All right. Well, welcome.
Welcome to my talk. Should I convert to Rome?
There's a little bit of a title change, more on that and a
little bit. But before we get started, let
me go ahead and pray because this is a very important topic.
It can be a sensitive topic. I also think it's an urgent
topic. And if done rightly, I think it
can actually help us in our sense of the church's mission
and of our identity as the people of God.
So pray with me. Heavenly Father, we thank you
for the gifts of your Son Jesus Christ, for the outpouring of
your Holy Spirit. We thank you for the birth of
the church at Pentecost, and we thank you for our birth into the
Church through baptism. I pray that what I say today
will be honoring to your name and that it will help us be more
faithful as your people, that it will help us know the clarity of
the gospel above all, and that it will help us in our unity
globally as the Body of Christ. I pray this through Christ, our
risen Lord, our Advocate, our Mediator, our Lord Jesus.
Christ. Amen.
OK, so I have retitled this talk Should I convert to Rome
Protestantism for the global church.
This is specifically addressed to our context as Anglicans,
many of whom have come from low church backgrounds or
evangelical backgrounds where we know nothing of liturgy.
And then when we discover it, it's, it's, it's, it's amazing
for the first time hearing, passing the peace or hearing the
blessing of the Triune God bestowed upon you, the first
time hearing the Nicene Creed spoken in a corporate context.
These are amazing treasures that when we discover them, it leads
us into liturgical worship and also perhaps leads us to ask the
question, how far should I go in this path of liturgy?
Do other church traditions have a more faithful inheritance or
stewarding of this liturgical tradition?
Is Rome inevitably the question that's asked?
Is Rome the truest, most faithful, exclusive heir of this
tradition of the Church? I'd like to answer that question
today by making a hopefully robust case for Protestantism as
a gift to the ecumenical body of Christ.
Global ecumenical, basically synonymous in the Greek oiku
mune, the globe, the known world, global Christianity.
I like to make the case that Protestantism offers a faithful
expression of the global church, and it challenges the rest of
the global church, global Church, whether Orthodox or
Catholic, to a more faithful adherence to the Gospel.
Let's go ahead to the next slide.
I'd like to make the case for these Protestant goods that we
can retrieve them for the ecumenical church and for our
own life as Christians. These three goods I'll call
historic ecumenism, prophetic ecclesiology, and gospel
clarity. Historic ecumenism.
Let's go to the next slide. Historic ecumenism is the case
that we are part of a global body that is represented equally
in every sector where the Church is planted and that it is united
under the head, Jesus Christ himself.
Now I'd like to compare a Roman Catholic understanding of this
ecumenism to a Protestant understanding of this ecumenism.
This is Pope Pius the 9th, the convener of Vatican One, the
First Vatican Council in 1868 to 1870.
This is what he said. If anyone therefore shall say
that the Blessed Peter the Apostle was not appointed the
Prince of all the apostles and the visible head of the whole
Church militant, or that the same directly and immediately
receive the same our Lord Jesus Christ from the same, a primacy
of honor only and not of true and proper jurisdiction, let him
be anathema. Let's go to the next slide.
It continues, therefore, it has always been necessary that each
Church, that is, those who are the faithful everywhere, should
agree with the Roman Church, because of the greater power of
the principality that she, the Roman Church, has received.
In order that all being joined together in the unity of that
seat, Peter's seat in Rome, from the veneration of which the
rights of communion flows to all, might associate closely as
members of one head, Christ, represented by Peter in the
compact unity of the body. If then, any should deny that it
is by the institution of Christ the Lord, and by divine right,
that blessed Peter should have a perpetual line of successors in
the primacy over the universal Church, or that the Roman
Pontiff is a successor of blessed Peter in this primacy,
let him be anathema. I think I have another portion
of that quote. If anyone then, shall say that
the Roman Pontiff has the office merely of inspection or
direction, so something that we might have in a Episcopal Church
polity, and not the full and supreme power of jurisdiction
over the universal Church. Let only not only in the things
which belong to faith and morals, but also in those which
relate to the discipline and government of the Church spread
throughout the world. Or assert that he possesses
merely the principal part and not all the fullness of this
supreme power, or that this power which he enjoys is not
ordinary and immediate both over each and all the churches and
over each and all the pastors and the faithful.
Let him be anathema. That's the papal encyclical
Pastor Eternis, which came as a result of the First Vatican
Council. Let's be clear what the Roman
Catholic teaching is here. As a side note, this lecture
will be slightly different in format than the previous two.
This will be what I'll use, the common academic lecture format.
I'll aim to have my lecture finished in half an hour to 45
minutes, and then it'll be a free for all question answer
time afterwards. Sound good?
Let's do that. OK, so Petra and supremacy, To
what extent does this foster ecumenism?
Notice how this Petra and supremacy and later papal
infallibility actually at the same time becomes Catholic dogma
only at the Vatican 1 Council. Now that's a good Roman Catholic
argument. In favor of this would be this
is just putting an official decree on what had always been
the practice in the historic Church, Church.
However the case may be, it is quite clear that there is a
supremacy and an exclusivity given to the Roman Pontiff to
the exclusion of those who claim other lineages going back to
Christ, even if those be Apostolic lineages.
Let's compare this to Scripture and let's compare this to the
1st 2 1/2 centuries of Christianity.
Let's go to our next slide, historic ecumenism.
How does it, how do we see it displayed or born in the New
Testament? First of all, Acts 15 verses one
through 21, the first council of the church, the Jerusalem
Council, where the collective witness of the apostles and the
elders gathered at Jerusalem. Notice Peter does speak up, but
he only speaks up along with Paul and Barnabas.
And James presides over the council.
He presides over the assembly, and James has the final word.
Notice how Paul lists these pillars of the church in
Jerusalem. He calls them Cephas.
And let's see here James, Cephas the rock, and John in that
order. Peter does not have preeminence
in this passage in Galatians 2, and he's actually soon to be
rebuked in the following verse. Peter is one of several pillars
of the church in the earliest form of Christianity.
Notice also that Peter and James do the same thing with their
introductions in their letters. Peter to a certain extent offers
a blessing to the Catholic Church in Asia Minor, Pontius
Bithynia, and Galatia in first Peter 11.
And he does it from Babylon, that is Rome.
So he is acting like a Bishop based in Rome, blessing a large
part of the body of Christ. But James does exactly the same
thing. In fact, he does it in a broader
audience. James chapter one, verse 1.
James, the brother of the Lord, to whom he says to the 12 tribes
of the dispersion. In other words, this diaspora,
this dispersed ecumenical body of Christ spread throughout the
world. James is exerting the exact same
kind of Apostolic authority as Peter in the New Testament.
Also look at Revelation One through 3, the seven churches
represented by the seven lampstands. 7 is a symbolic
number in Revelation and should be appreciated as such.
It represents the complete ecumenical church.
Rome is not even mentioned as one of those seven churches.
They're all located in Asia Minor and Rome doesn't even
feature in apocalypses heavenly ecclesiology unless we interpret
Babylon as the Roman church, which as much as they like
Luther, I think this might be a little bit of a stretch on his
part. So in the New Testament, the
ecumenical body of Christ does not have Peter as its head.
Our earliest documents show James functioning as a head when
it comes to the Jerusalem Council, and James and Peter in
their own settings establishing the Apostolic Gospel by their
own Apostolic credentials, and Paul also appealing to that same
level of credentials. Let's go to the next slide.
Then we move forward 100 years to the 2nd century AD.
We have this apocryphal text called the Epistola Apostolorum.
It's usually featured with several other apocryphal
gospels, but what's interesting about this one is it's actually
not a heretical document. It's Proto Orthodox.
It's promoting. The.
Incarnation of Jesus Christ, his full embodiment, and it's it's
advocating for the Apostolic faith of the physical
resurrection of Jesus. In this document, Peter is not
named first. He's named third after John.
This document likely originates in Asia Minor, and it encourages
the same network of churches that Revelation encouraged,
probably Yohannian churches that had traced their Apostolic
descent from John, not from Peter.
And so this document with John as the head, as the chief
representative of the church, gives a thoroughly Yohannian
Apostolic case for the Gospel. Now this, this is creating a
tension to be sure. You have Asian, Asian minor
Christians appealing to John as their progenitor.
And then you have Roman Christians appealing to Peter.
And you see a little bit of a tension emerging between those
two. We'll, we'll explore this
tension in our next, our next segment.
But let's appreciate how Irenaeus, St.
Irenaeus, who died around 200 AD, how he describes this
tension and also this unity, this diversity and this unity.
If you look at your Roman Catholic catechism, they will
point to this exact quote from Irenaeus to establish Petra and
supremacy, but they only quote the first half.
The Blessed Apostles having founded and built up the Church,
committed into the hands of lioness, the ministry of the
bishopric. I've translated this very
woodenly and then after that it goes on to assert the the the
validity and Apostolic origin of the Roman Church.
That quote is definitely worth seeing in full.
I can share that in our question and answer time and usually in
our Roman Catholic catechisms, we see that put to the front
like this is early evidence for pet triumph supremacy.
But then look at what he does in the very next section.
However. But Polycarp was not only
instructed by the apostles and conversed with many who had seen
Christ, but was also by apostles in Asia appointed Bishop of the
Church in Smyrna. That's modern day Ismir, Turkey.
To these things all the Asiatic churches testify, as do also
those men who have succeeded Polycarp.
Also, the church in Ephesus founded by Paul and having John
remaining among them permanently until the times of Trajan is a
true witness to the tradition of the apostles, not because Peter
planted the church, but because Christ planted it through Paul,
confirmed by John, who up and to his death remained there as the
witness, the Apostolic witness to the Gospel.
Irenaeus is establishing certainly the validity of the
Roman Church as a faithful Apostolic Church.
Amen to that. He is also establishing
independently the validity of the Asian Church based in
Ephesus. Amen to that.
Irenaeus is ecumenism actually brings together the four
gospels. Mark based in Rome, John based
in Ephesus, Matthew presumably based somewhere in the Holy
Lands because it's he says that Matthew preached among the
Hebrews and then Luke, who traveled all over the
Mediterranean with Paul preaching the Gospel.
So for Irenaeus, the fourfold Gospel, Matthew, Mark, Luke and
John is the emblem of the Church, the ecumenical body of
Christ, with who on the throne? Not Peter, but Jesus Christ the
Lamb. He does this by an allegorical
interpretation of Psalm 80 verse one which says the Lord is
seated between the cherubim. He combines that with an
interpretation of Ezekiel chapter 1 and the four living
creatures that shows the Lord the Son of Man exalted, and then
finally Revelation chapter 4 with those same 4 living
creatures exalting the living Christ.
So for Irenaeus, the fourfold gospel itself would be
undermined if one of those heads assumes supremacy and primacy.
Irenaeus, I think, advocates a truly ecumenical church
structure where each representative from the various
corners of the church are lifted up as faithful heirs of
Apostolic faith wherever it has been proclaimed.
Let's go to the next slide. We see this historic ecumenism
that's not founded in Petra and supremacy in other sectors of
the early church. We get to the 3rd century, 100
years later. Cyprian from North Africa, in a
correspondence with Stephen, the Bishop of Rome, said, quote,
Peter did not assert that he had a rights of seniority.
That's Primatus, quite literally, and that therefore
upstarts and laycomers ought to be obedient to him.
He further defines this unity in his tractate on the Unity of the
Church. This unity we ought firmly to
hold and assert, especially those of us that are bishops who
preside in the Church, that we may also prove the episcopate
itself to be 1 and undivided. Let no one deceive the
brotherhood by a falsehood. Let no one corrupt the truth or
the faith by perfidious prevarication.
The episcopate is 1, each part of which is held by each one for
the whole. He'll use this language to
describe Peter for sure, but he'll also use this language to
describe the other Apostolic progenitors of Christian faith
across the ancient Mediterranean all the way down to his own day.
Wherever the gospel has been faithfully preached and handed
down generation to generation, there you find the church.
That is why Calvin and the and the Reformers appealed so
consistently to Cyprian. They actually have derived their
Protestant reformational ecclesiology in large part from
Cyprian's interpretation of the biblical witness.
Let's go to the next slide. Finally, nice scene and
following. It's interesting to see the
Bishop of Rome's role in our ecumenical councils.
The Bishop of Rome was not even at the Council of Nicaea.
He sent delegates. He was not at the that one.
That's the one that really hammered out Trinitarian
theology. He was not at the the Council of
Constantinople, the third, which really dealt with the with the
heresy of Monothelatism. How many wills does the
Incarnate Christ have? A divine will and a human will.
How do those interact as one absorbed into the other?
Or are they kept distinct? So the Bishop of Rome did not
even he was he only sent delicates to that council.
Also Nicaea too, which tackled the question of iconography.
Only delegates were sent there. The Bishop of Rome did not even
send delegates to Constantinople with the first Council and
Constantinople the second council.
Constantinople, the first council was a reaffirmation of
Nicaea. Keep in mind that Rome
essentially became apostate between 325 and 381, with the
reigning emperor preferring Arianism.
And it took a different kind of ecclesiology to say the true
Church can go into exile and still remain the true church.
It doesn't have to stay at Rome. So these ecumenical councils, I
argue, were just that. They were ecumenical.
They were not functions of Petrine or Roman supremacy.
Now, let me clarify really quickly what I am not saying.
I'm not saying that a church based in Rome with faithful
passing down from generation to generation is not the church.
If and when the Roman Catholic Church has done that faithfully,
they are a true church. They bear those marks of the
true church. And I'm just reiterating what
Calvin and Luther would say. But what I am saying is even
though they are a true church, they are not the only church at
the exclusivity of the rest of the ecumenical body of Christ.
That's why I argue that Protestantism preserves a truly
historic ecumenism. That's my first section.
Next section, let's also look at how when the Roman when the
Protestant Reformation emerged, how these differing traditions
talked about each other. I'm going to try to show the the
most vociferous Protestant railings against Roman Catholic
and let's see how how how deep they go in criticizing the Roman
Church. Article 19 of our 39 articles.
As the Church of Jerusalem, Alexandria, and Antioch have
erred, so those are different Eastern Orthodox traditions.
So also the Church of Rome hath erred not only in their living
and manner of ceremonies, but also in matters of faith.
It's not a formal anathema, it's a declaration of having gone
astray. Also Article 22.
By the way, if you're Anglican or want to be Anglican, I'd
strongly recommend reading the 39 articles.
You'll be surprised at what Anglicans believe and don't
believe. Hopefully you won't be too
surprised. The Romish doctrine concerning
purgatory, pardons, worshipping and adoration, as well as images
as of relics and also invocations of Saints, is a fond
thing, vainly invented and grounded upon.
No warranty of Scripture, but rather repugnant to the Word of
God. OK, strong words to be sure, but
not a formal anathema. Article 37.
The Bishop of Rome hath no jurisdiction in this realm of
England. A firm word to be sure, but not
a formal anathema. It's Pope, a Bishop of Rome.
Yes, do your thing in Rome, but we are faithfully preaching the
Apostolic Gospel here in Canterbury.
We can do this as the ecumenical Body of Christ.
Now you get so Anglicans are kind of in this in between
space, preserving a lot of Roman Catholicism.
I think what that which faithfully demonstrates the
Gospel, but but still preaching the reformed understanding of
the gospel. When you get to the Prezis,
they're a little bit harder hitting, harder punching.
So Westminster Confession of faith, see what they say about
Rome. The purest churches under heaven
are subject both to mixture and error.
So they introduced this category even before they say their
strongest indictment against the Roman church.
They introduced this category that a true church can be mixed
with, can be mixed with error. So they're introducing the
category that even the Roman Church that they would say the
head of which is the Antichrist, even the Roman Church can be a
true church mixed with error. That's why they said there is no
other head of the church but the Lord Jesus Christ, nor can the
Pope of Rome in any sense be head thereof.
But is that Antichrist who sets himself out in the House of God
one of the strongest Protestant statements against Roman
Catholicism? As a sidebar here, this may have
been legitimate in that time, but I would argue against
against using that in any way in the present day.
I think we Protestants and Catholics have made a lot of
progress in the past 500 years and so this is actually one of
the reasons why I'm not Presbyterian.
Now let's see how the favorite was returned.
Actually, this was before contacted Domino Pope Eugene the
4th 1442 quote. The Roman Catholic Church
professes and preaches that all those who outside the Catholic
Church, not only pagans but also Jews or heretics and
schismatics, cannot share an eternal life and will go into
the everlasting fire which was prepared for the devil and his
angels, unless they are joined to the Catholic Church before
the end of their lives. You can find similar language in
Martin Luther's writings, but Luther acknowledged that he was
not writing on behalf of the entire church.
This is a papal encyclical which by the 1870 Pastor Eternis is
technically infallible. Next, the Council of Trench,
another historic document or council for the Roman Catholic
Church that has defined its doctrine.
And henceforth, if anyone saith that justifying faith is nothing
else but confidence in the Divine Mercy which remits sins
for Christ's sake, or that this confidence alone is that whereby
we are justified, let him be anathema.
Now that anathema, so a Roman Catholic apologist would say
anathema is not the same as condemnation to eternal fire.
It is excommunication from the one true Church.
So that caveat albeit considered, there is still
stronger words towards the D churching of those who hold
Protestant beliefs. Finally, Pope Pius the 12th
right before Vatican 2 says it is forbidden to any man to
change this, namely our declaration.
This is specifically dealing with the bodily assumption of
Mary. So this is a particular doctrine
in Roman Catholic dogma. It is forbidden to any man to
change this our declaration, pronouncement, and definition,
or by a rash attempt to oppose and counter it.
If any man should presume to make such an attempt to have a
different doctrine than the bodily assumption of Mary, let
him know that he will incur the wrath of Almighty God and of the
Blessed Apostles Peter and Paul. Now again, I am not invalidating
Roman Christianity. I'm merely trying to set the
terms of what's already been written in the discussion
between Roman Catholics and Protestants and try to show how
really, up until Vatican 2, the the the Roman Catholic instinct
and the the the Roman Catholic Church polity was not towards a
generosity of ecumenism. Contrast that with what we have
in our next slide in our gestures toward echumenism.
Look at what the 39 articles say in Article 19.
The visible Church of Christ is a congregation of faithful men
in which the pure Word of God is preached and the sacraments be
duly ministered according to Christ's ordinance and all those
things that of necessity are requisite to the same.
That's the that's the Protestant grammar for the church.
You can have a church wherever you have the gospel faithfully
preached and where the sacraments are faithfully
administered. So in theory, you can have a
church among the Roman Catholic communion.
Look what Martin Luther says. There is much that is Christian
and good under the papacy. In the papal church.
There are the true holy sacraments, true baptism, the
true sacrament of the altar, the true keys to the forgiveness of
sins, or Calvin's correspondence with Cardinal Sadaletto in 1539.
But what arrogance, you will say, to boast that the Church is
with you alone, and to to deny it to all the world Besides,
that's the point I'm trying to make today.
But then look at what he concedes.
I conceded along happily along with Kelvin.
We indeed so doletto deny. Not those.
Not that those over which you preside are churches of Christ.
So it seems that the Protestant theology of what is the Church
actually invites towards a greater ecumenism, regardless of
who the Apostolic figure is that established the Church where you
find it. So now I think it's my opinion
that the the Protestant moved towards that invisible unity of
the church was actually a good thing for the Roman Catholic
Church to express a more faithful ecclesiology.
Because look at what the look at the the the developments in
Roman Catholic doctrine that we get in Lumen Gentium and
Unitatis Reditegratio, namely the light to the Gentiles and
the reintegrated unity, light to the nations and reintrocuted
unity. These papal encyclicals that
came out of the Vatican 2 quote. The Church knows that she has
joined in many ways to the baptized, who are honored by the
name of Christian but have not preserved unity or communion
under the successor of Peter. Those who believe in Christ and
have been properly baptized are put in a certain, although
imperfect, communion with the Catholic Church.
This is a beautiful development in Roman Catholic theology where
we contrast it with 15th century Council of Trent.
I think this is an example of how Protestants and Catholics
can help each other towards a better ecumenism, a better
theology of a church, and what I'll show at my Third Point, a
better preaching of the gospel. This this this ties up our first
discussion on on the historic ecumenism being robustly
portrayed by Protestantism. The second heading now towards a
prophetic ecclesiology, namely does the head of the Church the
human representative of the Church?
Is there a function within the Church to call him to account
when he falls into apostasy? Let's see if the pre Vatican 2
Roman Catholic theology gives any avenues towards that kind of
semper reframanda. This is again Pastor Eternis
1870 from Vatican One. Therefore, faithfully adhering
to the tradition received from the beginning of the Christian
faith for the glory of God our Savior, the exaltation of the
Catholic religion and the salvation of Christian people.
The Sacred Council approving we teach and define that it is a
divinely revealed dogma that the Roman Pontiff, when he speaks ex
cathedra, that is, when in discharge of the office of
pastor and teacher of all Christians, by a virtue of his
supreme Apostolic authority, he defines A doctrine regarding
faith or morals to be held by the universal Church by the
divine assistance promised to him.
And Blessed Peter is possessed of that infallibility with which
the Divine Redeemer willed that his Church should be endowed for
defining doctrine regarding faith or morals, and that
therefore such definitions of the Roman Pontiff are
irreformable of themselves and not from the consent of the
Church. There is very little wiggle room
in here for a prophetic voice to come in and be able to speak a
message of repentance to the highest level of church
leadership. Quite frankly, I think that
poses a problem. Let's go to the next slide.
Let's see the biblical theology of prophetic history.
Think of Elijah, Jeremiah, and the prophets.
They opposed the kings who were in the line of David, to whom
God said, a your seed will remain on this throne in
perpetuity. So the line of David could say,
hey, look, I have been instituted.
There is Davidic succession. Who are you to oppose me?
Or how about the ironic priesthood in Jeremiah's day?
They could say, well look, I can trace my father's father's,
father's father's father's, father's father's father's with
Aaron, the first Levitical priest.
Jeremiah opposed that priesthood with the message of Yahweh.
Calvin, in his introduction to the Institute's in the letter to
the local monarch, he he appeals to this prophetic trend, this
prophetic theme running through the Old Testament, saying that
the Israelite church went into hiding in the days of Elijah,
but it was the true church. Because quote the Church may
exist without any apparent form, and moreover, that the form is
not ascertained by that external splendor which some foolishly
admire, but by a very different mark, namely, by the pure
preaching of the Word of God and the due administration, the
sacraments. Calvin appeals to Elijah being
fed by the Ravens and being given drink by from the brook as
and being told by God that there are 7000 who have not bowed
their knee to Baal to create his to create a biblical theology of
the Church when it has to be an exile outside of Jerusalem or
Rome or whatever Mother City was where the Church came from.
This Reformed ecclesiology gives us the agency to speak the
prophetic word of God to whoever is on the seat seat of ecclesial
power. Calvin also appeals to Jeremiah,
who opposed the Davidic kingship and the ironic priesthood when
they audaciously claimed that the law would not perish from
the priest. Priestly succession needs
prophetic critique in every age of the church.
Let's see what happens in the New Testament.
Jesus and John the Baptist do exactly the same prophetic
critique. John the Baptist, born in a
Levitical family, could have certainly been a priest in a
kind of way. He became a priest, baptizing
and offering and forgiveness of sins.
Right outside, right by the Dead Sea, right right at the Jordan
River, he was starting a counter priesthood that called out the
apostasy of the Levitical priesthood.
Caiaphas was a great, great, great, great, great, great
grandson of Levi, great, great, great, great grandson of Aaron.
And so Jesus and John the Baptist demonstrate this
prophetic ecclesiology that calls to repentance even the
head of the temple complex. Now, does this extend to the New
Testament era with Christ on the throne?
Do we not have a new era where there's no longer needed a
prophetic critique of the one to whom Jesus gives authority?
Now I'd like to argue, let's go to the third bullet point.
Here Paul introduces the possibility that apostasy can
enter right into the heart of the church.
So in the Antichrist, the man of lawlessness takes his seat in
the temple of God. Calling the church the temple is
directly drawing a line from Old Testament ecclesiology and the
grammar therein to New Testament ecclesiology and the prophetic
critique we need against leaders who might even sit in the center
of the temple of God proclaiming a truth that is contrary to the
gospel. Now we see an example of this,
not in a nefarious way, but in in simple human error.
We see this prophetic critique bearing itself out in the way
Paul opposes Peter. Now look at the name he uses for
Peter. Not when Peter came to Antioch.
Let me make sure I get this right.
When Cephas comes to Antioch, it might be when Peter came to
Antioch. But in that in that passage, Oh
my goodness, I left home without my Greek New Testament.
That's the world coming to OK Cephas is the rock that Jesus
says to whom Jesus gives the declaration about the keys of
the Kingdom. But even this rock is opposed
quote to his face when he stands condemned.
Paul's own words for compromising the gospel by his
hypocrisy, saying one thing in a certain setting and going
against that by not eating with Gentiles in another setting.
It's interesting Jerome and Augustin find different
strategies for understanding this tension even within the New
Testament. Witness Jerome says, well,
actually Paul and Peter were deliberately staging this
disagreement, and so they were staging it so that people can
have a greater truth even through their pretend
disagreement. Augustin on the other hand, and
I side with Augustin on this one, believed that Peter was
genuinely in the wrong and Paul corrected him.
And so the history of, of interpretation of these passages
shows how these apostles after Jesus rose and ascended to the
right hand of the Father. They had the capacity of writing
authoritatively, inspired by the Spirit, and these are the texts
and Scripture that are handed down to us.
But they also had the capacity for error.
And so there was a need for a prophetic critique, even among
the apostles themselves. Let's go to the next slide and
see how this prophetic ecclesiology emerges.
Remember the tension between Ephesus and Rome?
OK, that continued well into the 2nd century.
John's Gospel places Jesus's death on Nissan 14, the day
before Passover. Mark's Gospel places Jesus's
death on Nissan 15. The day of Passover.
Now critical scholars will say, ha, error in the Gospels.
You can't trust the whole thing. Actually, if you dive a little
bit deeper, you see that there was a Galilean Pharisaical
numbering of the moon when it when it first shone and when was
the first day of the month. And so by that Galilean
tradition, Jesus died on Nissan 15.
But in the Jerusalemite priesthood reckoning of time,
Nissan 15 started a day later. And so Jesus was crucified
according to the priestly reckoning on Nissan 14.
Same day, different reckonings, no contradiction.
Actually a more robust depiction of what Jesus accomplished,
being the Paschal lamb by being sacrificed on the day before the
Passover and being the one who brings us out of out of Egypt
through Exodus into the new creation, being crucified on
Nissan 15. This complementary and diverse
depiction of the cross of Christ had implications for how Easter
was celebrated in the East in Asia Minor.
John's disciples in Ephesus took up the practice of remembering
Jesus death on Nissan 14. But those from a Roman
Providence who probably had Mark's gospel as the Gospel they
read the most they took to celebrating Jesus death,
remembering his death on the Friday before Easter.
And this posed no small conflict during the days of John's own
student Polycarp, who lived a long time.
So he learned from John himself and then also taught well into
the mid 2nd century. He became the Bishop of Smyrna.
We mentioned him a few minutes ago.
He and Anaikatis, the Bishop of Rome at that time, had a
disagreement about when and how to celebrate Easter, based on
when Jesus was said to have been crucified.
They agreed to disagree on the date of Easter.
And look at these words, the very phrasing that Eusebius
preserves. Anikatas yielded to Polycarp,
obviously out of respect. So things were all, you know,
cleared up after then, right? Well, no.
Go to the next slide. Victor became Bishop of Rome
around 180 AD. He's a little bit more power
hungry of a Roman Bishop. He says, no, I don't like this.
They're not doing they think they're their own wing of the
church and they can practice Easter whenever they want to
know we're going to we're going to make only one practice of
when to celebrate Easter. So he he pressured them to
conform. Polycrates, Bishop of Ephesus.
Who traced his Apostolic lineage all the way back to John.
He writes a letter to Victor stating that he and all the
churches of Asia following John will continue to commemorate
Jesus's death. On this on 14.
Not afraid of threats, for it is better to obey God than man.
It's according from Acts when Peter and Paul, in this case it
was Peter. Acts chapter 5 is opposing the
Jerusalem priesthood, saying it's better to oppose God.
Sorry, it's better to obey. Amen.
It's better to obey God. It is better to obey God than
man. How does Pope Victor respond?
He attempts to excommunicate Polycrates and all the churches
of Asia Minor. But Irenaeus, whose name means
peacemaker, a native of Smyrna, student of Polycarp, A
missionary Bishop all the way in Lyon, modern day France, he led
a coalition of bishops to appeal to victor, to quote, rebuke him
sharply. By confronting the Bishop of
Rome and proving his error, Ironyus delayed the East West
schism by nearly 900 years. It was this prophetic
ecclesiology that kept the Church together.
And oh if it could have persisted in 1066 or 1054 when
the great Schism happened between East and West.
Let's continue. OK, it continues.
The plot thickens. We have a figure.
So Pope Liberius and Pope Felix the Second, who's actually in
Roman Catholic understanding is considered an anti Pope.
So Fast forward 200 years, we're in 355 AD.
After the Council of Nicaea, the Aryan sympathetic Emperor
Constantius the Second pressures Liberius, the true Bishop of
Rome, to issue a condemnation against our friend Athanasius,
the champion of Nicene Orthodoxy.
Liberius as a faithful Bishop who could trace his lineage back
to Peter. He refused, so Constantius
banished Liberius. Get out of here, you're no
longer in Rome, and installed Felix the Second as Pope.
Two years later, Liberius, under threat of death, agreed to sign
the condemnation against Athanasius, who had just begun
his third exile. This LED This was Liberius's
power play to get reinstalled back as the Bishop of Rome.
He did it for what might say good motives because he wanted
to exert good Nicene orthodoxy, but he did so by condemning
Athanasius. After Constantius's The Second
Death the Second's death, Liberius repented and rescinded
his condemnation against Athanasius.
So how does the Roman Catholic Church understand this
difficulty of the Bishop of Rome being exiled no longer in Rome
and another Pope coming in? Who's the true Pope?
They have a category known as the antipope for any figures
like Felix the Second. There are several antipops
throughout Roman Catholic history.
Now I think that is a legitimate interpret way to interpret the
history of these bishops of Rome, but it's basically
Protestant ecclesiology. Think about it.
The Bishop of Rome, the true heir of the Gospel, gets exiled
out of Rome, and so the Church goes with him out of Rome, and
then the church comes back and confronts Rome with the true
Gospel. That's just the Protestant
Church movement in an ancient form.
Let's go to the next slide and see another example of this.
Fast forward by another three or so centuries.
In the 7th century, the heresy of Monothelatism sprang up,
teaching that the Incarnate Son only had one will, rather than a
human will hypothetically united with a divine will.
So in 635, Pope Anorius the First came dangerously close to
endorsing Monothelatism by offering concessions to the
arguments of Sergius, the first Patriarch of Constantinople.
Now the he didn't technically endorse Monothelitism, but
perhaps out of generosity he he offered concessions to those who
were full on Monothelites. If so, remember from the Council
of Chalcedon, 451 AD, It's utterly important that Christ
has a divine nature and a human nature eternally without,
without without confusion, united in these two natures,
which means his divine nature has a divine will.
His human nature has a human will.
The two of those are united without, without with
distinction. But without?
Without. Blending they're united
eternally in his incarnation, so that way Christ can fully assume
human nature and fully redeem it into the Godhead.
It's really important that Christ in his Incarnate self has
two natures and two wills. So monotheletism actually is a
really important theological. Debate.
The 6th Ecumenical Council, Third Council of Constantinople
formally and mathematizes Pope Honorius the First quote, who
did not attempt to sanctify this Apostolic Church with the
teaching of Apostolic tradition, but by profane treachery
permitted its purity to be polluted.
Honorius the First is not considered an antipope.
He's a Pope in the line of the faithful who received the Gospel
from Peter. And yet he is.
Anathematized here. How do we handle that?
It seems that it's the prophetic ecclesiology that can even say
when a Pope missed that can even call the Bishop of Rome to
account when he does not sanctify the Apostolic Church
with the teachings. Of Apostolic tradition.
All right, let's go to the next slide.
OK. So so far we've had the
historic, historic ecumenism and we've had the.
Prophetic ecclesiology. Now third and finally, Gospel
clarity. I think this is actually the
strongest point that Protestants can make, our crystal clear
proclamation of the gospel of Jesus Christ.
Paul says it. I want you to I want to remind
you, brothers, of the gospel which I gospelized to you, which
you have received, and upon which you have taken your stand.
Through this gospel. You are saved if you hold firmly
to the word which I gospelized to you, otherwise you have
believed in vain. Let's see here then he says, For
I pass down to you that sacred Apostolic tradition passing down
as of first importance, what's the main thing, the most
important thing? If you forget everything else
that you hear in church, what's the most important thing to
remember? That the Messiah died for our
sins in accordance with the Scriptures, that he was buried
and that he was raised on the third day in accordance with the
Scriptures. He's the Messiah.
He died for our sins. He was buried and raised on the
third day in accordance with the Scriptures.
This fourfold Apostolic proclamation, the Greek word for
it is karigma, is the gospel that unites Paul with Peter with
John with James with Matthew, Mark, Luke and John.
This Apostolic gospel, you see it in First Corinthians 15, Acts
chapter 10 when Peter's preaching to Cornelius,
Ephesians chapter 1 when Paul is writing the Super run on
sentence in Greek. This Apostolic gospel is what
unites the entire New Testament Canon.
It is of first importance. Scholar recently has made
written this incredible book that shows how Matthew, Mark,
Luke and John as the four gospels.
Apostolic gospels are differentiated from the 80 other
apocryphal gospels because none of those eighty other gospels
preach this Apostolic charisma. Only Matthew, Mark, Luke and
John do. And so this is of first
importance. Now let's see how this gospel
clarity emerges in the divergent traditions.
Of Christianity. Let's do the next slide.
You see, every church tradition engages in the development of
doctrine. I kind of.
That's why I mentioned some of the the the frequently mentioned
later. Roman Catholic dogmas that
Protestant apologists like to point out 1870 is a relatively
late dogma, and so the the Petrine supremacy and papal
infallibility. Is a later thing 1870.
Now it's not just Roman Catholics who have development
of doctrine, Protestants too as well.
And so that same criticism might be levelled against some of our
distinct Roman Protestant doctrines.
And even the consensual Nicene Constantinopolitan and
Calcedonian traditions are similarly developments of the of
doctrine. Where do you see the word Co
substantial in the New Testament?
You don't find it. Where do you see the word
Trinity in the New Testament? You don't find it.
Where do you find the word hypostatic union?
You don't find it in the New Testament.
But any of us who recite the Nicene Creed every Sunday would
say these are genuinely in the text of Scripture.
It just took time to draw it out and for the seed to bear fruit
and the tree to grow. And so we have Nicene
Constantinopolitan Christianity. Which brings me to my question
regarding Gospel clarity. Which post Nicene traditions
show greater Gospel clarity in their further development of
doctrine? Let's see how the Orthodox,
Roman Catholic and Protestant traditions develop their
doctrines. Purgatory indulgences.
Never a dogma, but very commonly practiced before Trent,
Immaculate Conception of Mary, Petra and supremacy, Papal
infallibility, bodily assumption of Mary.
A good OP Dominican conservative Catholic theologian could make a
case that you see the Gospel somehow preserved, protected, or
embodied in these Roman Catholic dogmas.
OK, but with what clarity? Compare that to the
substitutionary atonement of Christ, the imputation of the
resurrected Christ's righteousness on us sinners, the
sole intercession of the ascended Christ on our behalf.
These doctrines go right to the heart of the gospel so that you
can know that Christ died. Christ died for your sins
according to the scriptures, and through him you can have the
confidence to face God on judgment day.
Not through the mediation of Saints and angels or the Blessed
Virgin Mary herself. It is through the sole work of
Christ. I don't have time to discuss to
discuss Greek Orthodox dogma. It's just interesting as a
parallel to notice how the dogma that develops in a Greek
Orthodox context has other implications regarding the
Gospel and regarding church practice.
For this, for the purposes today, I'm just comparing and
contrasting Protestant development of doctrine versus
Roman Catholic development of doctrine.
Let's continue. This comes to bear on our
liturgy, the implicit curriculum, the thing that you
say every single Sunday that shapes who you are.
Look at the difference between our Eucharistic prayers.
Now, I'm borrowing here from the Anglican standard text.
We use the revised ancient version, revised ancient text
for our Eucharistic liturgy, but the Anglican standard text is
also there in our Book of Common Prayer.
We earnestly desire your fatherly goodness mercifully to
accept this, our sacrifice of praise and Thanksgiving, asking
you to grant that by the merits and death of your Son Jesus
Christ, and through faith in His blood, we and your whole church
may obtain forgiveness of our sins and all of the benefits of
His Passion. And although we are unworthy
because of our many sins, to offer you any sacrifice, yet we
ask you to accept this duty and service we owe, not weighing our
merits, but pardoning offenses through Jesus Christ our Lord,
and of course, our prayer of humble access.
We do not presume to come to this Your table, O merciful
Lord, trusting in our own righteousness, but in your
abundant and great mercies. Let's contrast that with the
Roman Catholic Eucharistic Prayer in communion with those
whose memory we venerate, especially the glorious ever
Virgin Mary, Mother of our God and Lord Jesus Christ, and
Blessed Joseph her Spouse and all your Saints.
We ask that through their merits and prayers in all things we may
be defended by your protecting help through Jesus Christ our
Lord. Amen.
Have mercy on us all. We pray that with the Blessed
Virgin Mary, Mother of God, with Blessed Joseph her Spouse, with
the Blessed Apostles and all the Saints who have pleased you
throughout the ages, we may merit to be coheirs to eternal
life and may praise and glorify you through your Son Jesus
Christ. OK, again, if we had AOP,
Dominican conservative Catholic theologian would probably be
able to make a really strong case for how merit here does not
equal workspace righteousness, how merit here is actually a
transformation of the soul into the likeness of God, etcetera,
etcetera, etcetera. But what is more abundantly
clear, pointing to the grace of Jesus Christ for wretched
sinners like you and me. This is the glory of our
Protestant tradition, that it goes back to the Apostolic
Gospel. It proclaims it with utmost
clarity and it preserves it from generation to generation.
I don't have time to share about my own family's experience, but.
Suffice it to say. That coming from a N northern
Mexican Roman Catholic quasi folk religious context, being
confronted by Baptist missionaries 120 years ago with
this gospel of grace was transformative to my whole
family and I'm still experiencing its effects today.
And so I offer to you this Gospel clarity in our Protestant
tradition, together with our prophetic ecclesiology and our
historic acumenism, as hopefully a compelling case to remain.
Protestant, thank you. Oh.
Sorry. OK, lest I have the last word,
let me give John Kelvin, my homeboy, the last word he says.
When we see that the whole sum of our salvation and every
single part of it are comprehended in Christ, we must
be aware of deriving even the minutest portion of it from any
other quarter. If we seek salvation, we are
taught by the very name of Jesus.
The Lord saves that He possesses it.
If we seek any other gifts of the Spirit, we shall find them
in His unction. Strengthen His government,
purity in His conception, indulgence in His nativity, in
which He was made like us in all respects, in order that we might
learn that He might learn to sympathize with us.
If we seek redemption, we shall find it in His passion,
acquittal in His condemnation, remission of the curse in His
cross, satisfaction in His sacrifice, purification in His
blood. Keep going.
Reconciliation in his descent to hell.
Mortification of the flesh and His sepulchre.
Newness of life in his resurrection.
Immortality also in his resurrection.
The inheritance of a celestial Kingdom in his entrance into
Heaven. Protection, security, and the
abundant supply of all blessings in His Kingdom.
Secure anticipation of judgement in the power of judging
committed to Him. That is Christ.
Finally, since in Him all kinds of blessings are treasured up,
let us draw a full supply from Him and from none other quarter.
Those who, not satisfied with Him alone, entertain various
hopes from others, though they may continue to look to Him,
chiefly deviate from the right path, because some portion of
their thought takes a different direction.
Thank you very much. All right.
We have some time for Q&A. Go ahead in the front.
So 1 of my largest largest blockades for is.
Sorry for. Me being critical.
Of yeah, go ahead. Why?
Why would I want to associate with someone who removed?
Seven books from the Canon. Yes, Canon question.
So our so you can. So I commend to you 2 lectures
of the past two weeks. We did the Old Testament Canon
and the New Testament Canon. Short summary of both of those
lectures. When you see the Canon of the
Hebrew Bible, when you see the Canon of Athanasius, so of
origin of Athanasius, of Jerome, of John of Damascus, you see
common overlap that the core of each of those like the the and
the list doesn't include the Apocrypha.
There was a, there was this very thoroughgoing patristic teaching
that there are 22 letters of the Hebrew Bible and therefore only
22 books of the Old Testament. And that that is essential.
That is our Protestant Canon. Those 22 books include the the
12 books of the minor prophets as one book, Lamentations
together with Jeremiah, Ezra and Nehemiah together.
But it's 22 summarizing the entire language of God for the
Old Testament, just as there are 22 letters in the Hebrew
alphabet. Jerome, John Damascus,
Athanasius origin, Josephus the the the Jewish historian all
appeal to that argument for the closeness of the Old Testament
Canon at 22 books. It was later Christians who well
Christians along the same time as Athanasius, Jerome and
Augustine who said we have these other books, what do we do with
them? I think that the Anglican
approach to it is the most faithful that that really
follows the partistic tradition that says.
We have 22 books of the Old Testament when they're numbered
in that way as our authoritative scriptures, and then we have
these seven other books that are helpful for our instruction.
And so we commend them even for public reading.
And the Anglican seminary where I teach, we read from the
Apocrypha as part of our daily office.
We commend them for teaching of morals and instruction, but not
for any formulation of doctrine. And I think that just only that
faithfully anchors ourselves in what Athanasius?
Jerome, Shana. Damascus all the way back to
origin and back to the early church.
Early centuries of the church would say that's a good question
though. Go ahead, Sarah.
So. I have a question on the last.
Part. Looking at the clarity of the
gospel because when it comes to Catholicism and like praying to
Saints and everything, a lot of the way that we Protestant see
it is from Catholics to. Misunderstand.
Yes, yes, yes, Doctrine. And we also.
I also have a lot of examples of current.
Protestants. Oh yes, they abound that.
Then take like. Salvation by faith too far.
Yep, Yep, Yep, actually there's. No conformity to the acts of
right. And so despite the gospel
clarity, like, it's still perverted.
So Yep. Yep.
My question is like, how would you respond to the Catholic
doctrine? Yes, absolutely.
If I had another hour, I would just enumerate all the ways that
historic Roman Catholic theologians have challenged us
Protestants in ways where we have lost the Gospel.
And so, so I, I think the ecumenical dialogue towards
Gospel clarity should go both ways, certainly.
And I mean, to use an extreme example for within a, I'll have
to call it a broadly Protestant context, but look at the
prosperity gospel that is proliferating, especially in
sub-Saharan Africa. They take the name of.
Jesus and the power that is in it and ascribe to it a kind of
talismanic force that they can use to bless people for all the
prosperity and all their own acquisition of wealth as corrupt
pastors. It's all across the continent of
Africa. I spent five years of my life
teaching true doctrine and promoting the gospel because of
these Protestant errors. So I think the critique should
go both ways and each of our traditions should appreciate
where we marred the gospel and and blur its clarity.
So I think that's a really appropriate comment.
Yes, Renee, go ahead. So.
A couple of. Things.
Yes please having. Left the Catholic tradition
relatively. Recently.
Yeah, there is in the United States a great hostility because
Protestants are deeply untouched to.
Catholics in a lot of ways. The Catholic Churches are
desecrated on a regular. Basis.
And that's something that you understand if you're going to
disagree with someone. I think if you don't really
understand things, you will lose your integrity.
Very, very quickly. Absolutely the concept.
Of papal supremacy does not just come from one person's concept,
it was actually a parallel to Isaiah 20. 2 whereby?
A king gave the keys to the Kingdom to a servant and said,
I'm giving you the keys and my authority.
As the king. To run this, this, this Kingdom
on my behalf. And whatever you say will be
interpreted as I have said. It will have all of my
authority. And they look at the parallel
when Jesus said, I now named you Peter for the rock, and upon
this rock I will give my church. And then the cakes of thou shall
not prevail against it. And I am giving you the keys.
And a Jew would have looked at those parallels and said, Oh, of
course. And Paul went to see Peter
before he began his ministries. That's actually where it comes
from. The other things I don't agree.
With, yeah, I think it's. Really important.
If you're going to. Disagree with?
People. Yeah, to.
Really, really understand. Absolutely.
So we. The Catholic Church doesn't look
at merit as we have earned it is we have been transformed by.
Christ. And as such will perform good
things. Yeah, and they look at Saints
not like I need them to go to Christ.
Yep. But these are people who have
done great things and now have a relationship with Christ.
The wedding it came. Up.
Yep. Yep.
Mm. Hmm.
Absolutely. Yep.
And who went to Christ? Yep, said.
Just. That yes.
I I get very nervous. Mm hmm.
In these. Situations.
Yep, Yep, yes, and I. Said there are and then my other
question is how do I respond because I still have many, many
friends who are. Catholic about.
Things that were done post Vatican.
Yeah, yeah, yeah. I mean.
Kelis is a lot older, so they did things like theology of the
body. It's like, OK, we're going.
To develop Protestant theology of the body.
And how do I respond to people who say Anglicans are just
taking the the keys to the Catholic bus and trying to
drive? It off.
And that's, I have, I have heard that many times when people who
find out when I went from being a Catholic to an Anglican,
they're copying what we did, but then just taking out what they
don't. Want.
Yeah, both have faceted question.
Thank you so much. Let me just rapid fire.
Rapid fire is the worst analogy. Basically, I want to, I want to
affirm like several things right off the bat that I think the
whole group here should hear if the, the concept or the, the
errors or the, the harm that's caused by desecrating Roman
Catholic churches. Absolutely we need to cut that
out. The misunderstanding and the
disrespect that Protestants give to Roman Catholics.
Absolutely we need to do better. That's not that's not becoming
of our identity as brothers and sisters in Christ.
The properly representing Catholic arguments for their
doctrines. Absolutely we need to do that.
So I'm glad that you bring up Isaiah 22 pointing to Hezekiah,
giving Eliakim the the his representative the keys of the
Kingdom. There is there are good biblical
theological hermeneutics that run through from the Old
Testament passage of the keys of the Kingdom all the way to
Peter. I, I would so so I appreciate
that Roman, that biblical theology hermeneutic that Roman
Catholics are using for pad trance supremacy.
I only ask that they nuance it with the other things of Peter's
career that we see in the New Testament and the whole and the
history that I've outlined of ecumenical dialogue.
So absolutely yes, things that I'm affirming that you've said
and also ways in which we can, I can hopefully make a case like I
did while still extending the right hand of fellowship to
Roman Catholics. Question your question about are
we just sort of stealing all the goods of Roman Catholicism and
running the bus off I. Of course my answer is no, we're
not doing that. And the reason why is I whatever
tradition we find truth from, that reminds us and anchors us
back in the Apostolic Gospel, we should thank God for those
fontes, for those sources wherever we find them.
And even Calvin will quote from Thomas Aquinas and Bernardo
Clairvaux, just as he would quote from the Eastern Orthodox
Fathers. And yeah, even as he was
influenced by probably some rabbinic sources as well in his
day. So we need to acknowledge where
we get our theology from, not only kind of paying lip service,
but genuine gratitude for those sectors of the Church that with
with with which our polities don't have communion.
But with but to whom we are. Deeply indebted because of what
they have taught us by passing, passing down to us the Apostolic
faith. I think that that Oh yeah.
Then then regarding merits, Mary and the Saints, again, a
conservative Catholic description of these concepts, I
think does get to a point of saying how they relate to the
Gospel. But coming from a personal
experience of Mexican American Roman Catholicism, I can
definitely, I, I can very clearly see how just as in a, in
a sub-saharan African context with the prosperity gospels
leading others astray. I have seen and have continued
to see how reliance on other mediators, even like how your
typical folk Catholic Mexican is not going to know the
understanding of merit and the understanding of intercession.
And so they're going to them for salvation.
And so that's why I, I, I, I advocate the clarity that's
given in the Protestant tradition.
Go ahead up front, I wonder. If you could.
That Peter was indeed. The founder of the church in
Rome and that this isn't a later claim made by the leaders of
Rome that tried to take his authority for their own church.
Like why do we believe? That that Why do we believe that
Peter founded the church in Rome?
Yeah, well. Like what are what is, what is
the evidence? That Peter was actually.
Yeah. So if we just have the New
Testament, it. Someone could correct me if I'm
wrong, but it looks like Paul got there first in Acts 27 and
28. However, if we look at Irenaeus
in that quote that I brought up against Heresies chapter 3,
Section 3, he said yeah, the blessed apostles.
Then, having founded and built up the church, committed into
the hands of Linus. The office of the Episcopate and
then it mentions in section book three, section one that.
Peter and Paul were. Preaching at Rome and laying the
foundations of the church. So it's a Petrine and Pauline
collaboration that founds the church, which is why we have
basilica's to both in, in, in Rome, and which is why in one of
the Anathema's the, the, the Pope of that time said they they
would experience the wrath of God and Peter and Paul, they're
appealing to Pauline and Petrine origins for, for, for the Church
of Rome, But then interpreting Matthew 16, specifically saying
Peter would be that head. I disagree with with some of
that exegesis, but that's at least the argument that they
would make. Yeah, go ahead.
To what extent would you say that like a rise in literacy
explains sort of the timing of the Protestant schism?
Like the Roman. Catholic Church and like
printing press. And like 13. 50 and that sort of
thing, the Bible like. Yeah, yeah.
Just that, like, you know, as with any sort of human
institution. Yeah.
A lack of kind of oversight or, you know, many, many viewers
sort of distraction, the ability to sort of sort truth from, you
know, do you do you think like literacy was part of that?
Well, I mean, just see how Twitter can tear a church apart.
I think these. Technologies are like fuel to a
fire. They, they, they accelerate the,
the, the trends that are already there.
They were political dynamics, there were social, there were,
you know, the dynamics of plague and famine and war all and and
in addition to that, the increased levels of technology
that we have in the 15th century.
All of that, I think was contributing to it was
accelerating these dynamics that we saw in the 2nd century, that
we saw in the 7th century and that we saw in the 11th century
with the great schism. These these tensions over how
does the church stay united existed in out in every
generation. But the in the case of free
Reformation Europe, it would seem that the papacy, if there
was ever a papacy that was straying from the Gospel, it
would be that era which would lead to those dynamics, those
prophetic dynamics already present in the church, coming to
their full fruition towards eventual schism, even though the
original reformers did not want a schism.
So Alfred in the back. So I want to make sure I'm
understanding what the talk is and isn't.
Yes, so. The.
First one understand it. Explaining and saying is why
you're not. Yes, uh huh.
Absolutely is you. Don't seem.
To address the Orthodox question.
It seems to me from from listening that there is 2
reasons appeared to me. There were two reasons you were
a new author. Yeah, the.
Humanism of the Protestant Church and the sort of fidelity
to the the the true box. And I think.
Some anonymous in May for different of traditions and you
can go on to use those two. Pillars.
So just clarifying that you aren't actually addressing why
you aren't. Next summer, bring me back.
Yeah, it IA short answer would be it.
So I have used many Eastern Orthodox arguments today,
especially for the, especially for the accumulate, the historic
accumenism, and also a little bit of the prophetic
ecclesiology. A short answer would be it's
the. 3rd. Point the Gospel clarity.
If we had more time, we'd unpack how I still believe the the
Protestant exposition of the Gospel is still the clearest
when it's properly preached and why I'm sorry.
In my personal opinion, when you see Roman Catholic or Easter
Orthodox evangelizing, well, I think we Protestants have helped
them remember how to do that. Let's go to the side here,
Andrew. Yep, Yep.
Yeah. So how do we speak of the
continuity of doctrine and the unity across the body because of
one head? Yes, that is a that is a a real
draw to many, many a millennial or Gen.
Z Protestant. Well, as I think it's Brad
Lillijohn and Chris Casaldo have put it, if you go to Rome, for
the sake of clarity of doctrine, you have 66 books of the Canon
and more actually, and you have over 600 papal encyclicals and
church documents that you also have to sort through.
It's actually making things more complex as well.
It just so Protestants do that as well with our confessions of
faith. But if we make the argument that
Protestants have made things too complex and have invited
disagreements, we should also recognize that the number of
papal encyclicals and the church documents in the Roman Catholic
Church, including retractions, that we see in developments.
And I would, as a Protestant, argue contradictions between
Trent's and Vatican 2. We have just as much difficulty
squaring our circles and looking for clarity with regard to the
the one head of the Church. I think we can, we can and
should point to Protestant examples of, I can call it
unprecedented ecumenism. Look at the Lausanne Congress of
1974 convened by John Stott and Billy Graham and the, the, the,
the, the thousands of representatives from every
continent. So Lausanne, 1974, Lausanne,
that was in Switzerland, 1989 in Manila, 2010 in Cape Town, last
year in Seoul, Korea. These are ecumenical conferences
that bring together a wide diversity of Protestant
denominations. United and making common
commitments to the preaching of the.
Gospel look at the Anglican Communion that is represented on
every consonant in the world that arguably.
If you just. Look at a picture of the Gaff
Con conference in 2018. Jerusalem and the sea of faces
where no no one's skin color next to another is the same.
It's beautiful to see. Global ecumenism, I think is
beautifully practiced by specific bodies of Protestantism
to this very day. And that is another reason why
I'm glad to be part of the Anglican Communion and adjacent
to movements like the Lausanne movement.
That's a good question. The very back.
Yeah, I've been. Back into my face for a few
years now, been volunteering and visiting churches that across
the DNB. Yeah, people like me are.
Asking how? Yeah, I'm.
Trying to educate myself on. Yeah, yeah, yeah.
Feels like. Homelessness.
Or. Is my sole Yeah.
To eventually subscribe to something.
Yeah. Yeah.
Well, I would say what I would say.
So I served as a missionary in Ethiopia, based there in seven
years. And so I worked with Ethiopian
Orthodox and with Protestants of a variety of traditions and
Muslim background believers. And so there are many people in
each of those circles who had experiences of ecclesial
homelessness. And my encouragement to those
folks were find a church where the gospel is faithfully
preached and put yourself under their authority and stick with
them through thick and thin. That will be the, the, the best
for your spiritual growth and it would it will be the best for
your ministry within that church.
There is a practical, practical utility to, to having a
doctrinal statement of faith that we agree on so that we can
do practical ministry together. Even if we, even if we join
sides with other churches in evangelistic campaigns.
There's a practical, A pragmatic aspect to having a statement of
faith that defines who we are as a family, such that we can
disciple well. Yeah, so nice.
And creed, I would say go a little bit more defined than
that with a specific church so that you can be under the
authority of a, of a priest or a pastor who has taken vows before
God in the church to shepherd you in the faith, to correct you
when you stray, to preach the gospel of forgiveness for your
sins. We can't just hop from church to
church thinking that we're going to receive those those goods by
osmosis. It's good to be in a family.
It's good to be under authority. Yeah.
Someone had a hand up for a long time, Justin, in the very back.
So you. Sort of made a couple different
references and talked a little bit about for church,
particularly the exile, the church.
That's sort of true. Churches.
Exile comes. Back.
Yeah. When?
You think about sort of the churches split, split up, sort
of the big term, not the next 20 years.
Yeah. Hundred 500 How do?
You want to. Think about that.
Yeah. Do you see it more?
Do you see the churches or theology of the church more?
That eventually we want to come back together, right?
That there's things that can be rectified, pull back together.
Yeah. Or is it more of a historical
sort of like Asia Minor has a particular version of it and we
sort of work together and we try?
To clarify things about. The gospel, yeah, which is just.
An exile or more? Really, really good question.
I'm not going to try to wig a lot of this one by saying time's
up, but I will get to that question.
And I think that actually might be a good final question to
answer. It'll be 3:00 PM at that point.
Good time to end. OK, so we did Wentz.
Now let's do wither. Where are we headed as the
church, as the global church that is fractured by schism, by
division. There's a, there's, there are
two, two realities that exist at the same time and are already
not yet. Christ's resurrected body is
united in the heavenly realms. There's not a piece of him over
there, a piece of him over there.
He is resurrected in his in his fullness, representing humanity
at the right hand of God. And all of our prayer, all of
our intercession, all of our Eucharistic devotion is because
Christ is one in the heavenly realms.
The other reality is that his church is divided on earth.
And so we have this paradox that Christ is simultaneously united
in the heavenly realms, but divided among his people on
earth. Now that question is is
perplexing has perplexed theologians since even before
the Reformation. But I.
Think we need to lean into the? Lean into the the hope of the
eschaton that the church will be won at the last day and whatever
we can do this side of eternity to to preach the true Christ and
to work to the unity of his body.
I think we need to do both of those things all the time.
It will look different ways in different circumstances.
So for example, the East Ethiopian Orthodox Church in the
Horn of Africa did not have Christians or did not make
converts of African traditional religion up until the 20th
century in the southern bit of Ethiopia.
So when Protestant missionaries in 1895 went to the emperor and
said, hey, we have the gospel, we've brought all of our goods
in our coffins because we're going to die here in Ethiopia
preaching the gospel. Where should we go?
The emperor said, well, we're already Orthodox N but we're
Muslim east and we're Pagan South, so go, go South and east.
And so you have this amazing 80. Year.
Movement of Protestant Christianity in southern
Ethiopia. Now there are some among those
Protestants who want to go north and say all y'all Ethiopian
Orthodox have to have to become Protestants.
I actually disagree with that. I would say I would, I would, I
would follow a different trend, which is in the north of
Ethiopia and their seminaries. They're rediscovering the
Scriptures and there's a little bit of a reformation happening
even within the Ethiopian Orthodox Church.
That to me is pointing towards greater Gospel clarity at the
same time as this ever, ever approaching union of different
ecclesial bodies, even if it doesn't happen in our lifetime.
It is that latter ecclesiology that also has Gospel clarity
that I am committing my life to. Which is, and this is exactly
why I'm not anathematizing any Roman Catholics or Eastern
Orthodox. And it is why I have this, this,
this rugged, indefatigable hope that the Church will one day be
won. And the way for me most
faithfully to live towards that is to preach the Gospel in all
of its clarity. Be grateful for all of my
teachers, whatever sector of the Church they come from, and to
encourage those from other church bodies towards that same
clarity as we all grow in the likeness of Christ.
So thanks, Justin.