The end is here

It’s been real. It’s been fun. It’s over.
http://newpuritans.wordpress.com

Good Bye

I’m thinking of shutting this page down. It was an interesting experiment but it seems to be time. I’m working on something new w/ some friends of mine. Working title will be “The New Puritans”. I’ll posto ne more blog on here before we sign off for good to redirect you over to the new site.

Hey

I’m spending a lot of time working on music right now, so writing isn’t happening. If you want to follow what I’m up to currently, check out http://logueandthebanshee.wordpress.com

King of the Hill

This is a clip from the series, “King of the Hill”. Somehow, this little show nails quite a bit wrong w/ the American church. I love this clip and hope you all can laugh along with it because I’m pretty sure Jesus does NOT recommend Nat King Cole.

Reverend Bass Replies…

 The following is Reverend Bass’ reply to the reponses to his “Protestants and the Church Fathers” post.  Andy thought so well of it that he wanted it as it’s own post.
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 I appreciate the follow-up to my post regarding the Church Fathers. After reviewing them thus far, I don’t find anything substantial to stand in the way of any of my previous assertions.
1. Apostolic succession is often viewed through the lenses of the full-orbed contemporary development of the Papacy. It has not always been so. There has early on been a tradition of a multiplicity of presbyters, or bishops, in the Catholic Church: “Through countryside and city the apostles preached, and they appointed their earliest converts, testing them by the Spirit, to be the bishops and deacons of future believers.” (Clement of ROme, c. AD 80) “Take care to do all things in harmony with God, with the bishops presiding in the place of God and the presbyters in the place of the council of the Apostles.” (St. Ignatius of Antioch, AD 110) “After the death of the tyrant, the Apostle John came back again to Ephesus from the Island of Patmos; and, upon being invited, he went even unto the neighboring cities of the pagans, here to appoint bishops, there to set in order whole Churches, and there to ordain to the clerical state such as were designated by the Spirit.” (St. Clement of Alexandria, AD 190) A multiplicity of bishops with equal authority evidences itself in early Christianity. Additionally, with Augustine, we find him backing off on the absolute primacy of Peter in his later writings, especially in his “Retractions.” “What was said to him (Peter) was not ‘Thou art rock,’ but ‘Thou art Peter.’ But the rock was Christ, having confessed whom (even as the whole Church confesses) Simon was named Peter.” (Retractions, 1) Augustine came much closer to a classic Reformational view of Christ as the rock, with Peter having a primacy among the apostles, but not to the extent to which present day Roman Catholics extend it, to an absolute infallible authority. The temptation is always to read back into forebearers present day, whole cloth positions.

2, The question of the “real presence” in the Eucharist illustrates my point precisely. The Roman Catholic doctrine of real presence – where the substance is the literal body and blood of Christ while the accidents remain that of bread and wine – did not appear in anything like its present form until the 9th century in the theology of Radbertus, opposed vociferously by Ratramnus and Maurus (both “Good Catholics”). It wasn’t until AD 1050 that the Roman Catholic Church got around to condemning the spiritual presence of Christ in the Supper as represented by Ratramnus in favor of Radburtus’ “real presence.” Even then, Radburtus’ doctrine is not like that further developed and refined by St. Thomas Aquinas. In fact, the Reformers would later appeal to the “Catholic” Ratramnus to argue against the idolatry of the Mass. He is a prime example of the employment of a Catholic doctor with authority for even the Protestant reformers. Prior to the 9th century, both positions appeared in nascent forms with a number of Church Fathers and a certain ambiguity in others. To label the Church Fathers as uniformly “real presence” in doctrine is to misrepresent them and, once again, read back present day RC positions into those who held differently.

3, As to the 7th Ecumenical Council, if one neglects the Canons of the Holy and Ecumenical 7th Council, which affirm the decisions of the 6 previous councils and outlines the behavior of presbyters, then a case might be made to reject it. While most Protestants do not accept the provisions that sanction the veneration of icons, insofar as that Council affirms the decisions of previous councils, that Ecumenical Council is received. This is how it is understood among Protestants who recieve it.

4. Lest anyone forget, as I mentioned, “One must be careful…and in general, if one cannot embrace…etc.” The caution I bring to the Fathers and Councils is succinctly expressed in the Westminster Confession of Faith, chapter XXXI, section 3: “All synods or councils since the apostles’ times, whether general or particular, may err, and many have erred; therefore they are not to be made the rule of faith or practice, but to be used as an help in both.” Many Protestants and moderns look at this as a “carte blanche” dismissal of synods and councils, as if they rest in the dustbin of church history and of interest to those of recondite pursuit and little else. But they neglect what the Westminster Confession of Faith also asserts in section 2, that of these synods and councils, “which decrees and determinations, if consonant to the Word of God, are to be received with reverence and submission not only for their agreement with the Word, but also for the power whereby they are made, as being an ordinance of God, appointed thereunto in his Word.” How many Protestants receive any part of the creeds and confessions with anything approaching “reverence and submission,” receiving them as “an ordinance of God,” or “for the power whereby they are made?” No; rather, we here such pablum as “No creed but Christ!” or “No confession but the Bible!” No; in fact, Eck’s prediction is true in our own day among many evangelicals, where “Everyman his own Pope; every clique its own council.”

5. The 5th Ecumenical Council did not condemn the grammatical-historical method essentially, but rather specifically the heresies associated with the School of Antioch, e.g., Paul of Samosota, Arius, Apollonaris, Nestorius, and the three men condemned by the 5th Council. When, for instance, the council condemns Theodore of Mopsuesta, anathematizing all “who assert that his exegesis is orthodox,” they are not condemning the historical-grammatical method per se, but the way Paul used it to wrest heresy in texts like John 20:28 (alluded to in Canon XII) to claim that Thomas was not confessing Christ as Lord and God, but giving glory to God the Father, instead. Only with the most tendentious reasoning can one say that the fifth council condemns the historical-grammatical method in a blanket fashion, “essentially.”

6. The Eucharist as sacrifice appeared after Gregory the Great (AD 540-604) in the sense of the Mass (missa; see the Catholic Encyclopedia). It is by no means clear that at Chalcedon (AD 451) it carried this same sense of sacrifice as a recapitulation of Christ’s own sacrifice, performed efficaciously by the priest. Once again, this is a reading back into history a later definition. While one must be cautious about the exact meaning of sacrifice as it appears at Chalcedon, he must not jump to the conclusion that it meant then what it means now, with all of the freight it bears today.

7. I am surprised that anyone could dissent from Nicea in seeing Titus 3:5, which speaks of the ministry of the Holy Spirit as “the washing of regeneration and renewal,” as refering to anything but baptism. Those that do not are in the minority. Even Calvin says in commenting upon this text, “I have no doubt that he alludes, at least, to baptism, and even I will not object to have this passage expounded as relating to baptism.” He then goes on to expound upon the efficacy of the sacraments, where “here Paul addresses believers, in whom baptism is always efficacious, and in whom, therefore, it is properly connected with its truth and efficacy.”

8. Perhaps acolyte, who observes that “the 6th council condemns monergism,” should note that the monergism condemned in the canons is not the monergism associated with reformed doctrine. Am I correct in assuming that this might be in play? I apologize in advance if I am incorrect in my deduction. The monergism condemned at the Sixth Ecumenical Council, AD 680-1, or the 3rd Council of Constantinople, is that associated with the heresy that Christ had only one divine/human will or action or operation. It tended to confuse the human and divine natures of Christ, a doctrine that was a corrollary to the heresy of monophysitism. The monergism associated with reformed doctrine, that God alone works to elect, predestine, regenerate, and call the sinner to salvation, in opposition to synergism, where man works in cooperation with God in salvation, was not under consideration at Constantinople.

I hope this response helps to clarify why it is essential to affirm – in general and on the whole – the creeds, confessions, and actions of the Fathers and 7 ecumenical councils.