Month: June 2007

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Christian and Muslim Perspectives

I think the idea of a globalisation of solidarity is wonderful, and I am glad to say that CAFOD, the Catholic Agency for Overseas Development, has set in train a project called Live Simply, designed to help people live in solidarity with the poor. It has often struck me that Islam asks of its followers a similar commitment to solidarity with the poor. This seems clear in the idea of having a banking system that works in accordance with the basic principles of Islam. My thought is not that I should open an Islamic bank account, but rather that it may be time for Christian and Muslim economists to put their heads together to see what we can learn from each other in the sphere of genuine commitment to solidarity with the poor. Looking at the newspapers or the television news sometimes makes me shudder at the fate of so many people in the world who live in such a shocking state. But I feel uncomfortable and guilty if I cannot react. I do what I can; I imagine we all do, but I have a feeling that, together, we could do so much more.

A second thing we could undertake together to improve the state of tomorrowâ??s world for our children is to work for genuine freedom of religion. I have already mentioned that many British Muslims feel misrepresented or at least misunderstood in our media and in public opinion. You are not the only ones, but unfortunately in the present moment much more is being said about Islam than about Christianity or other religions. More than this, there are times when we may all feel that we are not exactly muzzled or silenced, but we are most certainly not free to express our deeply held convictions, sometimes simply for reasons linked to so-called â??political correctnessâ??. I think there are ways we can work with those who form public opinion to solve many of these problems, and I am certain that we should do this together.

Cardinal Cormac Murphy-O’Connor Christian and Muslim Perspectives on Inter-religious Dialogue

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Speaking from the Church

Among Catholic bishops, and among religious leaders in all communities, nobody has been more outspoken in this debate than Roger Cardinal Mahony of Los Angeles. Last year he received widespread media attention when he declared that he would engage in civil disobedience rather than comply with a law requiring him to report illegal immigrants, and he directed priests and other church workers to follow his lead. Many expressed admiration for his bold, even prophetic, stance, while others charged him with grandstanding, pointing out that nobody was suggesting that IDs should be checked at Mass or food kitchens.

More recently, Cardinal Mahony offered a comprehensive account of the Churchâ??s position on comprehensive immigration reform at the National Constitution Center in Philadelphia. He very specifically and repeatedly asserted that he was setting forth â??the underpinnings of the position of the Catholic Church on immigration reform legislation.â?? His lecture is sprinkled with expressions such as â??the church leadership argues that . . .â??; â??the Church maintains that . . .â??; and â??the Churchâ??s position is . . .â?? We are clearly given to understand that he is not merely expressing his own views or speaking in his capacity as the archbishop of Los Angeles but is speaking for the Catholic Church.

Richard John Neuhaus Who speaks for the Church?

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Christian University

Andy Goodliff has posted on The promise of a Christian university –

Christian University? You have got to wonder where he gets these ideas from. Andy posts a handy list of titles then, as these bloggers do, asks for more ideas.

Obviously his list includes Bristol’s finest, Gavin D’Costa Theology in the Public Square: Church, Academy and Nation

and the forthcoming Stanley Hauerwas The State of the University: Academic Knowledges and the Knowledge of God

Then what? Well, how about these?

Michael J. Buckley The Catholic University as Promise and Project

John C. Sommerville The Decline of the Secular University: Why the Academy Needs Religion

George M. Marsden The Soul of the American university and his earlier The outrageous idea of Christian Scholarship

Robert Benne Quality with Soul: How Six Premier Colleges and Universities Keep Faith with Their Religious Traditions. The six are Calvin, Wheaton, St. Olaf, Valparaiso, Baylor, and Notre Dame. Hum, not too many Catholic colleges there.

and of course the massive James T. Burtchaell The Dying of the Light: The Disengagement of Colleges and Universities from Their Christian Churches

Then the greatest analysis of the whole project of the university, Alasdair MacIntyre Three Rival Versions of Moral Enquiry: Encyclopaedia, Genealogy, and Tradition

Then on the wider faith-and-public-square issue there is the recent Ratzinger-Habermas dialogue of course Joseph Ratzinger The Dialectics of Secularization: On Reason and Religion

But, wait a minute, the very first thing that should be on this list is the magisterial Ex Corde Ecclesia – the Apostolic Constitution of John Paul II on Catholic Universities

BORN FROM THE HEART of the Church, a Catholic University is located in that course of tradition which may be traced back to the very origin of the University as an institution. It has always been recognized as an incomparable centre of creativity and dissemination of knowledge for the good of humanity. By vocation, the Universitas magistrorum et scholarium is dedicated to research, to teaching and to the education of students who freely associate with their teachers in a common love of knowledge. With every other University it shares that gaudium de veritate, so precious to Saint Augustine, which is that joy of searching for, discovering and communicating truth in every field of knowledge. A Catholic University’s privileged task is “to unite existentially by intellectual effort two orders of reality that too frequently tend to be placed in opposition as though they were antithetical: the search for truth, and the certainty of already knowing the fount of truth”.

Ah, at last. In the long run, it is not just the Christian university, it is not just the Catholic university, it is the university that is born from the heart of the Church.

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Partakers of Christ and partakers of God

In the De Decretis Athanasius argues against the opinion he had heard Eusebius express that the Son alone participates in the Father while we participate in the Son. If that were so, we would then be the Son’s sons. Rather, we are sons of the same Father as the Son is, our sonship being granted to us in accordance with our virtue, so that some sit on the twelve thrones, while others occupy lower places. Yet in a deeper sense the Son does participate in the Father. In the Contra Arianos Athanasius equates participation in the Father with the Father’s begetting. But since the essence of God cannot be divided, his begetting the Son means that he communicates himself wholly to the Son. When men partake of God, they therefore partake of the Son, ‘for that which is partaken of the Father is the Son’. Thus when men are said to ‘participate in the divine nature’, it means that the Son communicates himself to them.

This dynamic participation in the Logos is only possible because of the Incarnation and indeed is dependent specifically upon a Logos-sarx christology. When the Logos assumed a human body, he became the subject by the communicatio idiomatum of what the body experienced. ‘For what the human body of the Logos suffered, this the Logos, being united to the body, ascribed to himself in order that we might be enabled to participate in the godhead of the Logos’. By participating in the deified humanity of the Logos we participate in his impassible divinity, because the flesh has been endowed with divinity, just as the divinity has been endowed with humanity. Athanasius is silent about the soul, which in Origen plays an important part in mediating between the Logos and the flesh. In Athanasius’ view, because the Incarnation has transferred our nature to the Logos, we participate in the divine nature simply by participating in the humanity of the Logos.

Our participation in the Logos is made possible by the Spirit: ‘for through the Spirit we are all called partakers of God’. That is to say, we participate in the Son through baptism. The Spirit is the chrism and the seal with which the Logos anoints and seals us, making us, as it were, the fragrance of Christ. Another way of putting it is to say that the Son is life-in-itself, the Spirit is life-giving and the faithful are life-endowed. It is because the Spirit is divine that he is able to make us ‘partakers of the divine nature’, that is, of Christ, for the divine nature is not impersonal. Through the Spirit we become ‘partakers of Christ and partakers of God’.

Norman Russell Partakers of the Divine Nature (2 Peter 1:4) in the Byzantine Tradition

And have you seen Norman Russell The Doctrine of Deification in the Greek Patristic Tradition ?

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Not to separate precipitously

At the very least, then, the Lambeth Conference is like a council in that its purpose from the beginning has been to confront divisive issues with both truth and charity, engaged through the work of the Holy Spirit, and so nourishing and preserving unity in the midst of division. Thus, to insist that agreement be present before meeting – and despite previous meetings! – is simply to void the purpose of the meeting in the first place. Further, to separate precipitously from a body that no longer resembles Christian truth and practice as one understands them, or that seems incapable to upholding them, is to foreclose on the pneumatic promises of providence that call us into council in the first place.

The above points do not entail the conclusion that discipline cannot or should not be imposed on those who persist in an alien way or who scandalize by their behavior. I, like many others, believe such discipline is in fact required. Still, such alien and scandalous life should be confronted rather than avoided by absenting oneself from an encounter in the Lord and refusing the obligation to hold to account in the power of the Lord. The primary point behind all this is that Christians have been given a divine narrative and vocation that insists upon engaged suffering as a means of witness, rather than upon departure and beginning anew as a means of protest and self-protection. Thus, the prophets (eg Jeremiah) and Christ suffer among their people. They do not leave them to form another people.

Ephraim Radner Lambeth Can Be What It Wants To Be

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Old Testament

Here are a couple of titles that caught my eye while putting together a bibliography for next term’s Old Testament course

Aidan Nichols Lovely like Jerusalem: The Fulfillment of the Old Testament in Christ and the Church

The highly regarded spiritual writer and theologian Fr. Aidan Nichols, O.P. presents an overview of the Old Testament by showing what it is and its relationship to the New Testament. He explains that it is essential for one to be familiar with the Old Testament in order to understand properly, and in a deeper way, the richness and message of the New. In particular, Fr. Nichols shows how important it is to grasp that connection in order to understand better and to believe in the message and the person of Christ.

Ignorance of the Old Testament makes it impossible to comprehend the entire divine plan that stretches between the two Testaments. Nichols maintains that we are ill-equipped to read and understand the great theologians, saints, and Scripture commentators of the Christian era without a deep familiarity with the Old Testament. Even understanding and appreciating the art of the Church remains limited if the Old Testament is a closed book for us.

Nichols made use of studies by biblical experts from various Christian denominations–notably Evangelicals and Anglicans–in writing this widely appealing work. He also drew on the Fathers and Doctors of the Church to help illuminate the beauty of the relationship between the two Testaments.

“In this marvelous work of biblical theology and patristic ressourcement, Aidan Nichols illumines the pattern of God’s promises in salvation history in a manner that will be accessible and informative to students, pastors, and scholars. Other than Pope Benedict XVI, no theologian writing today has mastered so well the approach to Scripture set forth by such giants as Jean Danielou, Louis Bouyer, and Henri de Lubac. This book should be read by everyone who seeks an understanding of Scripture and of the early Christian Fathers.”
–Matthew Levering, Associate Professor of Theology, Ave Maria University

Robert Wilken Isaiah: Interpreted by Early Christian and Medieval Commentators

In his extremely thorough work on Isaiah, Robert Wilken brings to bear his considerable knowledge of early Christianity. Drawing on writings of the church fathers — Eusebius of Caesarea, Ambrose, Jerome, Cyril of Alexandria, Theodoret of Cyrus, Bernard of Clairvaux, and nearly sixty others — all of them masterfully translated, this work allows the complex words of Isaiah to come alive.

Wilken’s selection of ancient commentators clearly illuminates how Isaiah was used by the New Testament writers and understood by the early church fathers. Each chapter begins with a modern English translation of the septuagint, prepared by Moisés Silva. Editorial comments provide a foundation for understanding the excerpted commentaries and other writings that follow for each chapter.

Read everything by Wilken. And you know Brian E Daley The Hope of the Early Church: A Handbook of Patristic Eschatology

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Freeing speech

For Oâ??Donovan, the extraordinary events of that Pentecost day changed the world forever. Godâ??s people became open to mutual address.

â?¢ It eventually led to the â??conciliar movementâ?? in Christendomâ??a call upon the Pope to take seriously the Christian wisdom of others.
â?¢ In turn, there blossomed parliamentary movement in civil societyâ??a call upon the King to take seriously the wisdom, whether Christian or otherwise, of others.
â?¢ Threaded into this story is the Reformation, and the â??non-conformistâ?? movement among Christiansâ??a call by Christians upon each other to understand that claims for theological truth must be settled by words, not power, as the Bible is discussed freely among groups who freely meet together.

It comes as quite a surprise for many people to see the central role of Christianity in this historical story. In the popular alternative, secularism invented â??free speechâ??: while Christians were busily killing each other, the â??Enlightenmentâ?? saved the West by inventing free and rational enquiry. But that account is heavily mythological, and simply fails to notice all the developments in medieval Christendom that gave rise to the very possibility of free speech. A seed fell on the day of Pentecost, and sprouted in the soil of Christendom.

There was no political â??free speechâ?? in the Roman empire. But after Pentecost during the centuries that followed, political authority had â??to confront and accommodate the free discourse of a society which has learned to recognise authority also in the word spoken by God by manservants and maidservantsâ?? (Oliver O’Donovan The Desire of the Nations p. 269). If God could use anyone in his church to speak truth, then potentially, any voice could now address the society about the common good.

Andrew Cameron Freeing Speech

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An oddly self-regarding conceit

(Last week the Islamic scholar and reformer Tariq Ramadan argued in the Guardian for an end to calls on British Muslims to integrate. Here, Prospect editor David Goodhart replies)

The idea that British foreign policy has been run on an anti-Muslim agenda does not stand examination. In Bosnia and Kosovo (and Sierra Leone), Britain took military action on behalf of Muslims, in some cases against Christians. In Iraq, rightly or wrongly (and Prospect was opposed to Britain’s role) we helped to remove a secular dictator, and we will leave behind a Muslim democracy of some kind. If there has been a disproportionate intervention in Muslim countries, it is mainly because those countries are disproportionately unstable and conflict-ridden. Of course, I am aware it is not seen like that in much of the Muslim world—where the typical hypocrisy and realpolitik of the west (relating to UN resolutions, Israel, oil, good dictators and bad dictators) always seems to bear down on Muslims. But the belief that it is all about Islam is an oddly self-regarding conceit, arising from the prickliness and defensiveness that many Muslims feel confronted with a stronger and more successful western world. And if British Muslims are so troubled by the loss of Muslim life, why did we hear so little about the greatest unnecessary loss of such life in recent times in the Iran-Iraq war? No, unfortunately, what moves many political Muslims is the loss of Muslim life that can in some way be construed as the fault of the west. Shouldn’t you be using your influence to combat this anti-western, victim mentality among your fellow Muslims?

David Goodhart Open Letter to Tariq Ramadan

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Conversations in Deep Church

Westminster Theological Centre – Conversations in Deep Church
4 evenings beginning June 19th 2007

The late C.S. Lewis coined the expression Deep Church in a call for a concerted exploration of the resources in the Christian tradition that unite orthodox Christians across the denominational and theological spectrums. One of Lewis’ concerns was the erosion of a common Christian language and discipleship; the loss of the most basic understanding of the gospel that has been believed by the Church at all times and in all places.

In the last five years the Deep Church vision has been reawakened in the UK with St Paul’s, Hammersmith in London hosting regular discussions under the leadership of Prof. Andrew Walker, Dr Luke Bretherton, Revd. Simon Downham and Revd. Ian Stackhouse. These discussions have now produced three publications (GOSPEL DRIVEN CHURCH by Ian Stackhouse, EVANGELICALS AND TRADITION Daniel Williams and REMEMBERING OUR FUTURE), a series of lectures by Prof. Walker (at Westminster Theological Centre in the Autumn of 2007) and some new discussion at Andy Goodliff and deepchurch.blogspot.com and deepchurch.org.uk.

Explorations in Deep Church takes the discussion wider with professional educators from around the UK bringing the best of today’s theology to those of us committed to a passionate discipleship, orthodox faith and dynamic witness to a fast changing post-modern world.

Week 1 (19th June): Dr. Graham Tomlin – Luther, the Cross and the Christian Life

Week 2 (26th June): Dr. Chris Joby – Why do Christians worship?

Week 3 (3rd July): Dr. Alan Spence – The humanity of Christ

Week 4 (10th July): Dr. Douglas Knight – The people of the Spirit in the Body of Christ

Tuesdays 19th, 26th June & 3rd, 10th July 2007 7 – 9pm
Weeks 1 & 2 at St Mary’s Church, York St, London W1H 1EA
Weeks 3 7 4 at St Mark’s Church 245 Old Marylebone Road, London NW1 5QT