No longer under the radar

So if you used to read this blog, you know that I haven't posted in a very long time. There's a reason for that, and it's not just laziness.

About a year ago I moved from Munich, Germany, back to the United States. I was happy in academia, but wanted to pursue ordination and more direct ministry, instead of "just" teaching. We probably could have stayed in Germany, but  there were some other personal matters involved in the decision.

So, having been a member of the EKD, I entered into the colloquy process with the ELCA. Colloquy is a process by which a pastor from another tradition or Lutheran body becomes a pastor in a Lutheran body. And boy, is the ELCA different from the EKD. While I was comfortable in the EKD, if on the conservative end of things, in the ELCA, I was so far right on some issues that I could barely see the left-of-center leadership I was working with. Needless to say, this did not bode well for my colloquy.

I won't go into all the details, but it took me a year to accept the fact that it just wasn't a good fit - and five rounds of added requirements and rule changes to get the message that they thought so too. It was probably one of the worst years of my life, certainly one of the worst recently.

However, once I got it, I was able to take stock of what I felt called to do, and the situation around me, and I found a new home: the Evangelical Lutheran Conference and Ministerium in North America, the ELCM. I found a group that I'm 100% theologically in agreement with, and their polity is amazing. It's seriously by consensus - and stuff gets done! We are a moderate, centrist group, and I'm happy to be a part of things. I've been extended a call as healthcare chaplain and mission development pastor, and there is also a return, at least partially, to academia in the works. I've come a long way to be back where I started, but God has grown me a lot, and I've learned a lot about myself.

So what does that have to do with this blog? Well, I'm. I longer worried about what I say in here affecting my material security or future. I'm free to proclaim what I believe, faithfully.

So starting with this week, this blog is alive again. It's Septuagesima Sunday - a time of preparation for Lent, where we focus on our need for penance. A time where we are reminded, in the traditional Gospel for today, that God rewards as He chooses, and He gives to those He chooses (Matt 20:1-16). A time when we say, out of the depths have I cried out to thee, O Lord: Lord hear my voice - and know that He has indeed heard.

Old Testament Lection, Trinity 4

I've been pretty inactive with this blog for a while, so something I would like to start doing is sharing some of my thoughts on the readings for the week. The Revised Common Lectionary is what I'll be using, and I will reflect from time to time on the different passages from the Sunday that starts the week.

This last Sunday was the 4th Sunday after Trinity Sunday, and the Old Testament reading was from Isaiah 55:10-13 (ESV here):

¹⁰ “For as the rain and the snow come down from heaven
    and do not return there but water the earth,
making it bring forth and sprout,
    giving seed to the sower and bread to the eater,
¹¹ so shall my word be that goes out from my mouth;
    it shall not return to me empty,
but it shall accomplish that which I purpose,
    and shall succeed in the thing for which I sent it.

¹² “For you shall go out in joy
    and be led forth in peace;
the mountains and the hills before you
    shall break forth into singing,
    and all the trees of the field shall clap their hands.
¹³ Instead of the thorn shall come up the cypress;
    instead of the brier shall come up the myrtle;
and it shall make a name for the Lord,
    an everlasting sign that shall not be cut off.”

 There is a connection here between the natural order of things and the spiritual order of things. Verses 10 and 11 compare the two - the natural order provides an illustration for the spiritual, but this isn't because there is some necessity that the spiritual conform to the natural, or because the natural order objectively reveals something about the spiritual order, but rather because the spiritual order is prior to and foundational for the natural order. Nature looks the way it does because the model set for it is based on who God is.

What difference does that make? In verse 11, the Word of God has efficacy. Everything that is the Word achieves the purpose set by God - and we know of whom we speak when we talk about God's Word. The divine origin, divine commision, and divine power of the Word presuppose here (in personification) the divine nature of the Word. The deliverance from exile in verses 12-13 are also a type of our deliverance from subjection that the Word unfailingly brings. This is an anticipation of salvation offered in Christ.

The natural order shows us God, when we have the eyes to see, because if we know the One who sets the standard, we can see the echoes in nature.

On Heresy

So generally, I assume that there is at least some connection between faith as being salvific and the propositional content of faith. As a friend of mine put it recently, you can't have a relationship with God without knowing certain things about God. I tend to think in the older categories of notitia (factual knowledge), assensus (assent that the factual knowledge is true), and fiducia (trust and reliance). These seem to presuppose one another, i.e., I trust and rely on a God about whom I know certain things and hold those things to be true. For example, I know the fact of God's omnipotence, and I hold to be true that God is omnipotent, but the real faith bit is my reliance on God's omnipotence as sufficient to steer the world, deal with my stuff, etc.

So what happens when one of the first two categories (or propositional knoweldge at all) is untrue?

Here's a simple example that most would accept: Someone who "comes to faith" in a Jesus who is not divine has the wrong object of faith (false propositional content). But does that prevent faith in the sense of relying on and apprehending the promise of God?

Also stirring the pot is that I hold fides apprehensiva: the idea that faith is a created gift of God that then apprehends or takes hold of God's promise, resulting in the application to the subject. So can we have a created gift of faith taking hold of a promise when the promise is greviously misunderstood?


Obviously, we didn't do the easy one first, though. Take another example: Someone hears the Gospel and responds, but shortly thereafter is taught e.g. modalism. It's not at all clear that the initial faith is in the wrong object, but subsequent propositional content (as well as subsequent notitia and assensus) are heterodox. This individual has been taught heresy, but we don't want to place the efficiency of proclamation with the one who proclaims, or we're all in trouble. A possible heresy in a sermon doesn't preclude God's activity in Word as a means of grace. So is the subsequent heterodox belief a fall? Then we have to allow for a lot of back-and-forth. One possible solution here is to have a proleptic grace based on present (correct) faith and yet-future correct doctrine, but I worry that this hamstrings the impulse to correct heresy, either polemically or irenically.

Now we get more complicated: An individual who comes to living, fruit-producing faith, and who after a longer period of time, engages in theological reflection and is intellectually convinced of a heretical position. I'm pretty sure this was me at one point. I'm prepared to accept that this entailed a fall from grace, because of theological reflection (even if mine was naive, I had the obligation to know better). Someone who assumes a heretical position after theological reflection is consciously (or at least culpably) rejecting orthodox faith, so I am pretty sure that this imperils the soul. (By the way, I am talking about actual serious heresy, not adiaphora. My example before was modalism, in my case it was full-on Pelagianism) So there seems to be something about intellectual heresy changing the object of relying faith to move one outside of Christ.

A worry: how in the world can anyone differentiate between individuals of the second type and those of the third type until after the fact? On one hand, we are not a particularly theologically educated society. On the other, in modern societies with such an emphasis on education, we may all be culpable in the "should have known better" sense. And if you are standing on the outside looking at this, how does one correct heretical doctrine in (pastoral) love?

Hey, I don't have any answers, I just come up with problems.

News for a (belated) New Year

After a series of pretty crazy things at the end of last year and beginning of this year, I finally have time and opportunity to continue this blog. In the intervening time, I've completed and submitted my dissertation for the DA in Philosophy and Religion at Harrison Middleton University, and we've moved - we're back in the United States, and I have been accepted as a candidate for ordination with the Evangelical Lutheran Church in America.

On the academic front, I hope to be able to make another announcement here soon. Those interested in the current debate on ramified natural theology can read a contribution of mine here.

I'm hoping to have a bit more activity on here in the near future - I have some stuff in the pipeline that I've been thinking about, so if you haven't given up yet, dear reader, your patience will be rewarded (or, you know, the fact that you forgot the blog existed and you didn't delete it, that will be rewarded too...)

On Advent

As the first week of Advent comes to a close, I'd like to reflect a little bit on what Advent actually is.

This time of year is often the "pregame" for Christmas; we hear the carols and see the decorations, and at some point the tree goes up. At the same time, those of us who go into churches with vestments see penetential colors, and in daily Bible readings we hear about the Cross, not the manger. What's going on?

Advent is both of these things. We shouldn't reduce it to pre-Christmas, but it is the anticipation of the arrival of the Lord. That's what Advent means, from advenire, a to-coming, an arrival. At the same time, it's the time where we reflect on and remember why it is that we need a Saviour, and what the Lord who is come has done for us. It's a season in tension, and a season of the cry for salvation as well as the answer, God's answer. Jesus, God's Word to us, who is come and will come again - Advent is an anticipation of what has been and what is yet to come.

Advent is a time of the Church, a Christian time, where an already and a not-yet coexist. The Advent of Christ is in the incarnation and in the return. Our salvation is, and comes yet to us. Advent is the season of the sinner who is yet a saint, remembering and anticipating the Lord who is come and is yet to come.

So by all means, celebrate the coming Lord - but don't forget our need for Him.

Merry Tension.

Developments

It has been some time since my last post, though this time it was more intentional. I took a much-needed vacation, where I managed to actually have some vacation and relaxation, and not catch-up on research or other projects. I have also completed my final set of comprehensive exams at Harrison Middleton University, meaning that I am in the final stage of the program. This is where I get to propose a disseration topic and write. I actually have a pretty good idea of what I will be doing; I do have the unusual advantage of having already gone through one doctoral disseration process here at the LMU, so I know rather well what's expected and what an end-product should look like.

Some other projects are lagging behind, like the book, from which I was supposed to provide sample chapters last month, but that just can't be helped. Mostly, everything is on track.

A Thought on Baptism

Today in the church service, we had the special liturgy for the remembrance of our own Baptisms (along with one new Baptism). This is actually intended for the 6th Sunday after Trinitatis, but our pastor did it today, as we had another special event on that Sunday. It made me think a bit about baptism, specifically about the relationship between Baptism and faith (we had also last week one Baptism and one "blessing"; the latter being where the parents wanted "to let the child choose for themselves as an adult").

As one might know, I grew up in a credobaptist tradition, but am now theologically supportive of paedobaptism. There has also been a change in my theology from thinking of baptism as an ordinance and Baptism as a sacrament (see what I did there?), which has made me think a lot about the status of Baptism. If Baptism occurs chronologically before faith, it seems to be fully independant of the recipient; here we have the case of the parents who do not wish to choose something for their child (which cannot be undone, though I don't know if they had that in mind). If, however, faith precedes Baptism, is Baptism as a sacrament contingent on the human-side action or status of faith?

There is in my opinion a dual key to resolving this issue. The first is to have the proper definition of faith. Faith is not synonymous with assenting to a set of propositions, or "holding-to-be-true"; rather, faith is the faculty created by God in the believer which "apprehends" or lays hold to salvation. It is for this reason that Luther, for example, referred to faith as fides apprehensiva. Faith actually has not so much to do with intellectual assent, though it is accompanied by such assent in an adult. So the argument that an infant doesn't have faith in the first place is a rationalistic reductionism of the concept of faith in the first place. But wait, isn't some sort of assent and cognitive acceptance necessary (in technical terms, doesn't fiducia imply notitia and assensus)? Don't we have to know and acknowledge or agree with what we are laying hold of and placing our trust in? To an extent, yes - and this is where the sacramental nature of Baptism comes in. While the ritual act performed here is a temporal event which stands in relation to other temporal events, the presence of the eternal God in the sacrament necessitates that the sacramental aspect of Baptism is cotemporal with all temporal events. Our participation in Baptism is something that is always the case, and it is then the case that the individual at Baptism is the same individual who cognitively assents as a rational adult. The unity of the Christian as a person is held together through time by the eternal God, in whose life we participate. From a temporal perspective, it may seem like Baptism is retroactively actualized (cf. Wolfhart Pannenberg, for example), but a thorough application of the assertion that God's eternity is present to all temporal points and that the sacraments have us participating in God results in the sort of temporal unity I've just described.



Some of you who know me will notice what theory is doing the heavy lifting here, and if you are still waiting for that in print, I'm still working on the manuscript before I submit it...