Made present

What passes for sacramentology these days drives me insane sometimes. I get into the occasional friendly debate on the topic, being a believer in only two sacraments (baptism and holy communion) at a school populated mostly by Roman Catholics, and being an advocate of the propitatory aspect of the Eucharist. Why? Because the Eucharist is propitiatory!

Proceeding upon the grounds that one believes in the Real Presence, be that through transubstantiation, transignification, consubstantion, of simply through an acceptance of divine mystery, then when we receive holy communion, we are sharing in the bodily sacrifice of Christ on the cross, a sacrifice made for the satisfaction of the sins of all humanity. Yes, we are engaged in an act of thanksgiving and memorial, but in so far as we are sharing in the act of Christ’s sacrifice, we are engaged in a propitiatory act.

Now, I am not suggesting that consuming the consecrated gifts propitiates God. That statement would deny efficacy of Christ’s own sacrifice, by suggesting that further satisfaction must be made on the part of the believer. However, the act of Christ’s passion was itself propitiatory. Christ died on the cross to make satisfaction for the sinfulness of humanity (whether one views sin in a legalistic sense or one of spiritual health or of relationship to God is another issue), so that all who believe in Christ should have restitution made for their sins on their account, an act of which no human being, in our present sinful state, is capable without God’s help. This was sacrifice after the model of those making the sacrifice eating of the sacrificial animals to partake of the sacrifice’s real efficacy. When Christ offered His body and His blood at the last supper, He was giving us the ability to share in His sacrifice, to receive the real effect which His death has wrought in this world. The Temple sacrifices which were offered by the Israelites to God have been superseded by the final sacrifice which God Incarnate made for us on the cross, and all believers in that ultimate sacrifice can share in it through the consecrated bread and wine which are Christ body and His blood made present for us.

But people today totally lose sight of this all-important element of the Eucharistic celebration. Reformed memorialism formally did away with propitiation, making the Eucharist into nothing more than an act of memorial of the Christ who is not present. Today propitiation is socially inconvenient. Secular thinkers (Sam Harris spring immediately to mind) compare the propitiatory sacrifice of Christ on the cross with blood sacrifice of animals to appease pagan gods, an entirely fair statement, but one which they consider critical and so many Christians consider derogatory. So we conveniently lose sight of propitiation, in favour of thanksgiving and memorial, even when some of us enforce the doctrine of the Real Presence which is frankly little more than ritual cannibalism without the doctrine of Propitiation.

Aside from us forgetting our fundamental theology and over-emphasising what remains of the Eucharist, what does this mean for the community of believers? We’re now desperately seeking a meaning for the Real Presence. I always marvel at the enthusiasm with which my young Roman Catholic schoolmates regard the Cult of the Eucharist. The Real Presence is now only an object of adoration, as if Christ would ever want us to adore His physical body. The Lamb is not for beholding, He did not sacrifice Himself on the cross so we could venerate bread. The Real Presence was not shared with us for veneration, but for sharing in the ultimate act of love that was the passion.

Though it may like an unnecessary trapping of backward theology, the propitiatory nature of the Eucharist is fundamental to the meaning of holy communion. Without it, we have a whole not only in our sacramentology, but in our entire systematic theology.

St Francis of Assisi

The second of the two sections I had to cut out from the afore mentioned paper. Here I refuted White’s statement that St Francis of Assisi represent a viable alternative to the dominant Western Christian attitude towards nature.

                White’s posited Christian alternative to what he perceives to be the dominant, and ecologically detrimental, Western Christian attitude toward nature, St Francis of Assisi, does not represent the hope for a modern environmentally-conscious Christianity that White supposes. While Francis’ life is remarkable in the history of Western Christianity for his loving all creation equally, the environmentalism of St Francis (if indeed that term can be applied, since our modern concern for ecological balance and species survival was not present in Francis’ thought) is far from sufficient to address the concerns of the world today. The sentiment that creation, from the lowliest animal to the very Sun, exists in a fraternity of the love of God, and that all God’s creations are symbols of Him, such as is evident in St Francis’ Canticle of the Creatures, while suitable as a vehicle for spiritual development, does not translate into positive action. St Francis’ attitude more closely resembles that of White’s preferred model of sainthood: the contemplative Eastern[1] Christian Saint.[2]

                However, the problems facing the world today cannot be stopped by the pleasant inaction of the contemplative Saint. Though it is possible that had the larger Western Christian tradition adopted St Francis’ attitude toward the natural world, we would not be in the ecological crisis in which we find ourselves.[3] However, the damage, regardless of its cause, is done, and an attitude of action,[4] framed within a new paradigm for Christian thought, is necessary if we are to hope to un-do that damage.

 

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[1] White uses the terms “Greek,” or the “Greek East,” in contradistinction to “Latin,” or the “Latin West,” however this nomenclature is imprecise, and fails to cover the diversity of Eastern Orthodoxy (the communion to which White presumably refers, whether he means to exclude Eastern Catholicism, Oriental Orthodoxy, and other Eastern Christianities is uncertain)

[2] White, Roots, 1206

[3] Justly so, it is possible that we would also not enjoy the standard of living nor level of technological advancement that we do today

[4] The quality of Western models of Sainthood which White decries; White, Roots, 1206

The back of my mind

So i’m pretty inclined toward Predestination, as far as doctrines of salvation go, but a question is bugging me, always in the back of my mind. How does a doctrine of predestination that assumes that not all are saved, jive with the belief in an all-loving God?

A question

Is it intellectually honest to hold a wholly non-realist, non-foundationalist, or postmodern worldview, and still consider yourself a member of a religious tradition?

A thought

So while trying to escape a discussion with a crazy woman today, I had a thought about my Gospel Interpretations – Mark course. We are currently working with different methods of exegesis, and a friend of mine observed that all these methods seem to do is deconstruct, leaving us with tiny fragments with no value beyond the literary-historical. The question seems to be, how and when do we reconstruct?

So here is my thought.

The first step in looking at the Bible is deconstructive. We must look at it outside its Scriptural context and analysise it critically. Methods such as Historical, Grammatical, Form, Redaction, and Literary Criticism must be brought to bear so we can break it into it’s constituent part and analyze them, and get all the meaning out of it that we can. Then comes reconstruction, which is an exercise in theologizing. Once we have let the text speak for itself we can speak from it, and look at it Structurally and Canonically, and through our own ideological lenses. This is when we start forming opinions and theologies, not before.

Both step are crucial. If we skip the first step we are reading our own ideas into the Bible, and if we fail to complete the second step we loose the Bible’s importance as Scripture.

Thoughts?

Marionette or spinning the strings?

Being a student of the Queen of the Sciences can often be trying. You wrestle with difficult issues and wrangle with profs whose lectures are often an extended confession of their beliefs. And when those really contentious issues come up, like homosexuality and the means of salvation, spirited debate can waver precariously over the abyss of acrimony. One of the more volatile issues, and one over which I myself have lost some sleep, is free will vs. predestination.

Is salvation only available to God’s elect, an elite group whose membership was determined by the Almighty at the very moment of creation, or does our salvation require our participation? I remember a professor (and Roman Catholic priest) who told me about the many Saints who, in their private memoirs, speak of their great terror at their own power to say no to God. Now, not that I care particularly about the assumptions of modern Roman Catholic hagiography, but that raised in my mind an interesting question: do I have the power to say no to God?

Some would argue that it is precisely this power which caused the Fall: God’s greatest and most horrible gift to humankind of free will. Obviously I don’t mean the Fall as in the Genesis narrative of Adam and Eve in the garden of Eden, I mean the fact that humanity, because of our gift of free will, falls easily into sin. God gave the power to choose to follow Him or not, and we must exercise that power as we see fit, it is our gift and out curse as beings created in God’s own image.

The flip side of the coin is Predestination – John Calvin’s most famous and controversial doctrine. God controls everything, He created us and the circumstances in which we exist, therefore everything that happens is exactly what and how He wanted it. Our salvation was determined long before we were born, and nothing we can do will ever change it. Now to Calvin this was a comforting doctrine – we need not worry after our salvation, nor throw our money away on indulgences and donations to the Church, God’s plan will unfold just exactly as it should and were are just along for the ride.

Each side posses a certain appeal: Free Will means that I am in control, Predestination means that a power and intelligence much greater than I is in control. But each also has it’s holes: how can a little mortal like me defy the will of the Almighty, the First Cause, the Father of Creation (the doctrine of Free Will assumes that it is God’s wish that all humanity be saved); but why would God determine that some people should enjoy the eternal beatitudes of Heaven while others suffer for all eternity?

And what about the Lutheran doctrine of justification by Faith Alone? According to Sola Fide, our salvation comes about through our faith in Christ, but that faith is beyond our power, since humanity is irredeemably tainted and by sin, and can only come about as a gift of the Holy Spirit. Anglican or no (Anglicanism is the Church both Catholic [Free Will] and Reformed [Predestination]), I am inclined toward Sola Fide. But that inclination is not for theological reasons (when it comes down to the theology I am split between the three of them), I just like Sola Fide. Is going with your gut a good way to pick a doctrine of salvation?

Maybe the answer is none of the above. Maybe, as some of my fellow comtemplative Christians argue, salvation is not at all what Christianity has historically envisaged. I guess it’s just something we all have to work out for ourselves.