Help! I'm a heretic!

"The overarching connection in all of these crises has to do with the great Western heresy – that we can be saved as individuals, that any of use alone can be in right relationship with God. It’s caricatured in some quarters by insisting that salvation depends on reciting a specific verbal formula about Jesus. That individualist focus is a form of idolatry, for it puts me and my words in the place that only God can occupy, at the center of existence, as the ground of all being. That heresy is one reason for the theme of this Convention".

                           Katherine Jefferts-Schori, Presiding Bishop of The Episcopal Church (from her opening remarks at the 76th General Convention of TEC)

The Faith once given is not a matter of individual vs community redemption. It's both/and! Surely if this heresy of individualism is as she describes, her own part of the church is among its greatest exponents?

As for me, I'll continue to try, in my often faltering way, to declare "Jesus is Lord!", along with that vast cloud of witnesses who have gone before me.

With nine years until the next Lambeth Conference (and hence they face very little in the way of discipline and they have three General Conventions during which they can act with virtual impunity to change both their liturgy and doctrine), we can expect the leadership of TEC to reveal their true colours over the next few days.

Comments

[ryan]

Given's FODA's opposition to women bishops, I doubt there's anything +Katherine could say that could meet with their approval. Wouldn't overt orthodoxy merely make the "problem" of female ordination worse?

>>>salvation depends on reciting a specific verbal formula about Jesus.

If this is the evangelical position, then why do they justify homophobia on the grounds that (as Romans allegedly says) gay Christians won't inherit the Kingdom of God? Given said beliefs are usually coupled with a primitive faith in Hellfire, then outsiders could be forgiven for thinking that, although *initial* salvation may result from reciting a formula about Jesus, the "real" kind is a "faith without works is dead" combination of belief and Christlike behaviour (and the latter is necessarily social). Or what else is meant by the "it's a salvation issue!" rhetoric beloved of FOCA types?

>>> TEC to reveal their true colours over the next few days.

Looking forward to it! Not least because the cant, lies and bigory that constitute the "true colours" of Akinola's "Christianity" have long been revealed, presenting something of a problem for those who believe that ,War on Terror style, there are only two options in this debate and one must pick a side. Hopefully most evangelicals will use the WWJD? approach ;-).

[Tim]

Hmmm, slightly strange wording all round, there.

Given the choice I'd go for a far wider understanding of salvation - God's reconciling work - but individual as part of community, community as part of species, species as one of many on the earth, the earth as one planet in the universe-load thereof. (*Please* can we have a viable theology of cosmology, not just mere sociology? Thanks...)

And of course, I don't think +KJS' approach in any way prevents her declaring "Jesus is Lord!" if she wanted to, either. (I'd expect you've read Spong; even he claims in so few words to be able to say that.)

I'm much more inclined to disagree with your (use of the) phrase "faith once given" though. Historically, Christianity is in no way any such thing - it's a system evolved and argued (with more than enough violence, which proves nothing about any underlying truths) in which important doctrinal issues were being decided over the course of 3+ centuries (and the arguing continues today).
If it really were "once given" then you'd expect Jesus to have sat down and said "right folks, this is your new religion, off you go", but we have no record of any such saying. Certainly if there is a faith that goes back to the author, it should be *what Jesus preached* not some meta-gospel model that only came into being around the Reformation. And that is pretty much a minimalist "repent, for the Kingdom of God is at hand".

Ah well. Thanks for the space to let off steam. I've had these ideas going round my head for a while. ;)

[Kenny Macaulay]

But we knew this GV, about your being a heretic! It's why we love you!

[Joshua Bovis]

Don't worry GV - I am a heretic too! I am just glad they don't burn them at the stake anymore!
Joshua

[Andrew T]

I wait with great anticipation for more pronouncements from Ms Jefferts-Schori. Please can you keep us up to date with developments from this gathering, GV!

[Jimmy]

Every great lie is cemented together using the mortar of truth.
These opening remarks are an example of this.

Everything Christ went through was for one person...me.

[ryan]

>>Ms Jefferts-Schori.

ooh, refusing to call her +Katharine in the same way that allegedly non-homophobic evangelicals (!) call +Gene "Vicky"? Said cheap misogyny (does "Ms" mean that her doctorate isn't considered valid either?) is not much of an argument for the conservative cause. Although it is - from an inclusive Church perspective - usefully revealing.

[Andrew T]

Ryan,

One feels that you are in the territory of simply having cheap shots at me, otherwise I think that you would have observed from previous posts from myself that I am not in the custom of addressing/referring to people by ecclesiastical titles, preferring to address/refer by ordinary standards of courtesy, (Ms being the default setting for ladies these days). This must be owing to my presbyterian upbringing coupled with my growing congregationalist tendencies! If I should be referring to Ms Jefferts-Schori as "Dr", then I of course stand corrected. You can let me know and I shall do so in future posts on this strand.
Did you get anything nice for your birthday by the way?

[ryan]

Mea Culpa Andrew, although a quick look at the likes of Anglican Downstream will show that it is very common for conservatives to refuse to give the correct titles to those they disagree with. Whereas I don't think I've ever referred to e.g. "+" Peter Akinola. Apologies.
Got some (pink and camp!) birthday cards from evangelicals, thanks, thus proving that they're not all bad ;-). And various cricket-related goodies (strikes me that the "is it cowardly to pray for rain?" question, that often comes up when following England v Australia, could make a good sermon!). See that it was Calvin's 500th Birthday on Friday.

[Fr Dougal]

Strictly speaking, I'm sure each and every one of us is a heretic - my memories of Honours Patristics at Aberdeen suggested there was virtually no one who in some way didn't contravene post-Nicene Christological orthodoxy 3 times before breakfast! But it is a fair point to recognise that there is a corporate dimension to the proclaimation of saving faith, as well as a purely personal one. ++KJS may swing somewhat to the liberal side, but that doesn't totally invalidate the critique. The classic argument from St Cyprian (an African Bishop) was that there was no salvation outside the Church and that was defined by the communion of bishops and dioceses in alignment with the focal see and font of Orthodoxy for that Communion. In his case Rome (pre the Great Schism of 1045). For us in the Anglican Communion, surely that focal see is Canterbury and we define our membership of it by Communion with the See which happens to be currently occupied by Rowan Williams. I fail to see how you can claim to be Anglican and not recognise the Archbishop of Canterbury as Primus inter Pares.

[Paul]

Hi bloke,

This article is worth checking out on the subject:

http://heidelblog.wordpress.com/2009/07/15/the-presiding-bishops-over-realized-eschatology/

[(punditry, Warney!) ryan]

Hey Paul!

Hmm, not sure if said blog's combination of comical proof texting, clumsy fundamentalism and reactionary nonsense is a spoof or not. Very funny if so. I especially liked :

http://heidelblog.wordpress.com/2008/11/26/how-to-react-to-homosexuals-in-the-congregation/

[Tom Brisson, St. Paul's Anglican Church, California]

For every bishop with her opinion, I have a hundred saints and martyrs who think the opposite.