Under the Rainbow Bridge: A Family Tragedy

Late in 1941 three things came together: the new Mustang, the newly constructed Rainbow Bridge at Niagara Falls, and a young fly-boy named Nelson Purdue.  The Mustang was a small fighter plane that out performed the Spitfire and was destined to take a major role in the war.  The Rainbow Bridge had some strong romantic connections as the replacement for the Honeymoon Bridge, which collapsed due to an ice jam in the Niagara River. The new bridge had a marvelous view of Horseshoe Falls.  Put those two tempting items together with the newly engaged Nelson Purdue and a sunny day in the fall of 1941 and you have the stuff of family legends.  The tragedy is that Nelson was lost somewhere over Germany later in the war, leaving only the sparse legend surrounding his name. My aunt, who died several years ago, lost the most, and the event colored her life for some time to follow.  The rest of the family barely knew him.  I never met him.  Now sixty-five years later I know only the brief legend which was always told with joyful admiration, “Nelson flew under the Rainbow Bridge!”

What comes to mind is the admonition of a 8^th Century Saint, John of Damaskos, “All human affairs, all that does not exist after death is vanity.  Riches vanish, glory leaves us… every man born of the earth troubles himself in vain… by the time we have gained the whole word we shall be in the grave, where king and pauper are one.”[1]

What is truly important?  What is it that exists after death?  Certainly if God is our one true Love, all other loves and relationships will exist in him.  Here I want to raise a very important question for those of us in The Episcopal Church today.  Sixty-five years from now what will remain of the conflicts, vested interests, and personalities of the crisis within the church today?  The simple answer is not much!

In 1771 conflict arouse in the Church of England.  250 clergy who were deeply affected by the spread of Unitarianism submitted a petition to parliament.  British Statesman Edmund Burke responded: "These gentlemen complain of hardships: let us examine a little what that hardship is. They want to be honored as clergymen of the Church of England … but their consciences will not allow them to conform to the doctrines and practices of that Church. That is, they want to be teachers in a Church to which they apparently no longer belong; and that is an odd sort of hardship. They want to be paid for teaching one set of doctrines, while they are teaching another."[2]  Today’s conflict is only a variant of an ongoing debate between the orthodox and those who, like the second century heretic Marcion, refused the authority of Scripture and the Church wherever either disagreed with him. 

Marcion we know because the theologian Tertullian named him, but who are the 250 clergy who petitioned Parliament in 1771?  Their names are lost to posterity and they are only an obscure footnote in the history of the Church.  At least my family remembers that it was Nelson Purdue who flew under the Rainbow Bridge.  Karl Barth said something to the effect that it is one of God’s miracles that the Church still exists.  For twenty centuries, battered and bruised, the Church, the Bride of Christ rises from the ashes of conflict and opens the door to Salvation, Jesus Christ our Lord. 

From the perspective of history, there is nothing novel, or particularly earth shaking in the current attempts to deny the authority of Scripture in faith and practice.  Roseanne Roseannadanna was right, “it just goes to show you, it's always something! If it's not one thing, it's another!”  Of course it is.  St. Paul clearly warns us, “Pay careful attention to yourselves and to all the flock, in which the Holy Spirit has made you overseers, to care for the church of God, which he obtained with his own blood. I know that after my departure fierce wolves will come in among you, not sparing the flock; and from among your own selves will arise men speaking twisted things, to draw away the disciples after them.”[3]  So what’s new?

Conflict within the Anglican Church is like waves crashing against the beach.  No matter how many times they come in, they always recede again.  In the meantime, what are we to do?  First, and it ought to be obvious, don’t build your house on the sand.  Build your house on the rock!  This is precisely where Jesus presents a stiff challenge to today’s Church.   What is the rock?  The One whom we call the Rock says, “Everyone then who hears these words of mine and does them will be like a wise man who built his house on the rock.”[4]  The rock, very simply is the self-revelation of God in Holy Scripture itself.  

By definition, “In the name of Holy Scripture we do understand those canonical Books of the Old and New Testament, of whose authority was never any doubt in the Church.”[5]  The poet John Donne said it very nicely, “The Scriptures are God’s Voice.  The Church is His Echo.”[6]  I am well aware that not everybody wants that to be the solution for the painful stresses within the Church today, but I’m afraid that it is, and I don’t see away around the rock except by walking on the sand.  Stability in times of distress is a matter of basic principles firmly held.  I have always enjoyed the seashore, but for some reasons which should be obvious, I wouldn’t insist on building my house on the sand.

The second thing we are to do is follow the advice of Jesus who said “Fear not!”[7] and “Love one another!”[8]  Instead of worrying over things that are out of your control, put your trust in Him who is our steadfast love[9] and do the amazing thing he told you to do, and “love one another.”  That’s a whole lot better than pushing and shoving and saying uncharitable things.

The third thing we are supposed to do you already know.  Jesus said, “"All authority in heaven and on earth has been given to me.   ¹⁹ Go therefore and make disciples of all nations, baptizing them in the name of the Father and of the Son and of the Holy Spirit, ²⁰ teaching them to observe all that I have commanded you. And behold, I am with you always, to the end of the age."[10]  He didn’t mean for you to do it only on mild sunny days, but in all kinds of weather, even when it’s stormy.  The secret of Church Growth is this: Go and make disciples!  That is as simple as inviting people to Church.  How do I know?  Because that is the way most of us came to faith in the first place, somebody invited us.

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[1] John of Damaskos, quoted by St. Peter of Damaskos in “The Fifth Stage of Contemplation” in the Philokalia, Vol.3

[2] Alfred Plummer, The Church of England in the Eighteenth Century, (London: Methuen, 1910), edited in contemporary English, Rob Smith 2006, p. 168

[3] Acts 20:28-31 ESV

[4] Matthew 7:24

[5] The Articles of Religion, BCP, p. 868

[6] John Donne, Sermons VI. 5-7

[7] Many places in the gospels, but for a helpful verse look up Psalm 64:1b

[8] John 15:12 etc.

[9] Psalm 144:2

[10] Matthew 28:18-20

Purple Fever: A Retrospect

The honour I never almost had:

Purple Fever is an awful disease, it was candidate’s night, and the next day was the election of a Bishop.  I who was never nominated, and did not desire to be nominated, am somewhat chagrined that not only will I not be elected, but I will not even have bragging rights of saying; “Back in two thousand and something I was nominated for Bishop.”  Even the possibility of a small self-glorifying exaggeration is clean cut off, I fortunately can’t even say, “I was almost elected.”

I looked over the slate of candidates.  There were two obviously good men who were willing to let themselves be lured into a greater suffering on behalf of the church.  Of the others, two had been afflicted with purple fever.  One of them eventually would end up in legal problems, the other was just a sad individual.  At least they had bragging rights.   Come to think about it, at an earlier election one devout and holy candidate, or so we were told, was eventually defrocked for child abuse.  Purple fever can, and does, infect the most unsuitable candidates.

This purple fever is an insidious disease that has led some to leave The Episcopal Church in their lust to become bishops.  I know one “bishop” duly consecrated by somebody, somewhere, who has no diocese, no churches, no priests, and worked as a gardener, and another who admitted to having only 12 people in his congregation, and six similar sized congregations under his shepherding care; but he’s a bishop and he holds wonderful ordinations for his poorly trained disciples.  I know another who left The Episcopal Church with great fanfare and great expectancy hoping to become a bishop in one of the African dioceses, only to discover too late that they don’t consecrate divorced men as bishops.

It’s a terrible thing, this irony of not being nominated for a job I wouldn’t want and wasn’t even nominated for. It’s somewhat akin to being a guardian cherub desiring ultimate enthronement and then being summarily forced out of heaven by those insufferable angels.  “I, the Morning Star, I have fashioned for myself a coat of many colours, I do not have to dress in white.  I do not want to be dressed in white kowtowing to His royal goodness YHWH.  I almost seized the heavenly throne; a throne I could have had, if only, so at least I have bragging rights.”

The great mistake in all this is the attempt to affirm one’s value by seizing power and becoming a human doing instead of accepting the humiliation of being a human being.  In this unrestrained ambition the greater the doing, the greater the power, the emptier the soul!  The truth is that it is a fatal error to say, “I do, therefore I am,” and perhaps René Descartes missed the truth, “Je pense donc je suis,” “I think, therefore I am.”  It is closer to the mark to say, “I love, therefore I am.”  Ultimately our human identity is defined by our relationships.

Hierarchy and the Dance of Life

Some people are destined for misery, it can be no other way. Their problem is not understanding their place in the dance of life. For a start they do not know, or choose not to know, that there is a natural hierarchy in the created order simply because there is a Creator, and all else by very nature is creation. In the dance of life He leads and all the rest of us are feminine in contrast to his overwhelming masculinity.

This is very difficult both for men and “liberated” women. It is not easy even for women who profess that their husbands are the head of the house and say in the same breath, “But, I’m the neck that turns the head.” Unlike their unfortunate husbands God cannot be manipulated no matter how lovingly.

Hierarchy is the principle of organization for creation and for every human society, even the Church. Remember that Christ Jesus is the Head and we are his body. That is reflected in the four orders of ministry; bishops, priests, deacons and laity. The bishop who said that he was the servant of the servants of the servants of God spoke only a partial truth, and we all know that a partial truth is a heresy. This particular heresy is endemic in the American Church where those who proclaim it most loudly discover that they have lost their authority (how odd?) and end up having to go to the secular courts to sue their brothers over property. Here the problem is the disconnected hierarchy of the American Church that refuses to acknowledge any authority greater than itself. Where is no hierarchy there is no dance of life.

Surrender to the reality of hierarchy is surrender to an hierarchical order that is by nature an authority structure. That should be too obvious to bear mention, but it’s not. The only other alternative is chaos. Dare I mention an unpardonable word? Obey! Dare I interject that word into our understanding of the hierarchical order of bishops, priests, deacons and laity? Humility is understanding and accepting your place in God’s created order. The kingdom of God is not a democracy, and where it attempts to be a democracy it fails to be a kingdom. In a kingdom one reverently obeys the King. One also obeys his delegated officers and ministers. In American democratic fantasy people fancy that they decide things by a popular vote. That is idealized in the Town Meeting system that has the unique characteristic of not working very well, which is why we elect temporary rulers to argue and vote among themselves while the rest of us are just expected to obey. Now my remarks about hierarchy may not seem very American or democratic, but that is because my allegiance is to a kingdom with another King.


Not all are comfortable with the idea of kingdom because the notions of hierarchy and obedience cut cross grain across self-centered human nature and leave them feeling that their freedom of choice is impaired, that their rights are being trampled on. St. Paul points out an uncomfortable reality. We are slaves of sin or we are slaves of righteousness. There is no middle ground. We will end up obeying one or the other. The only alternative to God’s hierarchy, its obedience, order and joy; is chaos, desolation and misery. The reason why some will live in misery is that they do not know that the truth will set them free, and that freedom is of necessity freedom from the tyranny of self, and sin, and freedom from isolation from the dance of life.

What Constitutes Renewal?

     

What constitutes spiritual renewal?  Are we not talking about authenticity, about integrity in worship and in life?  I am renewed when I am most genuine before God, when I am laid bare before God and He has poured out His Spirit upon me.   Renewal is ultimately wayless and formless, but that does not mean that in corporate worship traditional forms have to be replaced by contemporary forms that have an illusion of being wayless and formless, if only because they are both poorly conceived and poorly formed.  Does “Worship the Lord in the beauty of holiness” (Psalm 96:9) actually demand that we abandon beauty in favor of T-shirts and jeans?

            While there was some need to revise the BCP, perhaps even some need to enrich its selection of canticles, did wholesale revision of either the BCP, or the Hymnal leave us with something more, or something less?  In using both the new BCP and Hymnal over the past few years, my soul (nephesh ~ my inner man) cries out for the something more because instinctively I recognize that I have ended up with something less.

            The same is true of worship music and hymnody.  How much contextualization is actually constructive?  Why do I spend so much time listening to classical music?  Why do I still prefer, greatly prefer, Handel’s Messiah to the current offerings of contemporary gospel?  Something identifiable, and negative, has happened to Gospel praise music in the last twenty years.  It has moved from praise, ranging from simple to almost, but not quite lofty praise of Maranatha and other groups; to the current stuff with insipid melodies and clanging rhythms often featuring pseudotestimonial songs about me and Jesus, and us and Jesus, and what he done did for ME, all of which is often told in a rambling sentimental personal stories.  Did I say sappy?  I meant to!  You can listen for quite a while on Christian radio and never hear actual praise, and when you do hear it, it seems noisy, cold and incomprehensible.  When did contemporary gospel music move from being group led (Maranatha and many others) to individual praise leaders, and is that necessarily an advantage?  Is it not rather a symptom that contemporary praise music has moved away from congregational singing to professional performance?

 Why should I just pick on contemporary gospel?  The other day someone told me of a “glorious” service at one of our large downtown churches that “wow” even had “paid singers”.  Of course what I want to know is what does that have to do with worship?  That by the way is also reflected in the shift from the 1940 Hymnal to the 1982 Hymnal.  In the former about 50% at most was singable in the average congregation, and in the latter 30% is singable if you are lucky.  It was of course actually put together by professional church musicians from that school that advises that you tighten your buttocks in order to better project your voice.  Woops.  That was uncalled for and perhaps unjust, but it certainly reflects the attitude of one very influential seminary music professor who it turns out actually became the General Editor of the 1982 Hymnal.  Having “sat under” his instruction I can easily see why the 1982 Hymnal is so ineffective for the average congregation.  It was all just too precious to be well balanced!

A Song of the Church

It is fashionable in our age to criticize the Church, but what does the Lord of the Church have to say about his own?

“Who is this who looks down like the dawn, beautiful as the moon, bright as the sun, terrible as an army with banners?”[i]

Who is the Accuser who would say otherwise?

We who are the Church, the Body of Christ, have accepted the Devil’s assessment of the Church and have been led with a ring through our nose into the attack on ourselves.  Immediately comes to mind the accusation that the Church is the only army that shoots its wounded.  Oh, really?

I note that in the usual form of this accusation that the Church is referred to as an ‘army’ that shoots its wounded.  That accidentally acknowledges that the Church is an army on the front line of a battle.  The world does not take that seriously.  It would never do to admit that the Church is involved in the global warfare between good and evil.  That is so much out of favour that in some places those called by the name of Christ won’t even sing Onward Christian Soldiers.

What must be considered is that the world is in the Church and the Church like any human organization has within it people of divided loyalties.  The Accuser holds up the shining mirror of the Church in the radiant glory yet to come and says, “See!  You are hypocrites; you do not live up to your image.”  Of course not!  The image is for the future, it is the wrong image and the Enemy would sell us a subtle deception. 

What is the correct image?  We are not yet the glorified Church, but we are a Church in transition; an imperfect Church made up of imperfect people.  Once we were lost, but now we are found.  We are a communion of sinners in the process of transformation.  We are a blood washed band on a pilgrimage to the Promised Land.  That is what so enrages the Devil.

Are people wounded by the Church?  Yes, insofar as the world is in the Church, and the Church is in the world.  There are tremendous flaws within the Church because of the humanity of the Church.

One of the reasons the world hates the Church is because in the Church the world sees its own mirror image, and more than that it sees its mirror image in the process of redemption.  The world is threatened by the demonstration in the Church that change is possible, that salvation and transformation can be seen in the ongoing salvation history of the Church and its individual people.

It is the image of a glorious Church in transformation from the kingdom of darkness to the kingdom of Light, and in fury the Enemy cries out, “How dare you say that salvation and change is possible?”  From his perspective that wrecks all!  The Church in this world, already beginning to reflect the glory of God, is a serious affront to the world, the flesh, and the Devil; because is true that even as the Church beholds the Light it is in the process of being transformed into Light.

The vision is for the future, but it is already in process now.  Therefore the Devil cannot stand it.

And I saw the holy city, New Jerusalem, coming down out of heaven from God, prepared as a bride adorned for her husband.  And I heard a loud voice from the throne saying, "Behold, the dwelling place of God is with man. He will dwell with them, and they will be his people, and God himself will be with them as their God.  He will wipe away every tear from their eyes, and death shall be no more, neither shall there be mourning nor crying nor pain anymore, for the former things have passed away."[ii]

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[i] Song of Songs, 6:10;

[ii] Revelation 21:2-4   

Katherine Jefferts Schori: The Heartbeat of God

A Brief Review[i]

There is a principle that theology should not be based on experience, but rather that experience should be evaluated on the basis of theology.  What is Schori’s theological method and what exactly is the basis on which her theology is formulated?

Schori’s theological method is: If I’ve experienced it and it agrees with my presuppositions it must be true.   Right at the outset she tells us, “We are all running down the same road, and our task is to break through the obstacles and make the road smoother for one another.  If you read the Hebrew Scriptures closely, you discover that God’s promise of full larders and planted fields and repopulated cities is followed by metanoia—a new mind and a new heart.”

She presents us with a naïve secular utopianism disguised in religious language.  It is naïve because it is based on an inadequate theological understanding of human nature.  Our job, the mission of the Church, is to usher in the Kingdom of God on earth.  What makes it difficult to comment on is that she is in part correct, but partial truth is a dangerous thing.  One wants to ask, “Are we indeed running down the same road?  And, if so, are we all running in the same direction?” [ii]

She clearly does not think that some are running down the same road.  She says, “Given the stories I’ve heard in the Dioceses of San Jaoquin and Fort Worth, leadership looked a lot like control and fear-mongering, and intimidation was used to keep people in line.  Bishops and clergy insisted that they had the fullness of God’s truth, and if anybody disagreed, well, then, they must be godless heretics.”[iii]  She makes a practice of vilifying those who do not agree with her, and at the least show herself no better than those she critiques, that is providing her assertion is correct. 

Please note that she bases this on stories that she has heard.  I know personally some of those she critiques so savagely, and while I do not agree with their separation, I would not call into question their orthodoxy, their morality, and is some outstanding people among them their love and charity.

She has in her opening introduction a misunderstanding, whether wilful or not.  She says that God’s promises of blessing are followed by metanioa—a new mind and a new heart.”  She is wrong.  Metanoia, is repentance, and as such precedes necessarily the gift of a new mind and a new heart, not the other way around.

Consistently through her book she evokes the questions preceding the baptismal covenant.  What she consistently ignores is the three renunciations of evil and the three baptismal questions that each adult candidate must answer for himself or herself, and each baptized child must eventually affirm at Confirmation.

What are those questions?  They are the expression of the very faith that she has condemned in a General Convention address as a Western Heresy, “Do you turn to Jesus Christ and accept him as your Savior?  Do you put your whole trust in his grace and love?  Do you promise to follow and obey him as your Lord?”

She is a secular utopian humanist with a predilection for the radical methodology of Saul Alinsky who felt that the greatest crimes in history have been perpetrated by religious, political and racial fanatics; and she is glad to identify her opponents as those very fanatics.

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[i] I actually read the book.  I bought it on Amazon for $4.95

[ii] Katherine Jefferts Schori: The Heartbeat of God, (Woodstock, Vermont:  Skylight Paths, 2011), p. xxxiv

[iii] Ibid, p. 163

The Call for Integrity

The Obedience of Faith Reflection 4

The first chapter addresses the morality and excesses of the Gentile world.  Now Paul turns his attention to the Jews who are standing in judgment on the Gentiles.  Understanding the relationship Jew to Gentile in the Early Church, one has to remember what Paul said in Ephesians, “Therefore remember that at one time you Gentiles in the flesh, called "the uncircumcision" by what is called the circumcision, which is made in the flesh by hands - remember that you were at that time separated from Christ, alienated from the commonwealth of Israel and strangers to the covenants of promise, having no hope and without God in the world.  But now in Christ Jesus you who once were far off have been brought near by the blood of Christ.”[i]  Paul’s audience in Rome is a mixed congregation of Diaspora Jews and Gentiles who have come to faith in Christ Jesus.  Remember that Aquila and Priscilla who shared the ministry with Paul in Corinth were Jews from Rome. 

We have a similar alienation within the Church today between the Sadducean Revisionists and the Pharisaic Schismatic.  Not all that are within The Episcopal Church are Sadducees and not all who are within the schismatic “Anglican” groups are Pharisees.  In terms of alignment with one party or the other there is no middle ground; although I find it difficult to think that Jesus himself would have looked at the impure state of Judaism and have become a schismatic.  Rather than that, through the Holy Spirit, he let the Gentiles in.  That is quite another matter. 

Leaving because you think the grass is greener on the other side of the Gospel fence is not the same thing as being forced out of the structure because you are transforming it from within.  St. Athanasius and St. Cyril of Jerusalem provide a model for today’s struggle within the Church.  Both would rather fight than switch, both were deposed, and both eventually returned to their Episcopates.  Neither one left to start a new church.

Paul leaves no quarter for those Jews who were judging the Gentile world.

Romans 2:1 Therefore you have no excuse, O man, every one of you who judges. For in passing judgment on another you condemn yourself, because you, the judge, practice the very same things.  ² We know that the judgment of God rightly falls on those who do such things.  ³ Do you suppose, O man - you who judge those who do such things and yet do them yourself - that you will escape the judgment of God?  ⁴ Or do you presume on the riches of his kindness and forbearance and patience, not knowing that God's kindness is meant to lead you to repentance? 

The underlying issue is the lack of integrity.  The Psalmist affirms, “I will live with integrity,”[ii] but that integrity has been lost.  There is an affirmation here in the midst of judgment; God’s kindness is meant to lead us to repentance.  To continue to ignore that kindness stores up wrath for us on the day of judgment.

⁵ But because of your hard and impenitent heart you are storing up wrath for yourself on the day of wrath when God's righteous judgment will be revealed.  ⁶ He will render to each one according to his works:  ⁷ to those who by patience in well-doing seek for glory and honor and immortality, he will give eternal life; 8 but for those who are self-seeking¹ and do not obey the truth, but obey unrighteousness, there will be wrath and fury. 

A truly biblical theology will not use this as a proof text for salvation by works.  Bear in mind that faith issues in good works, and where there are no good works, there is no effective faith.  We are saved by grace through faith, and faith without works is dead.

⁹ There will be tribulation and distress for every human being who does evil, the Jew first and also the Greek, 10 but glory and honor and peace for everyone who does good, the Jew first and also the Greek.  ¹¹ For God shows no partiality.”

That last statement was no doubt a surprise to both Jew and Gentile.  We should remember that in this age of disparate denominationalism.  Be careful with the tar brush when you try to paint others black; the Lord will use that same tar brush on you.

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[i] Ephesians 2:11-13 

[ii] Psalm 26:11 BCP