the responses, raises some interesting questions.

thanks for your post..

[tiki]

The Evangelicals I know and a whole lot of Protestants take the binding and loosing verse to mean each Christian.

[betty boop]

That's a very good perhaps, though I'm not sure it requires quantum physics to explain it. :)

Probably not, D-fendr. :^)

[kosta50]

This is why (on threads involving spiritual matters) you see me making a few remarks - some of them labeled "musings" and then quoting many Scriptures. The spirit and life are in His words, not mine

But they are your choices based on your interpretation.

You make yourself sound like niothing is yours; you are just a vessel.

if that is so, then you probably walk on water...

[kosta50]

That’s a very interesting listing that, as we see from the responses, raises some interesting questions

It's fascinating because most poeple never bother to compare. There's tons more of this. I just don't have the time or desire to do their homework. They dismiss anyway. Or, better yet, their "indwelling spirit" does.

[Alamo-Girl]

You make yourself sound like niothing is yours; you are just a vessel.

Indeed, that is true. All that I am - including the clothes on my back - are His to do with according to His own will.

For ye are dead, and your life is hid with Christ in God. – Colossians 3:3

I am crucified with Christ: nevertheless I live; yet not I, but Christ liveth in me: and the life which I now live in the flesh I live by the faith of the Son of God, who loved me, and gave himself for me. – Galatians 2:20

But then you said:

if that is so, then you probably walk on water...

LOLOL!

Walking on water is not my job. But whatever God assigns me to do, He will see it done.

But Jesus beheld [them], and said unto them, With men this is impossible; but with God all things are possible. – Matthew 19:26

Praise God!!!

[hosepipe]

[.. Well then we cannot comprehend even the Bible, and that holds for all who claim otherwise, and God's revelation was for naught. ..]

Some cannot understand the bible, as per plan..
Jesus plainly taught this was so, and WHY?..
Jesus didn't Get along well with ambient clergy..
or them with him since they murdered him..

[RightWhale]

The hermeneutika was devised for that purpose. It goes back to Augustinus, through Luther and sola scriptura and onward through Schleiermacher and is now taken by some to be the fundamental philosophy. The organic philosophy from Bergson or Leibniz through Whitehead is not related.

[kosta50]

Perhaps we have a way to faithfully read the Holy Scriptures without insisting that they be strictly "logical.

This statement certainly flies in the face of many a scholastically-inclined western Christian who built whole doctrines based on the assertion that God is "logical" (and as such must follow the laws of logic—which is itself an illogical conclusion, given that God is also not subject to the laws of Creation!).

The Jews call God a "paradox." Indeed. How can God Who is limitless and timeless empty Himself into a womb and become flesh and blood in time and limited by space.

And while the Jews may not have any difficulty accepting God's "paradoxical" nature by which He can be uncircumscribed and circumscribed, within time and outside of time, dispassionate and passionate, they run into a stumbling block when it comes to accepting Jesus because—get this—man cannot become God!

All of a sudden, we have a short circuit, where we reverse the logic, and dispense with the paradox which tells us that with God all things are possible, and insist—purely based on one's own preconceived reality—that man cannot be God, rather than accept that God can be(come) a man.

You can appeal all you want to their noetic inclinations, and their spiritual gift as 'chosen' people, to conform their logic and reason to the paradox of God and not the other way around, but they will remain steadfast in their denial simply because that would mean calling everything they believed in until that point, their entire ego, even self, a lie, and that is just too threatening.

As far as depending on the leanings in the spirit, that is all fine and dandy, except that we can never know what that "spirit" is. It is not the spirit that leads us to select verses, but our intention to prove them to someone else (in effect to prove that we and not them are right). So, we skip conveniently over those verses that don't fit our preconceived answer and engage our verse generator to find the "right" verse for us.

This is how some claim God repents and other don't. The Bible is full of either choice. Take your pick and then pick your audience and you can "prove" just about anything with the Bible in this way, except that what guides you is the "indwelling spirit."

To the ego, covered with pride, the Gnostic heresy is dear and near and is all over the New Testament.

As for you, the anointing you received from him remains in you, and you do not need anyone to teach you—1 John 2:26

You do not need anyone to teach you...we will "know" the truth "internally." That will be our "proof." You speak of the observer problem. There it is: in individual interpretations and rationalizations of the Bible, making them fit the paradigm of one's own solipsistic (virtual) reality. We all have a God in a book, after our own image. Especially those who deny it while claiming the Spirit leads them. but the God they find in the book is entirely a God of their own making, their alter ego.

[hosepipe]

[.. Yet over-riding this perception is the greater fact that... / I'm interested in how 'greater facts' are categorized - how they are determined to be both (1)facts and (2)greater. ..]

1) Spiritual reality..
2) Permanent not temporal data..

[D-fendr]

Well, you know I’m gonna ask you to define those terms now..

[kosta50]

In temporal time, when it may seem to us God has "changed His mind," it is in order to further teach us how to live according to His precepts

And who determines when the Bible is to be understood literally and when allegorically? You? Why, fundamentalists (of any creed) take their scriptures literally. Now you are telling me that there is a condition of "temporal appearance" which is not to be take literally. Wow! The power of rationalizations is endless, isn't it?

The Bible says on 13 or so occasions (all OT by the way) that God does indeed change His mind, i.e "repents," and you are telling me these are "temporary appearances?"

A system that cannot fail because its contradictions are not contradictions! You can find whatever you want in it and it will be "true," even if within the same book the author(s) contradict each other. The contradictions are dismissed as "with God everything is possible." So, why bother reading the Bible? Even the Bible tells us that we don't need to be taught by anyone (cf. 1 John 2:26).

"His will be done, on earth as it is in heaven."

That's right! Just go with the flow...

[kosta50]

In context, verse one of Math 18 establishes that jesus si speaking to the Apostles.

Then why does He tell them to take it to the church?

Verses 15-17 are about one thing (brother sinning again you). Verse 18 is about something else (Christ's promise to the Apostles). They are not related.

[kosta50]

lol. I've lost count how many times that excuse has been used by the RCC (and now you) in order to deprive the sheep of God's assurance, to make His promises only to a select few (the Apostles) and not to every one of His children for all time

At that time the disciples came to Jesus and asked, "Who is the greatest in the kingdom of heaven?"--Mat 18:1

He speaks to the disciples. It's in the Bible. I am sorry you think there were others as well. It's a conjecture.

[hosepipe]

[.. Well, you know I’m gonna ask you to define those terms now..]

-LoL...

1) Spiritual reality are observations in spirit/Spirit..
2) Permanent data are/is Eternal conclusions..

[hosepipe]

[.. And who determines when the Bible is to be understood literally and when allegorically? ..]

Good question actually..
A hard question too.. Seeing and understanding allegory in scripture is a gift.. Some miss most of the allegorical(metaphorical) truth.. and some make cartoons of the allegory trying to force "vision" of the image of it... yet others grasp the images of some allegory and miss others..

You have stumbled (I think) on a deep truth of scripture..
Scripture is hidden in the text seeing allegory from the literal takes blessing from the Holy Spirit..

[kosta50]

Kosta: You make yourself sound like nothing is yours; you are just a vessel.

AG: Indeed, that is true.

LOL!

Walking on water is not my job

LOL! "It's not my job" excuse.

 

[kosta50]

You have stumbled (I think) on a deep truth of scripture

Yeah, like "truth is what I think it is..."?

Scripture is hidden in the text seeing allegory from the literal takes blessing from the Holy Spirit..

You know a loving God would have made things a lot easier for an average dummy to understand and believe. Perhaps that's what God intended, but then all sorts of egos got in the way.

[D-fendr]

thanks..

-How do you differentiate an “observation in Spirit” from an observation not in Spirit? How do you tell the difference? What the the key differentiating characteristics?

-How is an eternal conclusion differentiated from one that is not?