ABC on Lourdes

The Archbishop of Canterbury is under fire for going to Lourdes, preaching at Lourdes, and in general for being a “papal puppet.” Jeremy Brooks, of the Protestant Truth Society levels his criticism:

Lourdes represents everything about Roman Catholicism that the Protestant Reformation rejected, including apparitions, Mariolatry and the veneration of saints.

The archbishop’s simple presence there is a wholesale compromise, and his sermon — which included a reference to Mary as ‘the mother of God’ — is a complete denial of Protestant orthodoxy.

I’m sure it will come as a revelation, but anybody can claim “orthodoxy,” not just conservative Catholics.

At a time when our country is crying out for clear biblical leadership, it is nothing short of tragic that our supposedly Protestant archbishop is behaving as little more than a papal puppet.

Good thing Rowan Williams doesn’t post on the blogosphere. It could be worse. File another under “Believers Behaving Badly.”

 

Hryniewicz Abstract

Brian linked the abstract from the controversial paper by Polish theologian Waclaw Hryniewicz. I’d prefer to take a look at the whole thing, but I think what this summary reveals does not show the CDF in any more of a positive light.

First, the author frames his piece as a commentary on the particular document, not the body of Church teaching on churches, communities, and other related groups.

This article comments on the recent document of the Congregation for the Doctrine of the Faith regarding certain aspects of the doctrine on the Church  (29 June 2007), which as an official statement of the Vatican has received a lot of attention from Catholic and non-Catholic theologians.

Additionally, the commentary is said to focus on one narrow aspect, namely a lensing of the statement through a “very specific” ecumenical and Biblical perspective:

He highlights the essential, biblical connection between the concept of truth and the notion of Christian hope. In his view, hope is related to eschatology, through which all doctrinal statements will ultimately be tested. The author stresses the particular character of truth approached from a Biblical perspective. This unique character denotes its openness and its direct relationship with eschatology. A positive, inclusive understanding of the truth is applied to ecclesiology.  In the light of this crucial connection between the Biblical concept of truth and Christian hope, the author reviews the significance of the recent document issued by the Vatican.

The conclusion, supposedly:

The author concludes by  re-affirming the value of Christian ecclesiological (denominational) diversity, which can be compared to different ‘paths’ which have been leading Christians towards God through the centuries.

The author seems careful to confine the speculation to the realm of theology, criticizing the “theological” quarrel. That is far more restrictive than the entire picture, which would include Christian religious cultures, politics, eschatology, and other aspects of Christian disunity.

Therefore, the theological quarrel about ‘the best way’ to God is pointless as the author states that Christian theology should be aware that God’s abundance in grace cannot be comprehended by theological models or channelled by just one form of Christianity. As noted by the author, God, like ‘an excellent musician uses many instruments in order to bring salvation to his people’ and this intuition of Clement of Alexandria is still a valuable signpost to all Christians.

An abstract isn’t the best place to assess whether St Clement’s metaphor is apt here.

What I glean from this summary is that the author appeals to the virtue of hope to accompany the principle of truth. That would be an interesting argument, if I read between the lines of what’s linked. I suppose it begs the question if curial documents can be questioned, criticized, or finessed. Hryniewicz concedes his approach is not intended to cover the whole spectrum of theology that touches on separated churches and communions. One approach was used, an approach not covered in the original brief document.

I’d still want to read the original piece, but I’m not prepared to either join in the CDF criticism or support a theological position I haven’t read.

 

Cheering on the Beach, Holding a Towel

It’s alternately funny and sad to see conservative Catholics attempting ecumenism. Just as reform2 is sometimes an attempt to recover some idealized golden age of liturgy, I get the sense that for some Catholics, ecumenism is all about standing on the Tiber beach, encouraging swimmers to stroke faster. Maybe they’re ready with a towel.

The biggest fallacy in this view is that is concentrates on the top-down approach (let’s see how many disaffected Anglicans we can lasso in) and has no clue about the day-to-day exchanges between fractured Christians.

It is also relentlessly rational, assessing Christian separation as a fault of the intellect. We Catholics have proven we’re the One True Church. The CDF backs us up. Everybody else just needs to haul their butts back in line. Such limited views ignore the human reality of emotions, of cultures, or even of human sinfulness.

I see a lot of cheering that the Orthodox are so close. Lots of disaffected Catholics admire the Eastern liturgy. They dig it that they even share the same name, with just the difference of a capital “O.” Somebody tried to convince me the obstacle to East-West reunion is that Roman liturgy sucks. Not to mention our biblical scholarship. I wonder how a decentralized system would go down if Catholics started looking more Orthodox. Somebody has to draw the line for everybody else to stand on, right?

Why are you so embittered, they ask me, about separated Christians escaping feminists and homosexuals and coming home to Rome? I don’t feel bitter about people with issues becoming Catholic. I was raised in a Protestant home and became Catholic myself, remember? But the expectation that the burden of Christian unity is all on the non-Romans is not how the Church defines ecumenism.

One commentator insists grass-roots ecumenism is dead. Funny, but last time I checked we have millions of Catholics married to non-Catholics. Neil blogged on these “laboratories of unity” most expertly last summer.

Yet we still have Catholics, even priests, who look upon such families with disdain. Unless the non-Catholic partner opts for RCIA or keeps their mouth shut.

On the horizon, we Roman Catholics could find some concern for the opening rifts among our own. I have a worry there’s a little too much rejoicing in divisions among Catholics. It’s a given that among a billion believers, we’ll have lots of different ways to approach worship, pastoral care, catechesis, and the other essentials of living the faith. But stressing unity as a folksy gathering of anti-feminists (or anti-gay or anti-iconoclsm, or whatever) strikes me as a rather sandy foundation for an edifice that should aspire to Christ and his example of love and sacrifice.