Habemus Altare

"Moreover, [Martin] Bucer was a nuanced and subtle thinker whose theology is not made easier to..."

Tue, 18 Jun 2013 14:20:00 -0500

“Moreover, [Martin] Bucer was a nuanced and subtle thinker whose theology is not made easier to understand by his inability to say anything concisely. Martin Luther (who was irritated by his independence of mind) unkindly but accurately called him a Klappermaul - chatterbox - and a modern historian has also acidly remarked of his writings that “his fairy godmother…withheld from him a pleasant and acceptable style.” Nevertheless, even Bucer’s enemies recognized his importance: Like Bullinger he devoted himself to Christian unity… He also cast his net wider, even toward papal loyalists. For that reason European rulers repeatedly brought Bucer into a variety of situations to act as a go-between or a facilitator for advancing particular reformations.”

- Diarmaid MacCulloch, The Reformation pg. 175

The more I read about Martin Bucer the more I identify with him.

A Time for Treason?

Tue, 18 Jun 2013 12:37:41 -0500

A Time for Treason?:

[L]iturgical formation of the laity is actually quite strong in American Christianity, it’s just liturgical formation in the rites of American exceptionalism and American Providence, not liturgical formation in the rites of Christianity. So as a Christian and a theologian, I approach secular holidays with a fair amount of dread. How much will this sucker hijack the church’s liturgy?

"Grace resides in the repetition. Liturgical worship assumes the weakness and frailty of Christian..."

Sat, 15 Jun 2013 21:02:04 -0500

“Grace resides in the repetition. Liturgical worship assumes the weakness and frailty of Christian believers. It takes for granted that the Christian will ever mumble and stumble on the path to God; that she will never be instantly and permanently converted; that he will fall away; that Christians must ask for forgiveness again and again. Repetition there must be. This repetition is blessed by God. It is grounded in the promise that Christ will not give up on us; he will carry us through the valley of the shadow of death and protect us from all enemies.”

- Walter Sundberg (via frauluther)

The First Myth Christians Have about World Religions

Sat, 15 Jun 2013 20:22:44 -0500

The First Myth Christians Have about World Religions:

The myth goes something like this: Christianity is the only religion with a Savior. I consistently hear Christians say that Christianity is the only faith where God comes to humankind in contrast to every other religion of the world where humans are trying to go to God. Yet the truth is that many world religions, including religions that were dominant when Christianity emerged as well as contemporary religions such as Shia Islam, assume a Savior figure.

"Learning how to read Scripture well implies, of course, some sort of corresponding instruction. A..."

Fri, 14 Jun 2013 05:16:00 -0500

“

Learning how to read Scripture well implies, of course, some sort of corresponding instruction. A remarkable passage from the Acts of the Apostles illustrates the need for guidance in the way of reading. In Acts 8, the deacon/evangelist Philip is traveling along a road that ran west from Jerusalem over to Gaza when he overhears an Ethiopian eunuch (a court official of the Queen of Ethiopia) reading aloud from the book of Isaiah: “Like a sheep he was led to the slaughter, and like a lamb silent before its shearer, so he does not open his mouth. In his humiliation justice was denied him. Who can describe his generation? For his life is taken away from the earth” (Acts 8:32–33, citing Isaiah 53:7–8). Prompted by the Holy Spirit, Philip runs to join the chariot and asks the eunuch, “Do you understand what you are reading?” The eunuch’s surprising reply goes to the heart of scriptural interpretation: “How can I, unless someone guides me?” He then invites Philip into the chariot with him and asks, “About whom … does the prophet [Isaiah] say this, about himself or about someone else?” Philip of course is eager to teach. “Then,” Acts continues, “Philip began to speak, and starting with this scripture, he proclaimed to [the eunuch] the good news about Jesus” (8:26–40). Philip the evangelist becomes Philip the exegete.

In its immediate literary context, the emphasis of the passage is largely on the necessary conditions for understanding Jesus of Nazareth as the one of whom the Old Testament speaks (as well as the result of such understanding—baptism and the welcome into Christian fellowship). The eunuch, that is, does not know about Jesus and must be shown by Philip how Isaiah speaks of him. Two millennia after the Christian interpretation of Isaiah, the fact that the figure spoken of in Isaiah 53 can be read as a prefiguration of Jesus’ suffering and death is unsurprising. But in the first century, no such interpretation was available. Isaiah 53 spoke of one who was to suffer, to be sure, but that this one was Jesus of Nazareth was entirely unknown until the Christians developed their exegesis of the passage. That Isaiah spoke of Jesus in particular, in other words, was something that needed to be discovered and learned.

The larger interpretive point of the scene with the eunuch and Philip in Acts cannot be missed: we can read all day long—even the right passages—and, without instruction in how to understand what we’re reading, miss what we most need to see. Or, to put it more positively, training in how to read Scripture well is a sine qua non of good reading itself.

”

- C. Kavin Rowe

Photo

Thu, 13 Jun 2013 16:40:58 -0500

"But Jesus laid down His life for others. And by your Baptism and His body and blood, He lives in you..."

Thu, 13 Jun 2013 13:43:25 -0500

“But Jesus laid down His life for others. And by your Baptism and His body and blood, He lives in you and He will teach you to lay down your life for others as well. That means loving and forgiving them even when they hate you and want you dead. And that’s not something we want to do or even can do. It’s something Christ does in us.”

- Higher Things Reflection for Thursday of the Second Week of Trinity: http://dtbl.org/5519 (via higherthings)

"One reason why Augustine’s influence has varied so much in the history of western Christianity..."

Tue, 11 Jun 2013 16:30:00 -0500

“One reason why Augustine’s influence has varied so much in the history of western Christianity is that there is much more to Augustine than his soteriology: He is at the heart of western thinking about the nature of the Church and its sacraments, and in some eras it was this aspect of his thought that mattered more than what he said about salvation. When Martin Luther and other theologians in his generation recalled the Church to Augustine’s soteriology, western Christians would have to decide for themselves which aspect of his thought mattered more - his emphasis on obedience to the Catholic Church or his discussion of salvation. Ina well-known summary, Princestion historian of theologian B.B. Warfield states, “The Reformation, inwardly considered, was just the ultimate triumph of Augustine’s doctrine of grace over Augustine’s doctrine of the Church.” So from one perspective, a century or more of turmoil in the western Church from 1517 was a debate in the mind of long-dead Augustine.”

- Diarmaid MacCulloch, The Reformation p. 107-8

"The word of God is a tree of life that offers us blessed fruit from each of its branches. It is like..."

Tue, 11 Jun 2013 12:29:28 -0500

“The word of God is a tree of life that offers us blessed fruit from each of its branches. It is like that rock which was struck open in the wilderness, from which all were offered spiritual drink. Be glad then that you are overwhelmed, and do not be saddened because he has overcome you. A thirsty person is happy when drinking, and not depressed, because the spring is inexhaustible. You can satisfy your thirst without exhausting the spring; then when you thirst again, you can drink from it once more”

- Fourth century poet Ephrem the Syrian (via scottxstephens)

"“Get rid of that flute at church. Trash that trumpet, too. What do you think we are,..."

Tue, 11 Jun 2013 11:58:00 -0500

“

“Get rid of that flute at church. Trash that trumpet, too. What do you think we are, pagans?”
200s: Instrumental music was almost universally shunned because of its association with debauchery and immorality. Lyre playing, for example, was associated with prostitution.

“Hymns to God with rhythm and marching? How worldly can we get?”
300s: Ambrose of Milan (339-397), an influential bishop often called the father of hymnody in the Western church, was the first to introduce community hymn-singing in the church. These hymns were composed in metrical stanzas, quite unlike biblical poetry. They did not rhyme but they were sometimes sung while marching. Many of these hymns took songs written by heretics, using the same meter but rewriting the words.

“The congregation sings too much. Soon the cantor will be out of a job!”
500s: Congregations often sang psalms in a way that “everyone responds.” This probably involved the traditional Jewish practice of cantor and congregation singing alternate verses.

“Musical solos by ordinary people? I come to worship God, not man!”
600s: The monasteries, referencing “Seven times a day I praise you” (Ps. 119:164), developed a seven-times-daily order of prayer. The services varied in content, but included a certain amount of singing, mainly by a solo singer, with the congregation repeating a refrain at intervals. The services were linked together by their common basis in the biblical psalms in such a way that the whole cycle of 150 psalms was sung every week.

”

- Ed Stetzer, “Church Music Conflicts: Have We Really Always Done It “That Way”?”

Nonjurors and Tories: the significance of 18th century Anglican political theology

Mon, 10 Jun 2013 12:27:16 -0500

Nonjurors and Tories: the significance of 18th century Anglican political theology:

But what are contemporary Anglicans - citizens in secular, democratic polities - to make of this ‘Church and King’ political theology? Is embarrassment - or downright rejection - the only appropriate response? Can the ‘Church and King’ critique of 1688 and 1776 have any meaning for contemporary Anglicans?

"My desire is to live more to God today than yesterday, and to be more holy this day than the last."

Sun, 09 Jun 2013 22:00:11 -0500

“My desire is to live more to God today than yesterday, and to be more holy this day than the last.”

- Bishop Francis Asbury (via momentsifeelfaint)

anglo-catholic: perfectthewayyouarerightnow: Triumphal...

Sun, 09 Jun 2013 10:06:29 -0500

anglo-catholic:

perfectthewayyouarerightnow:

Triumphal Crucifix of Oja Church,
Gotland, Sweden

That is a most beautiful rood

philipchircop: MADE THE SERVANTS OF ALLTwo young jesuits are...

Sun, 09 Jun 2013 09:59:19 -0500

philipchircop:

MADE THE SERVANTS OF ALL

Two young jesuits are being ordained priests today at Our Lady of Lourdes Church in downtown Toronto. A third will be ordained deacon. With this ordination in mind, here are a few wise words by Barbara Brown Taylor for your prayerful reflection:

“Ordination, like baptism, is the celebration of a demotion. Unlike sorority initiations or Eagle Scout ceremonies, it is a rite in which we step down, not up. It is a ritual in which we are made the servants of all, and it seems… that there is a rich irony in our lining up to do this kind of work. Would any of us answer a classified ad that said, ‘Menial labor, long hours, high expectations, low pay?’ And yet, here we are…”

Lutheran Divine Service in Brandenburg, 1539

Sat, 08 Jun 2013 15:09:18 -0500

Lutheran Divine Service in Brandenburg, 1539

Mass in the Church of the Savior, Toledo, Spain on Pentecost...

Sat, 08 Jun 2013 13:04:02 -0500

Mass in the Church of the Savior, Toledo, Spain on Pentecost Sunday 2013. Brothers of the Fraternity of Christ the Priest and Queen Mary.

"But the difference between the self-aware believer, the self-aware sinner and the conscious and..."

Fri, 07 Jun 2013 17:25:58 -0500

“But the difference between the self-aware believer, the self-aware sinner and the conscious and deliberate atheist is not a disagreement over whether or not to add one item to the sum total of really existing things. It is a conflict about policies and possibilities for a human life: between someone who accepts the dependence of everything on divine gratuity and attempts to respond with some image of that gratuity, someone who accepts this dependence but fails to act appropriately in response, and someone who denies the dependence and is consequently faced with the unanswerable question of why any one policy for living is preferable to any other.”

- Rowan Williams, Dostoevsky: Language, Faith and Fiction. (via furnaceofdoubt)

Die Lutherin: affcath: “The debate about marriage equality often centers, however...

Fri, 07 Jun 2013 12:30:22 -0500

Die Lutherin: affcath: “The debate about marriage equality often centers, however...:

affcath:

“The debate about marriage equality often centers, however discretely, on an appeal to the Bible. Unfortunately, such appeals often reflect a lack of biblical literacy on the part of those who use that complex collection of texts as an authority to enact modern social policy. As…

Fair enough. That was pretty much the only correction I thought needed to be made and I figured it would wind up being reblogged a bunch thoughtlessly so I fixed it. There’s a political moment for them making the statement and Avalos is an outspoken atheist- but I don’t think they said anything particularly controversial except maybe the conclusion bit about slavery.

Right, U.S. race relations are nothing like the Israelites’ relationship to their neighbors. But at that point in history Israelite identity was ethnic - shared descent and tribal god - and not “religious”. You could live in the midst of the Israelites as a “resident stranger” but you were still a Hittite or Moabite or Perrizite or whatever (and you probably still worshiped your tribe’s gods). The wives that Ezra and the elders expelled did not have the option of proto-conversion, they were not of the Israelite “holy seed” so they had to go.

"The debate about marriage equality often centers, however discretely, on an appeal to the Bible...."

Thu, 06 Jun 2013 10:29:42 -0500

“

The debate about marriage equality often centers, however discretely, on an appeal to the Bible. Unfortunately, such appeals often reflect a lack of biblical literacy on the part of those who use that complex collection of texts as an authority to enact modern social policy.

As academic biblical scholars, we wish to clarify that the biblical texts do not support the frequent claim that marriage between one man and one woman is the only type of marriage deemed acceptable by the Bible’s authors.

The fact that marriage is not defined as only that between one man and one woman is reflected in the entry on “marriage” in the authoritative Eerdmans Dictionary of the Bible (2000): “Marriage is one expression of kinship family patterns in which typically a man and at least one woman cohabitate publicly and permanently as a basic social unit” (p. 861).

The phrase “at least one woman” recognizes that polygamy was not only allowed, but some polygamous biblical figures (e.g., Abraham, Jacob) were highly blessed. In 2 Samuel 12:8, the author says that it was God who gave David multiple wives: “I gave you your master’s house, and your master’s wives into your bosom. … And if all this had been too little, I would have given you even more” (Revised Standard Version).

In fact, there were a variety of unions and family configurations that were permissible in the cultures that produced the Bible, and these ranged from monogamy (Titus 1:6) to those where rape victims were forced to marry their rapist (Deuteronomy 22:28-29) and to those Levirate marriage commands obligating a man to marry his brother’s widow regardless of the living brother’s marital status (Deuteronomy 25:5-10; Genesis 38; Ruth 2-4). Others insisted that celibacy was the preferred option (1 Corinthians 7:8; 28).

Although some may view Jesus’ interpretation of Genesis 2:24 in Matthew 19:3-10 as an endorsement of monogamy, Jesus and other Jewish interpreters conceded that there were also non-monogamous understandings of this passage in ancient Judaism, including those allowing divorce and remarriage.

In fact, during a discussion of marriage in Matthew 19:12, Jesus even encourages those who can to castrate themselves “for the kingdom” and live a life of celibacy.

Ezra 10:2-11 forbids [marriage between Jewish men and non-Jewish women] and orders those people of God who already had foreign wives to divorce them immediately.

So, while it is not accurate to state that biblical texts would allow marriages between people of the same sex, it is equally incorrect to declare that a “one-man-and-one-woman” marriage is the only allowable type of marriage deemed legitimate in biblical texts.

This is not only our modern, academic opinion. This view of the multiple definitions of “biblical” marriage has been acknowledged by some of the most prominent names in Christianity. For example, the famed [Reformer] Martin Luther wrote a letter in 1524 in which he commented on polygamy as follows: “I confess that I cannot forbid a person to marry several wives, for it does not oppose the Holy Scriptures.”

Accordingly, we must guard against attempting to use ancient texts to regulate modern ethics and morals, especially those ancient texts whose endorsements of other social institutions, such as slavery, would be universally condemned today, even by the most adherent of Christians.

”

- Robert R. Cargill, assistant professor of religious studies at the University of Iowa; Kenneth Atkinson, associate professor of history at the University of Northern Iowa; and Hector Avalos, professor of religious studies at Iowa State University

I think they touch on something which is really important in the discussion of Matthew 19: Jesus cites Genesis 2 to show that marriage is indissoluble, not to show that it’s good. When the disciples draw the conclusion from this that “If such is the case of a man with his wife, it is better not to marry”, Jesus does not rebuke them, but tells them that anyone who can should accept this teaching should.

(via affcath)

The Martin Luther quote is interesting.

(via myadventuresinoddity)

Yeah that bit is a favorite of: angry trad Catholics who act like Worms was yesterday; angry fundamentalists who think Lutherans are too popish; moral relativists who think it provides a logical “in” for whatever they want to put into Christian theology at the moment.

The context is twofold. One, Luther was on untested ground as he established the new church and all kinds of crazy questions came up. He screwed up big time on a few issues, the most horrifying being his shift in attitude towards the Jews—he started out very philo-Judaic but ended up a raving antisemite, and historians still aren’t entirely sure why. Luther was human, we don’t even call him “Saint Martin,” he is to be regarded as a theologian and like any theologian he was sometimes in error.

Two, there was the political situation of the Reformation which lead to this kind of thing.

Also please note that Ezra does not forbid “interracial marriage” as the original, unredacted article claims, but marriage of Jews to non-Jews, which is commonplace throughout the majority of Jewish history and is not based on race as Americans understand it, but religion. One can, after all, convert to Judaism.
(via frauluther)
I redacted the article because I thought that bit was excessively inflammatory but it’s anachronistic to talk about “conversion to Judaism” in Ezra’s day. The Book of Ruth came out of the post-Exilic debate over mixed marriages and even in that pro-intermarriage story, Ruth is still “Ruth the Moabitess” after committing herself to Naomi and marrying Boaz.

"The debate about marriage equality often centers, however discretely, on an appeal to the Bible...."

Wed, 05 Jun 2013 10:00:00 -0500

“

In fact, during a discussion of marriage in Matthew 19:12, Jesus even encourages those who can to castrate themselves “for the kingdom” and live a life of celibacy.

Ezra 10:2-11 forbids [marriage between Jewish men and non-Jewish women] and orders those people of God who already had foreign wives to divorce them immediately.