Roman or Catholic?

An Unsettled Tension 
One of the roles of the pope has always been the maintenance of the balance between the Roman and the Catholic dimensions. Roman Catholicism is the ongoing tension between two fundamental aspects of the whole: the Roman side, with its emphasis on centralized authority, pyramidal structure, binding teaching and the rigidity of canon law; and the Catholic side, with its emphasis on the universal outlook, the absorption of ideas and cultures and the inclusive embrace of practices into the Catholic whole. The resulting system is Roman Catholicism, at the same time Roman and Catholic. The human genius of Roman Catholicism and one of the reasons for its survival across the centuries has been its ability to be both, though not without tensions and risks of disruption.

Popes embody the Roman Catholic synthesis by holding together the Roman apparatus and the Catholic vision. Of course, they each do it differently, especially after the Second Vatican Council. John Paul II, for example, was a very Roman pope but at the same time a very Catholic one. For example, he strongly defended traditional Roman Catholic teaching (e.g. by launching the 1992 Catechism of the Catholic Church), but was second to none in promoting the universality of this Church around the world (e.g. inter-religious dialogue, traveling globally). Unlike John Paul II, who was both Roman and Catholic, Benedict XVI made the pendulum swing over the Roman pole. With his staunch conservativism in areas such as liturgy, morality and the critical relationship with the secular world, Benedict appeared to be more Roman than Catholic. He seemed to be a rigid, centripetal, doctrinaire pope. A Roman pope. Many felt that his papacy, while strong in its Roman centredness and boundaries, was weak in its Catholic breadth and warmth.

This criticism helps explain why a pope like Francis was chosen to succeed him. With the election of Pope Francis, Rome seemed to be wanting the pendulum to move in the opposite direction in order to re-address the balance. Distancing himself from many Roman features of the office (e.g. his refusal of the pomp of the Vatican Curia, his blurred teaching that leans away from official teachings), Francis has embodied the role of a very Catholic pope. His stress on “Who are we to judge?”, universal brotherhood with Muslims and other religions,ecological concerns, etc. made his papacy significantly shaped by the Catholic elements. The open-endedness of his teaching, coupled with the ambiguity of his language, has created some interest in the secular West, which resonates with much of what he says on social issues. This is to say that he is a very Catholic pope. Perhaps too Catholic andtoo little Roman for a growing number of Roman Catholics!

http://vaticanfiles.org/en/2020/02/vf172/

Dracula on the move

L'Osservatore Romano

Dracula has been leaving a trail of exsanguinated victims in Poland, Spain, France, Italy and Ireland. Police are stymied by the fact that Dracula is a shapeshifter. In addition, he's invisible to security cameras. All of which make him exceedingly elusive. 

Church authorities have had more success tacking him down, but with demoralizing effects. The usual techniques have proven ineffectual, resulting in Dracula exsanguinating the church's best vampireslayers. 

The reason is that Catholic vampireslayers have nothing to use against Dracula since he's Romanian Orthodox. A Latin cross or crucifix is ineffectual. They need to use a Byzantine cross. Making the sign of the cross is ineffectual because Catholic vampireslayers cross themselves backwards: from left to right rather than right to left. Holy water is ineffectual because Catholic vampireslayers profess the Filioque, thereby invalidating the sacramental. The Vatican has been in negotiations with the Ecumenical Patriarch to dispatch Rumanian Orthodox vampireslayers to the West, but the Ecumenical Patriarch has demanded that the Pope come home to mother church before he authorizes such action. 

Schism

1. Catholic polemical theology stresses the grave sin of schism. But that's circular because schism in Catholic usage is basically a made-up category. And don't quote me NT passages that use the word "schism" in Greek, because that's a semantic fallacy. In ecclesiastical usage, "schism" is a technical term. NT Greek usage doesn't have that specialized meaning.

The NT does have two related categories: heresy and apostasy. The clearest NT example of schism are the heretics who broke away from St. John's congregations (1 John). But, of course, evangelicals don't think the Catholic church is comparable to John's congregations. If anything, it's the other way around. The Catholic church broke away from NT exemplars. 

2. Here's another problem with the traditional Catholic allegation that Protestant denominations are schismatic. Schismatic in relation to what? To the church of Rome? A basic problem with that comparison is that the church of Rome keeps reinventing itself. Even though Protestants broke away from the 16C church of Rome, that no longer exists. It isn't possible to reunite with the 16C church of Rome, even if that was desirable. The 16C church of Rome is radically different from the 21C church of Rome. The 1C church of Rome is very different from the 6C church of Rome. How can you be schismatic in relation to a "parent" denomination that's constantly changing? The church of Rome keeps mutating into something else. 

Of course, Catholic apologists insist that there's fundamental continuity, but that's only convincing to Catholic apologists and like-minded Catholics. 

All be one

that they may all be one (Jn 17:21).

That's a Catholic prooftext I've discussed a more than one occasion. Some additional observations:

i) Catholics mentally translate this into a prayer that all Christians be (or become) Roman Catholic. But on the Catholic construal, not only has Christ's prayer gone unanswered for 2000 years, Catholicism has lost ground over time. For instance, Europe, Quebec, Great Britain, Latin America, and the USA are far less Catholic than they used to be. 

ii) Furthermore, what hinders the Father from granting the Son's request? If it is God's wish that every Christian be Roman Catholic, God could greatly facilitate his wish by providing unmistakable evidence for Roman Catholicism in Scripture and church history. Instead of Catholic apologists laboring to piece together a case for Roman Catholicism from isolated prooftexts and quote-mining church fathers, God could have inspired the Bible to make very explicit statements about Roman Catholic theology, to establish a Roman monarchal episcopate from the get-go, and to give Roman Catholicism a monopoly on miracles. 

Missionary syndrome

http://whatswrongwiththeworld.net/2019/06/missionary_syndrome.html

I'm a schismatic!

In light of Catholic ecumenism, it's worth recalling that all Protestants are still officially classified as schismatics: 

schism is the refusal of submission to the Supreme Pontiff (1983 CIC 751). 

http://www.vatican.va/archive/ENG1104/__P2H.HTM

Marriage to a Praying Mantis

I'll comment on this post:

https://matthewtuininga.wordpress.com/2018/04/25/christian-ethics-protestant-and-catholic-500-years-after-the-reformation/

Protestant ethics was centered on biblical authority, they argued, while Roman Catholic ethics, because of its natural law tradition, was far too enamored with the powers of human reason. Protestants emphasized the consistency of the Bible’s moral teaching, summarized in the Ten Commandments, while Roman Catholics wrongly contrasted the new law of the gospel with the old law of Israel.

In some ways, to be sure, the reformers themselves paved the way for this contrast. While they upheld the traditional Christian teaching that God’s moral will is written on the human heart and in the creation order (i.e., natural law), they expressed fresh skepticism regarding the capabilities of human reason. While they insisted that Christians were to interpret the Ten Commandments in light of the law’s fulfillment in Christ, they downplayed any meaningful contrast between the ethical teaching of the old and new testaments.

1. It oversimplifies the issue to say Protestant ethics centered on the Decalogue. 

i) Does Lutheran ethics center on the Decalogue? Does Anabaptist ethics center on the Decalogue? What about Anglican theology a la Hooker? 

ii) Even in Presbyterianism, there's the general equity of the Mosaic law in addition to the Decalogue. 

2. A common problem with natural law appeals is how Catholic apologists gerrymander natural law to retroactively defend positions that were arrived at independently of natural law, based on ecclesiastical authority. Case in point is the Catholic position on contraception. 

Over time, however, many evangelical Protestants virtually abandoned the concept of natural law altogether, in favor of an emphasis on biblical authority. And because of their emphasis on the Ten Commandments as the perfect expression of God’s moral will, they largely ignored the distinctiveness of the New Testament’s virtue-oriented, Christocentric approach to ethics. Thus one could look far and wide for any meaningful Protestant study of Christian virtues akin to that of Aquinas.

1. I don't object to natural law in principle, but it's usually bedeviled by lack of specificity.

2. Did Aquinas have a Christocentric approach to ethics?

3. The virtue-orientated aspect of Protestant ethics is indexed to a pastoral theology of mortification and sanctification (e.g. John Owen, Richard Sibbes). 

4. The relation between OT and NT ethics is a matter of perennial theological debate. 

5. Does Tuininga think NT ethics is virtue-oriented in contrast to OT ethics? Of course, the Mosaic law is largely a civil and penal code, so it's focussed on behavior. But there's also a recurring theme about circumcision of the heart in OT ethics. 

6. What about classic examples of Protestant casuistry by William Perkins, William Ames, and Richard Baxter? 

Yet even here, as Protestants we have much to learn from our Catholic brothers and sisters. 

Bible scholars like Richard Bauckham, Gordon Wenham, and Christopher Wright have done yeoman work on OT ethics. Likewise, we have fine evangelical ethicists like John Frame, John Feinberg, and John Jefferson Davis. 

For example, the Catholic church has long promoted and protected Christian celibacy as an alternative to marriage, in line with the example and teaching of Jesus and the Apostle Paul. 

The Catholic church has long promoted and protected clerical pederasty as an alternative to marriage, in line with the example of bacha bazi in Islam. 

Likewise, the Catholic church has held faithfully to the sanctity of marriage, insisting that divorce is profoundly incompatible with the sacramental meaning of marriage as an analogy for the unity between Christ and the church. 

Likewise, the Catholic church has skirted the sanctity of marriage through the loophole of annulment. The "sanctity of marriage" in Catholicism is a sham. 

In Scripture, marriage is a covenant, not a sacrament. 

In stark contrast, Protestants have tended to overemphasize marriage as the only ideal life plan for all Christians, while at the same time tolerating and even defending the prevalence of divorce.

In stark contrast, Protestants agree with Scripture that there are justifiable grounds for divorce.  

Protestants also have much to learn from Catholic social teaching as it pertains to poverty and oppression. 

Like how the Roman Catholic church used to oppress theological dissidents, viz. the Inquisition, Exsurge Domine? Like how the Catholic church exploited the poor through the sale of indulgences? 

Classic Christian thought taught that God has given the world to human beings in common. It affirmed the legitimacy of property subject to the requirement that those who have what they need share with those who do not, in order that the poor might receive justice. This has evolved into the modern Catholic concept of solidarity, which calls Christians to bear the burdens of those who are poor and oppressed. 

Poverty isn't always the result of injustice. 

Protestants would do well to emulate the Catholic conviction that the sanctity of life requires vigorous protection at every stage and in every form, like a “seamless garment” from beginning to end.

That's a euphemism for opposition to capital punishment. 

The gospel of the kingdom and its righteousness remains the same as it did one thousand and two thousand years ago…

The NT Gospel remains the same. But that's hardly the Gospel preached by Rome a 1000 years ago, or 500 years ago, or today. Catholicism is a different religion from biblical theism. 

…and faithful Protestants and Catholics of all denominations will increasingly find that, as pilgrims on the same journey, serving one Lord with one faith, they will come much nearer to their goal if they walk together than if they walk separately.

Oh, Gosh, all we need is a picture of a cowboy riding off into the sunset with an angel choir in the background. Catholic theology and Protestant theology represent divergent theological visions. A road sign pointing in different directions. 

Disunity Predates The Reformation And Is Rampant Among Non-Christians

We're getting the predictable media stories about how the Reformation supposedly brought about such lamentable disunity, like here and here. Stories like these don't mention that it was common for people to complain about widespread disunity in Christianity long before the Reformation occurred. Celsus raised the issue in his treatise against Christianity in the second century. Origen wrote a response to Celsus in the third century, and he made another point there that's ignored by media stories like the ones linked above. As Origen noted, we also find widespread disunity in philosophy, medicine, and other fields, not just in Christianity or only in religious circles. (To read more about what Celsus, Origen, and other pre-Reformation sources said on issues of unity, see here and here.) Maybe the media should run some stories on how lamentable it is that modern journalism is so fractured, with so many reporters and media organizations disagreeing about issues related to journalism, holding differing views of journalistic ethics, competing with each other, hating each other, working to undermine each other, and so on. Yes, there's a lot of disunity in professing Christianity. The same is true of Islam, Judaism, Buddhism, Hinduism, atheism, science, medicine, politics, journalism, philosophy, etc.

Van Til was “Prophetically True” on Roman Catholicism

Daniel the Prophet Accurately Describes Roman Catholicism

Leonardo De Chirico explicates Van Til’s view of
the syncretism of Roman Catholicism

In his latest issue of Vatican Files, Leonard De Chirico has published an excerpt of a paper given at a September 2014 conference in Rome entitled “Rerum Novarum: Neo-Calvinism and Roman Catholicism”. Google translates “Rerum Novarum” as “of the new things”. That is also the title of a papal encyclical, Rerum Novarum, by “Pope Leo XIII”, and the title indicates “the spirit of revolutionary change” – beginning with the “Rights and Duties of Capital and Labor”.

This theme was an appropriate point of contact between neo-Calvinists of the late 19th century, and it was deemed to be the theme of a program in 2014 as well. Here is the theme of the program from the organizers:

Roman Catholicism was a world player when neo-Calvinism began to develop from the second half of the nineteenth century onwards. At that time, both Catholicism and Protestantism went through substantial changes. For the neo-Calvinists, Catholicism functioned as both an antagonist and an ally in their struggle to uphold religion in the modern age of ‘rerum Novarum’. The neo-Calvinists were the first Protestants to cooperate openly with Roman Catholics in politics and on social issues. Theologically they were particularly interested in neo-Thomism, but remained critical of Roman Catholicism until after the Second World War and the Second Vatican Council.

The conference will focus on the theological, ecclesial, philosophical, political, social and cultural interactions between the two traditions: in what ways did they influence and approach each other, on which aspects did they continue to differ and why, and how could their relationship over a century and a half best be described?

This, it seems to me, is a useful approach that Reformed scholars and believers can take in addressing Roman Catholicism. Especially useful, it seems, is the paper given by De Chirico (excerpted here, and to be given in a fuller form in a book-length project soon to be released from this conference): “The clay of Paganism with the iron of Christianity: Cornelius Van Til’s Critique of Roman Catholicism”.

Mere Protestantism

This post is a sequel to my prior post:

http://triablogue.blogspot.com/2017/09/interpretive-levels.html

I'll comment on this:

http://reformingcatholicconfession.com/

I guess the best thing that can be said for it is the pertinent reminder that the Reformation isn't over. It says a lot of things I can agree with. It has some good signatories, as well as some not so good signatories. However, I won't be signing "A Reforming Catholic Confession". I'll begin with two lesser objections:

i) Jerry Walls cochaired the drafting committee. Jerry plays a Julius Kelp/Buddy Love character, wherein he can instantly transform from a militant anti-Calvinist to "the most ecumenical man in the room" and back again. The makeup is impressive, yet the actor underneath the magnanimous makeup isn't the ecumenist, but the militant anti-Calvinist. Sorry, but I can't exercise the willing suspension of disbelief to take his performance seriously. 

ii) The document is terribly redundant inasmuch as there's already plethora of "mere Protestant" creeds in circulation. Every evangelical seminary, college, denomination, and parachurch ministry has a generic evangelical statement of faith. 

However, I wouldn't say (i-ii) are deal-breakers. Moving along:

He will judge the world, consigning any who persist in unbelief to an everlasting fate apart from him, where his life and light are no more. 

Notice what that doesn't say. No mention of "eternal misery" or "everlasting conscious punishment". It's worded in such a way that an annihilationist can sign it. And that's probably intentional.

Perhaps a supporter of the "mere Protestant" confession will say it doesn't deny everlasting conscious punishment. 

Yet creeds are equally important for what they exclude as well as what they include. That's a basic function of creeds. To draw boundaries. To rule some positions out of bounds. 

And needless to say, it is equally silent on Purgatory, which is making a comeback thanks the cochairman of the drafting committee (Jerry Walls). 

What about penal substitution? That, too, is passed over in silence. How mere can you get? 

By the same token, this "mere Protestant" confession is silent on open theism. A "mere Protestant" confession that leaves the door open for open theism, annihilationism, and Purgatory is too mere for me. 

That Protestants are divided is equally obvious and, given our Lord’s prayer for unity (“that they may be one” – John 17:11), even more grievous.

i) Sigh. By that logic, the Son's prayer has gone unanswered for 2000 years. Even if, after 2000 years, the Father finally got around to granting the Son's petition, isn't that like a health insurance company authorizing treatment a week after the patient died? 

ii) Didn't Jesus say the Father always hears him (Jn 11:41-42). So shouldn't we believe that the Father already granted the Son's petition? Indeed, that the Father has been continuously granting that petition, throughout the course of church history–from the inception up to the present–until the Parousia? 

In that event, we should see in church history an answer to that prayer. If we fail to see that, it must be because we're looking for the wrong thing. 

What kind of unity is Jesus referring to? I think the best explanation is that if believers are in fellowship with the Triune God, then believers are thereby in fellowship with one another (1 Jn 1:3,6-7).

Our reforming catholic confession sets forth the catholic substance of the faith (the consensual tradition worked out over the first few centuries of church history about the triune God) according to the Protestant principles of the faith (sola scriptura, sola gratia, sola fide).

i) Freewill theists don't believe in sola gratia. They have a synergistic soteriology.

ii) What about Protestants who reject the classic Protestant (e.g. Reformed or Lutheran) view of justification in favor of something like the New Perspective on Paul? Or the more recent position of John Barclay? 

That these two ordinances, baptism and the Lord’s Supper, which some among us call “sacraments,” are bound to the Word by the Spirit as visible words proclaiming the promise of the gospel, and thus become places where recipients encounter the Word again. Baptism and the Lord’s Supper communicate life in Christ to the faithful, confirming them in their assurance that Christ, the gift of God for the people of God, is indeed “for us and our salvation” and nurturing them in their faith.

I think the sacraments are simply pictures. 

the Spirit proceeded to guide (and continues to guide) the church into a right understanding of these foundational texts (John 15:26; 16:13).

In a sense this is the right doctrine from the wrong texts. 

i) In context, Jn 15:26 & 16:13 isn't a promise to "the church". 

ii) There is a sense in which God continues to guide "the church". God gives teachers to the church. And God preserves the elect. That doesn't render them infallible, but to keep them faithful, God prevents them from straying too far. 

Yet, given the weight of orthodox judgment and catholic consensus, individuals and churches do well to follow the example of the Reformers and accept as faithful interpretations and entailments of Scripture the decisions of the councils of Nicaea (325), Constantinople (381), Ephesus (431), and Chalcedon (451) concerning the nature of the Triune God and Jesus Christ.

"the weight of orthodox judgment and catholic consensus" is not a reliable criterion. That's an intellectual shortcut, and the appeal amounts to a circular argument. By definition, "orthodox judgement" is orthodox, but that tautology is useless in ascertaining orthodoxy. You already need a preconception of orthodoxy to recognize examples of orthodoxy in church history. 

Moreover, "catholic consensus" is a very small sample. Most Christians were uneducated back then. They were in no position to exercise independent judgment. 

One set of Christians is not the doctrinal benchmark for another set of Christians.  Divine revelation is the only standard of orthodox. The onus is not on modern-day Christians to conform their beliefs to a "catholic consensus". Rather, the onus is on a "catholic consensus" to match up with divine revelation. 

Reunion with Rome

Ecumenists pine for reunion. I notice that Catholic convert Bryan Cross has a "Week of Prayer for Christian Unity" over at Called to Confusion. Evidently, he has a deep emotional investment in this issue. Does he lie in bed, staring at the ceiling, as he contemplates the plight of his "separated brethren"? Is that a cause for insomnia?

Now, an interesting but unexplored question that ecumenism raises is what reunion with Rome actually requires. Before Vatican II, the answer was clearcut. To join the Roman Church, you had to renounce your Protestant theology and adopt Catholic theology. You had to submit to the Roman Magisterium. 

But let's consider two examples. Archbishop Lefebvre was finally excommunicated. But to my knowledge, he was excommunicated, not because of what he believed, and not because of what he said, but because of what he did. He wasn't excommunicated for denying the authority of Vatican II. Rather, he was excommunicated because his actions were deemed to be schismatic, by consecrating breakaway bishops.

Then there's the case of Hans Küng. Although he's a notorious gadfly, he hasn't been formally excommunicated. He hasn't even been defrocked. Although it's possible for a Catholic to incur automatic excommunication, to my knowledge there's no indication that Rome thinks Küng ever crossed that line. Indeed, he's on friendly terms with Pope Francis. In fact, he even remains on amicable terms with archrival Joseph Ratzinger (aka Pope Benedict XVI). 

That raises some interesting questions about Catholic identity in relation to Protestant identity. Suppose I'm born into a pious Catholic family. I'm diligently catechized. My family takes me to Mass every Sunday.

Suppose, in my teens, after conducting my own studies, I change my theological beliefs. I adopt classic Protestant beliefs. 

Am I still Catholic? From a Protestant perspective, I'm not longer Catholic. But from an official Catholic perspective, am I still Catholic? Or have I incurred automatic excommunication?

Given the current state of Catholic theology, it's possible, from what I can tell, to be simultaneously Catholic and Protestant. I can be Catholic without sacrificing any of my Protestant beliefs. I didn't step on any tripwires by changing my beliefs. 

If so, then joining the church of Rome wouldn't require me to leave my Protestant faith behind. Traditionally, for a Protestant to become Catholic involves conversion from one to the other. By becoming Catholic, you cease to be Protestant. But is that still the case? Or can you now be both at the same time?

Suppose there hadn't been a Protestant Reformation. Suppose you didn't have that formal break. Suppose, instead, some cradle Catholics developed Protestant beliefs. They might be considered dissenters, like Küng. But given how tolerant Rome has become regarding theological dissenters within its ranks, even in the episcopate, it seems as though Protestants could just be another theological faction under the big tent to Roman Catholicism. Consider the two synods which took place under the auspices of Pope Francis. You had German bishops who publicly opposed the status quo. They weren't relieved of duty for insubordination. If anything, it was the old guard that was sidelined. 

Even Dominus Iesus referred to Protestant denominations as "ecclesial communities". And Pope Francis might well take a softer line than Ratzinger. 

The upshot is to explore the hollowness of what reunion with Rome amounts to these days. If my analysis is correct, Protestants could reunite with Rome without recanting or modifying any classic Protestant beliefs. They could return to Mother Church with their traditional theology entirely intact. 

There is, of course, something manifestly absurd about that hypothetical prospect, yet that's consistent with post-Vatican II trajectories. So ironically, if the dream of ecumenists like Bryan Cross came true, that change would be utterly superficial. There'd be no substantive change in Protestant theology. You needn't even meet Rome halfway. The theological boundaries of Rome have become so fuzzy that it's like Hinduism. 

The Pope's Failed Visit To America And His Failed Leadership

Here's a New York Times story that unintentionally illustrates how corrupt the Catholic Church is and how bad of a leader Pope Francis is. For example:

But mostly Francis demonstrated a nuanced political dexterity, effectively sidestepping the familiar framework of American debate while charting his own broader path. He advocated “life” but emphasized opposition to the death penalty, not abortion. He made strong stands for religious freedom — a major issue for American bishops — but refocused the concept on interfaith tolerance and harmony….

Francis responded on this trip by advising the bishops to use less harsh language, be less critical and offer a more welcoming approach in the church and in society. “Our common house can no longer tolerate sterile divisions,” he said Sunday during his final Mass, on the Benjamin Franklin Parkway.

He never mentioned same-sex marriage — and is opposed to it — but analysts say his message was that bishops should focus less on such issues and more on pastoring to Catholic families over all….

While Francis needed to be careful wading into politics, “complete silence on these issues demoralizes those who are on the front lines of these battles,” wrote R. R. Reno, the editor of First Things, a conservative journal on religion in public life. “The only specific issues Francis mentioned before Congress are associated with progressive politics.”…

“I love the inclusiveness of this pope,” she said. “He stepped outside the borders of what’s been acceptable before in the Catholic Church.”

While everyone in the church if not the country was parsing what Francis said during his visit, the faithful, including Ms. Giovinco, heard unmitigated tolerance. “He’s following the original precepts of the church: Love one another.”

Contrast the Pope's behavior with Jesus' calls for repentance, confrontations, and rebuking of his contemporaries in the gospels, the behavior of the apostles in Acts, and how early church leaders like Polycarp and Athanasius conducted themselves. For documentation of the contrast between the ecumenism of modern Catholicism and the beliefs and practice of patristic Christianity, see the fourth post in the comments section of the thread here.

Are denominations a winnowing process?

for there must be factions among you in order that those who are genuine among you may be recognized (1 Cor 11:19).

i) Ecumenists lament denominations. However, this verse raises the question of whether denominations are, in fact, necessary. 

ii) Some commentators think the verse must be ironic. Surely Paul can't say anything good about factions. Hasn't he been attacking factions within the church?

iii) Keep in mind that there's nothing in the wording of the verse itself to indicate that Paul is speaking ironically. Unless we think Paul can't be serious, there's no reason to reach for the ironic interpretation.

iv) To say that Paul thought factions are bad is simplistic. For instance, it depends on which side of the dividing line you're on, and how you got there. For one thing, you might have two (or more factions) because one group broke away from another. It's not that all parties concerned are divisive. If one group breaks ranks with another, that leaves two factions–but not because both were necessarily divisive. Rather, one group separates from another while the other group finds itself separated–as a result of the group which initiated the split. "We didn't leave you–you left us!"

You can also have factions because one group expels another group. That's different than one group splitting from another.  

Likewise, there are situations in which it may be necessary to break away. OT prophets often stood apart from the religious establishment. As did John the Baptist. As did Jesus. As did Paul himself. So it depends on whether one has just case. Even if factionalism is blameworthy, that doesn't entail that each party is blameworthy.

v) Division can be a winnowing process. Sifting the wheat from the chaff. The Bible often uses that type of metaphor. As one commentator observes:

Although this could possibly be irony…more likely it is a reflection of Paul's "already/not yet" eschatological perspective (see on 4:1-5). 

In keeping with the teaching of Jesus [Mt 10:34-37; 24:9-13], Paul expected "division" to accompany the End, divisions that would separate true believers from those who were false…Paul, therefore, probably sees their present divisions as part of the divine "testing/sifting" process already at work in their midst…God is working out the divine purposes; those who truly belong to God, the "tested/approved" (dokimoi=those who have passed the "examination"), are already being manifest in their midst, and presumably they will escape the final judgment that is coming upon the world (v32). G. Fee, The First Epistle to the Corinthians (Eerdmans, rev. ed., 2014), 596-97. 

Returning to an empty lot

Every year, predictably, there are Roman Catholics and ecumenists who lament or complain about Reformation Day. The Reformation was, at best a "tragic necessity," and we should work overtime on interfaith dialogue to achieve reconciliation. 

One obvious problem with that scenario is that it isn't even possible to return to Rome, even if you wanted to. The Church of Rome which the Protestant Reformers left behind no longer exists. That's long gone. It's like going back home to an empty lot. Just weeds. The house was bulldozed years ago. 

You can still convert to Rome, but you can't revert to Rome. Not unless you're a post-Vatican II cradle Catholic. There's no Rome to go back to. Rome keeps changing. Same address, different establishment. Under new management. New menu. 

It's like telling fourth-generation Chinese-Americans to "go back to where you came from." At best, that's something their great-grandparents could do. It's way too late for that now. 

Burnt to a Crisp

I'm going to comment on an interview with Oliver Crisp:

http://www.christianitytoday.com/ct/2014/september-web-only/softer-face-of-calvinism.html

There are many tensions in his interview, but one in particular is the tension between ecumenism and the progress of dogma. The progress of dogma is divisive and sectarian rather than ecumenical. The progress of dogma generates increasing theological divergence rather than convergence over time.

The less people are required to agree about, the more they agree. It's easy to agree with the uninterpreted statements in the Apostles' creed. That conceals a lot of latent disagreement. It's easy to agree with the Nicene Creed, because it only covers a few topics.

The Westminster Confession is more sectarian because it covers far more ground. The more theological questions you presume to answer, the more room for disagreement that creates or exposes. 

The progress of dogma begins with many open questions in theology. Over the centuries, more questions are given official answers. There are ever fewer open questions. People takes sides. That's moving apart. 

The catholic creeds of the first few centuries of the church are a secondary tier of norm that witnesses to Scripture. Then we have confessions that represent particular church bodies, like the 39 Articles of Anglicanism—which are very Reformed, I might add—and the Westminster Confession for Presbyterians. Confessions are a third tier of witness, norms that stand under Scripture and the catholic creeds.

I understand that that ranking system is appealing to an ecumenist. But if we're truth-seekers, why would the earliest creeds, the most theologically underdeveloped creeds, outrank later, more theologically reflective creeds?

Or one might end up cherry-picking some things and not others.

What about a different agricultural metaphor? Winnowing the wheat from the chaff?

No one theologian, however important, can trump the voice of the church expressed in the creeds or confessions. 

Are creeds or confessions "the voice of the church"? Creeds and confessions are formulated by a handful of bishops or theologians. They can be appropriated by "the church." Christians can embrace them. But they don't start out as "the voice of the church." They must earn that right. They must be true. A creed can speak on my behalf if it's true. 

But in that respect, a theologian a trump a creed. It just depends on who is right. 

There's no tradition of universalism in Calvinism. No universalism in Reformed confessions. Heck, no Reformed theologians of any note who espouse universalism. 

Perhaps that's why he tries to classify Barth as a Reformed theologian. To use Barth's implicit universalism as a foothold. But that's circular. That begs the question of whether Barth is Reformed.

And tradition aside, reprobation goes to the deep structure of Reformed theology. It's not just a historical accident–like some inherited doctrines. 

Although universal unconditional election is theoretically possible, reprobation concretely demonstrates the unconditionality of election. God doesn't have to save everyone, and he proves it directly by not in fact saving everyone. 

Moreover, this isn't just a question of different possible ways to combine different ideas. There are factual constraints on Calvinism. Calvinism is guided by its understanding of revealed truth. 

Does he mean universalism is compatible with Calvinism because Calvinism has the internal resources to pull it off? If predestination is true, then God can predestine everyone to be saved? (Which would require other adjustments, like universal atonement.)

If so, how does that fit into his libertarian Calvinism?

Finally, yes, all things being equal, God could save everyone. But what if, all things considered, God has objectives which conflict with universal salvation? 

It's not just a matter of extending the scope of election, while leaving everything else intact. There are tradeoffs.

For that matter, why would God predestine the Fall in the first place if he intended to save everyone? 

Two 19th-century Reformed theologians come to mind. The first is William Cunningham, who was a professor at the University of Edinburgh and one of the founding fathers of the Free Church of Scotland. He wrote an important essay on this topic, arguing that the Westminster Confession neither requires nor denies “philosophical determinism,” as he called it. He believed the Confession is conceptually porous on the matter and doesn’t commit its adherents to determinism, though it doesn’t exclude it either.

He's wrong about that. Cunningham was distinguishing between spiritual inability due to original sin, and Edwardian necessitarianism. Edwards isn't just a divine determinist. Arguably, he's a divine necessitarian. 

It isn't just a question of whether humans could do otherwise, but whether God could do otherwise. I think this is related to his appeal to the principle of sufficient reason which he deployed against Arminians. God must have a sufficient reason for what he does. And that means God can't do otherwise. Alternate possibilities aren't live possibilities–even for God.

You have that tension in Leibniz, as well as Aquinas. Cunningham is noncommittal on metaphysical necessity. That's a very strong version of determinism. 

One question is what is he opposing? William Hamilton is one of his foils, whom he quotes:

That man has no will, agency, moral personality of his own, God being the only real agent in every apparent act of His creatures…that the theological scheme of the absolute decrees implies fatalism, pantheism, the negation of a moral governor, as of a moral world (471).

Clearly, to reject that is not to endorse either libertarian freewill or merely partial predestination (pace Crisp).

Cunningham then defines his terms:

The advocates of this doctrine [philosophical necessity] maintain that there is an invariable and necessary connection between men's motives and their volitions,–between objects of desire and pursuit as seen and apprehended by them and all their acts of volition or choice; or that our volitions and choices are invariably determined by the last practical judgment of the understanding.The invariable and necessary influence of motives in determining volitions,–and a  liberty of indifference, combined with a self-determining power in the will itself,–are thus the opposite positions of the contending parties on this question.  The dispute manifestly turns wholly upon a question as to what is the law which regulates those mental processes that result in, or constitute, volitions or choices (484).

Throughout the essays he refers to a "system of necessity" or psychological "laws." He associates philosophical necessity with a regime of psychological laws.

It's an interesting question where that framework comes from. Does that involve a parallel between physics and psychology? Does that involve an extension of Newtonian physics to psychology? Just as there are laws of nature, there are laws of the mind? 

On that model, philosophical necessity suggests that God determines human choices through the mediation of psychological laws. I'm not sure what that's supposed to mean, but in any event, the logical alternative to that framework isn't libertarian freedom. It's not as if "psychological laws" are the only way God could determine human choices. 

Cunningham says:

Predestination implies that the end or result is certain, and that adequate provision has been made for bringing it about. But it does not indicate anything as to what must be the nature of this provision in regard to the different classes of events which are taking place under God's government, including the volitions of rational and responsible beings (509).

Here he distinguishes between what God predetermines and how he brings it about. He's noncommittal on the mode of execution, but not on the scope or inevitability of predestination. 

It [the will] is not emancipated from the influence of God's decrees foreordaining whatever comes to pass. It is not placed beyond the control of HIs providence,–whereby in the execution of His decrees He ever rules and governs all His creatures and all their actions. It is not set free from the operation of those general laws which God has impressed upon man's mental constitution, for directing the exercise of his faculties and regulating his mental processes. But it is set free from the dominion of depravity; and thereby it is exempted from the necessity of willing only what is evil… (521).

Here Cunningham affirms the universality of predestination. Everything is foreordained. Everything comes to pass by God's providence. 

The closest thing Cunningham says which might give Crisp is "wiggle room" is:

The doctrine of necessity, when once established, leads by strict logical sequence to predestination, unless men take refuge in atheism. But it does not seem to follow e converso, that the doctrine of predestination leads necessarily to the doctrine of necessity; as men may hold, that God could certainly execute His decrees and infallibly accomplish His purposes in and by the volitions of men, even though he had not impressed upon their mental constitution the law of necessity, as that by which its processes are regulated and its volitions determined (513).

But that doesn't reject divine determinism. Rather, it's noncommittal on a model of divine determinism based on "law-like" mechanism. 

He does say, two pages earlier, that:

...we think, unwarranted and presumptuous to assert, that even a self-determining power in the will would place it beyond the sphere of the divine control,–would prevent [God]…from superintending and directing all its movements according to the counsel of His own will (511). 

Although taken by itself, a "self-determining power of the will" suggests autonomy, he couches that as a hypothetical position, and even so, he states that in the context of God's ability, even in that hypothetical situation, to control the outcome.  

Cunningham distinguishes lack of freedom due to original sin from lack of freedom due to psychological laws. Although he discusses Edwards, one limitation of his analysis is that his interpretation of Edwardian philosophical necessity doesn't consider another definition of philosophical necessity: the principle of sufficient reason.

However, I don't think commitment to the PSR commits one to metaphysical necessity. At most, God must choose the best provided that there's one best thing to choose. But that seems equivocal. Since not all possible goods are compossible, some possible goods must be sacrificed to achieve other possible goods. In that event it's not clear that there is one best choice. The distinctive goods of one possible world are gained at the loss of other distinctive goods. So God is never confronted with a forced option. 

Back to Crisp:

On one hand, I am concerned about ecumenical theology and the place of Reformed theology relative to other communions within Christianity. But I am also trying to show there is a significant breadth to the Reformed tradition that is often overlooked, that there is more wiggle room than is often perceived.

Ecumenists are such silly people. Every generation has ecumenists. They fail, just like the previous generation.

That's because ecumenical dialogue consists of ecumenists dialoguing with fellow ecumenists. It's circular from start to finish. 

Ecumenists don't really come to agreement. Rather, they wouldn't be ecumenists in the first place unless they were noncommittal on some doctrines. Those are the bargaining chips. That's what they are prepared to give away. Those were always negotiable. Their commitment to ecumenism precommits them to find areas of agreement. Their agreement was a foregone conclusion. So they end where they began. There's no real progress (even if that was a good thing).

Ecumenists remind me of women who knowingly marry philanderers. They think to themselves, "But this time it will be different. He won't cheat on me, because he truly loves me. I'm special. Why, he looked in my eyes and told me that never met anyone like me." Yeah...which is something he says to every woman. 

Take, for example, the Book of Confessions of the PCUSA, my own denomination. 

Well, I'd say he just tipped his hand.