10 March 2008
Old Lutheran Quote of the Day
When error is admitted into the Church, it will be found that the stages of its progress are always three. It begins by asking for toleration. Its friends say to the majority: You do not need to be afraid of us; we are few, and weak; only let us alone; do not disturb the faith of others. The Church has her standards of doctrine; of course we shall never interfere with them; we only ask for ourselves to be spared interference with our private opinions. Indulged in for a time, error goes on to assert equal rights. Truth and error are two balancing forces. The Church shall do nothing which looks like deciding between them; that would be partiality. It is bigotry to assert any superior right for truth. We are to agree to differ, and any favoring of the truth, because it is truth, is partisanship. What the friends of truth and error hold in common is fundamental. Anything on which they differ, is ipso facto non-essential. Anybody who makes account of such a thing is a disturber of the peace of the church. Truth and error are two coordinate powers, and the great secret of church statesmanship is to preserve the balance between them. From this point error soon goes on to its natural end, which is asserting supremacy. Truth started with tolerating; it comes to be merely tolerated, and that only for a time. Error claims a preference for its judgments on all disputed points. It puts men into positions, not at first in spite of their departure from the Church's faith, but in consequence of it. Their recommendation is that they repudiate that faith, and position is given them to teach others to repudiate it, and to make them skilful in combating it. C. P. Krauth, (The Conservative Reformation, pp. 195, 196)
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8 comments:
An all-too-familiar pattern.
...and a good way to recognize when and whether the house is on fire or the ship is sinking.
Yes, Krauth nailed it. But remember that Lutherans don't think of our Synods the way that Orthodox think of the Church. Synods come and go and have across the years - they are man made structures, formed by the Lutheran parishes, not vice-versa - to assist the parishes in doing stuff together that they would have trouble doing on their own. So for us the congregation is where the Church concretely lives her life out. A Synod "ablaze" (no joke - that's the word for the latest push towards church growthery) is no cause for panic in the Lutheran parishes, for the Synod stands over against them in advisory capacity. It's just so different from the way that the Episcopalians or Orthodox are structured that it's about impossible to make linear comparisons of one to the other. The best way I can express it is that Reginald Fuller was right when he told Lutherans that our problem is not that we don't have any bishops, it is that we have too many. The Lutheran parish honestly corresponds more to a bishop's diocese than to a parish in the Orthodox setting. Which is weird to you, I know, but part of our wild and wooly heritage.
Once down in NOLA a friend of mine, a pastor, went to a meeting at Tulane that was interdenominational. The Roman priest frowned at him when he walked in, noting his pectoral cross: "In my tradition," the priest said, "only bishops may wear those." My friend smiled a big smile and replied: "In my tradition, I AM a bishop."
So if, hypothetically speaking, the Missouri Synod would "sink" or "burn down", the various congregations would be just fine?
Parishes would then likely reorganize and form another Synod of some sort.
What about the parishes? Are they also considered man-made?
Parishes are recognized as not "man made" just as the Office of the ministry is not of man, but instituted and established by Christ. The parishes establish fellowship with a Synod based upon doctrinal agreement; they break fellowship if a Synod proves over time that it has forsaken the doctrine to which the congregation is pledged. But there is always time allowed for correction and much prayer raised before this happens. Still, some parishes have already felt that the situation in Missouri (which is oddly more preaching/liturgical crisis than strictly a doctrinal one - though they are related inevitably, of course) has reached that point. If you are interested, you can check out what a group of them has done:
http://web.mac.com/hunnius/ELDoNA/Welcome.html
Other parishes are in a "wait and see" mode, encouraged by a number of positive signs and dismayed at a number of discouraging ones. In Missouri it is, to swipe a phrase, "the best of times and the worst of times."
For which I covet your prayers - for me, my parish, and the fellowship of which we are a part.
This quote fits many organizations and political parties.
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