Digging Out the Embedded Church - The Maranatha Community

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Christology constantly faces new challenges and each such challenge both changes and enriches us. Even those who cannot always be thanked for their answers must at least be thanked for their questions. How do we translate homoousios and perichoresis into the plain English of today? The 4 th Century theologians ransacked their world for appropriate images. We must find ours in the world of singularities, quarks, black holes and electro-magnetism. He who finds a serviceable new image puts the whole world in his debt. The task goes on, then.‟ 20 David Willis sees the creeds as „channel markers‟ to guide the ship of the Church. He writes: „There were and are, when it comes to the Church‟s teaching about Christ, only a few ways to speak about the mystery of the unity of God and humanity in the person of Christ. These major ways came to be defined as channel markers within which saving, sane, wholesome navigation could proceed. That is a very different picture from ones that either toss out the doctrinal development of this period altogether or treat the formations of these agreements as pretty much the last and final word. Channel markers for sane navigation are for proceeding. That means the dynamic business of discerning what the makers of the creed agreed to at the great ecumenical councils and then attempting to translate and interpret that agreement into the terms and ethics which serve the purposes of the gospel in subsequent languages and cultures.‟ 21 It is not the purpose of this book to investigate how the Nicene Creed can be applied to the cause of Christian Unity today, but to call for this to be done. The task has already been begun in the symposium Nicene Christianity, the future for a new Ecumenism. In this volume Ephraim Radner observes that Creed must go with Canons: „We must realize… that the communal ordering of the Creed‟s speech was given in the context of Canon Law. If the Creed makes any sense or points to any sense within the faith of the Christian community, it does so only within the context of the ascetically ordered life of the Church.‟ 22 His caveat shows what a lot of work lies ahead in relating ecumenism to the Creed, but even Radner ends on a hopeful note: „Let us take our minds, let us take our money, let us take our wills and our plans, our strategies for reform, our manifestos and demands, and let us give them over to one another. That is order. And at that point, „credo in unum deum et in Iesum Christum, et unam ecclesiam‟ will be a sound with a startling swell.‟ 23 20 Macleod, Donald, The Person of Christ, Contours of Christian Theology, Inter-Varsity Press, 1998. 21 Willis, David, Clues to the Nicene Creed, William Eerdmans Publishing Coy, 2005, p 78. 22 Radner, Ephraim, To desire rightly, the force of the Creed in its Canonical Context, essay in Nicene Christianity, the future of a new Ecumenism, ed Seitz, Christopher, R, Brazo Press, 2001, p 220. 23 Radner, Ephraim, To desire rightly, the force of the Creed in its Canonical Context, essay in Nicene Christianity, the future of a new Ecumenism, ed Seitz, Christopher, R, Brazo Press, 2001, p 228. Page 25
CYPRIAN AND AUGUSTINE OF HIPPO The influence of two great North African bishops, both of Carthage, must be mentioned in relation to Christian Unity. The first is Cyprian (c.200-258 AD). Cyprian was born and brought up in an upper-class pagan family and was converted to Christ as a young man. Intensely earnest about his Christian faith, on baptism he forsook pagan ideas and literature, concentrating solely on the Christian Scriptures. In his rejection of Greek pagan ideas he was like Tertullian (c.170-200 AD), another great church leader in Carthage, who once wrote, „What has Jerusalem to do with Athens?‟ Some Christian leaders in the Early Church, like Clement of Alexandria (c.150-215 AD), had tried to encompass some aspects of Greek philosophy within Christian truth; not so Cyprian or Tertullian. Cyprian is particularly important to a history of Christian Unity in that he lived and suffered during times of persecution and had to deal with the question of „Does the Church have a place for Christians who have fallen away from the faith but want to be restored to the Church? Is the Church only for those who are strong and pure, or has it a place for the weak and sinning?‟ This is a question that Christians in Eastern Europe had to face on the demise of Communism at the end of the 1980s. During the 1960s and 70s I got to know one or two churches behind the „Iron Curtain‟ and saw how one church dealt with one of its members who had, for 20 years, gone over to the Communists, becoming a Party member and spying on his fellow Christians. When he wished to rejoin the church he had left, it is good to record that he was freely welcomed back into fellowship. Cyprian had fled in the Decian Persecution (205-251 AD), the first systematic persecutions of Christians, and, returning to Carthage, found that the Church there (and generally throughout the empire) was bitterly divided about what to do with the „lapsed‟. The Emperor had demanded that all citizens should make a pagan sacrifice and some Christians did (named the „sacrificati‟); others (the „libellatici‟) bought certificates („libelli pacis‟) saying they had sacrificed when they had not. Cyprian also found that those who had stood firm (known as the „confessors‟) were easing the lapsed back into the Church. Cyprian influenced two church councils in Carthage which followed (251 and 252 AD) to lay down the moderate discipline that the lapsed should only be allowed back into Church after due repentance and penance. But for Cyprian it was the local bishops who had the rule in the matter. The persecution had given rise to schisms of believers who could not accept such easy restoration of the lapsed, and Cyprian‟s high view of the authority of the bishop came into play. As long ago as the middle of the 1 st Century, Ignatius of Antioch had insisted that nothing ought to be done without the authority of the local bishop; Cyprian followed this tradition. For him, the question of the lapsed was a matter for the bishops. The consequence of this was that the Church of the (accredited) bishops became the only place where a Christian could find his home. Unity was the issue. Outside of the Church, the single, universal church throughout the world, there was no salvation. The charismatic Page 26
Page 1 and 2: Digging Out the Embedded Church Dis
Page 3 and 4: The Maranatha Community comprises t
Page 5 and 6: Introduction CONTENTS Chapter 1 Chr
Page 7 and 8: ead, nicely browned on top. He plac
Page 9 and 10: HOW DO WE DIG OUT THE EMBEDDED CHUR
Page 11 and 12: That the Church should express this
Page 13 and 14: For Alfeyev, „Faith is a gift, th
Page 15 and 16: „heresies„ of the Early Church
Page 17 and 18: Traditionally, the Church has made
Page 19 and 20: CHAPTER 1 CHRISTIAN UNITY IN THE EA
Page 21 and 22: A certain Docetic teacher, often id
Page 23 and 24: Novatianism When the persecutions o
Page 25 and 26: The fortunes of the Arian party in
Page 27 and 28: An attempt was made in 482 AD (29 y
Page 29: was development in the interpretati
Page 33 and 34: position would see baptism as not t
Page 35 and 36: The Eastern Church‟s relationship
Page 37 and 38: insisted from the second Lateran Co
Page 39 and 40: There is so much that Orthodoxy sha
Page 41 and 42: we do not talk to each other. Our t
Page 43 and 44: The question of heresy does not com
Page 45 and 46: They were missionary-minded and the
Page 47 and 48: Lollard ideas lingered in English r
Page 49 and 50: CHAPTER 4 THE SECOND GREAT SPLIT: W
Page 51 and 52: unity‟s sake in subsequent centur
Page 53 and 54: Erasmus wrote he asserts, through o
Page 55 and 56: attle-cry, is perhaps the most famo
Page 57 and 58: Regulations for the good ordering o
Page 59 and 60: Eucharist was not just a commemorat
Page 61 and 62: CHAPTER 5 QUOTATIONS ON THE THEME O
Page 63 and 64: How rare then it is to meet a man w
Page 65 and 66: are often much bigger divisions bet
Page 67 and 68: St Germanus of Constantinople - 8 t
Page 69 and 70: manner. He declared that men could
Page 71 and 72: S L Greenslade - 20 th Century: „
Page 73 and 74: CHAPTER 6 HOPES FOR CHRISTIAN UNITY
Page 75 and 76: imminent return of Christ (Komensky
Page 77 and 78: a concern that merchant adventurers
Page 79 and 80: also anti-Socinian. Calixtus himsel
Page 81 and 82:
The Eastern Churches were not rent
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everyone - from outward forms to in
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Women were not usually members of t
Page 87 and 88:
work in America, shows him, though
Page 89 and 90:
The aim of the conference was to br
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From 1768 Harris‟s home at Talgar
Page 93 and 94:
twice more to congregations of Whit
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denominations was not their distinc
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It was from the overseas Protestant
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THE OXFORD TRACTARIAN MOVEMENT Anot
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the Church of England‟s doctrinal
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„We pray that… all who desire t
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thereof, in prayer, in the remembra
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honours the Lord and his Word; the
Page 109 and 110:
apostolic church enjoyed, and that
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episcopate were too radical for mos
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Denominations began to form their o
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In this Shanghai Conference‟s Rep
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With so much talk of unity and coop
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„The liturgical movement in weste
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• Sharing a corporate life of wit
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• Our acknowledgement of the Apos
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(h) The Evangelical Church in Germa
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It changed nothing in respect of do
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Some Evangelical Protestants want t
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• It is in continuity with the
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But things have changed. Richard Ma
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evangelism - (and) state what the r
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Repentance and faith are at the hea
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outcome of being justified. Agreeme
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Virgin‟s salutary influence on me
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h) Confession The sacrament of pena
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demanding way would be sin. The que
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If the opportunity for the Church t
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Ministers, priests and laypeople in
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West Kirby, near to my home, the Si
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n) Shared Study Courses There is a
Page 155 and 156:
Even some Protestant churches today
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Vincent de Lérins spoke of a „pr
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It is not likely, in the foreseeabl
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Christ and are trying their best to
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upon the name of our Lord Jesus Chr
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Perhaps this dying process is now b
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economic factors giving rise to suc
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deeper ecumenism, one that does not
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APPENDIX 1 THE NICENO-CONSTANTINOPO
Page 173 and 174:
APPENDIX 2 FOUR BIBLICAL TEXTS ON T
Page 175 and 176:
The „apostles and elders‟ of th
Page 177 and 178:
„The purpose of the Reformation C
Page 179 and 180:
What all three traditions have in c
Page 181 and 182:
Cromwellian period, in a treatise o
Page 183 and 184:
BIBLIOGRAPHY OF BOOKS AND DOCUMENTS
Page 185 and 186:
Cullman, Oscar, The Earliest Christ
Page 187 and 188:
McCarthy, Tim, The Catholic Traditi
Page 189 and 190:
Letter concerning the civil princip
Page 191 and 192:
Coptic Orthodox Church, 10 Council
Page 193 and 194:
Parousia, 24, 68, 93 Paul VI, 10, 1
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Digging Out the Embedded Church - The Maranatha Community

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