Aside from the obvious, what would the Christians churches around the world lose by reverting to the standards of the pre-Schism Church in terms of faith and practice? What Gospel essentials would be lost?
Sure, Rome would have to give up the filioque, which she has seemed willing recently to do. Then there's the Pope-thing. Granted, it's not like you can consider that optional if you want to be a Roman Catholic. But surely the ties of the Western churches in communion with the Roman See need not be lost. Wouldn't it be possible to envision an arrangment of organization (at least transitionally) in which Rome kept her jurisdictions? And as far as papal infallibility and the immaculate conception, couldn't these be subsumed under the review of the pre-Schism standard?
Of course, Protestants have more to worry about. The cacophonous mulitiplicity of polities would have to be submitted to the scrutiny of the New Testament and earliest Church Fathers. Then there's the doctrines relative to Holy Baptism and the Holy Eucharist. Protestants would have to learn to submit their theologies to the consensus of Scripture and Church.
But if its between perpetuating our human institutions and assuming that we're so much smarter than they were a thousand years ago, and making real the visible unity of the Church in our own lives and groups--well, why wouldn't we opt for unity? This isn't a matter of performing a Jurassic Park experiment. It's a matter of a living faith where all parties in humiliity and love submit themselves and all their lives unto Christ our God and to one another. It's the living faith of the common mind of the Church. In Pelikan's words: "the living faith of the dead" not "the dead faith of the living."
I know where I want to cast my lot. My wife, however, is at another place in her own pilgrimage. So I made some calls yesterday afternoon to some churches near our home. The number to one had been disconnected. Information about another that came to light revealed an unrepentant adherence to heresy and immorality (though called something else, to be sure). I left a message at a third, but haven't been contacted yet.
How [expletive] depressing. In smalltown USA, where I've spent most of my life, you may have five or six different denominations represented, mostly Protestant. Of course, in Chicago, well, multiplicity is the order of the day. I look around and all I see is schism, schism and more schism. Does God still work in the midst of all this? Mysteriously, and wonderfully, I believe the answer is yes. But my job in my home is to lead my family in the faith and practice of the New Testament Church. It's awful dadgum hard to do that when all I see around me is human monuments.
God have mercy on us all, and on me a sinner.
Posted by Clifton at March 1, 2003 08:05 PM | TrackBack