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I've been reading the Apostolic Fathers recently -- largely on Sunday afternoons after gathering for worship. It provides a good context for me to read to understand our gathering in line with those who have gathered before, and stretches me in praying with/for our congregation and our mission together. There is a concreteness in these immediately post-NT (some earlier than some NT documents) that helps envision our life together in Mid-City as a very local, particular body of Christ. It also helps me to think faithfully in light of the role of the church within the United States and the liberal political society that we live within.

Today I read also after visiting on Friday with Mike Patterson who has been diagnosed with terminal cancer this week. My brother Eric Lee at www.ericisrad.com profoundly blogged on his visit with Mike earlier this week. It is apparent that we are going to learn to die as Christians with Mike, that in suffering with him, we will suffer with Christ, and thus await for resurrection with Him. I have ordered Cardinal Bernardin's book "The Gift of Peace", his meditations as he died of terminal pancreatic cancer, as well as read some interesting reflections on suffering in modernity by Talal Asad, Formations of the Secular. I hope to share these as I work through them, and in the gift that is Mike as he faces his mortality, and thus, his immortality in Christ. When I told Mike that we will be with him in his sufferings, and though we will miss him, accept him in his mortality as a gift. His response was "I know. I feel guilty. I am going home, and you all will be left here grieving."

What does all this have to do with the Fathers? First, St. Ignatius wrote on his way to his martyrdom in Rome -- and his deep embracement on his body, his suffering, Christ's suffering, that transposes this suffering into hope of the resurrection and refusal to conform to political allegiance (faith) in the emperor as Lord, and thus refusal to submit to the authority of the Roman empire. This was a stance that he urged upon all those around him. Living in unity with the bishop that he exhorts is a means to not be assimliated into the morality, the practices of Rome.

But what struck me most was the simple addressees of the letters throughout the Fathers. The English translations don't really get at the matter. But it became almost stereotypical in the Fathers to write to the congregations as "aliens" (paroikousa) within their local political setting. Thus, Polycarp wrote to "the church (ekklesia) of God, the aliens of the Philippians."

The parallel between the phrases to describe the congregations is fascinating. Ekklesia is a term for the voting members of a city, the members of the juridical assembly; paroikousa, however, were disenfranchised, "foreigners", persons of the city without rights, vulnerable to the decisions and power of those whose commitments were to the well-ordered continuation and improvement of the political status quo. The church is the real assembly of God, a different polity/assembly from the society around them, with different allegiances from those of the society around them. From God's perspective they are the ekklesia; this makes them aliens within the society where they stay. Augustine's two cities is nothing more than continuing this description after the emperor becomes "Christian".

Such a description of congregations reminds us that "this world is not our home". We are pilgrims, sojourners here, on our trek from God to God. A "church building" is a pilgrimage way station, a monastery, whether a congregation knows it or not. Like Mike reminds us, we live in Christ to die well in hope of the resurrection, the judgement of Christ, and the renewal of creation. This is not to deny suffering, or disembody ourselves to a "spiritual realm" separate from creation. What it does is to free us from the evaluations, practices, and allegiances to the order of the society around us to live as the ekklesia, true citizens of God within God's creation. In a society which lives in fear and denial of death that would isolate and thus, dehumanize someone like Mike, we can accept Mike in his sufferings as a gift, to unite us with the sufferings of Christ.

As aliens, our task is to witness to God's kingdom here, to show that the world is the world by showing the true nature of creation as witnessing to the glory of God. We are not here for the continuation of the society around us, but to engage in the works of mercy that witness to God's kingdom in Jesus. As "aliens", we do not seek power, to take control of the local "ekklesias" in order to bring in God's kingdom by policy. Indeed, like "aliens" we have to devise tactics to survive, to not be assimilated into the allegiances of the powerful around us, even for the what seems to be the good.

We can't overlap the witness of congregations to the liberal political and capitalistic order around us, nor do we let its rejection define us. We have to make our way as witnesses to God's kingdom, faithful to Christ. We must learn to improvise along the way, much like a jazz musician does in continuing the beauty of the musical themes, in living our devotion to Christ through the works of mercy as we form a way-station amidst our journey.

We are "the church of God, aliens of San Diego". As I walked from our worship today, I was reminded of this. Our friend, David Harrison, who has spent much of his life recently, living without consistent shelter, spoke to me how he used his excess food-stamps, $50 worth, to buy the food to feed the hungry for Bread of Life. Dave could have used these funds for luxury food items (or more beer!). Instead he shared his goods as part of the congregation to engage in the work of mercy of feeding the hungry. And he was very thankful that he had the opportunity to so share as part of us.

Aliens indeed.

Posted by johnwright at 7:56 PM | Comments (6)

Evangelical Protestants have no real doctrine of the church in the United States -- if not throughout the world. Salvation is exclusively a "personal affair" of a "personal relationship with Jesus". It is this "exclusively" that provides the problem -- although "personal relationship with Jesus" language is neither Scriptural nor within the tradition. With no ecclesiology, the doctrine of the church, "faith" and "forgiveness of sins" and "sanctification" drop out of evangelical language and experience of salvation, not to mention baptism and Eucharist as significant practices. Worship becomes a means of therapeutic personal experience to help cope with the psychological struggles of the week that comes from competing in a capitalistic market of conflicting personal interests.

The lack of ecclesiology has also made evangelical prone to cooptation by partisan political groupings in the United States. By use of marketing technology for partisan ends, evangelicals have seen their personal moral concerns for abortion and the nature of Christian marriage incorporated into a much wider agenda of the neo-liberal American right that blatantly goes against the gospel; it also invites a backlash to try and Christianize the American left to make it the "litmus test" for gathering with a specific congregation. These things are communicated very, very subtly, but effectively when a congregation gathers.

It is thus with interest that I read Aidan Nichol's on Benedict XVI's doctrine of the church. Benedict has read and thought long and hard about the nature of the church from within the Christian tradition. His first doctoral dissertation was on Augustine's ecclesiology, in which he proved himself a very able, subtle reader of the Augustinian text and the Scriptures. This is very hopeful, and we can all take guidance from Benedict's reflections on the life and mission of the church -- indeed, we must for the sake of the Kingdom of God and the church's witness to this kingdom.

According to Nichol's, Benedict adopts from Henri de Lubac a eucharistic ecclesiology -- God makes a congregation the body of Christ visible in the world through the body and blood of Christ -- "The Church is 'the people of God by virtue of the body of Christ'" (p. 138) -- it is a spiritual/physical reality. Drawing upon Augustine (who himself drew upon the Scriptures), "Augustine's divine city is not some purely ideal community of believing people, yet it has noghitn to do with any earthly theocracy of a 'Christianised world'. Rather is it . . . 'a sacramental, eschatological reality' which exists in this world as a sign of the coming world. The State is, despite all Christianisation or apparent Christianisation, an earthly State, and the Church an 'aliens community', which may use earthly realities but is never at home here" (p. 149).

The church (which I don't want to abstract, but to talk in terms of a parish or a congregation -- for the church in its catholicity is also always local) therefore has a mission -- "Given that the Church has no other meaning or purpose except in being the instrument of Jesus Christ, . . . she is herself, as Christ's ecclesial body, the 'gesture' of the divine openness. She must ever place herself at the service of taht gesture, and actualise it in history. But the one and only aim of the divine gesture of openness is the drawing of all finite reality into that "holy exchange' which began with the Incarnation. . . . 'mission as the prolongation of the movement of the Word's procession, and the simle gesture of disinterested love in the actualising of the divine love, a love which streams forth even when it remains without response.' Here we have at last a criterion for judging the appropriateness or otherwise of 'openness to the world' in particular cases. The service of mission and the service of charity form together a 'two-in-one canon'. By reference to this canon, we make our discernments about what is 'true', that is Christologically fitting, openness on the part of the Church, and what is merely 'worldlified' and so false" (p. 151).

To see this in terms of a local congregation/parish is important because, on the basis of Jesus, the Word became flesh; thus the church as the body of Christ is not poetic word, but fleshly bodies. Yet what Benedict rightly shows us is: one cannot separate charity, works of mercy, from commitment to Christ as the openness of God; nor can one separate commitment to Christ from charity, works of mercy, in the world, even to those who might be ungrateful or even unaccepting, those whom Dorothy Day called "the ungrateful poor."

If we would anchor the life of a congregation in the life and sayings of Jesus, in devotion to the Triune God by faith in the participation in the Eucharist, one understands that "personal relationship with Jesus" language just does not approach the profound beauty of salvation in Christ by which we participate in the very life of God in faith, hope, and love. It also prevents the cooptation of the life of the church by powers, while calling us personally and cooperately into the sufferings of a fallen world in the name of its Creator, who desires to call it beyond these sufferings in a celebration of the Life that God is. When we see it this way, we understand the practical beauty, truth, and goodness that Benedict describes as the true life and mission of a congregation. We must live this out always within our concrete environment, but such a people will always be recognizable as the body of Christ, not the agenda of a state, amidst the world.

Posted by johnwright at 9:28 AM | Comments (7)

So far in Acts, the story of God's gathering of the Jews by the Spirit through their Messiah, the beginnings of our story, has been one positive ride from within. The Apostles have boldly proclaimed the Messiahship of Jesus; the authorities have tried to intimidate them into stopping, but it has changed the in-gathering of other Jews in Jerusalem into the apostolic gathering at all.

The kingdom of God has shown forth visibly among this new people as the Spirit has worked. The lame have walked; the beatitudes in Luke 6 are being fulfilled. A common life of shared goods has broken forth so that the poor among them have been blessed, and the hungry filled. Unity abounds in heart and mind. Generosity becomes the norm as Barnabas sells a field to give to the Apostles for the redistribution of wealth. It all sounds like a prequel to Jimmy Stewart in "It's a Wonderful Life."

Acts 5 starts innocently enough. Barnabus's and others generosity spills over to a married couple, Ananias and Sapphira. Read Acts 5:1-2 and compare it to 4:36-37. What are the similarities and what is the difference between Barnabus and Ananias and Sapphira?

It seems to me that this is a crucial point to understand this narrative. Explore why Barnabus and A and S engage in such activity? Are they coerced? Are they told that it is essential? What would be the results within the gathering of these messianic Jews for one who sold property and gave it to the Apostles? What does it say about Barnabus that he gave it all to the Apostles for distribution, but that A and S held some back? Must they give it all? Why would they hold some back? What would be the benefits of this to them? Have they been told that they can't hold any back?

Verses 3-4 depict Ananias bringing the funding from his sale to Peter and Peter's response. If you notice, Ananias never speaks in the whole passage. Why does Peter ask everything in the form of questions until the very end? What offends Peter about Ananias? Where did the sin take place in Ananias? What was the behavioral consequence of this sin? Since Ananias never really says anything, how is it that he has "lied"? Why is lying such a grave sin amidst those gathered in the name of the Messiah by the Spirit?

Verses 5-6 give the result of the encounter. Is the death ascribed to the Spirit or Peter? What does this tell you? What has happened to Ananias? Why would he die?

Verses 7-11 tell the followup story with Sapphira -- v. 7 gives the interval of 3 hours. Notice the difference here in Peter's questioning and the fact that Sapphira has a voice here Ananias did not. In v. 8, what is Peter giving her the opportunity to do? How is it that A and S "tempted the Holy Spirit of the Lord" by their conspiracy? Why is Peter more harsh to her than to Ananias (note v. 9)?

Verses 10-11 give the results of this encounter. Again, is the agency of Saphira's death given? Why is it that "great fear fell upon the whole church"? Is this fear a good thing or a bad thing? What does it tell you that this story belongs at the origins of our story as a congregation? What is the appropriate role of fear within the church?

Why does membership in a congregation, even in engaging in its good works, bear with it a potential for danger? What is the importance of the proper inner virtue for engaging in the acts and works of the congregation in participating in the kingdom of God through acts of mercy such as Ananias and Saphira did? What can acts of mercy shield one from and become a pretense for? Finally, why is honesty in these transactions so important for the witness of the ccongregation?

Finally, discuss the implications of the fact that not all those embedded within the central life and mission of the church had the right motives/inner virtues and this affected the visible witness of the church, especially to those within. What does it tell you about the church that such an event happened even in its very origins? Does this discredit what God has done in gathering these people together as witnesses to the kingdom? Are the other members of the community the focus of the commitment of those whom God has gathered? What is, and what must be, to sustain the on-going participation with such a group?

Enjoy the discussion!!

Posted by johnwright at 10:01 AM | Comments (3)

The Zenit.org interview with Tracey Rowland continues today. I want to post an excerpt from it because it has an important point that links the dynamics of contemporary American evangelicalism to two different Thomisms within Catholicism. She describes this as the main theological battle of the church. After the excerpt, I'd like to analyze how the same dynamic is found within evangelicalism. The difference is, whereas in Catholicism, the "Whigs" have not taken over the "teaching office of the church," largely due to the "back to the past, ressourcement movement behind Vatican II, American evangelicalism has had only a small ressourcement movement, if at all, within its ecclesiastical leadership, and is dominated by a "Whig" visions. Here's the excerpt (emphases added by me):

Q: You have said that the major intellectual and theological battle within the Church is between the "Augustinian Thomists" and the "Whig Thomists." What does this mean?

Rowland: "First, let me define "Whig." The expression "Whig Thomist" was coined by Michael Novak to describe his intellectual project. Originally the word "Whig" came from the Scottish word "Whiggamor" for a cattle driver -- though some sources say cattle thief and others say horse thief. It was initially applied to Scottish Presbyterians, mostly from the west coast of Scotland, who opposed the Stuart cause in the wars of the 17th century. Their counterparts, the Tories -- a word derived from the Gaelic for "outlaw" -- consisted of some aristocrats, large landowners and agrarian peasants. They were mercantilist in economic policy, royalist in politics and tended to support the succession of James II [1633-1701]. Over time the term was used to refer to a faction in British politics. Although there was never anything like a strong doctrinal definition of the term, as a sociological generalization it can be said that the Whigs were the heirs of the Scottish Enlightenment, which emphasized economic and political liberty, or an emerging philosophy known as liberalism, which was often fused with a Puritan form of Protestantism. In the 19th century Lord Acton popularized the idea that Thomas Aquinas was the first Whig, that is, the first proponent of a modern, post-Enlightenment concept of politics. Thus "Whig Thomism" refers to an intellectual project that seeks to locate the genesis of the liberal tradition in the thought of Thomas Aquinas and to synthesize elements of the Liberal tradition, particularly those provided by the Scottish Enlightenment, to classical Thomism. The project of reading Aquinas as the first Whig or first Liberal has been criticized by a number of scholars. For example, Robert Kraynak, in his work "Christian Faith and Modern Democracy," has written that "though intriguing, Acton's interpretation is misleading because Thomas defends power sharing and political participation, not as a right of the people to parliamentary consent nor as a means for protecting personal rights and liberties, but as the prudent application of natural law whose ends are best realized in a stable constitutional order dedicated to peace, virtue and Christian piety. This is medieval corporatism applied within the [Augustinian] doctrine of the Two Cities, rather than the first stirring of modern liberty." Those who may loosely be classified as "Augustinian Thomists" follow such a Kraynak-style reading of Aquinas, rather than an Actonian. What I argued in my book "Culture and the Thomist Tradition: After Vatican II" is that there is a division between those who think that the Thomist tradition should accommodate itself to the culture of modernity, particularly the economic dimensions of this culture -- the self-described "Whig Thomists" -- and those who believe that modernity and its liberal tradition are really toxic to the flourishing of the faith. Those who take the latter position do not want to supplement the Thomist tradition with doses of Enlightenment values. They are very broadly described as Augustinian Thomists for the want of a better label because, in a manner consistent with St. Augustine's idea of the two cities, they reject the claim of the liberal tradition to be neutral toward competing perspectives of the good and competing theological claims. While the Whigs argue that liberalism is the logical outgrowth of the classical-theistic synthesis, the Augustinian Thomists argue that the liberal tradition represents its mutation and heretical reconstruction, and they tend to agree with Samuel Johnson that the devil -- not Thomas Aquinas -- was the first Whig. There are thus two different readings of modernity and with that, two different readings of how the Church should engage the contemporary world. While the Whigs want the Church to accommodate the culture of modernity, the Augustinians favor a much more critical stance. Another point I made in my book is that those who think that the liberal tradition is avant-garde are about 40 years behind the times. Liberalism ceased being the hegemonic intellectual tradition in the Western world in 1968. At least since then the intellectual battlefront has been three-cornered. First of all there are theists -- Catholics, Muslims, Jews, Protestants, etc.; secondly, there are believers in Enlightenment-style rationality, that is, different varieties of liberals who sever reason from faith; and thirdly, there are the postmoderns who think that the Enlightenment was a very oppressive social experiment and that all versions of rationality are in some way related to theological or mythological presuppositions, although they do not accept that we can use our reason to judge between those competing theological presuppositions. On some fronts Catholic scholars may do better to work with the postmoderns than those who insist on a strict severance of faith and reason, or at least not nail their colors irrevocably to a liberal mast. The point at which the Whigs and Augustinians come into conflict is over the issue of the moral quality of what is called the "culture of America," which is not of course confined to the geographical boundaries of the United States. It is, as Alasdair MacIntyre says, a theoretical construct. The Whigs want to baptize the current international economic order, while the Augustinians take a more critical approach, arguing that there are economic practices characteristic of this order that cannot be squared with the social teaching of the Church. Moreover, the Augustinians are more likely to point out that most people do not sit down and develop a worldview for themselves from hours of philosophical and theological reflection. They tacitly pick up values and ideas from the institutions in which they work. The Augustinians argue that there are aspects of the culture of modernity that act as barriers to the flourishing of Christian practice and belief, and unless the culture is changed, no amount of intellectual gymnastics on the part of the Church's scholars will be of help to those 1 billion Catholics who have to make a living within the world. In other words, if one has to be a saint not to be morally compromised by the culture in which one works, then there is something wrong with that culture. I don't think that this is the major intellectual battlefront within the Church, but it is an important one."

Okay, now a few thoughts. Modern evangelicalism is still grounded in the Scottish Enlightenment project of Scottish common sense and its political and capitalist economic program. What "conservative" (actually liberal!) Catholics and evangelicals share in common is not their commitment to the faith given to the saints, but this modernist project -- which can also be shared with some variations with liberal Protestants. The "Whig political/economic project" holds together the "religious economic conservatives" in the United States, but the faux Christian language gives it a transcendental value in the United States by grounding the project, anti-Christian in its origins, in God. The American project becomes God's project; Hal Lindsey and Michael Novak find their common faith in the American liberal free-market project with "freedom" for "personal relationships with God" that the government is to ensure.

Obviously I am committing my life, here and hereafter, to the "Augustinian" project of two cities. Part of adopting an ascetic monastic life-style at Mid-City is because it is so easy to pick up tacit values from the culture at large even as we try to discover/build new/old institutional/cultural matrices that the Spirit can use for our sanctification -- and thus the sanctification of the world.

Our biggest challenge comes in the tacit values that form us -- or at least me, so subtly. We do live in a culture where of the commodification of everything -- if not of material goods for ourselves, at least of "experiences" so that we can reach a certain type of emotional equilibrium for personal satisfaction with all the unpleasantness that we have to face in life. It seems to me that we might have to relativize these individualistic therapeutic forms of experiences (even in their communal forms) that our culture teaches us are essential in order to be formed into those who are shaped into the image of Christ by the theological virtues of faith, hope, and love by grounding our life together in the objective love of God found in Jesus Christ, experienced inwardly by the Spirit in our common participation in the Triune God in the Eucharistic feast.

Posted by johnwright at 9:46 PM | Comments (6)

This morning, following the Prayers of the People, we confessed together the Nicene Creed before sharing in the Peace. This will not be the last time the we do so. A brief explanation for why we began this practice is in the extended entry. But more important, the Creed itself:

We believe in one God,
the Father, the Almighty,
maker of heaven and earth,
of all that is, seen and unseen.
We believe in one Lord, Jesus Christ,
the only Son of God,
eternally begotten of the Father,
God from God, Light from Light,
true God from true God,
begotten, not made,
of one Being with the Father.
Through him all things were made.
For us and for our salvation
he came down from heaven:
by the power of the Holy Spirit
he became incarnate from the Virgin Mary,
and was made human.
For our sake he was crucified under Pontius Pilate;
he suffered death and was buried.
On the third day he rose again
in accordance with the Scriptures;
he ascended into heaven
and is seated at the right hand of the Father.
He will come again in glory to judge the living and the dead,
and his kingdom will have no end.
We believe in the Holy Spirit, the Lord, the giver of life,
who proceeds from the Father.
With the Father and the Son he is worshiped and glorified.
He has spoken through the Prophets.
We believe in one holy catholic and apostolic Church.
We acknowledge one baptism for the forgiveness of sins.
We look for the resurrection of the dead,
and the life of the world to come. Amen.

When God gathers us to worship, what God is it that gathers us? That seems a curious question – after all, God is God, right? Yet when we gather, we gather in the name of the true and living God, not in the name of an idol.

God, as Creator of all that is from nothing, would be an utter mystery to us if God had not revealed God’s own Self to us. Given especially the distortion of our understanding that has come from sin, idolatry constantly tempts us – creating god in our image, a god that we can use. The Creed helps guide our way to true worship.
God in God’s mercy has revealed God’s own Life to us in Jesus Christ through the presence of the Holy Spirit.

The Nicene Creed is a summary of God’s own revelation. Written in 325 CE at the First Ecumenical Council of Nicea, the Creed expands upon our baptismal confession of faith, the Apostle’s Creed. In language drawn from the language and imagery of the Scriptures, the Creed ensures that we avoid idolatry in our worship by understanding that in worshiping God the Father through Jesus Christ the Son in the power of the Holy Spirit, we are worshipping One God, a One-in-Three God who is Love.

The Creed was written to clarify confusion that had arisen from some prominent leaders denying that the Son was eternally God in the same way as the Father. The Creed affirms that in Jesus, God has fully made God’s own Self known to us by becoming human, without diminishing or losing God’s divinity. The Word in Jesus is not some lesser god that we worship, but fully God. The Nicene Creed summarizes the mystery of the Holy Trinity Who stands at the center of true worship.

The Creed therefore emphasizes the relationship between the Father and the Son. We should not hear the Creed, however, as making a statement about God’s gender – that God is male. Male and female are equally together in God, as humanity was made in God’s image, male and female. But God in God’s own Life is Beyond Male and Female – categories drawn from creation not to be attributed to God. The language of the Father and the Son is about relationship – the eternal begetting of the Divine Word from the Divine Source. Father and Son are the linguistic analogies often used in the Scriptures to describe this relationship of the Divine Persons that is God.

We recognize the limitations of human language to speak of God. Language, after all, takes place as part of creation, and God is not part of creation, but Creator. Yet in confessing the Creed together, we join the voices of the faithful who have come before us, and who will follow us, until that day when the Triune God will bring forth God’s kingdom, the kingdom of the eternal peace of the Father, Son, and Holy Spirit, One God, on earth as it is in heaven.

Posted by johnwright at 9:42 PM | Comments (5)

I just found the following interview, published on Zenit.org. It overlaps with yesterday's posting on an analysis of Benedict XVI and his doctrine of the church. I am not merely interested in Benedict because of some Roman Catholic nostalgia, but because I honestly believe that there is some real wisdom here for our witness at Mid-City. I am fascinated by the overlap between Hauerwas and Benedict as seen in this interview -- particularly in the critique of modernity and an accomodated church to liberal democracies. I don't think that this is an accident, as George Lindbeck, with whom Hauerwas studied, not to mention David Burrell, the Holy Cross priest who brought Stanley to Notre Dame, both were at Vatican II and influenced especially by the initial discussions, before the document on the "Church in the Modern World" was released. Also the interview is with one of the authors within the Radical Orthodoxy series -- and the overlap again is obvious.

I find the vision compelling, intellectually and pastorally. I believe that there is "gospel" here, a guide to the visible witness of the church in the world, as well as an intellectual resources to sustain Christian higher education. Yet I also recognize the need for the Spirit to call people into such a life amidst such a church. I'm fully cognizant that an American-laced, consumerist (modernist/post-modernist) privatization of the church, collapsing Jesus into a subjective, personal experience, rather than objectively found in the Lord's Supper, is much better to generate crowds and finances today.

I hope that you find the interview interesting:

Code: ZE05072429

Date: 2005-07-24

Benedict XVI, Vatican II and Modernity (Part 1)

Tracey Rowland on the Pope's Interpretation of the Council

MELBOURNE, Australia, JULY 24, 2005 (Zenit.org).- Many believe that "Gaudium et Spes" was the key document that shaped the life of the Church in the years immediately following the Second Vatican Council.

However, according to theologian Tracey Rowland, 40 years of post-conciliar history and reflection on the 1965 pastoral constitution have led many to conclude that the document had an inadequate understanding of culture, particularly that of the culture of liberal modernity.

The result, Rowland reckons, was the unleashing of currents within the Church that gravely harmed the liturgy and offered a false humanism ultimately destructive to the pastoral care of souls.

Rowland is dean and permanent fellow of the John Paul II Institute for Marriage and Family -- Melbourne and author of "Culture and the Thomist Tradition: After Vatican II" (Routledge).

She shared with ZENIT why a reconsideration and reinterpretation of "Gaudium et Spes," a dominant theme in the theological work of Joseph Ratzinger, is necessary to reorient the Church's encounter with liberal modernity.

Part 2 of this interview will appear Monday.

Q: What was Joseph Ratzinger's role at the Second Vatican Council, and how did it shape his theological views?

Rowland: He attended the Council as a peritus for Joseph Cardinal Frings of Cologne. In a famous speech, Frings launched an attack on the Holy Office and the exchange between him and Alfredo Cardinal Ottaviani is often described as the most passionate debate of the Council. It is thought that the young Ratzinger contributed ideas for Frings' criticism.

As for the effect of the Council on Ratzinger, his attendance as a peritus would have given him a valuable bird's-eye view of the Catholic intellectual landscape, a knowledge of the problems faced by the Church in different parts of the world and some experience of the operation of the Curia.

I don't think, however, that the Council changed his views so much as his views shaped the Council.

Q: What is the new Pope's view of the Church's role and its relationship to "the world" as understood by the Second Vatican Council?

Rowland: The Second Vatican Council described the Church as the universal sacrament of salvation. Accordingly, the Church is not an entity distinct from the world but the world reconciled unto itself and unto God. This is the kind of vision one would expect Benedict to promote.

Contrary to popular perceptions, his Augustinian spirituality does not mean that he is against the world or that he believes that Catholics should crawl into ghettos.

What it does mean is that he is no Pelagian. He doesn't think that with sufficient education the New Jerusalem can be built on earth. Civics education alone, lectures on human rights, exhortations about brotherly love and the common good, will get nowhere unless people are open to the work of grace and the guidance of the Holy Spirit.

A humanism that is not Christian cannot save the world. This was the conclusion of his fellow peritus Henri de Lubac, and Benedict has made some very strong statements against the pretensions of a mere secular humanism.

Moreover, while he is not advocating a retreat from the world, he has exhorted Catholics to rediscover with evangelical seriousness the courage of nonconformism in the face of the social trends of the affluent world.

He has said that we ought to have the courage to rise up against what is regarded as "normal" for a person at the end of the 20th century and to rediscover faith in its simplicity. In other words, one can engage the world, and be in the world, without being of the world.

Q: How has this project, laid out by the Council Fathers in "Gaudium et Spes," succeeded or failed?

Rowland: Against the background of secularizing readings of "Gaudium et Spes," John Paul II argued that the document needs to be read from the perspective of Paragraph 22. In a nutshell, it says that the human person needs to know Christ in order to have self-understanding.

No doubt Pope Benedict would agree that this paragraph undercuts some of the ambivalent language if it is taken as the lens through which the rest of the document is read. But how many of the world's Catholics, including the clergy, know about the significance of Paragraph 22?

The popular interpretation of this document was that it represented an acknowledgment on the part of the Church that modernity is OK and that it is the will of the Holy Spirit that Catholics accommodate their practices and culture, including liturgical culture, to modernity's spirit as quickly as possible.

This had the effect of generating a cultural revolution within the Church such that anything that was characteristically pre-conciliar became suspect.

Modes of liturgical dress, forms of prayer, different devotions, hymns that had been a part of the Church's cultural treasury for centuries, were not just dumped, but actively suppressed. To be a practicing Catholic in many parishes, one had to buy into the pop culture of the 1960s and 1970s.

Against this, Ratzinger has been critical of what he calls "claptrap and pastoral infantilism" -- "the degradation of liturgy to the level of a parish tea party and the intelligibility of the popular newspaper."

If the project of "Gaudium et Spes" is taken to mean "accommodating the practice of the faith to the culture of modernity," then I think that the project has been problematic in pastoral terms.

If, however, it is read more through the lens of de Lubac's "The Drama of Atheistic Humanism," then I think that the project of reaching out to so-called modern man and helping him to find himself by promoting John Paul II's theology of the body, the Trinitarian anthropology of the encyclicals "Redemptor Hominis," "Dives in Misericordia" and "Dominum et Vivificantem," and the values of the Gospel of Life in "Evangelium Vitae" and "Veritatis Splendor" -- that project has really only just begun and has a long way to go before it starts to bear fruit.

Q: In what sense is there continuity or discontinuity between in the views of Pope Benedict XVI and Pope John Paul II -- a major contributor to "Gaudium et Spes" -- in regard to the Church's interaction with "the world"?

Rowland: I think that there will be continuity in the sense that Benedict would no doubt agree that a de Lubacian-type reading of "Gaudium et Spes" is desirable -- that culture is not theologically neutral, that we have a choice between a civilization of love and a culture of death, and that Christ and a Christian anthropology are needed to rescue us from a web of cultural and moral practices which destroy human integrity and foster nihilism.

However, one difference in nuance is that Benedict is less inclined to use a particular rhetorical strategy favored by John Paul II.

To give an example, John Paul II once said that the Church of the Council "saw itself as the soul of modernity." He then defined modernity as "a convergence of conditions that permit a human being to express better his or her own maturity, spiritual, moral and cultural." The problem here is that this is not what most people think of when they hear the expression "modernity"; and it is certainly not the reading one finds in the many scholarly accounts of this cultural phenomenon.

From what I have read, Benedict doesn't adopt this intellectual strategy. When Benedict talks about modernity he doesn't try to redefine the common meaning. This is perhaps because he thinks that there is little rhetorical advantage in presenting the Church as modern when the postmoderns are so busy being critical of modernity. It simply aligns Catholics with a position whose popularity in on the wane.

A second way I think the papacies of the two might differ is that whereas John Paul II concentrated on ethics and anthropology -- and hence the central themes of "Gaudium et Spes" -- it is possible that Benedict will take a more ecclesiological focus, concentrating on themes in "Lumen Gentium" and the [Vatican II] decree on ecumenism as well as dealing with the whole territory of liturgy.

In the "City of God," St. Augustine wrote that in the composition of the world's history under divine providence there is a beauty arising from the antithesis of contraries -- a kind of eloquence in events, instead of in words.

Comparing the two papacies there is a kind of historical eloquence in that Wojtyla, the Pole, is elected to see off the Marxists and focus on the promotion of an alternative Christian anthropology, while the German Ratzinger is elected to contend with problems created by, among others, Luther and Nietzsche.

This papacy may well be focused on healing the wounds of the Reformation that began in Germany, and fighting what Benedict calls the "dictatorship of relativism" whose intellectual lineage is also strongly Germanic.

There is a definite divine beauty and playfulness in this.

[Monday: Benedict XVI, Thomism and liberal culture]

Posted by johnwright at 8:02 PM | Comments (9)

I just finished the book by Aidan Nichols, The Thought of Benedict XVI: An Introduction to the Theology of Joseph Ratzinger. It is a book originally published in 1988, that was reissued with a new title after Ratzinger's election as pope. I got it to try and understand the differences between the impressions that I had of Ratzinger from my days at Notre Dame and what I had read of him during John Paul II's funeral and after his election. The book is a pretty straightforward description of Ratzinger's publications, unfolded in a chronological fashion.

Ratzinger/Benedict interest me for (1) his use of the Ressourcement theologians (DeLubac, von Balthasar) to point the church in mission into the future -- the way to the future comes from a authentic repetition of the church's past within our contemporary setting; (2) the common themes that Ratzinger seemed to have in common with Radical Orthodoxy thinkers, but with a more concrete, Christian language from addressing the church rather than the North American/British academy; and (3) the combination of technical theological thought concerning God with earnest pastoral concern for the shaping of the future mission of the church.

I probably will try to blog on different features of the book. Yet what clearly comes through is, like Radical Orthodoxy, Benedict takes very seriously the thought of Augustine, and the difference between the City of God and the City of Humanity. This seems to offend many persons who want the church to be the chaplain of the liberal democratic nation-state or a Marxist state -- in other words, those who see the church as subordinate to politics of the state. He arrives at a reading of Augustine's doctrine of the church similar to what John Milbank 'borrows' from the Archbishop of Canterbury, Rowan Williams.

I don't think Augustine was very creative in using the motives of "the two cities", but merely and obviously lifted the image from the Revelation of St. John (a very different reading of Revelation from Hal Lindsey and "The Left Behind" series -- who have no doctrine of the church at all except as an apostate institution that individuals must be saved from). For Augustine, the city of God is from above in that it's foundation lies in God. The fact that it is from above is "its sense of strangeness here, its unwillingness to tarry, its hope for something beyond . . . The Church and the City of God are not, pace some Protestant readings of Augustine, two wholly distinct quantities. Rather, that City has its 'pilgrim colony on earth': the community which, by its self-offering in outward signs in the communio caritatis, comes before God in the sacrament of Christ's body" (p. 49).

Several things here: (1) any congregation is not equivalent to the city of God, but participates as a sign of this heavenly city now until it comes in its fullness -- it thus is a pilgrim people, a group of 'resident aliens' to wax Hauerwasian; (2) the difference between a congregation and the world is visible now: it is seen in the outworking of the different loves of those in Christ from those in the world; and (3) nonetheless, a congregation itself is composed of pilgrims, way-farers, 'strangers in a strange land': it is those in the colony awaiting to live in the fulness of their citizenship in heaven while they now live amidst a the city of man, characterized by its violence and disordered loves.

Coming back from the wedding of Joshua and Alison tonight, I saw a bunch of 'strange people' -- the strangeness of the event was seen in its beauty, not just of Alison and Josh's exchange of vows, but in their surrounding by a congregation of friends, including those newly married. It was seen in the missions table, that had information from Ashby's drive to start her children's home in southern Kenya with other concerns. It was seen in sharing with Matt and Brenda as they get ready to "take Manhattan" and inviting some adolescents to come visit them (a dangerous thing to do!) while Matt studies at Columbia Medical School and Brenda works in the city. It was obviously evident in Alison's friend from college noting the differences in Alison's life -- a difference that we can name, if she couldn't, as Jesus Christ. It will be seen when Josh and Alison come to participate in worship tomorrow morning, being made part of the body and blood of Christ and in their handing out sleeping bags to friends on the streets tomorrow afternoon.

The fullness of the city of God? No. God forgive us. As Eric notes in the Acts blog from earlier this week, sometimes it seems we are far away, personally and as a congregation, from continuing the story begun in Acts. Yet something was visibly different this afternoon, something that Ratzinger noted that Augustine had noted -- something that John the Elder recognized as well. For this, we can just give thanks to God, who pulls us into the adventure of God's kingdom as we participate in the life and love which is God.

Posted by johnwright at 9:22 PM | Comments (7)

As I've been reading and thinking and praying this past year, the writings of what has been called the "Ressourcement" has beckoned me to them. "Ressourcement" is a French word that has become a technical term even in English to represent a movement in Christian theology that the way forward for the church theologically comes in re-capturing anew the thought of the past. These theologians and historians were behind Vatican II, and unbeknownst to me at the time, behind those who influenced me at Notre Dame.

Yet more, Ressourcement has become a means of understanding and embracing the heritage of John Wesley from which the Church of the Nazarene springs, and, I am convinced, were fed by the same springs as H. Orton Wiley -- the main theologian of the Church of the Nazarene. I have found them instrumental in the commitment to "post-modern critical Augustinianism" that one finds in Radical Orthodoxy.

The Ressourcement holds out three challenges for me vocationally:

(1) As a biblical scholar, how does the historical and theological work that I do relate to the interpretive tradition of the church? As a scholar of early Judaism and earliest Christianity, who do these forms help us live in continuity with the forms of thought and life of those who have come before?

(2)As a professor within a Christian liberal arts school, how do we respond to the modern and post-modern trends of the state and surogate state institutions that would reduce the Christian witness to "values" or "spirituality" or "religious psychotherapy" or "social justice" within these institutions? Is there a truthful, intellectual life that can reorder our understanding to call us to a more faithful practice as a Christian institution?

(3) As a pastor, how do we keep this from being merely abstract cognitive games, interacting persuasively and critically with other thinkers, but participating with bodily habits the undercutting of the actual ecclesial witness that demanded the theological thought to take place in the first place?

My quest for Ressourcement sees these all as intertwined for faithful witness into the future, as well as the sanctification of the present. As a vision for our congregation, I'm trying to put forth the image of a "pilgrim way-station." Last week at our Board meeting I put forth certain practices that I thought are central to sustaining such a place. But maybe the "pilgrim way-station" isn't the only image -- some were concerned that it did not account for those of us who stay. While I reminded us that we are all "pilgrims" here, passing through, I've been trying to work more with the image, searching for concrete examples from the past. I recently found this description of the early Benedictine monasteries:

"The Order of St Benedict spread like wildfire through mediaeval Europe. In addition to the houses' obvious purpose of worship of God, they also became de facto medical centers, shelters for travellers, sources of employment, places of pilgrimage, and important intellectual centers and repositories for the manuscripts of antiquity in an increasingly chaotic world. It is not too much to say that the Benedictine monasteries were the last fortresses of civilization after the Fall of the Roman Empire. As everything else grew increasingly primitive, the monasteries continued to inspire art, literature, music, and the higher things of God of man."

donjim.blogspot.com/2005_07_01_donjim_archive.html#112108529169902984

This is the time, as Alasdair MacIntryre reminded us at the end of After Virtue, for a new monasticism -- or better, a Ressourcement of monasticism within late capitalism. Thus, I want to offer for the congregation the document that I gave to the board for your comments, and hopefully, for our common embodiment.

A Congregation Committed to Ressourcement for our Sanctification:
A Vision for the Church of the Nazarene in Mid-City, San Diego

(1) A vowed order of members, living a common discipline from the General Rules of the Church of the Nazarene, for the care of those passing through and each other through a common worship life together at 4101 University Avenue, San Diego.

(2) Eucharistic (thanksgiving) center of worship through the ministry of Word and Sacrament. We will commit ourselves to the historic norms of worship with fresh expressions of faith, hope, and love for the Triune God.

(3) Small group meetings for immersion in Word through common life in Scriptures and encouragement for works of mercy.

(4) Distribution of food to the hungry, and shelter from the elements for those without housing.

(5) Establishing stable housing for vowed members; adequate, sustainable housing for those we encounter through our works of mercy and amidst those who are moving through the area.

(6) Inviting others into an active life of faith in Jesus Christ, from sin into the church catholic in baptism, and into sanctification, the renewal of the image of God, through active participation, even membership, in the life of the vowed order.

Posted by johnwright at 2:19 PM | Comments (6)

Yes, you've noticed a silence on the blog for the past five days. Much has happened that I need to reflect upon -- a visit to Comic-Con, the release of Harry Potter, Pastor Eric, the DS from Tanzania and our service Sunday, a Multi-congregational meeting, reading Harry Potter and the Half-Blood Prince (I finished last night about midnight), as well the paper I am working on for my trip to Germany and reflections on PLNU's academic plan. Hopefully I can clear my head to try and make sense of all of this stuff on the blog. I am amazingly thankful about the range of experiences that I have. To quote Winnie-the-Pooh, however, since I am a bear of little brain, "it can muddle me so."

Posted by johnwright at 10:44 AM | Comments (12)

Acts 4:32-37 provides the "end" of the story of the healing of the Jew born blind -- the final goal to which the story moves. The passage therefore parallels Acts 2:42-47. As a matter of fact, this parallel shows Acts 1-2 in the grand movement of the story of Pentecost parallels Acts 3-4 in the grand movement of the story of the healing of the lame man. To begin, it might be good to discuss the parallel movement in the two stories and re-read together 2:42-47. How is it the same and how does it differ from Acts 2:42-47? What is the significance between what is in common and how they differ?

A close reading of each of these verses is interesting, as well as its overall structure. V. 32 a provides an introduction; v. 32b speak of a practice that arises out what is stated in v. 32a. Verse 33 focuses on the role of the apostles, and v. 34-36 takes up again in more detail what is described in v. 32b. The passage therefore has a ring structure:

Intro: v. 32a: unity of the many of those who had believed

v. 32b: common use of individual goods

v. 33: Apostolic sharing of the resurrection of Jesus and grace upon the whole

vv. 34-36: the distribution of the goods among those who had believed.

What does the text show by placing v. 33 in the middle? (We'll come back to this at the end)

I'm not real happy with the translation of v. 32 in the NIV, for it misses some of the distinct dynamics of the text. I would have translated v. 32a:

"And the many/multitude of those who had believed were of one heart and soul." What is the relationship of the many and the one? Why would this summary passage begin with this notification? How does it set the basis for what follows? What would happen in shared goods did not arise from "one heart and soul", if the external goods becomes separated from a common internal good? What is the basis of this internal good?

V. 32b I would rather translate:

"And any one of those who had control himself over goods (property) was not saying to himself that it was his own, but it was held in common for them (all)."

What is the purpose of economic goods, property here? Is private property abandoned for the believers?

As mentioned above v. 33 lies at the core of the passage. What is the reference to the resurrection important? What would "great grace being upon them" mean in this context?

Verses 34-37 speak about the practical means of distribution of the individual goods for the common good. What is the role of the believers? When and how do they distribute their goods? What is the role of the apostles? Why distribute through them? What is the result? Why would the passage mention Joseph's act?

For the first time, I've appended onto this some extensive reflections about how we continue to live this common good as the church -- all churches that I know of do so in some way, even if we don't recognize it. I am especially concerned to develop a more Christian way to talk about this outside the presuppositions of the world around us. You'll sense my Christian anarchy here, and my understanding of the church as an economic group in its own right, providing an alternative to the contemporary political economic right and left. You'll have to decide if it's conservative or liberal! If it is helpful, use the reflections. If it's too esoteric, just go to the last questions in it. After all is said and done, before praying to leave, maybe someone in the group could read Luke 6:20-36 as a final part of what the Acts passage discusses.

[Pastoral reflections on issues underlying this for our common practice: This use of property as depicted in this passage is important, for within our contemporary society, property is seen in a much different way. We can get caught in a false dichotomy between right-wing politics and left-wing politics because of how the contemporary nation-states has taught us to view property. Property is seen as an absolute individual right, yet even property is subordinated to the power of the state to redistribute -- all property is taxed and if one does not pay the tax, the property is confiscated by the coercive power of the state. In this right-wing capitalist nation-states, and left-wing 'Marxist' nation-states agree.

The differences between a right wing and a left wing politics is found in how and to whom the state redistributes the property income based on its sovereignty. In a capitalist society, the State exercises its power by distributing the goods to wealthy, private individuals to build its power by increasing its tax base -- evident as a recent Supreme Court decision gave a city's right to transfer property from one private owner to another to increase their tax base. It maintains the myth of 'private property' but requires rents (taxation) at all times. A special economic and power relationship arises between the state and the wealth "property owners". By increasing the wealth and power of the state, the wealthy become the beneficiaries of the state, support its sovereignty against those who might contest it.

On the left, the state takes direct control over property to oversee its direction distribution on account of 'the people'. It hopes to generate loyalty of "the masses" by its beneficial distribution to all, thus legitimating its sovereignty.

Acts 4:32-37 seems to call for a very different understanding of economic goods. It presupposes sovereignty over creation to be in God, as seen in the resurrection of Jesus Christ. We can see, then, not to get caught up in contemporary contests between a left-wing politics and a right-wing politics in the world because both sides represent an economics that is based in a system of sovereignty that is alien to believers. The politics and economics of the church is very different. Property is seen as a good, but a good that must be subordinated to the good of others, especially the poor. Private property is not renounced, but profoundly subordinated to the distribution to the church so that the solidarity of heart and soul is also a solidarity of bodies within the one body, that is the Body of Christ.

If this is so, we need to develop the skills of learning to exist in this alien world, but not getting caught up in its divisions (i.e., sustaining the many in the one heart and soul), that can divide the body of Christ. The issue for the church, and individual believers, is how to order our goods for the common good that is the kingdom of God revealed in Jesus by the Spirit.

What do you think of this analysis? Does it make sense? (some of the analysis comes as a result of reading a book by an anthropologist named Tal Asad, Interventions of the Secular, Stanford University Press, 2004 if you care -- and not that you should!) Can you discuss ways that we currently live this out? Can you think of ways that we might live this out more completely?]

Posted by johnwright at 9:43 AM | Comments (4)

Patrick Allen, PLNU Provost, has been my friend for ten years since we both migrated out to San Diego from Indiana within ten months to each other. He is wise, and taught me much about administration.

I am getting ready to go to his "departure reception" this afternoon before he leaves for a new assignment at Southern Nazarene University. In his honor, I wanted to post something I found last night on ressourcement.blogspot.com: Excerpts from a 1973 interview of Wendell Berry. Patrick was the one who introduced Berry to me, for which I am thankful.

The column has interesting reflections on "intentional communities". I think that it nicely explains why a congregation cannot be "an intentional community" and still maintain a faithfulness to the gospel. The center of the witness is not the congregation as a community, but the fact that God gathers people through contingencies and accidents, outside their own intentionality, to witness to God's kingdom in the world in and through the body and blood of Jesus in the Eucharist by the power of the Spirit. A Eucharistic congregation is not "intentional" at all, but a gift of grace! Here's Berry's reflections:

PLOWBOY: In the face of that kind of cultural pressure, it takes a conscious effort to reinstate the ceremony and ritual in our lives. Many intentional communities are trying to generate this kind of awareness and stability . . . .

BERRY: But I'm much more interested in the results of accidental communities that have formed by fate and fortune and circumstance. The intentional community seems to me a rather escapist idea, sort of a new version of the white citizen's council. I thought that's what we were trying to get away from. I think the idea that you can have an intentional community is about as misleading as saying you can have an intentional life. If you're going to have a decent and stable community, you've got to produce the cultural and social forms by which to deal with the unexpected and the undesirable. The intentional community idea assumes that when you say love your neighbor as yourself you have some kind of right to go out and pick your neighbor. I think that the ideal of loving your neighbor has to take on the possibility that he may be somebody you're going to have great difficulty loving or liking or even tolerating.

More good Berrys:

A young fellow came up to me after one of those meetings [on college academic requirements] and said, "I've never had a foreign language and I want you to tell me why I should take French. I'm studying agriculture, not literature." "Well," I said, "if you don't know, I can't tell you. That's why you take French for two or three or four years, to learn why you should take it."

The fact is that a great deal that's necessary and satisfying to know is not pleasant to learn.

What I'm saying is that the young have had lots of praisers and lots of detractors but few critics which is really a way of saying they've had few friends.

A farmer, who's a neighbor of mine and probably the oldest friend I've got in the world, had told me, "They'll never do worth a damn as long as they've got two choices." That's the most important thing that's been said to me in the last couple of years. It illuminates the meaning of marriage. When you believe in a thing enough so that you eliminate the second choice, forsake all others, then you're married to it. So we decided that this place would have to be our fate and that we'd stay here no matter what happened as long as life was possible. That decision changed us and became a kind of metaphor of our own marriage. Since then, life on this place has had a much different and fuller meaning for us.

Many of the things we're asked to call the blessings of progress are actually deforming diseases.

The excerpt is found at leowong2004.blogspot.com/2005/07/wendell-berry-on-intentional.html

Posted by johnwright at 2:36 PM | Comments (6)

I noticed that the latest issue of the Journal of Biblical Literature has an article on our passage by a scholar from Baylor University, Mikeal C. Parsons. I'd like to share some notes from this article just for background, and then look at the questions for the passage itself.

The article is called, "The Character of the Lame Man in Acts 3-4". If you want a new big word, it looks at the character of the man in light of ancient "physiognomy" -- attempting to link a persons outward characteristics with inner moral qualities. Let's just say that there is ample evidence to suggest that lameness was seen, not merely as a physical disability, but as a moral failure of the person. Here's a good quote for you from an ancient "physiognomic text" (say that three times fast)that Parsons quotes from Polemo: "If you see contracted, strong feet, and their tendons are straight and strong, and their joints are evenly proportioned, these are signs of powerful and might men. If they feet are very fleshy and soft, they indicate weakness, softness, and laxity." If you'd like, you can test this hypothesis during the bible study.

The point in the healing of the man is that, as Parsons states, "membership in the eschatological community of the Way requires rejection of the assumption that physical appearance is directly connected to the moral character" (p. 300). His leaping after the healing shos that "the lame man's healing is paradigmatic for the potential restoration of Israel within the establishment of the cosmic reign of God" (p. 312).

It might be interesting to discuss how our society employs physiognomy". What type of "outward appearances" does our society relate with "moral character"? If there is a sense in which this works, this might help us understand the restoration of the man, the response of the authorities, and the reason for the disobedience of Peter and John. This all sets the setting for the final 'episode' in this story.

As Parsons rightfully notes, Acts 3-4 is unusual in the New Testament because it is a continuous narrative: "This narrative segment is comprised of four scenes: 3?1-10; 3:11-4:4; 4-5-22; and 4:23-31, demarcated by temporal and spatial shifts. The temporal shift from day 1 to day 2, effected by a 'nocturnal pause' between 4:4 and 4:5, causes scenes 1-2 and 3-4 to be more closely related to each other" (p. 300). If this is so, Peter and John's meeting with "their own people" (v. 23) is closely tied with last weeks meeting of the authorities threatening to arrest Peter and John, and their avowal of disobedience to the authorities.

V. 23 sets the setting for this new segment of the story. Why would Peter and John, after being threatened with arrest, go to "their own people"? Who are "their own people"? Why are these people "their own"? With whom are "their own" contrasted? What does that say for who we are, who "our own" are today? Why is this so? Peter and John discuss "what the chief priests and elders had said to them". Why?

Vv. speak of "their own's reponse to what Peter and John tell them? What do "their own" do in response? Why? Verses 25b-26 quote from Psalm 2. Reading Psalm 2 might be helpful to understand the prayer. Who do they perceive the threat to arrest Peter and John resisting? What is the request at the end of their prayer?

V. 31 speaks of the aftermath of Peter and John's report and the prayers of the church. What happens? What would be the reason for such intensity that "the place where they were meeting was shaken"? As a result of this shaking, what do they do?

Here we see an informal meeting of the church for prayer, rather than worship? Given this, why is it important for such meetings of the church for prayer? What does the whole meeting presuppose about the life of the church? What is really at stake in a prayer meeting like this as a part of the whole story for the witness of the church? How does this determine the content of prayers and the perception of oneself, the church, and those outside the church? How is praying together part of the witness and mission of the church in these informal gatherings?

It is interesting to see, and might be fun to talk, how our meeting together in informal prayer groups finds its origins here in this passage. How does this help you see why it is necessary for us to so gather? How does the fact of your gathering to pray help you understand this passage?

Posted by johnwright at 11:52 AM | Comments (3)

Acts 4 represents a very important chapter in our story, one that challenges us to perform today in faithful manners. It is the follow-up to the healing upon which we've spent the last two weeks -- a work of mercy conducted explicitly in the name of the resurrected Jesus by Peter and John. This week we follow the aftermath.

To understand this we must get rid of any distinctions between "religion" and "politics". What the passage discusses is particular concrete allegiances to particular leaders and their representatives. Neither the temple authorities nor Peter and John are "religious figures". What we have here is conflicing political orders and allegiances -- one to the contemporary political status quo and the other to the resurrected Lord Jesus Christ and the Good of his Kingdom.

Maybe as a background to this story, it would be helpful to look at Luke 22:1-6, 47-52; 23:1-10 -- why don't the priests, captain of the temple guard, the Sadducees, the high priest, and the Sanhedrin like Jesus? What is their concern in eliminating Jesus? Who are they trying to serve?

Now read 4:1-4: What are the two different responses to Peter and John's teaching about the resurrection of Jesus? Why would so many believe, yet the authorities be disturbed?

Read vv. 5-7: Why would there be a trial? What have Peter and John done? Why is this wrong in the eyes of the authorities?

Read Peter's third sermon(!!), this time to the Sanhedrin, in vv. 8-12: Why does he appeal to the healed man and the resurrected Jesus? What do you think is the nature of the salvation in this context mentioned by Peter in v. 12 (I'm not searching for any specific answer, but it is an interesting use of the world "salvation" and tied directly and exclusively to the name of Jesus). Why does Peter talk beyond the elders and authorities to all the people of Israel? Who really is on trial here?

Vv. 13-18: What dilemma does Peter's speech leave the authorities? Why do they have to withdraw into private consultation? Why are they trying to stop the spreading of this group? What is the best solution they can come up with? Why? If Peter and John obeyed them, what would happen to their works of mercy? Why?

Vv.19-20: How do Peter and John respond to the decision of the Sanhedrin? Why? How is the real authority that they must obey? What is the basis of their declaration of disobedience (v. 20).

V. 21-22: Why do the Sanhedrin respond with physical threats? Why can they do nothing else?

This passage is very important for an understanding of our relationship as the church to other political authorities. Obviously, Peter and John here explicitly embrace a type of what we might call "civil disobedience". Maybe we should better call it the disobedience for evangelism. What is the basis for refusing to obey the authorities? What type of activities would call for such disobedience today? Disobedience to the authorities by the greater authority of God and the church is not an end in itself. What is the positive condition for disobedience? What is the positive result of obedience to God (and thereby disobedience to the autorities)? Finally, what type of character must we have to express obedience to Christ and the works of mercy to the authorities?

Posted by johnwright at 12:56 PM | Comments (0)

I think that these will probably wind up my reflections on the Church of the Nazarene General Assembly. I've listened to some friends who were there during the legislative sessions, read limited actions of the Assembly, and tried to think why I have the particular perspective that I do. As I've thought, I think that a little of my biography in its relationship to internationalization makes a difference to me.

I had just graduated from college and married to Kathy in the summer of 1980. I was an "intern associate pastor" at my home congregation in Dayton, Ohio. I came back from my honeymoon (a road trip to romantic Kansas City, with a return via Hannibal, MO), and the senior pastor left for five weeks for General Assembly, and then vacation.

The first week was Vacation Bible School -- with a "hired program" that I knew nothing about. We somehow survived. But what I really remember was a visit from Rev. James Hudson, the regional director of Central America at the time. Dr. Hudson had just come from the General Assembly. The 1980 General Assembly approved the internationalization of the Church of the Nazarene. Dr. Hudson had been one of the key architects behind the move to internationalization. I was intrigued. During a meal in our little apartment, he admitted that he had taken the model for this agenda from Roman Catholicism. To this day, I don't know any other Christian disciplined community that seeks to live in the same ruled polity other than the Church of the Nazarene and Roman Catholicism. In other words, while Nazarenes speak of "internationalization", this is a translation from its historical roots within "catholicity." I have never forgotten this, and even wanted to deepen these commitments. I have come to understand that one cannot separate the church's internationalization/catholicity from other signs of its catholicity -- the sacraments, Scripture, ecumenical Creeds, the lives of the saints -- and its catholicity is the end time gathering of persons from every tribe and every nation as we witness now to the kingdom now present until it comes in its fullness.

It seems to me that unless the Church of the Nazarene can adopt catholicity in the second sense above, it will be doomed to fail in its internationalization, for the national, cultural, linguistic factors all lead to fragmentation, or the reduction of the various parts of the church to an "interest politics." With this in the background, three items from the General Assembly come to mind.

First, the General Assembly rejected, with no one speaking for the motion, to require baptism before one is admitted into church membership. This places church membership in the Church of the Nazarene as a more basic initiatory rite than baptism. Not only does this violate the membership ritual itself, it severs the Church of the Nazarene for its anchorage in the sacraments (not to mention the words of Jesus). It shows the inability of the church to think outside the heritage given by Charles Finney who believed that the "mourners bench" was the same as baptism. It shows the Church of the Nazarene's schismatic (even, in Finney's case, heretical) origins in revivalism and subjective anthropological experience, and its fundamental struggles to find an ecclesiology.

Second, the General Assembly unanimously changed the name of the "General Rules" to something like "The Covenant of Christian Character." This again shows how the church has forgotten its story, its origins. Within a liberal society, a "rule" is a restriction of individual freedom -- the ability to choose what one wants. But within the history of the church catholic, a rule is a monastic-type discipline for a very different type of freedom -- submitting to certain formative practices to allow one to live holy lives. The phrase had survived over 250 years from John Wesley's "Rule for the United Societies" that drew upon this monastic tradition for his Methodist Societies. By changing the title, the General Assembly drifted farther from the perfectionist heritage that we represent. It moved us farther from a genunine catholicity, and our movement within the church catholic to remind the church of the importance of sanctification and Christian perfection.

Finally, in the assembly, a resolution was passed by about a 7 to 1 margin that said that the leadership of the church should reflect the diversity of the church through the world. Then the Assembly elected to General Superintendents from the same congregation -- three now have their origins in Olathe College Church. It shows that the intent of the church to internationalization is there, but that the church has not been sufficiently formed in order to live out its intent. I want to suggest that the only means of being adequately formed to live out the Church of the Nazarene's intent is to recover a rich sense of internationalization as a sign of the church's catholicity. But to do this means that church leaders are going to have to give up understanding themselves as a Protestant denomination.

What I'm afraid that the early visionaries of internationalization didn't understand is that one cannot just lift the Roman Catholic polity from its theology and heritage. Internationalization is not merely a means of the church's practical administration, but a sign of the integrity of its theological witness.

Benedict XVI had a wonderful sermon for the Solemnity of Sts. Peter and Paul last week. While ultimately collapsing catholicity into a doctrine of the Chair of Saint Peter (though recognizing that the Eastern Orthodox have a different understanding of what this entails), the sermon is worth reflecting upon by those with any interest in the Church of the Nazarene, and those interested in internationalization. The following excerpt is lifted from zenit.org/english:

The feast of the holy Apostles Peter and Paul is at once a grateful memorial of great witnesses of Jesus Christ and a solemn confession in favor of the one, holy, catholic and apostolic Church. It is above all a feast of catholicity. The sign of Pentecost -- the new community that speaks in all tongues and unites all peoples in one people, in one family of God -- became a reality.

Our liturgical assembly, in which are gathered bishops from all parts of the world, people of many cultures and nations, is an image of the family of the Church spread over the whole earth. Strangers have become friends; beyond all borders, we recognize ourselves as brothers. With this, the mission of St. Paul has been fulfilled, who knew how "to be a minister of Christ Jesus to the Gentiles ... so that the offering of the Gentiles may be acceptable, sanctified by the Holy Spirit" (Romans 15:16).

The aim of the mission is a humanity that has itself become a living glorification of God, the true worship that God expects: This is the most profound meaning of catholicity -- a catholicity that has already been given to us and toward which we must continue to orient ourselves. Catholicity does not express only a horizontal dimension, the coming together of many people in unity; it also expresses a vertical dimension: only by turning our gaze to God, only by opening ourselves to him can we truly become only one.

Like Paul, Peter also came to Rome, the city that was the place of convergence of all peoples and which precisely because of this could become the first of all expressions of the universality of the Gospel. Undertaking the journey from Jerusalem to Rome, Peter surely felt himself guided by the voices of the prophets, by the faith and by the prayer of Israel.

Also a part of the proclamation of the Old Covenant is, in fact, the mission to the whole world: The People of Israel were destined to be light to the Gentiles. The great psalm of the Passion, Psalm 21, whose first verse "My God, my God, why hast thou forsaken me?" Jesus pronounced on the cross, ended with the vision: "All the ends of the earth shall remember and turn to the Lord; and all the families of the nations shall worship before him" (Psalm 21:28). When Peter and Paul came to Rome the Lord, who invoked that psalm on the cross, was risen; this victory of God would now have to be proclaimed to all peoples, thus fulfilling the promise with which the psalm concluded.

Catholicity means universality -- multiplicity that becomes unity; unity that still remains multiplicity. From Paul's word on the universality of the Church we already saw that part of this unity is the capacity of peoples to overcome themselves, to look toward the one God.

The true founder of Catholic theology, St. Irenaeus of Lyon, expressed this link between catholicity and unity in a very beautiful way: "This doctrine and this faith the Church, disseminated throughout the world, guards diligently, forming almost one single family: the same faith with only one soul and one heart, the same preaching, teaching, tradition as if having one voice. Churches of Germany do not have a different faith or tradition, as neither do those of Spain, of Gaul, of Egypt, of Libya, of the East, of the center of the earth, as the sun creature of God is only one and identical in the whole world, so the light of true preaching shines everywhere and enlightens all men who wish to come to the cognition of truth" ("Adversus Haereses" I, 10,2).

The unity of men in their multiplicity became possible because God, this one God of heaven and earth, showed himself to us; because the essential truth of our life, of our "from where?" and "to where?", became visible when he showed himself to us and in Jesus Christ made us see his face, himself. This truth of the essence of our being, of our living and our dying, truth that by God was made visible, unites us and makes us become brothers. Catholicity and unity go together. And unity has a content: the faith that the apostles transmitted to us on behalf of Christ.

[. . .]

We said that the catholicity and the unity of the Church go together. The fact that between them the dimensions are rendered visible to us in the figures of the holy apostles, indicates to us already the subsequent characteristic of the Church: she is apostolic.

What does this mean? The Lord instituted Twelve Apostles, just as twelve were the sons of Jacob, indicating to him by this as tribal head of the People of God that, having now become universal, from now on comprises all the peoples. St. Mark tells us that Jesus called the apostles "to be with him, and to be sent out" (Mark 3:14). It seems almost a contradiction. We would say: Either they are with him or they are sent and undertake the journey.

[. . .]

The Church is apostolic because it confesses the faith of the apostles and seeks to live it. It is a unity that characterizes the Twelve called by the Lord, but there exists at the same time continuity in the apostolic mission. In his first letter St. Peter described himself as an "elder" with the elders to whom he was writing (5:1). And with this he expressed the principle of the apostolic succession: the same ministry he had received from the Lord now continues in the Church thanks to priestly ordination. The Word of God is not only written but, thanks to the testimonies that the Lord in the sacrament has inserted in the apostolic ministry, remains a living word.

[. . .]

In this hour of the world, full of skepticism and doubts but rich in the desire for God, we acknowledge again our common mission to witness together Christ the Lord and, on the basis of that unity that is already given to us, to help the world believe. And we entreat the Lord with all our heart to guide us to full unity so that the splendor of the truth, which alone can create unity, will again become visible in the world.

Today's Gospel speaks to us of the confession of St. Peter from which the Church took her beginning: "You are the Christ, the Son of the living God" (Matthew 16:16). Having spoken today of the one, catholic and apostolic Church, but not yet of the holy Church, we wish to recall at this moment another confession of Peter pronounced in the name of the Twelve at the hour of the great abandonment: "We have believed, and have come to know, that you are the holy one of God" (John 6:69).

What does it mean? Jesus, in the great priestly prayer, talks about consecrating himself for the disciples, alluding to the sacrifice of his death (John 17:19). With this Jesus expresses implicitly his function of true Supreme Priest who realizes the mystery of the "Day of Reconciliation," no longer only in the substitutive rites, but in the concreteness of his own body and blood. The word "the holy one of God" in the Old Testament indicates Aaron as Supreme Priest who had the duty to accomplish the sanctification of Israel (Psalm 105:16; see Sirach 45:6). Peter's confession in favor of Christ, whom he declares the holy one of God, is in the context of the Eucharistic discourse, in which Jesus announces the great Day of Reconciliation through the offering of himself in sacrifice: "The bread which I shall give for the life of the world is my flesh" (John 6:51).

Thus, in the background of this confession, is the priestly mystery of Jesus, his sacrifice for all of us. Better still, it is always sanctified again by the purifying love of Christ. Not only has God spoken: He has loved us very realistically, loved us to the point of his own Son's death. It is precisely from here that we are shown all the grandeur of the revelation that has the wound inscribed in the heart of God himself. Now each one of us can say personally with St. Paul: "the life I now live in the flesh I live by faith in the Son of God, who loved me and gave himself for me" (Galatians 2:20). Let us pray to the Lord so that the truth of this word will be profoundly imprinted, with its joy and responsibility, in our hearts; let us pray so that irradiated by the Eucharistic celebration, it will become ever more the force that shapes our lives.

Posted by johnwright at 8:52 PM | Comments (11)